This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.
Just wanted to let you I is that I reverted your large edit to the above named list. This is for three reasons. Firstly, there's nothing inherently wrong with a redlink on a list article, per WP:REDLINK, and removing a brand just because it doesn't have an independent article, nor has it been pointed as a redirect to an appropriate parent article, such as the main article on the company that makes it, is a poor choice of action. It's a list article, not a navbox or category. Everything on does not have to be an existing, independent Wikipedia article.
Secondly, because I don't think you checked thoroughly enough for notability. You outright removed Town Branch Bourbon, and the link to the company, as non-notable, despite the distillery being part of the Kentucky Bourbon Trail, a major industry program. The distillery's joining of the Trail received significant press coverage last year. Just because someone hasn't gotten around to writing an article on it yet doesn't mean it's not notable; even after a these years Wikipedia sti is missing many articles on notable subjects. That's why WP:REDLINK exists, to remind people that there's noting wrong with them.
Finally, the other reason is that, following some collaboration on the list talk page, an effort is underway to completely redo the entire article. Your input would be most welcome, but a major removal of the list contents would be ill-advised at the time, as it would remove information needed to make the new-format article complete. oknazevad (talk) 03:33, 22 October 2012 (UTC)
I agree with a good deal of what you say, and after I made the edit you refer to I did think again, and wonder whether it would have been better to have left it. However, I removed the content not just because it was redlinked, but because it was also unsourced, as you will see if you read my edit summary. The trouble with unsourced content is that it is unverifiable, and it is an unfortunate fact that a hell of a lot of mistaken content or even downright lies does get posted in Wikipedia articles. Checking for notability before removing? In an ideal world yes, but in a case where there are hundreds of unsourced entries checking every one of them is not realistic. Wikipedia policy is that The burden of evidence lies with the editor who adds or restores material, and is satisfied by providing reliable sources that directly support the material, and that any material challenged or likely to be challenged must be attributed to a reliable, published source. Having said that, I have no intention of edit-warring or quarrelling about this, and I will leave it to you and the others who are involved in the effort to "completely redo the entire article". I wish you well with the job. JamesBWatson (talk) 09:26, 22 October 2012 (UTC)
Thanks for the good wishes. It was actually a point of discussion about verifiability for these brands. The hard part is that there's no requirement for sourcing to be online, and the existence of a brand can often be verified simply by seeing it on a store shelf. Indeed, I know I added a couple of items while I was actually holding the bottles in my hand. But that doesn't necessarily help with notability. Notability, however, is about the existence of a separate article, not necessarily the presence of a brand on a list article, or a mention at its producer company. So you see why this is a difficult proposition. Thanks for the consideration of the issues. oknazevad (talk) 12:27, 22 October 2012 (UTC)
Above and beyond
You deserve congratulations for your recent efforts to rehabilitate that editor. I'm pretty sure you don't know me, but I dealt with him a few times a while back and found his narcissism and obduracy to be frustrating. You have more patience than I, and deserve congratulations for trying to make the best out of a bad situation—you really did go "above and beyond". Thanks for trying. — UncleBubba( T@C ) 22:41, 21 October 2012 (UTC)
Thanks. It's nice to know someone appreciates my efforts. I do try to allow people another chance in cases like this, even when I am doubtful whether it will work. As for being pretty sure I don't know you, your user name does seem distinctly familiar, so I think I may well have come across you some time. Or maybe I'm just confusing you with some other Uncle. JamesBWatson (talk) 07:48, 22 October 2012 (UTC)
I'm not sure, either. I spend a fair amount of time (I wish I had more to spare) patrolling recent changes and have to ask for admin-type help from time to time on various noticeboards. That may be it. Regardless, thanks again for your work—and patience. — UncleBubba( T@C ) 02:11, 23 October 2012 (UTC)
Hi James. I don't think the revision you reverted to today was clean (ditto the reversions of 27 September). See my comments here. Best, Voceditenore (talk) 09:09, 24 October 2012 (UTC)
You are 100% right. I have spent an huge amount of time on this, and still haven't fully sorted it out. If you can point to a version which really is copyright-infringement free it will be very helpful. It may be necessary to revert back a very long way, losing a large number of edits by numerous editors. The trouble that has been created by one persistent sockpuppeting editor is enormous. JamesBWatson (talk) 09:22, 24 October 2012 (UTC)
I had drafted a message at Wikipedia:Copyright problems, but, before clicking "Save page", I did some more checking to make sure that what I wrote was exactly right. While I was doing so, I had computer problems which prevented me from continuing. By the time I got it all sorted out you had edit-conflicted me. One way and another, the amount of trouble I have been caused by this one disruptive editor is ridiculous. JamesBWatson (talk) 09:26, 24 October 2012 (UTC)
I just checked your latest version and spot checks of various phrases indicate that this one is OK. Good job! What a massive pain editors like this are. :/ Best, Voceditenore (talk) 10:49, 24 October 2012 (UTC)
unrequired edits
you seem to be upset over something i said to someone else. what i say to someone else is none of your business. i have not asked for not do i need 3rd party intervention. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Superfast1111 (talk • contribs) 10:46, 24 October 2012 (UTC)
No, I am not upset. I am, however, concerned about your incivility. What you say to someone else certainly is my business, if you are uncivil, and especially if you verge on personal attacks. Wikipedia is a collaborative project, and we need to cooperate. Editors who don't do so may be blocked from editing, if attempts to communicate to them what the problems are turn out to be ineffective. In the message I posted to you I assumed that you had edited in good faith, and that your unfortunate choice of wording was a mistake. However, I the light of the above message to me, it looks as though that may not, in fact, be the case. JamesBWatson (talk) 10:54, 24 October 2012 (UTC)
After 15 months I'm afraid don't remember. However, looking at editing histories, including some edits that have been revision-deleted so that they can be seen only by administrators, it looks as though the following were involved:94.116.41.168, 212.183.140.7, 212.183.140.12, 212.183.140.50, 212.183.140.61. The editor seemed to be a sockpuppet of [User:Mikemikev|Mikemikev] (also known by over 50 other names). I think I restricted myself to "you are the same person who has been posting disruptively from several IPs", and not mentioning any accounts, for the following reason. The editor said "I am not a blocked user". It was perfectly clear that the person was a user who had been blocked via IP addresses, referring to that made it an open and shut case, and there was no need to argue over whether the user was or was not Mikemikev. JamesBWatson (talk) 08:49, 22 October 2012 (UTC)
Thanks for the info. It was actually useful. Tijfo098 (talk) 16:04, 24 October 2012 (UTC)
Hi, Please have a look at Comparison of network monitoring systems. There are lots of commercial products there and someone there deletes all new entries unless they have a wikipedia entry. That's the reason I created the page Nagwin. I've written this argument on delete notice's page just to see it is completely ignored.
On what SPECIFIC reason have you removed Nagwin ? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Tevkar (talk • contribs) 20:52, 24 October 2012 (UTC)
You mention notability !?! Can you prove somehow if some systems in the same list have better notability than Nagwin ? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Tevkar (talk • contribs) 20:59, 24 October 2012 (UTC)
First of all, I fully sympathise with you, and other people in the same situation. I too was once a newcomer to Wikipedia, and was frustrated by people undoing my work, giving reasons that seemed to make no sense. However, as I became more used to Wikipedia's ways, I gradually came to realise that the policies and guidelines were not so arbitrary, and there are logical reasons behind them. (That does not, of course, mean that I personally agree with every detail of them, but on the whole they are there for good reasons.) I will try to clarify some of the points which are relevant in this case. I hope my efforts will be helpful to you.
Wikipedia's manual of style page on lists says "Lists contain internally linked terms (i.e., wikilinks) and thus in aggregate serve as natural tables of contents and indexes of Wikipedia." It does also say various other things, but that is the principal purpose of list articles. A list article does not exist so that someone with an interest in a particular topic can use Wikipedia to call attention to the topic's existence to a wider public. If the main purpose of a list is to serve as an index to Wikipedia articles, then clearly there is no point in including a topic which has no article. Now, the experience you have had is, unfortunately, quite common. Someone new to editing Wikipedia has some topic on which they wish to provide information to the public, so they add it to a list. The list item is removed, with the lack of an article given as the reason, so the person writes an article about it, thinking this will mean they can then add it to the list. The article is, for one reason or another, deleted. Its author then protests "but I wrote the article because I was told there had to be an article so it could go in the list". As I said above, I fully sympathise with the sense of frustration this engenders, and I can see how, out of context, this will seem arbitrary. However, the point is that the articles are the essential substance of Wikipedia, and lists are an adjunct, to serve to support use of the articles. The desire to have a subject included in a list does not justify the existence of an article: the article must be justified in its own right, and if it is justified then it is reasonable to link to it from a list. Therefore, the first step should be to consider the question "Does this subject satisfy Wikipedia's criteria for inclusion as an article?" If the answer is "yes", and only if it is, then the next step is to write a suitable article.
The essential question is whether the topic satisfies Wikipedia's notability guidelines. In my opinion, there are far too many of these guidelines, and they are far too long and complex, making them highly confusing to newcomers. However, the basic principal is that an article is acceptable only if its topic can be shown to have substantial coverage in multiple independent reliable sources. ("Independent" means that information published by anyone creating or distributing the software, or in any other way having a direct connection to it, is not acceptable as evidence of notability.) You may look at the guidelines on notability and reliable sources and judge for yourself whether Nagwin qualifies, but for what it's worth, I tried some brief internet searches, and it looks to me as though it doesn't. What I found was coverage on www.itefix.no (the web site of the organisation responsible for Nagwin), an essentially content-free page at nagwin.com, and various other sites such as FaceBook, Twitter, SourceForge, forums, wikis, etc etc, few if any of which could be regarded as independent reliable sources.
If, having looked at the relevant guidelines, you do decide that, contrary to my impression, the subject satisfies Wikipedia's notability standards, then those guidelines will help you to see what is required. However, note that the article was deleted not because of lack of notability, but because it was substantially promotional in character and because it appeared to infringe copyright. Content copied from the web site of the subject you are writing about is almost never suitable for inclusion in a Wikipedia article, both because of the copyright issue, and because it is never written from a neutral point of view: it varies from somewhat promotional (as in this case) to full-blown advertising.
I have written the above in the hope it will help you. I see that there is a brief "welcome" message on your talk page, put there automatically by a "bot". I will put a more extensive welcome message there, with links to various pages that may be helpful to you. Don't try to read and thoroughly learn all of them before you do anything else: as I have said above, there is far too much there, but do have a quick look at the ones which seem most relevant.
Finally, the answer to your question "Can you prove somehow if some systems in the same list have better notability than Nagwin?" is "no". In an ideal world, every single article on Wikipedia would fully satisfy all the relevant policies and guidelines. In reality, with over 4 million articles on Wikipedia, it is impossible for anyone to check them all, and many unsuitable ones escape detection for quite a while before being found and deleted. More on this is to be seen at WP:OTHERSTUFF. JamesBWatson (talk) 08:47, 25 October 2012 (UTC)
I AM NOT DONE ANY DISRUPTIVE EDITING!
I AM NOT DONE ANY DISRUPTIVE EDITING!. I have not done any violation of Wikipedia's neutral point of view policy with this edit.I Will not be blocked.Because I have not done any violation of Wikipedia's neutral point of view policy with this edit.I am an indian.I clearly know the organization 'Popular Front of India'.It is not doing any anti social activities.The allegations on the PFI have been, so far, proved false.I edited the article "Popular Front of India" because i found many mistakes in this article.I will list some mistakes in this article.
SOME MISTAKES IN THIS ARTICLE ARE THE FOLLOWING:
Motto Naya Karavan : Naya Hindustan
Purpose/focus Islamist[1]
There are many more mistakes.The corrections of the above mistakes are the following:
Motto Naya Caravan Naya Hindustan!
Purpose/focus A neo social movement for a new India of equal rights to all Indians
IF YOU HAVE ANY DOUBT REGARDING THE Purpose/focus of the organization 'Popular Front of India'.
VISIT THIER WEBSITE.THIER WEBSITE IS http://www.popularfrontindia.com
I see that FisherQueen gave you advice on explaining your edits on the relevant article talk pages. She is perfectly right: if you make edits which are likely to look unhelpful to others, but in fact you have sound reasons for them, to avoid giving the misleading impression that your editing is vandalism, or an attempt to impose a point of view, or for some other reason unconstructive, you need to do what she suggested. However, since you have raised some issues here, I will attempt to clarify for you how your edits gave the impression of being aimed at imposing a point of view, and what is problematic about giving that impression. I hope this will help to make the issues clearer for you.
Wikipedia is edited by a large number of people from all over the world. Frequently we have people who disagree about what is "the truth". We do not have some magical way of deciding what is "true" and what isn't, and instead our criterion for inclusion of content is that it is supported by coverage in reliable independent sources. In this edit you removed information which is indeed supported by reliable sources, evidently because you personally disagree with it. If content is supported by a reliable source, then for an individual editor to remove that content because he or she believes it is wrong, is to try to impose his or her point of view about what is true. In the same edit you also changed a section heading from "Allegations on PFI" to "False allegations on PFI". The word "allegations" in itself implies that the accusations may or may not be unfounded: to specify that the allegations are "true " or to specify that the are "false" is to introduce a specific point of view.
Likewise in this edit you removed substantial content which was referenced to reliable sources. For example, you removed "Kerala state government banned the freedom parade conducted by Popular Front of India stating it would jeopardize communal harmony. The ban was challenged in the Kerala High Court which upheld the ban." This is fully supported in the cited article in the Times of India. If you believe that the reporting in the Times of India is inaccurate, i.e. that the ban did not take place, that the ban was not challenged in the High Court, or that the High Court did not uphold the ban, then you need to provide reliable sources that show that the reporting is inaccurate: simply to remove it looks like an attempt to suppress information which you don't like, i.e. to impose your preferred point of view.
I will not spend the time it would take to give similar commentary on each of your edits, but those two should be enough to indicate the general pattern. Again and again you have made similar edits.
As for your invitation to look at the organisation's own web site, we do not accept a subject's own account, which is likely to be biased, as the defining truth about that subject. Instead, we consider what independent, third party, reliable sources say. This is particularly so in the case of political organisations, which invariably seek to convey an image of themselves which they believe will show them in a favourable way.
I find it surprising that anyone who chooses to use the username "Muslimcyberforce" can deny the intention of editing for a particular point of view. That user name in itself suggests that you intention is to impose a muslim point of view, and everything in your editing fits in with that impression.
Finally, in answer to the statement "I Will not be blocked", I sincerely hope you are right. You will probably not be blocked if you realise that Wikipedia articles need to be written from a neutral point of view, which will often mean that they are written from a point of view different from yours, because you clearly have a point of view which, far from being neutral, supports the viewpoint of certain political organisations on which you have been editing. Writing about a political organisation from a "neutral point of view" does not mean writing to support that organisation's point of view about itself. If you can realise that, then there is no evident reason why you should not be able to contribute constructively to Wikipedia. However, editors who persist in trying to bias Wikipedia's coverage on a particular topic to a particular point of view do get blocked. Finally, the fact that you believe that your editing is "the truth" does not mean it is not a point of view: we all believe that our own point of view is the correct one. JamesBWatson (talk) 09:37, 25 October 2012 (UTC)
True that I usually sign block notices, but occasionally I don't, and I don't regard it as a big deal, as the blocking admin is displayed at the top of the contributions page. Even so, I will go back and do it. Thanks. JamesBWatson (talk) 11:38, 25 October 2012 (UTC)
Djathinkimacowboy sock tagging
I don't see why you tagged him as a sock of that master, who has no edits and is stale, AFAIK. Was recent socking a reason for the block?--Jasper Deng(talk) 22:03, 21 October 2012 (UTC)
(1) The accounts were clearly operated by the same person. (2) The newest account has been used disruptively in many ways. (3) The editor has a history of sockpuppetry, and has persistently lied about previous accounts. (4) It is possible that at some time in the future someone may have need to check the history of this editor. This would happen, for example, if the user were to make an unblock request, or if there were reasons to suspect further sockpuppetry. In this case, it will be important for all the evidence to be readily accessible. I know from my own experience that sometimes a huge amount of time and effort can be wasted searching through editing histories, reading old archived talk page posts, etc etc, to try to find out the background in such a case, in order to be able to make an informed decision. Quite often, much of this time and trouble could have been saved if only someone had noted some essential fact in a readily accessible place. Placing a notification of sockpuppetry on a user page is a standard and recognised practice, so anyone needing to know the relevant history will be able to find out instantly which previous accounts are relevant. It may, of course be that the question never arises, but the possibility that it may be is the reason for placing the sockpuppet notification. JamesBWatson (talk) 07:41, 22 October 2012 (UTC)
By an interesting coincidence, below, at "Question about an IP", you can see a case where it might have helped current investigations if I had recorded this sort of information at the time. A very good illustration of the point I have tried to convey in my reply to you. JamesBWatson (talk) 08:52, 22 October 2012 (UTC)
I'm not so clear on #1, hence why I asked.--Jasper Deng(talk) 14:31, 22 October 2012 (UTC)
I see that I misunderstood. I thought your point was "what purpose is served by tagging as sockpuppet, since the original account is stale", rather than "what makes you think this was a sockpuppet of that account". I also see that I didn't answer your point about RevAntonio having no edits. I will try to answer those points now.
Bear in mind that very often an editor who seems to have no edits actually has edits which have been deleted, and this fact is visible to administrators. However, on this occasion the explanation for the apparent lack of any edits is different: RevAntonio was renamed to User456246478845, and so the edits are to be found at Special:Contributions/User456246478845. I have now changed the target of the relevant sockpuppet notices to point to User456246478845 rather than RevAntonio, as this will be more helpful to people such as yourself, looking for the relevant editing history.
I spent a considerable amount of time searching the editing history of the various accounts, including deleted edits. I found considerable similarity in editing in various ways, including general style and similar changes to articles. Two features in particular stood out: a striking similarity in approach to other editors, and a degree of overlap in what topics and articles the accounts edited that goes beyond any reasonably plausible chance coincidence. Note that, in that last point, I am not just referring to a common tendency to edit on a particular topic, which (on its own) might indicate no more than two editors with similar interest: I am referring to a common tendency to edit on certain articles that have no apparent connection to one another except all having been repeatedly edited by accounts belonging to one known sockpuppeteer. For a new editor to happen by chance to do a significant proportion of his/her editing in such articles is remarkable, and when that is combined with other evidence concerning style, use of language, ways of dealing with other editors, etc etc, the result was way beyond all reasonable doubt. In addition, after being blocked, he posted various messages from IP addresses which essentially said "I'm sorry I did it", rather than "I didn't do it". JamesBWatson (talk) 10:31, 25 October 2012 (UTC)
Well, the part about the user being renamed answers my question.--Jasper Deng(talk) 16:28, 25 October 2012 (UTC)
changing the status of the Snooker Premier League 2011 from Variant to Non-Ranking ?.
hi james i would like to change the above event.as you are aware there was deadlock on the wiki snooker talkpage.i have emailed world snooker and leading snooker statistician david hendon myself.i have information from both sources that Premier League 2011 was regarded as a non ranking event and not a variant.i have email evidence from both sources. i have been told century breaks made count towards a players career total,and matches count towards players career head to heads.neither of these would not occur if this event was a variant.how can i present this evidence to get this event moved to its proper section ?.regards — Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.81.127.21 (talk) 14:06, 24 October 2012 (UTC)
I have spent a good deal of time in the past trying to clarify this for you, as have several other editors. The bottom line is that, when there is a disagreement, Wikipedia works by consensus, and consensus is very clearly against you. JamesBWatson (talk) 14:15, 24 October 2012 (UTC)
hi james but i have evidence from the governing body that runs the sport that this event is a non ranking event.i can produce this information for anyone that wants to see it.i have only one question for you.is this evidence not good enough to clarify what the event is and if not why?.ive gone to great lengths to get this info.if it is no good can we seek clarification from world snooker about the event to prove im 100% genuine in my endeavors.regards — Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.81.127.21 (talk) 14:05, 25 October 2012 (UTC)
I will make one last attempt to explain what has already been explained to you repeatedly. (1) Unless the evidence you refer to is in a published reliable source it is no use. Private communications are not usable. (2) Consensus is against you. You would be well advised to accept the fact and move on. JamesBWatson (talk) 14:20, 25 October 2012 (UTC)
Copyright question
im a little confused about my content that was deleted... was my citation format incorrect? im doing this for a class assignment and am still new to adding and editing information. i have been very careful to cite all of my work. i dont know how i could have forgotten to put in a reference....
Jayjay317 (talk) 23:33, 25 October 2012 (UTC)jayjay317
Replied on your talk page. JamesBWatson (talk) 09:39, 26 October 2012 (UTC)
SPI
Hi. There is a case you were involved in last year. [1]
You may not remember it since it was a long time ago. But I recently opened a case on some accounts I suspected to be from this same user. [2] I was wondering if you could just take a look at it and maybe give me your take on it since you had experience with the first case. Maybe let me know if you feel the behavior is similar or not to Plouton2. A clerk declined and said some accounts were stale, and the IPs could be dynamic. Can you tell me if you see any similar behavior between the socks I listed? The reason I felt it was Plouton2 is because these accounts revert to some of his/her past sock edits, and they also edit the same exact articles saying similar things.
Shatabdi edits : James, I took your advice & toned down my response to Abhishek191288's edits. Unfortunately it seems that he is hell bent on removing the images i have posted THINKING that they are irrelevant & for self gratification.
I do not have problems with people thinking but to remove Shatabdi photo's from Shatabdi's for thinking does not seem to make sense but i am of the opinion that unless there is something factually wrong with the article or images then it must not be deleted.
Is there anyway i can prevent Abhishek191288 from deleting the images without a good reason other that his thoughts?
I feel as if I need to inform an administrator about this and see that they think. User Wintran[3] is unnecessary describing such things like a character’s Martial Arts when the links to them already provide that information.[4] I mean isn’t that what links are for? 99.168.78.169 (talk) 18:17, 27 October 2012 (UTC)
At a quick glance, it looks as though you may be right, but there is no administrative issue, so an administrator is no more relevant than any other experienced editor. I suggest raising the matter on the article's talk page, and calling attention to your post there on the editor's talk page. JamesBWatson (talk) 18:25, 27 October 2012 (UTC)
Waterbeach FC
James, will you restore the version you G6 deleted. I may have cocked up the move (not sure I did but hey) but the version you deleted to move the misplaced page from was the tidied up version. The PROD is your perogative and I may well dispute it but I'd rather do it from the tidied up page. NtheP (talk) 21:26, 27 October 2012 (UTC)
Restoring that version in place of the version I moved would create attribution problems, but I have restored the last revision of it, where you "tidied it up". I hope that is satisfactory. Let me know if not. JamesBWatson (talk) 21:34, 27 October 2012 (UTC)
that'll do, thanks. NtheP (talk) 21:42, 27 October 2012 (UTC)
Urgent Help
James, a little urgent help please. Abhishek191288 is deleting images that i have posted without a good reason such as factually correct information. His bias against me is evident by the fact that he is leaving the other images untouched & no other user seems to have a problem with them. I have no desire to get into a edit war but i do not intend to take mindless deletions of my work lying down either.
Pardon my butting in, JBW, I've already warned both editors. If you feel further action is necessary, I would understand. Tiderolls 03:58, 28 October 2012 (UTC)
Hello James. Obviously someone forgot to notify you about this (you've deleted the page). --Vejvančický (talk | contribs) 09:59, 29 October 2012 (UTC)
talk
i was annoyed because of the reason given for the edits.i.e. he don't think they are relevant. you are perfectly right to edit if there was a issue of relevance or factually incorrect information. Why shatabdi photos on a page dedicated to shatabdi express is THOUGHT to be irrelevant, well the sense eledues me. i have put in almost 2 yrs of travel to various locations & want to show anyone who visits the page a chance to see the photos. Like you said, wikipedia is a collaborative project it surely needs a passion for it. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Superfast1111 (talk • contribs) 11:15, 24 October 2012 (UTC)
hi james i took your advise & am still trying to sort out issues with Abhishek191288 however it seems that he is just not willing to reason. I have reported him to an administrator. Apologize for my roughness earlier.
Superfast1111 (talk) 10:36, 30 October 2012 (UTC)
One of my articles, Joseph Fosco, is suddenly gone. I can find no proof this deletion was debated. It seems you deleted it because of a G4 violation, but I cannot find any proof this is true, aside from some other page I had nothing to do with from years ago.
(talk page stalker) Like it or not, the version you created in 2011 closely matched the one deleted after discussion in 2009. That's the problem when others can edit your edits :-) .. there is no "debate" for WP:CSD#G4 (✉→BWilkins←✎) 10:51, 31 October 2012 (UTC)
The "other page [you] had nothing to do with from years ago" was the subject of a deletion discussion which ended in a "delete" decision, as you must be aware. Since it is nearly 11 months since you created the new article, it is likely that you don't remember, but when you created it you will have been confronted with a big red notice telling you that an article with that title had been deleted, and providing you with a link to the deletion discussion. Unlike creating a new article with a new title, you will not have simply been presented with a blank editing area to start writing it, but will have seen the notice informing you of the previous deletion discussion, and will have then had to specifically click on a link to confirm that you really did want to re-create it. When you did that, it was, of course, entirely up to you whether or not you took the time to also click on the link to the deletion discussion or not. If you did choose to do so, you will have known why the article was deleted, and could have avoided spending time creating a new article with exactly the same faults that led to the deletion of the original one. Before deleting the new article I did look at the deletion discussion, and at the article, and found that the reasons for deletion still applied to the new version of the article. That is why it was deleted. JamesBWatson (talk) 11:10, 31 October 2012 (UTC)
I did in fact see that warning, and if you read the talk page on my version of that article, you will see this was discussed. As per the deletion discussion page for the '09 version, my article made no mention of something called “KTF media”, or Stella Foster. Conrad Black was mentioned, but I had a direct quote from an article he wrote for the National Post talking about Joseph Fosco. I’ve got no idea what this previous author did, but it doesn’t seem that Conrad Black article existed at that time (impossible to tell though, as I cannot see the content of that ’09 deleted article to tell what exactly is referenced). Other items I used for sourcing did not exist in ’09 as well, including records and articles about trials of Chicago Outfit members Joseph Fosco was involved in. I cannot understand how this article survived a year, with a moderator attempting to delete it a year ago when I first created it (and losing the argument, mind you, like he did with another article I have written) only to disappear like this. Unless you have some method to see that '09 article, I do not know how you could compare it to mine. Mobwatcher22 (talk) 11:54, 31 October 2012 (UTC)
The AfD discussion essentially related to the question of notability. The talk page discussion did not even mention that issue, but dealt only with questions of neutral language and promotional writing.
KTF media was mentioned only by an editor who, as far as I can see, was suggesting that it was a reliable source. Substantially similar remarks apply to Stella Foster. The consensus in the discussion was against accepting them as adequate sources, in which case the presence or absence of mention of them in the new version of the article is irrelevant. in any case the absence of mention of a source in the new version of the article cannot possibly be an argument for notability, no matter how good or bad the source.
I don't know what you mean by saying that "a moderator" attempted to delete it a year ago. I can find no record of any speedy deletion tagging of the article, nor any proposal for deletion, until 24 October 2012, and there certainly wasn't a second "articles for deletion" discussion. I can't even see a talk page post or edit summary that suggests it should be deleted. As for how it can have survived for a year, my guess is that it simply wasn't noticed. Almost all of the editing of the article was by two accounts, the few exceptions mostly being rather trivial changes, and the page view statistics do not indicate a great deal of attention, so it seems likely that few people were aware of its existence, and fewer still were likely to be aware that there had been a deletion discussion.
Yes, I do "have some method to see that '09 article". In order to be able to assess administrative issues (such as the request for speedy deletion that was posted in this case) administrators have access to the archived records of of deleted pages. I would never re-delete a previously deleted article without first checking any old versions. JamesBWatson (talk) 12:29, 31 October 2012 (UTC)
Thank you for taking the time to speedily answer my questions. I appreciate all the work mods like you do here, and I hope you did not take my confusion as a hostile expression. It was not intended as such. I've done the mod thing in other places and know how thankless it can be. Is there any way for me to get a copy of the article moved to my userspace/sandbox to look it over? Mobwatcher22 (talk) 14:48, 31 October 2012 (UTC)
Certainly. I have "userfied" it for you at User:Mobwatcher22/Joseph Fosco. Please note that userfication is a short-term measure to allow time to work on the page. It is not meant to be a long term way of keeping content which is not considered acceptable as an article, and if it is left lying around for a long time it may well be deleted again. JamesBWatson (talk) 14:56, 31 October 2012 (UTC)
Tell me, then
Who claimed that the Whore of Babylon stuff wasn't true? ResonX (talk) 16:02, 31 October 2012 (UTC)
I've no idea whether anyone claimed it wasn't true or not. Whether anyone has done so or not is not pertinent to the point of my message, which was that you need to accept consensus and current Wikipedia policies. I mentioned a couple of examples of ways in which you have not been doing so. I could have said a lot more (such as pointing out that consensus is that trivia only tangentially related to the subject of an article don't belong there), but I have no intention of spending hours writing everything I can think of that could possibly be relevant. JamesBWatson (talk) 16:10, 31 October 2012 (UTC)
I don't see a list of Search for Tommorrow characters as there is for All My Children. Go ahead and delete the article.--Wlmg (talk) 17:17, 31 October 2012 (UTC)
Mary Help of Christians Cathedral
Hello JamesBWatson,
This is regarding the article Mary Help of Christians Cathedral that you deleted for copyright infringement. I have read WP:Close paraphrase and now better understand the issue. I would like to rewrite the article, so please could you create a copy of the deleted page as a user subpage for me, to enable me to reuse things like the infobox, categories, images, etc.? Any other advice you have for me regarding this is welcome.
Regards, The Discoverer (talk) 17:42, 31 October 2012 (UTC)
Rotten regard appears to be a single purpose account who does almost nothing except remove prod templates from pages. These are often without comment or with statements like "Not eligible to be prodded". I can't find anything that says he can't do what he's doing, but it might fall under the general catch all of disruption. Specifically "Rejects or ignores community input" and "Does not engage in consensus building". What do you think? I've no desire to see him run off or blocked, but would prefer that he shows more clearly that he's put thought into removing the PROD tags or edits in another area. RyanVesey 21:56, 30 October 2012 (UTC)
Thanks for making the comments. I hadn't considered that his "not eligible to be prodded" might refer to articles that had been prodded before; however, I picked a random example Scott Stevens (weatherman) and that didn't appear to be the case. Hopefully he sticks to what he said and is more communicative in the future. RyanVesey 20:32, 31 October 2012 (UTC)
I can assure you Ryan I am very thorough when I remove prods for ineligibility. Thank you. Rotten regardSoftnow 20:55, 31 October 2012 (UTC)
I apologize for my mistake there. Thanks for being much more communicative with your PROD removals. It helps a lot. Have a good one, RyanVesey 18:04, 1 November 2012 (UTC)
Question about Are You Watching This?! Deletion
Greetings James,
I think the page on Are You Watching This?! is worth of inclusion in Wikipedia. There companies has press articles from major news organizations around the globe, and counts companies like The Sporting News and FOX Sports as its customers.
A business does not inherit notability from its customers, any more than the people who clean the floors at the White House inherit notability from their employer. As for "has press articles", I am not sure what you mean by that, but neither the references provided in the article nor anything I have been able to find elsewhere suggests that there is substantial coverage in independent reliable sources. Certainly there is a very great deal of coverage in non-independent sources, including business promotion web sites, writes up of press releases, etc etc, but none of that does anything to establish notability: it just shows that the business has a very active PR team working for them. JamesBWatson (talk) 11:20, 31 October 2012 (UTC)
Hey James, what do you mean by independent and reliable? I would think sources like ABC News, AOL, Techcrunch, and GigaOM would fall under that definition? NPR, ESPN, and the Technology Review have also written about the company--I'm happy to cite those as well. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Mphil14 (talk • contribs) 23:15, 1 November 2012 (UTC)
Protection of Billy Graham article
Seem rather odd that the article is semi-protected since very few of the recent edits have been made my anonymous editors. --Walter Görlitz (talk) 14:36, 1 November 2012 (UTC)
Anonymous editors were not involved. An editor who has used several newly created accounts to harass another user has been editing various articles, including that one. The user has returned to several accounts with a new account. Short-term protection is an attempt to prevent more of the same, in the hope that the user will give up. JamesBWatson (talk) 14:55, 1 November 2012 (UTC)
I now know more about this disruptive editor. He/she has been active for a very long period, using a very large number of accounts. JamesBWatson (talk) 15:04, 1 November 2012 (UTC)
Note about the sockmaster
I have edited your sockpuppet taggings to label the correct sockmaster of those socks. --Bsadowski1 14:52, 1 November 2012 (UTC)
Thanks. I thought there might be others, but I did not guess on what scale. JamesBWatson (talk) 14:58, 1 November 2012 (UTC)
Greetings. Since you are an Admin I have no doubt of your decision making skills being fine tuned but can I please ask you why the 'formal introductions' section was removed? It wasn't harming anyone. Also I don't see any more vandalism having been run in the history since I undid the errors. Also on the block no timescale has been stated, was this block placed in a rush? if you look at My Talk Page you will see that I keep an eye on that page, I report back to my school's technical department on goings-on from the IP Addresses and under their guidance take the required action, but i'm not seeing the reason as to why this blocked was placed. Would you please be so kind as to specify? Thank you. Meva / CHCSPrefect - (Give cake?) 16:25, 1 November 2012 (UTC)
I do appreciate that you have been trying to control vandalism from this IP address. However, the fact still remains that vandalism continues, and indeed almost all edits from the IP address are vandalism, and the few that aren't are clearing up after vandalism from the same address. Someone editing from that IP address (perhaps you) has said that vandals at the school will be traced and punished, but that does not alter the fact that vandalism takes place, and, in the time between a vandalism edit being made and it being reverted, a Wikipedia page is faulty, quite apart from the time wasted by other editors in correcting the vandalism, issuing warnings, reporting to "Administrator intervention on vandalism", etc. The knowledge that the culprit may well have been punished at school doesn't alter that. Even during the last block on the IP address, several vandalism edits were made to the IP talk page. I see absolutely no evidence at all that unblocking would benefit the project. The block is for six months, as you can see here. Perhaps you mean that I did not state the block length on the talk page. If so, I rarely specify the length of a long-term block on a school IP, as doing so seems to serve little purpose other than informing vandals when they can successfully resume vandalism. As for removing messages from the talk page, there seems little point in keeping detailed messages referring to a situation which no longer exists, and which cannot exist again until six months have passed. You may, however, restore your message if you think keeping it there during the duration of the block is likely to be useful. JamesBWatson (talk) 08:38, 2 November 2012 (UTC)
This is ResonX
Please do not block me like that again.
Let me ask you this: If all mainstream, third–party, "reliable" sources are worth 1,000 "notability points".
In that case, how many points are fan sites with thousands of visitors, hundreds of users, and many complex fan works worth?
And how many points are the stories themselves worth? At what point does a character become notable enough for an article just by having enough appearances and stories to their name?
Give me a number for each.
Also, when is it acceptable to use sources that aren't "reliable", and when is it acceptable to not have sources at all?
Please respond on my talk page.
ResonX (talk) 16:49, 1 November 2012 (UTC)
(talk page stalker) Assuming that "notability points" is a reasonable concept (it isn't), the answer to your first question is 0. Anything is a reliable source for itself; we can use stories as the source for basic plot summaries. But we can't use it as a reliable source for talking about anything else, and it can't be used as a reliable source for the purpose of demonstrating notability. A character becomes notable enough for its own article when it passes the simple answer to Wikipedia; that is, when it (specifically the character, not just the story with a mention of the character) has significant coverage in multiple, legitimate reliable sources that are independent of each other and the subject, just like everything else. The answer to both of your final questions is "never". Writ Keeper⚇♔ 16:57, 1 November 2012 (UTC)
By the way, have you tried editing TVTropes instead of Wikipedia? It's much more suited to this type of thing; for one, they don't care about notability there. It's a pretty fun site; I edit there occasionally, especially before coming to Wikipedia. Writ Keeper⚇♔ 17:09, 1 November 2012 (UTC)
the user simply appears to be blowing off steam on talk pages and not interfering with the encyclopedia. I withdraw any request for pre-emptive action. -- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom 18:37, 1 November 2012 (UTC)
I'd also like to throw this and this on the pile. Anybody got a match? Zad68 18:10, 1 November 2012 (UTC)
I'm holding fire for now myself, though that may change shortly. I did see those diffs already, and TRPoD's had me hovering over the block button, but I dunno, maybe reason will prevail. Writ Keeper⚇♔ 18:14, 1 November 2012 (UTC)
I knew that would be the response, and it's the correct one, IMHO. It's all sound and fury until we see actual disruption or damage to the articles, which I can't quite see a convincing case for, at least not just yet. Zad68 18:17, 1 November 2012 (UTC)
I haven't damaged or disrupted a single article. I am only adding to the site. ResonX (talk) 18:18, 1 November 2012 (UTC)
A statement like this from someone who has already declared that he will not follow the rules regarding what kinds of edits are damaging does not hold any weight. It's up to the community of people who do adhere to the rules to determine whether they've been breached. Zad68 18:23, 1 November 2012 (UTC)
Lupo & Tan pages @ Hummingbird Music
I have replied to your questions & suggestions on my talk page. Please let me know how I can proceed with getting the pages back up! Thank you. Angelchiu (talk) 13:25, 2 November 2012 (UTC)angelchiu
IP you blocked before still making weird AFC requests
Greetings, the IP has racked up a large number of AFC Declines since you last warned him. Maybe time for harsher steps? User_talk:46.18.177.229. Thanks for looking into it. MatthewVanitas (talk) 15:46, 2 November 2012 (UTC)
Unexplained message
I've tried my best to prevent vandalism but all you've done is protect it along with the bold-faced liars who spread it. Your actions are irrelevant. 99.158.249.195 (talk) 21:59, 2 November 2012 (UTC)
What have I protected? What actions? Irrelevant to what? JamesBWatson (talk) 22:03, 2 November 2012 (UTC)
It seems this image was accidentally orphaned after some IP vandalism went unnoticed. Could you restore it please?—Ryulong (琉竜) 11:25, 4 November 2012 (UTC)
Delete this please. Greeting! --Kolega2357 (talk) 13:53, 4 November 2012 (UTC)
Remembrance Day
Would you mind if I made a few changes to Remembrance Day (United States section)? I would like to change "commemorated" to "observed" (first sentence). Also, I would like to change the last sentence to read: Veterans Day is observed with memorial ceremonies, salutes at military cemeteries, and parades.
I am asking because the article is semi-protected by you. Very respectfully, Tiyang (talk) 04:35, 4 November 2012 (UTC)
That's fine, just go ahead. Those seem perfectly reasonable changes. The semi-protection is to stop outright vandalism, and there is no reason why you should hold back form making the sort of changes you have in mind. JamesBWatson (talk) 13:24, 4 November 2012 (UTC)
Thank you very much. The changes have been made. You should know your name is in the Edit Summary as having been discussed with you. Very Respectfully, Tiyang (talk) 15:31, 5 November 2012 (UTC)
What is the evidence that the AfDs are created in bad faith? JamesBWatson (talk) 16:24, 5 November 2012 (UTC)
I checked to my watchlist and the nominator did the fake deletion discussion, it should be closed all three fake AFDs and the editor would block indefinitely for prevent editing again. ApprenticeFanwork 16:32, 5 November 2012 (UTC)
(talk page stalker) It appears to me that the AfD nominations are done in good faith (at least one of them is an absolutely brutal article), just that the AfD's have been improperly created - manually creating AfD's is a multi-step process that is easy to mess up - I think that's also what JBW is trying to say (✉→BWilkins←✎) 21:16, 5 November 2012 (UTC)
Given the text used, highly likely the editor is an MMA fan, probably a banned MMA sock. Mtking (edits) 22:40, 5 November 2012 (UTC)
This account has said nothing about MMA. I nominated some crufty articles about a non-notable television show for deletion. WHAT are you talking about?! If you think those articles can be saved, then participate in the discussions I started. --Jfgsloeditor (talk) 13:39, 7 November 2012 (UTC)
You didn't create the discussions properly (✉→BWilkins←✎) 13:48, 7 November 2012 (UTC)
I noticed you removed the CSD'd form the AfD the user had created, you are right not G1 but most likely G5. Mtking (edits) 22:37, 5 November 2012 (UTC)
Dude, what is wrong with you?! Leave me alone! --Jfgsloeditor (talk) 13:43, 7 November 2012 (UTC)
A barnstar for you!
The Admin's Barnstar
I Love your work as a wiki admin.
P.S How did u get that clock that show how long u are on wikipedia DetectiveSherlockHolmes (talk) 06:52, 7 November 2012 (UTC)
I guess I don't get the point of this website. Entries like one for my film "Drifter: Henry Lee Lucas" get created then someone like you comes along and deletes it.
There are no copyright violations. I am the writer and executive producer on the film which you can see with a quick look at IMDB or renegade picture.us. All I try to do if I edit is correct things that aren't right, add references and do what I can to add value. Maybe you don't see any value in an entry on this service about a feature film but others may disagree. I do. If one film is pointless then they all are. Frankly I find it insulting. I know there's all this neat "talk page" crap but some of us don't have time to sit trolling all day pointlessly deleting material they no nothing about.
If you want to really talk about this call me at 913-205-1747 and we can clear the air.
Hello, Wood Dickinson. I will try to clarify a few issues. I hope doing so will be helpful to you. You have presumably seen the deletion log entry, otherwise you would not have known that I deleted the article. You will therefore have seen that the reason I deleted it was logged as "Article that has no meaningful, substantive content". Indeed, the full and complete text that you posted was "Drifter: Henry Lee Lucas. Developing entry for this film. I wrote it and produced as well. Wood Dickinson reference" followed by a URL. The deletion had nothing to do with copyright, nor did it indicate that I "don't see any value" in having an article on the subject. The only relevance of copyright is that a completely different article on the same subject written by a different person was deleted three years ago. I expressed no opinion at all on the value or lack of value of a proper article on the subject. Wikipedia does not have "placeholder" articles waiting for content to be added, as such articles are immediately visible to the readers of Wikipedia, and a web page that says words to the effect "we haven't written this page yet, but we will" does not produce a good impression. Instead, if an article is being worked on but not yet ready for publication, we keep it in a "userspace" page: for example, if I were to write an article on that subject then I could create a page called User:JamesBWatson/Drifter: Henry Lee Lucas, and move it to Drifter: Henry Lee Lucas when it was ready.
I give up quite a significant amount of my time to Wikipedia administration. Unfortunately a large proportion of what is posted here is vandalism, trivia, propaganda, uninformed adolescent speculation, illegal content, and other unhelpful stuff. If there weren't people willing to put time into cleaning up the mess, Wikipedia would soon degenerate into something very different from the very useful and widely consulted reference that it is. You are, of course, welcome to criticise any Wikipedia policy, and also to express rational disagreement with any particular decision I take in the course of the work I do to help implement those policies, but I disagree with your characterisation of my administrative work as "trolling".
I hope these comments will be helpful to you. If you have any further questions about these matters, please feel welcome to contact me here again. However, I have no intention of getting involved in phone calls about Wikipedia work, especially not calls from one continent to another. JamesBWatson (talk) 08:38, 7 November 2012 (UTC)
Thanks for the information. So you know I did not create the entry for this film nor did I create the entry for any of the films I have made. I am assuming others with an interest in this stuff is creating them. I really don't have time. I do an incredible amount of consulting and research for psychiatrist mainly. Filmmaking and the movie biz has been with me all my life so I write, produce and sometimes even get paid. It is important to me that these entries are correct and I know I'm close to these projects but that's the reason why.
If I have done something wrong to cause someone else hardship I'm sorry. I'm frankly not on this site hardly ever. Just stumbled across those entries and as with IMDB I make sure it is right. Don't delete them just because of me. Someone put a lot of time in creating them. I just want them to be right and understand how they work.
Over the course of nine months you have evidently forgotten, but you did indeed create the article Drifter: Henry Lee Lucas. The creation of the article is listed in the log as 10:49, 4 February 2012 . . Wooddickinson (...) (←Created page with '=== Drifter: Henry Lee Lucas === Developing entry for this film. I wrote it and produced as well. Wood Dickinson reference Http://www.wooddickinson.com'). JamesBWatson (talk) 09:03, 7 November 2012 (UTC)
It wasn't done by me. When you make a feature film you have A LOT of people working and handling different tasks based upon their position in the crew/staff/admin etc...
Sorry for all the trouble.--Wood Dickinson 02:20, 8 November 2012 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Wooddickinson (talk • contribs)
In that case it was done by someone else using your account. Wikipedia's policy is that an account is for an individual, and you shouldn't let anyone else use your account. JamesBWatson (talk) 08:33, 8 November 2012 (UTC)
Talkback
Hello, JBW. You have new messages at HJ Mitchell's talk page. Message added 14:57, 7 November 2012 (UTC). You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.
Talkback
Hello, JBW. You have new messages at Lovysinghal's talk page. Message added 09:18, 8 November 2012 (UTC). You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.
Hi there - thanks for letting me know. I had in fact spotted the block modication on my watchlist, and wasn't worried at all by it. Regards, BencherliteTalk 13:31, 8 November 2012 (UTC)
sup
Dr watson y is it u removed ma post on Bismas's page coz he aint given me an answer bout somein else init as well so i was try n get ma point across u get me faim and thats all i is doing u know what i mean faim ~ ~ ~ ~ — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jackie55667788 (talk • contribs) 20:13, 8 November 2012 (UTC)
If you would like to explain what you mean then I will try to answer. JamesBWatson (talk) 08:11, 9 November 2012 (UTC)
NFL Player Engagement page creation request
I would like to recreate a page for the NFL Player Engagement Department on Wikipedia. Please provide guidance on how to do so without it being viewed as a promotion. Thanks. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Awmoss2 (talk • contribs) 14:41, 9 November 2012 (UTC)
Hello James I need help.
I have been desperately trying to figure out the problem to my page "dpt labs". I have a message at the top of the screen that says the following: (This article includes a list of references, but its sources remain unclear because it has insufficient inline citations. Please help to improve this article by introducing more precise citations. (August 2012)). Aside from this There is a request for a speedy deletion of the page claiming its purpose is to solicit. I can assure it is meant for informative purposes, but nonetheless if you can provide me with a clear and concise solution I would greatly appreciate it. If not I am willing to create a new page if you can guide me in a way to steer clear of the same mistakes, but preferably I would like to work on the current page.
Hi James. Could you please move the deleted SAF Group page to my sandbox. would appreciate that. Thank you. Alijabari (talk) 02:40, 10 November 2012 (UTC)
Thanks...
...for setting me straight and helping out with that unblock request. I appreciate it. Drmies (talk) 15:19, 10 November 2012 (UTC)
Editing Articles Titles
Sorry for earlier, I was trying to change the article's title. I wans't able to change it, at first I thought it was a problem with my internet, so I tried to change the title everyway, and after I finally did it i couldn't revert it. Could you help me? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don%27t_Stop_%27Til_You_Get_Enough I want to change the "'til" to "'Til", I want a capital "T". Thanks. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Pisguila (talk • contribs) 17:16, 10 November 2012 (UTC)
That would be grammatically improper. The apostrophe replaces the "Un" ...so the capital letter has been replaced - you cannot decide to capitalize the 3rd letter of a word (✉→BWilkins←✎) 17:19, 10 November 2012 (UTC)
(talk page stalker) I'm actually unsure if it should be "'Til" or "'til". Some sources have one, some have the other. I don't have the time to look at the moment for an "official" source (i.e., label or artist's estate), but the usage in the article is inconsistent at the moment and I don't want to clean it up one way or the other. Thoughts? --Kinut/c 17:45, 10 November 2012 (UTC)
I'm afraid I moved it before seeing the comments here from BWilkins & Kinu, so sorry if I got it wrong. However, (1) my searches suggest that the capital is significantly more common, although both exist, and (2) the capital is included in at least some material from the publisher. Frankly, though, it is beyond me why anyone would care one way or the other about anything so trivial, so I have no intention of getting into discussions about this, let alone move-warring if someone thinks there is a good reason for moving it back. JamesBWatson (talk) 21:31, 10 November 2012 (UTC)
That works for me, especially considering my statement "I don't have the time" was effectively code for "I really don't care that much". --Kinut/c 00:42, 11 November 2012 (UTC)
Leandro
Long time no speak. Leandro again on IP: 177.18.76.196. It's been a while since I've been around, but immediately, I've had to undo about 50 edits. Could you see to this IP when you have a minute? Thanks. Paralympiakos(talk) 20:21, 11 November 2012 (UTC)
I have blocked the IP address for a few days. However, I will mention a couple of points for future reference. Firstly, when I read your message here, I had no memory of who "Leandro" was. If martial arts is a significant interest of yours, you may well be well aware of who has been disruptive on martial arts articles, but I have no knowledge of or interest in the subject, and someone who I blocked some time ago does not necessarily stay in my memory. (In recent weeks my editing has averaged at a rate equivalent to about 1700 edits per month, and something I did well over a month ago is not necessarily still in my mind.) It took me a while searching through my talk page archives to find Leandro da silva pereira santos, who is no doubt who you mean. It would have helped to have given me the exact user name. Secondly, I very quickly saw that there was a considerable overlap between the articles edited by the IP and those edited by Leandro da silva pereira santos, but that could just be a case of two editors with similar interests. It was by no means immediately obvious that they were the same person. If you know of specific reasons to connect an IP to a blocked editor, it would help a great deal if you would briefly mention what the evidence is. JamesBWatson (talk) 20:51, 11 November 2012 (UTC)
Fair point. They are the same person. They keep making the same disruptive and nonsensical edits. All the IPs are from Porto Alegre, as 177.97.69.239 is too. Anyway, I just figured as you've been the one who is (admittedly not so much) aware, I would come to you. Cheers for stopping that previous IP. Paralympiakos(talk) 22:53, 11 November 2012 (UTC)
CSIA
JamesBWatson, Hi.
I am notifying you that the modifications I made to the article "Canadian Ski Instructors' Alliance" were not complete. I undid your changes because I will continue editing the article until it falls within an acceptable range, which is currently impossible because some editors are undo-button maniacs. References will be added shortly, so please give me a break! --JellyBean4.1 (talk) 21:54, 11 November 2012 (UTC)
By the way, as an administrator, you should know that there currently is a huge decline in the number of Wikipedia editors. Supporting them instead of deleting their every moves might be something you should consider. Cheers. --JellyBean4.1 (talk) 21:56, 11 November 2012 (UTC)
I would be grateful if you would not delete articles (ref: Effectrode) without justification. I was working on updating this article and then found it had disappeared. Poor etiquette on your part. The article has been substantially edited and contains valid content. Please could you at least inform me or open a dialogue before simply deleting my work. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Moogolplex (talk • contribs) 11:50, 12 November 2012 (UTC)
I did not delete the article "without justification". As for informing you, you were informed about the deletion discussion, and knew that it had resulted in a consensus to delete. When you re-created the article you will have been confronted with a prominent notice reminding you of that deletion and of the deletion discussion that led to the deletion. In addition, even if the article had not been a recreation of a deleted one, it did not show significance of its subject, and could have been speedily deleted on those grounds. JamesBWatson (talk) 12:02, 12 November 2012 (UTC)
Please stop deleting my articles
Okay, can you advise what an article needs to "show significance of its subject"? Several 3rd party references from professional and reputable sources were cited in this article. Also, for reference, I examinined Wikipedia for similar articles with similar subject matter, for example Strymon (company). Not only is the deletion of the Effectrode article unjustified, but there is also an obvious inconsistency here. Additionally, the two articles submitted were removed with such zeal and so rapdily there was not sufficient for me or any other peers to edit and improve them. --Moogolplex (talk) 19:23, 12 November 2012 (UTC)
Justin Friesen
Why did you delete the page Justin Friesen without nominating it and bringing it to a discussion? I think more discussion could certainly have been made. (Yohowithrum (talk) 14:31, 12 November 2012 (UTC))
Because, as you know, it had already been discussed. Wikipedia policy is that, if a deletion discussion has already taken place and a deleted article is re-created without addressing the issues that led to deletion, then we do not spend time on going through another discussion, but rather the article is speedily deleted. (Whether you or I agree or disagree with the policy is irrelevant, but for what it's worth have you considered what would be the consequence of starting a new discussion each time someone ignores the outcome of a deletion discussion? Any disruptive editor who wished to defy consensus could simply re-create the article each time it was discussed, resulting in the article being deleted for one minute every week and existing the rest of the time, while editors would waste their time repeating the same arguments over and over again.) JamesBWatson (talk) 14:42, 12 November 2012 (UTC)
The previous discussions were not based on new evidence of Notability, I thought you had carefully reviewed the situation and understood that. This was't a case of disruption, just notability based on new information. (Yohowithrum (talk) 15:05, 12 November 2012 (UTC))
Yes. In fact, I actually went to the trouble to state in the deletion log that I had considered your claims on the talk page and that, despite those claims, nothing in the current references suggested any more notability than before. I did that precisely in order to anticipate what you have just said. JamesBWatson (talk) 15:15, 12 November 2012 (UTC)
That is subjective. The claims cover 5+ points on the notability guidelines. Why not air on the side of caution? I understand the "Other stuff exists argument", but there are 1000s of other Canadian Actors/Directors who have similar pages, with 1-4 lines of text and are left alone - just because they were made years ago and slipped through the cracks. Justin's contemporaries over at List of Etobicoke School of the Arts people are chalk full of these types of pages, less notable than friesen. Justin Friesen's page has just been picked on, and is forever stigmatized with these closures. Yohowithrum (talk) 15:20, 12 November 2012 (UTC)
If you understand the point of WP:OTHERSTUFF then I think you have answered your own argument. JamesBWatson (talk) 15:25, 12 November 2012 (UTC)
This isn't a deletion argument though. This is an argument for the lack of a deletion discussion. Yohowithrum (talk) 15:30, 12 November 2012 (UTC)
*blink* Reading that "article" made my eyes hurt. Sadly, any suggestion of actual notability was unsourced. Much of the rest was horribly/improperly sourced. This was a burn with fire deletion, and thankfully so. (✉→BWilkins←✎) 15:58, 12 November 2012 (UTC)
This is pretty malicious sounding language guys. You're being pretty condescending and nasty. Relax. It's Wikipedia. Yohowithrum (talk) 16:19, 12 November 2012 (UTC)
First of all, thank you for the speedy deletion of NCLab. I have also proposed to G11-speedy delete Mathomatic, which a non sourced article about a software written by the author of the article (see my post on the talk page). Another admin has declined the speedy deletion with the summary "As reviewing admin, I think this at least somewhat informative, and not entirely promotional, so speedy deletion declined". This suggest that this admin is against removing WP:OR from WP. Looking further, it appears that User:Gesslein, which is the author of the WP article Mathomatic and of the eponymous software states in his user page: "This user is a member of the Association of Inclusionist Wikipedians". The user page User:DGG of the admin who has declined the speedy deletion and the corresponding edit summary suggest that this admin is close to this association.
What shall I do in this situation? In fact, there are several problems.
If I nominates the article to WP:AFD, all the inclusionists will probably pollute the consensus
Is it possible to appeal for a declined speedy deletion?
Do has this admin acted as an admin is supposed to do? If not, what should I do?
As soon as I read your message as far as "As reviewing admin..." I knew who the admin was. The only time that expression ever appears in Wikipedia is when DGG is declining a deletion. DGG is a reasonable and intelligent administrator, and is not an irrational "inclusionist" like some wikipedia editors, but he is certainly much further towards inclusionism than any other admin I can think of offhand.
My own view of the article is that it is essentially promotional in character, but borderline for speedy deletion. In fact, I considered deleting it myself before you tagged it, but decided it was not quite blatant enough promotion for me to be sure about doing so.
In answer to "is it possible to appeal for a declined speedy deletion", it is by no means uncommon for a second speedy deletion nomination to succeed after a first one has been declined. However, this is usually in cases where the first one has been unreasonably declined, most often (though not always) by a non-admin. In a case like this one, where declining the speedy deletion was debatable but not grossly unreasonable, I think the only reasonable way to proceed, if you still want deletion, is to take it to AfD. It sometimes does happen that "all the inclusionists" try to "pollute the consensus", but there is no certainty that that will happen, and if it does there is no certainty that they will succeed. Most admins who review AfD discussions are capable of seeing when a load of people join in a discussion to try to rig the result.
AfD is by no means certain to result in deletion for this article, but in my opinion the sources cited do not come near to establishing notability, so there is a reasonable chance that it might. JamesBWatson (talk) 15:10, 12 November 2012 (UTC)
Thanks. D.Lazard (talk) 16:26, 12 November 2012 (UTC)
Re: Restoration of deleted articles
Thanks for letting me know. It looks like both Pedok and Tamm have know played for the Estonian national team meaning they meet WP:NFOOTBALL, so I won't be renominating them. Cheers. Sir Sputnik (talk) 15:08, 12 November 2012 (UTC)
Yes, that's what I thought. JamesBWatson (talk) 15:16, 12 November 2012 (UTC)
Thank you for moving my page-in-progress
Thanx for moving my article-in-process to the correct user space. I messed up developing a "user sub-page." My first WP post. sigh. MEMarraMA MEMarraMA (talk) 19:35, 12 November 2012 (UTC)
Hello James, just letting you know I removed the prod from the above article as I think the film is notable. Thank you. Rotten regardSoftnow 00:09, 13 November 2012 (UTC)
Tow users user:zeeyanketu and user:Ashermadan are disrupting the page of Son of sardaar
user:Ashermadan in one of his edit at 07:59, 13 November 2012(UTC) has removed everything totallly blanked the page of SOS.so i restored it .and user:Zeeyanketu is hell bent on merging the son of sardaar (soundtrack) page to this main page without a discussion on talk pag .a detailed and thorough discussion.i have removed unncessary reviews from the table,anyhow i will bring more genuine sources of review and then add to that tablebut please check these two vandalising users. --Filmonline111 (talk) 08:59, 13 November 2012 (UTC)
Hello, James. I would like to ask a block against JHUSPO for harassment and socking (his rant in my talk-page seems to be a retaliation to this). Plus, all his contributions constitute vandalism (blatant violation of WP:OVERLINK and WP:EGG); could we automatically revert them? Thanks. --Omnipaedista (talk) 12:53, 13 November 2012 (UTC)
This is a really strange case. Every edit, apart from creating a user page, has been to pages which you have edited, which is way beyond any plausible chance coincidence, and yet, apart from the rant on your talk page, none of them seems to have any obvious connection with the edits you made. However, both the post to your talk page and similarities to edits by blocked accounts in the SPI you mention point to this being a sockpuppet, so I have blocked the account. I have also reverted several of the account's edits that I regarded as unconstructive. If you wish to revert more of them that is up to you. JamesBWatson (talk) 13:25, 13 November 2012 (UTC)
I think it is a typical case of wikihounding. Regarding the violation of WP:EGG: part of Plouton2's campaign was/is to replace "Ancient Greek" with "[[ancient Greece|ancient]] [[Ancient Greek|Greek]]" in random Wikipedia articles. Anyway, thanks for your time and assistance. --Omnipaedista (talk) 13:36, 13 November 2012 (UTC)
My wikipedia page was blocked/deleted by you
I was assigned to create a Wikipedia page about Digital Consumer Experience for my grad class at Bellevue University. According to you I have messed up per rule G11. How do I get my page back to edit it accordingly?
Thanks,
Gregg Mattox — Preceding unsigned comment added by 198.203.221.241 (talk) 14:37, 13 November 2012 (UTC)
The first thing to do is to log in to your account and request an unblock on your user talk page. In your unblock request, explain what you were trying to do, and make it clear. An administrator will consider your request. If you are unblocked, I consider restoring the page for you, or maybe another administrator, such as the one who unblocks you will do it for you. Until you are unblocked you must not edit anywhere other than on your talk page. If you continue to edit without logging in to your account that will be regarded as block evasion, and the IP address you are editing from will be blocked. JamesBWatson (talk) 14:50, 13 November 2012 (UTC)
...
From what I understand, you deleted my account. How do I login to request to unblock it? When I try to login as gmattox, nothing. Please be patient with me as I'm a newbie at Wikipedia.
Thanks,
Gregg Mattox
(talk page stalker) The user Gmattox does exist ... usernames are case sensitive. Nobody can delete accounts :-) (✉→BWilkins←✎) 16:05, 13 November 2012 (UTC)
BTW, I have undeleted the sandbox, however I see no reason for the contents to be a separate article ... it merely builds on the online aspects of customer experience and would belong as a section on that very very short article. Arguably, a redirect or 2 could point to it (✉→BWilkins←✎) 16:12, 13 November 2012 (UTC)
Note: If you wish to add comments on this topic, then please add them to this section, rather than fragmenting discussion by starting a new section.
Hello, I left on my talk page an explanation why I think the page should not be deleted. It is an overview of a project, not an advertisement. I would be glad to remove from the page anything that seems inappropriate. Thank you PavelSolin (talk) 08:56, 12 November 2012 (UTC)
If you really did not see the article as promotional, then it seems that you are so close to the subject that you are unable to stand back from it and see how your writing will look from the detached perspective of an outside observer. The whole page, from start to finish, read like a publisher's brochure telling potential customers why they should use the product, rather than like an impartial, outsider's description. This is, in fact, a good illustration of why Wikipedia's conflict of interest guidelines recommend not writing articles on subjects in which we have a close personal involvement. Leaving aside blatant spammers, which you are clearly not, even people who sincerely do not intend promotionally often find it difficult or impossible to see how promotional their own writing will look when a subject they have a close connection to is involved, and it seems that is so in this case. I see that you have received several messages about conflict of interest and promotional editing, and that as far back as July you expressed the intention of avoiding the problems. The fact that, despite that indication of your intentions, you have still failed to remove the clear and unambiguous promotional nature of the article, tends to confirm that you are too close to the subject to edit objectively on it. I think it best to accept that Wikipedia's conflict of interest guidelines strongly discourage writing an article on a subject in which you have such a close involvement. If the subject really does satisfy Wikipedia's notability criteria then no doubt an independent, uninvolved, editor, will write an article on the subject. JamesBWatson (talk) 09:18, 12 November 2012 (UTC)
James, you are probably right, I should stay away from writing about NCLab. I am giving all my energy to the project and I may be failing to write impartially. But there are many users who would love to have NCLab page on Wikipedia. Would you recommend that someone else starts from scratch, or would you be willing to return the page for a limited trial time and see if people can remove its promotional character. Thanks to NCLab, high schools can access a free CAD system in the web browser and other things that make the kids excited about STEM. I realize that even this text here may sound promotional but I would very much appreciate you understanding and help. If the page can be reinstated, I will not edit ot myself in the future. Sincerely PavelSolin (talk) 17:45, 12 November 2012 (UTC)
Hello James
I am in the process of introducing Python as a general purpose computational tool for
the Physics Curriculum at both the third year and Honours Level at
the University of South Africa (UNISA) in Pretoria
I have started to investigate using NCLab as part of this effort.
Now It has come to my attention that you have decided to delete the NCLAB page
based on your interpretation of the rules of wikipedia.
I would like to appeal to you to reverse your decision and give the
community of users of this excellent online computing environment
a chance to address your concerns.
regards
M Braun
UNISA
moritz.braun@gmail.com
41.74.101.72 (talk) 19:12, 13 November 2012 (UTC)
Hello James!
I am advocating STEM Curriculum for Washoe County NV, the NPO I represent, LEAF, uses the NCLab interface for my after-school programs. The wiki page for the lab is important to me since it gives teachers a point of reference when looking at my projects. (the LEAF website: http://nessesque.wix.com/leafoundationnv#!home/mainPage). Would you please give me access to the deleted page so that I may edit it down for approval? I know the Sage worksheets and similar interfaces have pages. I can make sure it is approved, and find the wiki IRC Channel helpful for input so that it is ok before you make a final decision to delete or keep the page. Thank you so much! JordanBlocher (talk) 22:47, 12 November 2012 (UTC)
Hello, JBW. You have new messages at JordanBlocher's talk page. Message added 04:45, 14 November 2012 (UTC). You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.
I would like to support NCLab web page on Wikipedia. Please do not delete it. I use this web page in teaching of my Computational Science classes at the University of Texas at El Paso. Wikipedia is an important source of information and I use the article about NCLab at Wikipedia as a reference for my students.
Pownuk (talk) 19:06, 13 November 2012 (UTC)
Dear James,
I'm contacting you regarding the deletion of the NCLAB pages. Could you please explain why these have been deleted? In the past, students and postdocs of mine have found these extremely useful, so I rather dismayed to see that they no longer exist. I do hope that you can re-instate these pages, as soon as possible.
All the best,
Paul Houston
Chair in Computational & Applied Mathematics
University of Nottingham.
81.156.204.60 (talk) 19:57, 13 November 2012 (UTC)
Hello,
I would like to say, that in my opinion NCLab Wikipedia page is really helpful, at least for my CS students taking my Numerical Methods classes at Warsaw University of Technology in Poland. I was able to point my students to this page when introducing them to NCLab. It saved me so much time, and students (when they were curious about NCLab) were able to read about other details of this system on their own. Chaberb (talk) 20:41, 13 November 2012 (UTC)
Hi Dr. Watson,
I am a graduate student at UC Santa CRuz and I use NCLabs for my research. Can you tell
me why the Wiki page for NCLab was deleted?
Thanks,
Elinor Velasquez
98.248.205.26 (talk) 00:17, 14 November 2012 (UTC)
Dear James,
I'd like to express my agreement with the above writers. The NCLab page probably had a promotional character but it also contained valuable and helpful information, which facilitated using NCLab as a tool in classes on numerical methods. If you reinstated the page, I am rather sure that there will be people taking care that its writing style meets wikipedia's standards.
Hello James,
I don't understand the reason for the deletion of the NCLab Wikipedia page. In my opinion there wasn't more promotion/advertising as for example on the MATLAB page. NCLab is used by many students who are interested in numerical methods. A lot of them got their first
impression of NCLab from the wikipedia page. I hope the page will be reinstated.
Thanks, Melanie 131.188.56.102 (talk) 09:02, 14 November 2012 (UTC)
Hello James, I noticed that the page describing NCLab has been deleted today. I think that NCLab is for teaching numerical methods so useful that page on wikipedia should exist. This page contains a lot of useful and helpful informations not only promotional character. Thanks, Pavel Karban 11:58, 14 November 2012 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Karban (talk • contribs)
Wow! I've never before had anything like so many people posting in such rapid succession about one deletion. I wonder whether they have all come here independently, or whether word has got around that people should approach me on this. I am particularly interested to note that the substantial majority of the people concerned (seven of them) are either accounts or IP addresses that have never made any other edits, and have clearly come to Wikipedia specifically to try to save this article. However, I will put that aside, and deal with the issues concerning deletion. There are, in fact, three separate issues: (1) the reasons given above for asking for the article to be restored, (2) the reasons why the article was deleted, and (3) the question of whether any article on the subject should exist, not specifically the one which was deleted.
The arguments given above largely amount to saying "the article should be kept because I like it" and "the article should be kept because it is useful", usually specifically "it is useful to me in the course of my teaching". However, Wikipedia's inclusion criteria have nothing to do with whether people like it, or whether lots of people have a use for it. You may like to look at the page Wikipedia:Arguments to avoid in deletion discussions, particularly the sections on the arguments keep it because I like it and keep it because It's useful. The argument that the article should be kept because it is a useful tool for teaching courses falls foul of the policy that Wikipedia is not a manual, guidebook, or textbook. In fact, in view of that policy, the fact that the article was written in a way that seemed to be designed to make it a useful manual or how-to guide is a reason for deletion, not a reason for keeping it. The only reason why I did not mention that in the deletion log along with promotion is that only the latter was a reason for immediate speedy deletion.
The article was nominated for speedy deletion by D.Lazard as being purely promotional. As the administrator assessing that nomination, I looked not only at the latest version of the article, but at its history, right back to it initial creation in January. It was clear to me that from the start the article had failed to comply with a number of Wikipedia's policies and guidelines, including the fact that its overall tone and character seemed to be such as to encourage the reader to use the software, rather than to simply inform an interested reader what it is in neutral terms. That is to say, it sought to promote the software, so I agreed with D.Lazard' deletion nomination. It is perhaps worth pointing out that BWilkins, another administrator, has (above) expressed a third opinion, agreeing that it was promotional.
It would be possible to restore the article with a view to improving it, and it would equally be possible for someone to write a new article from scratch on the subject. It is my opinion that either of these courses would be a waste of time for whoever did it. The article would be taken straight to Articles for deletion, and I think it would be very unlikely to survive. The existing article would certainly not survive, as it fell foul of a number of Wikipedia policies, of which the policy against promotion is just one. It also failed more than one aspect of the policy on what Wikipedia is not, including the policies that Wikipedia is not a manual, guidebook, or textbook, as the article was clearly written for the purpose of giving instructions to people who are encouraged to use it. For that reason, I think that restoring the article would serve little purpose. If there were to be an article on the subject, writing a new article from scratch, in a totally different spirit, would be more appropriate. However, I think it only fair to warn anyone thinking of doing so that I think they would probably be wasting their time. Both a check of what was contained in the article and my own searches have failed to produce any sign of the sort of coverage in independent reliable sources that are required by Wikipedia's notability guidelines. Any new article would be taken straight to Articles for deletion, and my assessment is that it would be unlikely to survive. I also doubt whether any of the people asking for the article to be saved would find much point in such an article in the unlikely event that it did survive. For the reasons I have described above, any such article would be radically different from the one that was deleted, and would not be written in a way that made it suitable for use as a manual for someone learning to use the software. My advice is that the people who want a manual on how to use this software for their students to use would be better advised to write one in a place that exists for such purposes, rather than in Wikipedia, which exists for a very different purpose. For example, surely one of the several universities that are mentioned above as having made use of the article could host such a manual on its web site. JamesBWatson (talk) 13:57, 14 November 2012 (UTC)
James, with all due respect, your recent actions and comments seem to be biased against NCLab. Here are few of your arguments that stand out: You said that some of the people who commented do not have a prior record of editing Wikipedia. Is this a requirement to comment on a talk page? You are diminishing their comments by pointing out that they have not used the proper wording about "usefulness" of the page. But you skipped what they actually are saying. If you indicate that someone (me?) sent them to the page, I did not but I am very grateful that they told you this. NCLab admins are now getting a large number of concerned reactions from users who used the Wikipedia page to reach the open source projects that they use through NCLab. While the page probably had a promotional tone, it was very useful for various open source projects. I find unusual the way you try to discourage people from re-creating the page in a different style. Few days ago you said that if the page was of interest, sooner or later someone will restore it. I certainly hope that you will not be the only admin who will review the page if/after someone re-creates it. Thank you PavelSolin (talk) 17:50, 14 November 2012 (UTC)
(talk page stalker)I hope y'all will forgive me for barging in, but Pavel: I think you're not quite understanding some of the things James is trying to say. First, the "Articles for deletion" processed mentioned by James is primarily a community discussion. What happens is that discussion is created about whether the article should be deleted or not, according to Wikipedia's policies. Anyone can weigh in on this discussion, which runs for seven days. After the seven-day mark passes, an administrator will come along and judge consensus about the article based on the discussion. It's not a straight vote, though; it's wherever the strongest policy arguments are based. Though I can say with pretty strong confidence that James does not have a bias against NCLab, it wouldn't matter even if he did, since his would be only one voice of many within the discussion.
Now, as for policy, James is talking about much more than "the proper wording". You see, articles are not included or excluded based on how useful they are. After all, pretty much any article has to potential to be useful. The problem is more about notability, and its underlying principle of verifiability. On Wikipedia, we value reliability. Of course, Wikipedia isn't a reliable source, but we still strive to make it as reliable as we can. But, because user anonymity and freedom to edit are also things we value, we have no way of telling who's writing what and why, so we really can't just take people's word for it if we want to be reliable. The only way we can be at all sure of what we write about is by backing our information with citations to reliable sources, so that readers can see for themselves where our information is coming from. It bears repeating: our information is only as good as the sources that back it. Notability is a guideline we've developed to make sure that our articles have enough coverage in reliable sources. If they don't, then we have nothing to write verifiably about, and without anything verifiable, we have nothing of encyclopedic worth to put in an article. That's one of the reasons why notability, defined as significant coverage in multiple, independent, reliable sources, is the minimum standard for inclusion of articles. The appeals from the various users don't address the notability of the NCLab.
And just so you know, the creation of multiple accounts, or use of multiple IP addresses, by one person posing as many people to influence a deletion decision is a very common tactic on Wikipedia. It's called sockpuppetry and is not allowed. I don't know whether you're doing it in this instance or not, but the use of many IPs and freshly-created accounts with no other edits is one of the hallmarks of the all-too-common sockpuppetry, so James isn't making accusations out of the blue. If you're really not using sockpuppets, then you don't need to worry about it; it won't influence the deletion decision anyway, since like I said, the deletion discussion isn't a straight vote. It'd be more effective for you to do some research and try to find independent reliable sources that can support the article and demonstrate its notability.
(and James, feel free to correct me as necessary!) Writ Keeper⚇♔ 18:24, 14 November 2012 (UTC)
First of all, thanks to the two talk page stalkers who have taken the trouble to try to clarify things for PavelSolin.
PavelSolin, it does seem, as has already been suggested, that you have misunderstood some of the things I have written. I will make another attempt to clarify a few points.
You say that I "said that if the page was of interest, sooner or later someone will restore it". What I actually wrote, as you can confirm by looking above, is that if the subject satisfies Wikipedia's notability criteria then an independent person is likely to write about it. Being "of interest" is not at all the same as satisfying Wikipedia's notability criteria.
I said that it was unusual, in fact unique, to have so many people posting to me about one deletion, and I wondered whether they had come independently or whether someone had alerted them to the deletion. You seem to think that I was suggesting that there would be something sinister if someone had done so, but in fact I was suggesting nothing of the sort. I was quite simply surprised at getting a whole string of messages about it, in a way that has never happened before, and I wondered whether they had all come independently, that is all. I also checked the editing history of those who had posted about it, and found that there were a couple of established editors, including yourself, but that most of the interest was from people who do not appear to be regulaar Wikiepdia editors. Since the vast majority of talk page posts come from established editors, I thought it was striking that so many outsiders had been attracted to this discussion, and thought it interesting enough to mention. I certainly did not wish to suggest or imply that having a history of editing Wikipedia is "a requirement to comment on a talk page". I am sorry that I gave that impression. It is true, as has been mentioned above, that sometimes a string of apparently new editors is a case of sockpuppetry. However, I genuinely did not think that was so on this occasion, nor did I intend to imply that I thought it was.
You say that I am "diminishing their comments by pointing out that they have not used the proper wording about 'usefulness' of the page". However, it is not merely a question of proper wording: it is a question of the concept they are referring to. Wikipedia policy is that Wikipedia articles are not manuals or instruction guides, and being "useful" does not feature at all in Wikipedia's inclusion criteria. Yes, I was "diminishing their comments" by pointing out that they are irrelevant to Wikipedia's inclusion criteria, but that is not my choice, it is a matter of what Wikipedia's policies say.
You say that "NCLab admins are now getting a large number of concerned reactions from users who used the Wikipedia page to reach the open source projects that they use through NCLab". The message to take home from that is that it was a mistake to try to use Wikipedia as a free web host to host content for use in this way. No doubt the people who decided that Wikipedia was the place to publish a manual on the software did so in good faith, thinking that it was within the acceptable range of things to post on Wikipedia, but unfortunately it was, as I said, a mistake. Much better to have it somewhere where you have full control, and it is not liable to deletion.
You say that you "find unusual the way you try to discourage people from re-creating the page in a different style". It is not, in fact, unusual at all, at least not for me. I very frequently give similar advice to editors who have misunderstood the purpose of Wikipedia and had an article deleted. The reason I do so is that over the years I have very, very often seen the following happen. Someone puts some time and effort into writing an article, but it is deleted for some reason, such as because it infringes copyright, or because it seems promotional. The person then puts more time and effort into rewriting the article, in a way that addresses the reason for deletion. It is deleted again, for a different reason. The person writes it again, addressing the new deletion reason, and sees it deleted yet again, for a third reason... I can imagine, as no doubt you can, how frustrating that must be. Consequently, instead of just saying "the article has been deleted for such and such a reason", I choose to explain all the potential problems that I can foresee. This takes me far more time and effort than it would take me to simply write a two sentence statement of the reason for the first deletion. The one and only reason why I take this extra trouble is to try to help editors to avoid the frustrating and time wasting experience I have just described.
This is my third message to try to help you and others understand the situation with respect to this deletion. I have not kept count of how much time it has taken me to draft these three messages, but it has been considerable. You seem to think that my messages are written in bad faith, that I "seem to be biased against NCLab", that I am implying wickedness on the part of editors who come here to express concerns about the deletion, that what I have said about Wikipedia policy has been some sort of malicious interpretation of my own, and so on. I hope that, after this latest attempt at clarification, you now realise that your interpretation was mistaken. If, however, you still hold the same view of my attempts to help, then I doubt that there is any point in my throwing away yet more of my time in trying to clarify what I said. You are perfectly free, if you wish, to write another article on the subject. If you do so then you will find out for yourself whether my advice not to spend time doing so was good or bad advice. JamesBWatson (talk) 20:50, 14 November 2012 (UTC)
Hello, I think that it would be possible to trace the IP addresses of the people who commented above to different countries. Trust me that I did not write any of these comments except where I was signed. I appreciate your effort to keep Wikipedia clean from promotional materials and I admitted that the article probably had promotional tone. But it was not a manual, I do not know why you keep repeating this. Other projects such as Sympy or Sage (and many others, much smaller than NCLab) also present themselves. Presentation of NCLab certainly can be done in an impartial way, so the only problem left is notability of the project. Correct me if I am wrong. Getting constructive guidance on this topic would be very helpful. There are more than 10000 free users but I can't show them to you. They come to NCLab to learn and work, not to write about it. Would it help to show that NCLab was referenced in scientific articles? There are several free open source textbooks related to NCLab that are used at K-12 schools and where people are contributing (see http://femhub.com/textbook-karel, http://femhub.com/textbook-python, http://femhub.com/textbook-cad). But I do not know how to prove that except for getting letters from the schools. Links to NCLab are included at official web pages of universities in various countries. It would take me time to collect them but I will do that if you can let me know whether this is the way to go. Thank you, PavelSolin (talk) 21:27, 14 November 2012 (UTC)
That's still not quite it; notability is more about what independent reliable sources have to say about the subject. Links to NCLab on official school web pages is the closest of the things you mentioned, but that's still not enough; it doesn't meet the "significant coverage" criterion. It's more like an article in a reputable newspaper or magazine that discusses NCLab. That kind of thing, where NCLab is talked about in detail by a reputable third-party entity that's not affiliated with NCLab itself, is what we're looking for when we're talking about notability. Writ Keeper⚇♔ 21:36, 14 November 2012 (UTC)
Thank you, this is helpful. The primary audience so far has been K-12 education. High school teachers or kids do not write many papers. But there already are scientists who use NCLab for research. We will ask them to cite the project as a resource (which they should do automatically) or even write a paper about it. This will take some time though. Would you be willing to consider a simple informative page about the project that would mention the existing references, even though they do not include a journal publication yet? PavelSolin (talk) 23:03, 14 November 2012 (UTC)
Comment from another talk page stalker: the chorus of people begging for this page back say things like
"it gives teachers a point of reference when looking at my projects"
"I was able to point my students to this page when introducing them to NCLab. It saved me so much time, and students... were able to read about other details of this system on their own."
"it also contained valuable and helpful information, which facilitated using NCLab as a tool in classes on numerical methods."
"I use the article about NCLab at Wikipedia as a reference for my students."
This suggests that they want Wikipedia to host something like a system reference guide, but that is not what an encyclopedia is here to provide, and any article acceptable to Wikipedia would not serve that purpose. The place for that is the website of the system itself - why is this NCLab website not the place for the system description you can point your students to?
We often have a similar argument with people who want their companies' articles to list all the company's products and services. If an article is written to be useful to the customer (or in this case the student) it is at the wrong level for a general encyclopedia. JohnCD (talk) 23:22, 14 November 2012 (UTC)
The primary audience of Boys' Life is teenage boys, who do not write papers. Sesame Street target audience is preschoolers who do not write papers. BUT they stiil are covered by many reliable third party sources. -- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom 23:20, 14 November 2012 (UTC)
Hi, I feel that the nature of the arguments is changing. Some the rhetoric that is used on this talk page now could be used against any software project at Wikipedia. All of them list their features. Some even have the photos of their authors. Some contain lots of computer code -- is this how a project should be presented to general public? Many of the pages only reference themselves. The way NCLab was presented was the result of an attempt to present the project in the best possible way. Overdone, accepted. But I think that the language could be fixed or the page could be rewritten by someone else, and still this could be an over-average software project page. Instead the page was just killed, within hours, without warning. And after being removed for promotional language, the argument against its restoration was changed to notability. The user base of NCLab is growing so it can be expected that there will be publications in reliable third party sources. In the early stage of this discussion, Mr. Watson said that if there is an attempt to restore the page, it will be marked for deletion right away. Please measure all software project pages with the same meter. Thank you for any consideration, PavelSolin (talk) 03:39, 15 November 2012 (UTC)
"We will ask them to cite the project as a resource (which they should do automatically) or even write a paper about it. This will take some time though." Do you mean you will try to get papers written about it for the purpose of making the subject seem more notable than it really is, so that you can use that as a justification for having a Wikipedia article on it?
I wonder how many people would think that a paper written specifically for the purpose of making a subject appear notable so that it could be included in Wikipedia was a reliable independent source. My experience is that in the past, when people have done things like creating web pages about a subject just so they can cite their own web pages as sources in Wikipedia, those web pages have had about zero plausibility in the Wikipedia community.
Other unsuitable articles on software exist, yes. So did this one for 10 months, until D.Lazard spotted it and nominated it for deletion. If you know of other specific articles that do not comply with Wikipedia policies, then please take appropriate action, i.e. editing them to make them comply if possible, or nominating them for deletion if they have no reasonable chance of being made to comply. The fact that some bad articles exist does not justify the existence of other bad articles. JamesBWatson (talk) 08:55, 15 November 2012 (UTC)
Done JamesBWatson (talk) 13:20, 4 November 2012 (UTC)
