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Archive 5←Archive 9Archive 10Archive 11Archive 12Archive 13→Archive 15

Attention needed

Adrian Albert looks legitimately notable, but the article is so poorly written and technical it.s really hard to tell. Note also the creator is a strongly suspected sockpuppet. Circeus 16:39, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

Help wanted at WP:LGBT

WP:LGBT has started a drive to cross-reference our LGBT lists with all the people categorised as LGBT on Wikipedia with reliable sources. We have a list of the great unlisted here, and we'd quite like your help! Just committing to adding one person a day to our lists would be great. Please help us out if you can. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 17:20, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

WP Munich People Task Force

I'm looking for some members to work on a task force for WikiProject Munich which would be all about biographies related to people born in Munich Kingjeff 05:02, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

Let me carefully explain:

  • Inter-wiki links are links from one wiki to another. This is things like v:Philosophy linking to Wikiversity's Philosophy page.
  • Intra-wiki links are the ones within a wiki, like Calvinism or Wikipedia:WikiProject Calvinism, linking to pages locally stored on Wikipedia

If you're wondering why I'm going on about this, it's because the 11-step section uses this term incorrectly, and links to an article that describes inter-wiki links, when you're talking about intra-wiki links.

My suggestion would be to link intra-wiki links (which doesn't have a page) to the appropriate part of the manual.

-- TimNelson 12:30, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

New workgroups: new template parameters & help needed

We have two new workgroups, Wikipedia:WikiProject Peerage and Wikipedia:WikiProject Baronetcies. Baronetcies is a child project of Peerage which is a child project of Biography.

I've updated our template with two new parameters to support these workgroups:

  • peerage-work-group=yes
  • baronets-work-group=yes

(with some tweaks to follow). I've also written a script to create assessment categories, which I used to set their categories up. I'll also be adding code to support the new params to my plugin, and doing a bot run.

So... since that's a lot of work, I'd be grateful if somebody else (who know's what they're doing) could:

  • Add the WP Bio navigation templates and other information to the pages of the 2 new projects, like already at WP:BROY and WP:MUSICIANS
  • Add the new workgroups to the navigation templates
  • Ensure that the workgroups' infrastructure is properly categorised within WikiProject Biography.

Thanks. --kingboyk 23:07, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

Anyone? I can't do everything myself! --kingboyk 12:06, 4 April 2007 (UTC)

WP:LGBT still needs help.

We still have a list of people categorized as LGBT whose articles need to be checked for reliable sourcing. We've done 128 so far, and could do with more help! This effort is necessary and urgent, to comply with Wikipedia's policy on living persons. Please take a few moments to source one article; if you've got time, do another. Dev920 (Have a nice day!) 22:23, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

Michael Phelps

There's an issue on this page over a DUI incident and whether it is given undue weight in the article and even if it should be included at all. Can someone provide their input. MahangaTalk 23:31, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

Malcolm Sargent

User:Tim riley, I and others have put together a rather thoroughly researched article on Sir Malcolm Sargent. Both Tim and I are somewhat technologically challenged, but the text is all there. I suspect it would be easy to get this article up to GA or even FA status if anyone wants to help with images, etc. Best regards, -- Ssilvers 15:18, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

WikiProject Actors and Filmmakers

Wikipedia:WikiProject Actors and Filmmakers has been established out of council consensus. Please help setting up the film section to the biography template and project components, - reorded Arts and Entertainment etc. Thanks ♦ Sir Blofeld ♦ "Expecting you" Contribs 16:49, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

Two questions

I am editing a biography article, Amir-Abbas Fakhravar and I have two questions.

  1. Although I have found plenty of information from secondary sources regarding parts of his life, I have relied heavily on his own biography from his website for his background/family/university life. I just wanted to double check that this is OK?
  2. I couldn't find any guidelines for which headings/sub headings are generally good to have in a biographical article. Are the ones I have used any good?

Cheers, --Rayis 17:25, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

Ian MacAlister Stewart

I am trying to find out the date of death for this very little known person, if any body on this task force can help i would appreciate it. Thanks. Article is Ian MacAlister Stewart. Tristan benedict 20:23, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

Daniel Dumile

There is a problem at the Daniel Dumile page. Some users want to add several links that, although relevant, deserve to be on their respective pages (Namely links relating to Madvillian, DANGERDOOM, and Daniel Dumile discography). I have argued that yes, I do know they are related to the subject matter, but I have also argued they belong on their pages. The external links section on the Daniel Dumile article is becoming a farm. Also, what is the consensus on using commercial websites, such as MySpace.com, in the external links section? CanbekEsen 19:11, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

This article is about Daniel Dumile as a whole, not just as MF DOOM, it does a great job of showing the fact that he has many Aliases, and i believe links to his Official sites related to his many Aliases are appropriate for the page. 7 links is not a farm at all, and his myspace sites are basicly his official sites. Why are you throwing such a fuss about 7 links, all to related, official, sites about him?— Preceding unsigned comment added by ArrowRoot (talk • contribs)

James I of England FAR

James I of England has been nominated for a featured article review. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. Please leave your comments and help us to return the article to featured quality. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, articles are moved onto the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Remove" the article from featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. Reviewers' concerns are here. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 03:51, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

Duran Duran FAR

Duran Duran has been nominated for a featured article review. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. Please leave your comments and help us to return the article to featured quality. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, articles are moved onto the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Remove" the article from featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. Reviewers' concerns are here. LuciferMorgan 16:49, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

Relevant category discussion - animals

Have a look at Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2007 April 5#Category:Animal births by year. Some people seem to still think that merging animal birth and death year categories into the human ones is no big deal. I've pointed out that WP:BIO might have different views. Carcharoth 17:48, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

Anyone want to help with the Kid Rock article?

It needs major work: as it has a massive trivia section, and a lot of cluttered unformatted (and in some cases at least: unsourced). I've done some work on it, but it has a while to go. Someday I would like it to be a featured article: as Kid Rock is a great musician that deserves a decent article. RobJ1981 00:41, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

death date and age template

Two users are persisting on adding a "death date and age template" to the FA Nick Drake; which only adds, as far as I can see, the goulish words -died at 26- to the infobox. I've reverted them a few times over the last few weeks, and have engaged in a circular argument on talk. Whats going on here, do I have to submit to this -in my openion- low value template? Ceoil 22:44, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

That would be the "circular argument" where you claimed we were a minority, despite outnumbering you 2:1? And told me to "buzz off" from the page? "Ghoulsih" is your interpretation; since Drake's age at death is already in the body text, your concern would appear to be misplaced. The template not only adds that wording, it adds semantic structure to the data, which can be extracted and used by machines. Andy Mabbett 22:49, 7 April 2007 (UTC)
Two authors turning up within an hour of each other, each espousing fringe viewpoints, do not constitute a majority of wikipedia editors, IMO. Wheather or not your text can be "used by machines", I dislike the words "died at 26" being so prominent and explicit in the article. Can you not appreciate that this is extremely 'unsubtle', and borderline gratuitous. Ceoil 23:06, 7 April 2007 (UTC)
The timing is irrelevant, unless you have a more concrete allegation to make - otherwise please AGF. "Fringe viewpoints" is an unsubstantiated allegation. The words "died at 26" are not placed in the article by the template. It already includes "Drake died from an overdose of antidepressants at the age of 26." [~] and "Died 25 November 1974", and the template appends "(aged 26)" to the latter. And no, I do not agree with your personal interpretation - in fact I find it bizarre.
[~ Actually, it currently says "Nick Drake died...", because you also reverted an unrelated edit of mine. Please fix that ASAP.] Andy Mabbett 23:22, 7 April 2007 (UTC)
I do not understand what you believe to be wrong with the template. It provides easy-to-access information that is concise and does not require a reader to have to compute what the age of death was. I also don't seem to understand how it is "goulish" considering all it says is "age 26", referring to the age he died. There is no "-died at 26-", just a number. I understand that you don't like how other users have contributed to an article you've contributed heavily to, and I thank you for doing such, but a mere template like the "death date and age" cannot devalue the article. It cannot because it is helping the reader in a way I've already stated before. I know many a people who do have trouble with simple arithmetic and I find it very helpful that templates such as these are used. Also, I agree with Andy Mabbett in the fact that his death age is already stated in the lead and adding it to the infobox would only make it much easier for readers to access short information such as tidbits. Now, I wish not to partake in a large argument and would like to see this resolved soon. CanbekEsen 00:52, 8 April 2007 (UTC)
(Came here through the AN/I on this matter) I support the template use. ThuranX 00:17, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

WP BLP Noticeboard

Please forgive me if I'm being dense, but I don't see the Biographies of living persons Noticeboard linked or mentioned on the project page or here on its talk page. Is it here somewhere and I'm just not seeing it? If it isn't, is there a particular reason for that? — Athænara ✉ 03:44, 11 April 2007 (UTC)

Feel free to edit the project page; "this is a wiki" applies here as much as anywhere else. --kingboyk 14:52, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

Requst re infoboxes

Stuff like this is just a little annoying. I've had this a few times now, where an article has been tagged with "infobox required", when birthdates - like here - and death-dates of the person in question are completely unknown, and, in the Millico case, your typical infobox would go on for longer in the viewing window than the actual article does. Is there a way of avoiding this? Cheers, Moreschi Want some help? Ask! 13:41, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

I agree that for very short articles/stubs, an infobox is not required. But, for larger articles, an infobox is a nice summary of the person. Even if the birth and death dates are not known, there is plenty of other information that can be added to the infobox. If the infobox requires those dates, then perhaps the infobox can be modified to make them optional. --Kimontalk 14:20, 12 April 2007 (UTC)
When you (Moreschi) used the edit summary "Infoboxes are loathful", were you citing policy, reflecting consensus, or merely stating a personal opinion? Andy Mabbett 14:32, 12 April 2007 (UTC)
Personal opinion. Did I offend anyone? This discussion might also interest some - my apologies in advance for my rather barbed comment there, which I've already apologised for :( Moreschi Want some help? Ask! 14:36, 12 April 2007 (UTC)
The other thing I dislike with infoboxes is that they're a tad BITEY - a newbie trying to edit is immediately confronted in the edit window with something that's both incomprehensible and uneditable. But again, that's just my POV. Moreschi Want some help? Ask! 14:39, 12 April 2007 (UTC)
My endorsement of Moreschi's views has been put in another section, so I'd like to repeat that his 'personal opinion' is shared by a number of other editors also working in the same general field. - Kleinzach 23:04, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

Proposed wikiproject

I just proposed the following wikiproject Wikipedia:WikiProject Council/Proposals#Recently Deceased Biographies to help those articles about recently deseased people attain the highest quality. Let me know if anyone is interested in this. Remember 14:11, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

I don't know if that would require a project in itself. Perhaps a task-force within Biography project would be more appropriate. --Kimontalk 14:26, 13 April 2007 (UTC)
I posted at the above location saying pretty much the same, although I wouldn't even go as formal as a task force. Just create a subpage of this project and get to work. There's simply no need for more bureacracy. --kingboyk 14:35, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

Bob Dylan - Proposal

I have made a proposal on the page Talk:Bob Dylan to remove Bob Dylan from Category:Converts to Christianity. Please go there to discuss. --Metzenberg 20:53, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

WikiProject banners

Initial post, from Kleinzach, moved by Kingboyk, from prior section to new section here

Greetings from Opera Project where we are working on the biographies of some 400+ opera composers of a variety of nationalities and periods. I would like to broadly endorse everything that Moreschi has said. I believe other members feel similarly.
Specifically would it be possible to stop putting boxes on the talk pages of articles about composers when the Biography Project is not involved in their development? As Moreschi has shown they clutter the pages, and they imply a potential clash of editorial styles. At the Opera Project we have been sensitive to the need for editorial rules for handling polyglot material. We would be unhappy if our work was undone. Best regards and all success to the Biography Project! - Kleinzach 00:02, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

end of initial post which had been moved to this new section

Beginning of response from Kingboyk after moving the above post:

I think from the following post to my talk page you're talking about project banners, not infoboxes. Either way, you've certainly got me confused.

Can I refer you to the discussion atWikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Biography#Requst_re_infoboxes. People at the Opera Project - who have been developing the articles in question - would really prefer not to have the boxes cluttering up the Talk pages. They are also confusing for new editors. - Kleinzach 00:36, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

end of cross post from my talk page. --kingboyk 14:45, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

Should I explain? The comments about infoboxes were comments about infoboxes. The comments about project banners were comments about project banners. Sorry if the two were insufficiently separated typographically. - Kleinzach 22:58, 13 April 2007 (UTC)
That's ok, presumably this new section break has sorted it. --kingboyk 23:05, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

Continuation of response from Kingboyk after moving Kleinzach's initial post:

I'm afraid there is a school of thought which says that as composers is entirely a subset of Biography, you should be sharing our template. That would cut down on the clutter far more than any self-imposed restriction in tagging scope by this project (a restriction which I don't think is going to happen; if an article is within scope we tag it.) See Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Council#Multiple_Banner_discussion where {{Composers}} is mentioned by name.
WRT to the comment "when the Biography Project is not involved in their development", I think that's hard to quantify. This is more of a "meta project" than a traditional WikiProject. We have a lot of members, a very big scope, and lots of people do work which could count as being a contribution to or on behalf of this project without actually signing up. --kingboyk 14:41, 13 April 2007 (UTC)
I am not a member of the Composers Project. I am a member of the Opera Project where we have developed an editorial style and rules for writing pan-European articles on artists and creators, which we hope will be respected by other editors.
I've started 50-odd articles on people. You claim, by implication, that I am a member of the Biography Project. I am not. You write: lots of people do work which could count as being a contribution to or on behalf of this project without actually signing up. This is not so. We don't become members of other projects by default. The simple reality is a large amount of the work on WP is done outside the projects.
Your Kingbotk is trawling through far more pages than the Biography Project can ever hope to look after. It's a bit like a mad cat marking off territory far beyond its local neighbourhood. It would be much better if it were used selectively. What do other members of the Biography Project think? Is the bot of any practical value? Is it just an annoyance? Best regards as ever. - Kleinzach 00:40, 14 April 2007 (UTC)
I was asked to tag dead people categories by other member(s) after the last assessment drive (which assessed 30,000 articles, a sign of this project's ability). You're going to have to use a WikiProject shell template, apply to share our template for the biographies part of your project's scope, or find some other solution. We tag all biographies, by common consensus. (Over 200,000 tagged now, and barely a complaint). In the meantime please see WP:OWN.
Also, please don't drag this on by trying to now make my bot to be the villain or some other new tactic. I've stated this project's position, knowing now that we tag every Bio article we find, let's try to find a solution or compromise instead of trying to get us to change that. If we did it for your project, we'd have to do it for every project. Current consensus is that it's the other way round: small projects should be template sharing with large. --kingboyk 11:25, 14 April 2007 (UTC)
Since this Project has made it's position clear (we claim scope over every biography), you might want to contribute to ongoing discussion at Wikipedia:WikiProject Council and Wikipedia:WikiProject reform. Thanks. --kingboyk 11:53, 14 April 2007 (UTC)
Kingboyk, might part of the problem be a misunderstanding of the intention of WPBio in tagging all of the biography articles? - please see the new section I created below. I think, if we slowed down and tried to clarify the real concerns of the participants in the discussion, we might find that we had more common ground than it appears at first sight, and may be able to resolve some apparent conflicts of opinion. Thanks, Lini 12:00, 14 April 2007 (UTC)
Yes indeed, I fully agree with you and thank you very much for your input (see below). --kingboyk 12:01, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

Restructuring of order of entries, and some indenting, without change of content, for the sake of clarity in following the flow of the above discussion, done by Lini 10:45, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

interlanguage opening

I've come across some articles that use templates for the standardization of putting native spellings of peoples' names in the opening sentence of the Bio. For example, Satoru Iwata uses {{nihongo}}, which automatically formats the various ways the name is displayed. Is there a centralized location to find information about doing this correctly, as well as somewhere to find further appropriate templates for other languages? — pd_THOR | =/\= | 15:53, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

There was a discussion a couple weeks back about adding the "nested" option to {{WPBiography}}. At that time, the need to pull the BLP banner out of the template was (rightly) expressed. I've had another go at working the {{WikiProjectBannerShell}} and would like y'all to take a look: Wikipedia talk:Sandbox/blp1. Let me know if there are any questions or concerns. If it meets with the project's approval, I can make the changes to WPBS and would like y'all to make changes to WPBiography. Thanks! -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 19:54, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

Impressive piece of work, so you have my lukewarm support. The reasons for not-full support are 1) that my bot (and an assistant) are actively tagging at the moment, and bot support for the two competing WP banner container templates isn't currently implemented (I'd hope it will be in the AWB library at some point, but we have plenty else to do first), 2) I can't fully support anything which hides our template :)
Seriously, though, I wouldn't be too unhappy to see that implemented and certainly admire your work. --kingboyk 20:02, 9 April 2007 (UTC)
On second thoughts, having seen an increased number of {{WikiProject Banners}} templates out in the wild, I support. This is far preferable. I think you can go ahead and add the code as I doubt anybody will object since the BLP and activepol banners aren't getting hidden and our template isn't being deprecated in any way. --kingboyk 22:13, 11 April 2007 (UTC)
I like too. Nice work! Carcharoth 04:30, 10 April 2007 (UTC)
I was thinking I'd wait a few days to see if there were more comments. But I've made the changes necessary to the WPBS, so if an admin wants to change the WPBiography template, they can do so with this diff. The current version of Wikipedia:Sandbox/blp2 is an exact copy of WPBiography with the diff made, so it can be copy/pasted into place. Thanks :) -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 01:17, 12 April 2007 (UTC)
Doesn't seem to work: User:Kingboyk/Sandbox, User talk:Kingboyk/Sandbox. Could you apply the code changes to the current version of {{WPBiography}}, and drop the working changes into my sandbox please? I'll then run another test and commit the changes if successful. --kingboyk 14:58, 12 April 2007 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Sandbox/blp2 is a copy of the current (2007-04-14 20:51 Eastern) template with the nested changes. Let me know if that works okay or not. -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 00:59, 15 April 2007 (UTC)
No, it doesn't. Please see my sandbox! I don't think it's too much to ask that you test it with some of our template parameters before submitting! :) --kingboyk 13:04, 15 April 2007 (UTC)
Ah it kinda works if I use Wikipedia:Sandbox/blp1 |blp=yes|activepol=yes, but 1) needs-photo=yes seems to be broken, 2) it's not as clever as I thought as it obviously needs blp and activepol parameters to the Shell template. Is there no way, perhaps using divs, to keep this functionality solely in WPBiography? --kingboyk 13:48, 15 April 2007 (UTC)
Ahhhh - I see. None of the other projects have tried to hide the extra boxes - Film, for instance, required that theirs not be hidden. Hmm - are you sure you want to hide them? And yeh, BLP and ActivePol actually have to have those parameters in the WikiProjectBannerShell to work properly and keep those boxes outside the box. That's the only way I could do that, and is one reason this has been such a difficult process :) -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 14:25, 15 April 2007 (UTC)
"Hmm - are you sure you want to hide them?" Pass? :) If that's the way the other WikiProjects are doing it, then fine. I didn't realise that, I thought that everything got hidden. One other thing, is nested=yes actually needed? Removing it doesn't seem to make any difference :/ User talk:Kingboyk/Sandbox
Anyway, I think it's ready for pasting in now. I'll just check for any replies then do it. --kingboyk 14:28, 15 April 2007 (UTC)

Core project

What happened to the core project? I posted a note at the talk page with no response yet. Carcharoth 14:55, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

Dunno. They've identified their 200 core articles, maybe they're all on holiday now :) Perhaps try contacting some of the previously active members individually? --kingboyk 15:07, 13 April 2007 (UTC)
Are there any "contact" people for the various entities of this project? If not, maybe having one designated for each group would be effective. Or maybe some sort of set-up like Military history has, with designated "officials" of some sort. John Carter 16:07, 13 April 2007 (UTC)
One was proposed at Wikipedia:WikiProject Biography/Coordination Council but is marked as historical. I personally think we do OK without official co-ordinators, but if you wish to revive the proposal please feel free! --kingboyk 16:16, 13 April 2007 (UTC)
By the way, with regards to the core project or any other part of the project (or Wikipedia), if folk are absent but you find work to be done (as you definitely have in this case), take over! You may yet be our first project coordinator, who knows? Cometh the hour, and all that.
Seriously, please don't let the apparent fact that nobody's home dissuade you from working on core articles. Just gather some new people and you have a new core bios team. I note, btw, that a post just went to that page saying that one of the core bios is an FA candidate now, so there's something else to work on! :) --kingboyk 17:30, 14 April 2007 (UTC)
Another possibility, if you feel that the core bios page should be left alone as merely a holding place for the 200 core list, is to create a sub page such as Wikipedia:WikiProject Biography/Core biographies/Article improvement drive. I certainly think it would be a wonderful idea to give those articles priority attention; indeed, the goal ought to be 200 FAs! --kingboyk 18:58, 14 April 2007 (UTC)
I might go a bit more slowly than that! I make no promises. Anyone should be bold and carry out the above suggestions. Sadly, I'm rarely organised enough (yet) to do stuff like that, though I like to prod other people sometimes... Carcharoth 12:42, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

Relationship between WPBio and WPOpera / WPComposers

The relationship between the Biography Wikiproject and the Opera and Composers Wikiprojects need not be seen as an adversarial one. All three of these are active, vital, well-thought-out projects, with clear scope. I have a high degree of respect for each of them.

Please understand that the intention of WPBio is not, at the "metaproject" level, to support every one of the hundreds of thousands of biography articles, nor to dictate style of every biography article. My understanding is that the intention is for WPBio to be broken out into work groups that would be able to focus in on reasonably-sized subsets of related biography articles. There currently exists an Arts and entertainment workgroup, with child workgroups Actors and Filmmakers, and Musicians.

I think that both WPBio and WPComposers / WPOpera would benefit by the establishment of a Composers and/or Opera working group associated with WPBio (consisting of current members of WPComposers and/or WPOpera). The valuable work that has been done at WPOpera, for example, in developing "an editorial style and rules for writing pan-European articles on artists and creators" (to quote user Kleinzach, as he captures the essence better than I could in my own words :), could serve as a model for other Biography working groups.

The association with WPBio as a working group would facilitate bringing WPComposers and WPOpera members into centralized discussions regarding issues such as the usage of InfoBoxes, Project Banners, and bots to automate the tagging of articles. The Biography metaproject is a valuable forum and agent for addressing issues of quality and protocol that are common, across the board, to all biography articles, such as the use of the "Biography of Living People" template.

Each of the projects, WPBio, WPComposers, and WPOpera have the same objectives: improved quality of articles, collaboration of editors with similar interests, and development of guidelines to address the unique issues that arise with different subsets of articles. I'd be excited to see an association that would work together toward the mutual goals. --Lini 11:50, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

Agree. (But could you put some paragraph breaks into the above to make it easier to read please? :)) --kingboyk 11:55, 14 April 2007 (UTC)
Done --Lini 12:03, 14 April 2007 (UTC)
I'd like to add a few thoughts to Lini's constructive comments. The Opera Project is currently developing a few thousand articles in a fairly obscure little corner of WP. We, like other projects, would like to get on with the job. In our case this mean working out how to present a large amount of foriegn language derived information in English, much of it historical, in ways that are clear but not anachronistic. We respect the work of other projects such as the Biography Project and would not wish to interfere with their work.
At the moment your bot - and some other ones - are depositing prominent banner boxes on talk pages. These detract from the purpose of the Talk pages which are for discussion. The boxes duplicate each other and use up a lot of space. Nobody I have spoken to likes them. They are regarded as a nuisance. (As you know, there is also strong criticism of the 'potted biography' infobooks now appearing on the main article pages - as discussed by the Composers Project).
I hope we can cooperate amicably in the future with the Biography Project on matters of style, presentation etc. This would be facilitated by switching off the bot and not trawling through all our pages leaving territorial markers of no practical value.
I trust this is helpful. Best regard to all. - Kleinzach 14:28, 14 April 2007 (UTC)
You're starting to sound like a broken record. Lini was proposing working together. You're still saying we should abandon our templating. Unless there is a sea change in consensus - which one person from a small WikiProject does not represent - we won't. End of.
No practical value to our template?! I take it you don't want your project's articles to appear in print and DVD versions of Wikipedia then? {{WikiProject Opera}} has no assessment scheme in place. Perhaps I should nominate {{WikiProject Opera}} for deletion as a "nuisance" and a "detraction from the purpose of the Talk page"?
{{WPBiography}} is one of the most useful templates on Wikipedia. It deals with assessments, the living persons biography warning (official policy), the active politicians warning, photo needed, infobox needed, and other infrastructure for multiple workgroups. {{WikiProject Opera}} on the other hand is merely an advertisement.
I suggest you go away and read and contribute to the WikiProject Council, WikiProject Reform, and Wikipedia 1.0 Assessments, since you're not going to convince us to abandon our template.
If on the other hand you want to work together by having a workgroup of WPBiography which is also a child project of WPOpera (like the new WikiProject Actors and Filmmakers) I'm sure we'd be only too happy to oblige and cooperate. --kingboyk 14:39, 14 April 2007 (UTC)
We use Opera Project banners, on articles we create and develop, to direct other editors to our project page so they can discuss general matters etc. and to encourage them to take part in our work.
The Opera Project has indeed no assessment scheme although we have looked at ones and continue to do so. We have yet to find a satisfactory model. We don't want one that leads to clutter, dumbing down of articles and inappropriate content, or distracts from the main business of developing good content.
BTW I have just discovered you have deleted the bona fide comment I made on User:Kingbotk/Plugin about having an opt out feature. This makes progress towards any sensible resolution of the bot problem rather difficult, does it not? I wonder if my comments will be deleted here as well? - Kleinzach 15:31, 14 April 2007 (UTC)
Not here, no, but unless you want to hire me as a consultant I'm under no obligation to code at your request! I've already said I'm not going to be having an exclusion list from the WPBiography template; you don't own talk pages and you can't prevent us from placing our tags on them. (The wider community most certainly can, but hasn't expressed any desire to do so. Given that my bot alone has tagged over 200,000 times and I get nary a complaint is testimony to that).
I've made these points umpteem times and I'm not making them again.
If you want to talk to us about a cooperative subproject, that is fantastic. If you don't, please take your complaints elsewhere, probably Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Council. --kingboyk 15:38, 14 April 2007 (UTC)
Regarding cooperation: this must be mutual. If is not, and one side is simply dictating to the other, then it won't work. - Kleinzach 00:21, 15 April 2007 (UTC)
That's not how we operate. Go ask WP Musicians or WP Peerage if they're happy with the service they got from WP Bio, and if they've been treated heavy handedly. You might be pleasantly surprised :) All we do is give them some infrastructure, and they get on with the business of writing articles and running their wikiprojects. --kingboyk 00:25, 15 April 2007 (UTC)
It seems to me that the above question for an "exclusion" function would run directly contrary to WP:OWN. Why on earth should wikipedia policy be violated for the sake of any single group? And to claim that such violation of wikipedia policy is the only way to reach a "sensible resolution" is probably the most nonsensical thing I've seen anywhere in wikipedia, barring blatant vandalism. John Carter 18:34, 14 April 2007 (UTC)
To User:Warlordjohncarter: It is not against WP policy to suggest ways of safeguarding the quality of articles from automated bot action. Articles written about music and opera are open to normal editing by normal editors as usual. We encourage writers. If you want to contribute to content about music and opera you will be most welcome. Best regards etc. - Kleinzach 00:21, 15 April 2007 (UTC)

If I may. Rather than discussing whether to work together, which is getting a bit adversarial, just try working together. You might be pleasantly surprised. Join each other's projects, read up on things, contribute to discussions. Don't argue, but try and come up with productive suggestions. I too have been dismayed sometimes to see colonisation of an article talk page by banners from many wikiprojects, many of whom will take forever to actually do anything (if at all), but in this case WP:BIO is clearly just tagging biographical articles. The actual editing can, with a clear conscience, be left to the Composers and Opera projects. They are producing good stuff. Carcharoth 12:46, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

Generally agreed with Carcaroth above. But the question that still remains is what purpose is served by "safeguarding" articles from action of people who are not members of a given project, which does at least suggest the idea of exclusive input from members of that project. Personally, the tagging I have been doing is primarily to ensure that the articles are assessed, so that the 1.0 Editorial Team (to which I belong) will know what state of development a given article is at, and, at least potentially, maybe try to bring some effort to bear for the improvement of the more important articles by the greater community. That is the primary purpose of the assessments, after all, to help make the articles chosen for the various release editions as good as possible. John Carter 14:50, 16 April 2007 (UTC)
Yes indeed. There's more on that issue at User_talk:Martinp23#MartinBotII_problems, a thread I would like to move here for transparency if participants agree. --kingboyk 14:55, 16 April 2007 (UTC)
In response to the comment on that page regarding photos, I have repeatedly added that particular function to articles regarding saints, many or most of whom existed before photography. While I would personally love to see a photograph of Mary (mother of Jesus), John the Baptist, or Paul of Tarsus, I thought it was easily understood that a photo of a portrait or anything else with an image of the subject in question was considered sufficient to add a bit of "color" to the page as requested by that particular template. John Carter 15:35, 16 April 2007 (UTC)
Indeed. We might consider adding a needs-image=yes or image-requested=yes, to make that more obvious though? --kingboyk 15:53, 16 April 2007 (UTC)
Don't know how such things are done, but that might clarify things for some people. John Carter 16:11, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

Recently Deceased template

Because articles of recently deceased people often attract attention, it may help if such articles are marked. Inspired by the concept of Wikipedia:WikiProject Council/Proposals#Recently Deceased Biographies, I suggest creation of a template for marking articles about recently deceased people. The template probably should require a parameter for the date of editing. The date of addition of a death report should be used, not the date of death. The template should be removed after a specified period of time. (SEWilco 04:55, 15 April 2007 (UTC))

See {{recent death}}. --PhantomS 05:37, 15 April 2007 (UTC)

WP:SPOTLIGHT work on John Gow

Howdy folks, we put the spotlight on the stub John Gow. Its now a fully fledged article. You guys can check out our changes at this link. If you want to join our efforts, just hop into #wikipedia-spotlight on the irc.freenode.net network. If you need any help with this just ask me. —— Eagle101 Need help? 00:41, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

I was in the process of adding the name David Sutton to the list of recepients of the Benson Medal, and I noticed that the current article under that name is referenced in several articles, few if any of which refer to the same man. Had I more time, I could have cleaned this up in the usual way. In lieu of such work, I resorted to the following clumsy preface:

This is about the editor and author; David Sutton is also the name of an archivist, a theatre owner, a photographer, and a tenor, among others

It would have beeen convenient (and more graceful) to be able to mark a biography as needing disambiguation via a standard cleanup template. 68.165.77.189 23:08, 11 April 2007 (UTC).

It was messy so I started the disambiguation page. Note the tenor already had an entry under (singer). (Emperor 15:43, 17 April 2007 (UTC))

Wikipedia:Article development

A new editor has come to ask me about a biography he wrote which has been deleted. The article was, honestly, quite bad, although I imagine the subject might just pass on notability if he were written about "properly". I've tried to help him as best I can, but I was a bit troubled to discover that we don't have an article on "how to write a good biography" (or that, if we have one, it's not easily found). I'd like to help this new editor as best I can, but short of writing the bio myself the best thing is to send him to a clear and concise guide. So, if we have one, could somebody please direct me to it; if we don't have one, is anybody interested in making a start? --kingboyk 18:46, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

On the project page that goes with this talk page, there are the "WikiProject Biography 11 easy steps to producing at least a B article" - I'm not sure if this is the kind of thing you were talking about? --Lini 19:40, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

Kind of, but I thought it was a bit "fluffy", you know what I mean? I was looking for something a bit more substantial. Thanks for the reply tho! --kingboyk 19:47, 14 April 2007 (UTC)
I tried the "11 easy steps" once. They aren't that easy really! I agree, a written version of that might be more user friendly to some. Carcharoth 12:18, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

A-class reviews

In anticipation of setting up a review department for A-class articles, I have been reassessing current A-class articles for some time now. Look here and here for plans, proposed criteria, and a large list of downgraded A-class articles. Errabee 10:30, 17 April 2007 (UTC)

I'm happy to see that the project decides to adopt A-Class review. I strongly support such a decision, and I declare from now that I'll be a dedicated reviewer! Maybe instead of downgrading A-Class articles, you should leave them as they are, and review them first of all, before new nominations, after the A-Class review is set. In this way, the downgrading will be an official review decision.--Yannismarou 11:39, 17 April 2007 (UTC)
Not sure I'm really qualified to be of much assistance here, but will be willing to help out if such is requested. John Carter 14:31, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

Uma Thurman FAR

Uma Thurman has been nominated for a featured article review. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. Please leave your comments and help us to return the article to featured quality. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, articles are moved onto the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Remove" the article from featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. Reviewers' concerns are here. LuciferMorgan 19:28, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

Lindsay Lohan FAR

Lindsay Lohan has been nominated for a featured article review. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. Please leave your comments and help us to return the article to featured quality. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, articles are moved onto the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Remove" the article from featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. Reviewers' concerns are here. LuciferMorgan 19:35, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

Starting a work-group?

There is some interest in starting an Opera work-group. The scope would be opera-related biography articles (including composers, directors, librettists, managers, singers, etc.) At least one other editor and myself are willing to represent the working group; there is also a very active Opera project that would be able to utilize the Opera working-group category listings, to facilitate the efforts they are already making toward the quality of biography articles falling under the scope of WPOpera. What would need to be done next to get the work-group started? Thanks, Lini 10:42, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

There's no formal process. Generally if another WikiProject wishes to work with us, we discuss it here or on the template talk page, and then, when there's agreement, somebody (usually me, alas) adds the new group to the template.
I think I'd like to know that WP Opera is serious about this before spending time on it, as at least one member seems to continue in a belief that this project is a spawn of the devil. We should also discuss how you want the project set up and how it will operate (in general terms, just an idea of how it will work).
Beyond that, if there's no objections or problems, I or whoever is coding the template, will need to know proposed wording, proposed image, etc., just the practical issues for adding the group to the template. --kingboyk 12:30, 18 April 2007 (UTC)
One of the disputed areas seems to be assessments. It might be worth discussing how WP Opera view the grade bands initially set up (I think) by the Editorial Team for Version 1.0 (or whatever it is called). ie. the stub/start/B/GA/A/FA bands. And then see if they are willing to assess their articles. Though obviously groups can work together to improve articles without any need for implementing any assessment strucutre. Carcharoth 13:41, 18 April 2007 (UTC)
Thanks, Kingboyk, for your answer, and you are correct that there is not yet agreement that people from WP Opera would want to go ahead with this. We will get back to you if and when that happens. And thank you, Carcharoth, for the relevant info about views on assessment scales. Cheers, Lini 10:12, 19 April 2007 (UTC)

hCard microformats in infoboxes

A number of biography-related infoboxes now produce an hCard microformat. Please feel free to add the necessary mark-up to more. (Cheifly, that's class="vcard" on the whole infobox and "class="fn" on the pagename or name field.) Note that the date of birth is only included if {{Birth date}} or {{Birth date and age}} is used. Andy Mabbett 17:08, 19 April 2007 (UTC)

A-class review department set up

The A-class review department is up and running. All we need now is a couple of dedicated reviewers. Errabee 12:39, 20 April 2007 (UTC)

It would probably be worthwhile sending out a new project newsletter with this news (and other news, such as assessment drive, bot tagging, new film workgroup, etc etc) --kingboyk 12:54, 20 April 2007 (UTC)
Good idea! Unfortunately, Mocko13 has been MIA for more than a month now. I'll make a start with the newsletter, but I'm unfamiliar with delivery options and could use some help with the other subjects. Errabee 13:03, 20 April 2007 (UTC)
It's looking really good already! (Wikipedia:WikiProject Biography/Outreach/April 2007 Newsletter). I'll try and chip in I have time, but not tonight as I'm working on some major internal changes to AWB and it won't compile until I'm done! --kingboyk 21:23, 20 April 2007 (UTC)
I've found the FA list in the logs, and added that - perhaps it could be noted that BROY work group managed 3 FA's in March, centrally through the work of User:DrKiernan, and are continuing in the same vein with Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/George V of the United Kingdom? RHB Talk - Edits 00:16, 21 April 2007 (UTC)
Yes please! --kingboyk 11:00, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

I'm happy to deliver it with AWB if no-one else wants to? RHB Talk - Edits 21:19, 20 April 2007 (UTC)

That would be great, thank you! Errabee 08:42, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

Questions

I note the main project page still mentions the February assessment drive toward the top of the page. I don't want to fiddle with the subpage because I might screw something up, but it probably should be removed. Also, as a potential follow-up to it, has there ever been any sort of organized effort to try to indicate that any of the articles fall within the scope of the various work groups, and indicate such on the banner? I would think that might be a useful follow-up. John Carter 20:59, 21 April 2007 (UTC)

I've rworded it a bit, so the link is still there, but it doesn't invite people to sign up anymore. Errabee 21:34, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

WikiProject Biography 11 easy steps to producing at least a B article

Step 8 gives the "ONLY" two choices. There is a third - to write an article for the red link. Tyrenius 07:26, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

Good point. Edited accordingly. -GTBacchus(talk) 07:43, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

Unreferenced BLPs

There are over 16,000 articles on living people on Wikipedia that do not cite all of their sources; see User:Messedrocker/Unreferenced BLPs. —Signed, your friendly neighborhood MessedRocker. 16:58, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

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