Perpetually Yours Taking just a bit of aW i k i b r e a Kfor an undecided period of time – I'll check in once in awhile – provided I don't drop out the west end of an eastbound tiger!
Best of everything to you and yours! and... Spread the Good!
Thank you for your contributions to Wikipedia – its articles, redirects, templates – all your improvements, and have a prosperous, productive and enjoyable life – both on and off Jimbo's amazing reference work!
Gentle reminder... this is my talk page, where you and I may get to know each other better. Thank you for coming here, and thanks beyond words for your interest in and your contributions to this encyclopedia project! Offline and other online interests sometimes keep me very busy, and that's when I'm slow to respond to echo noties, my talk page and emails. Do me a favor, please forgive me, and again, thank you for being here!Paine Ellsworth
I am not an administrator on Wikipedia. I very much respect admins and have been helped by them many, many times over the years. I also respect the community vettings at RfA that often show the ultimate community respect and trust of an editor.
I shall likely remain a non-admin doing the best I can to enjoy discussions with other editors. I sometimes participate, sometimes help with disagreements and sometimes close discussions when needed. I am no stranger to closing contentious discussions about controversial subjects. I sometimes close the easy talks, too, because if it's in the backlog, then it's fair game!
Remember that WP is not a democracy, so discussions are not just a vote. The key factors in all good discussion closures are the arguments written by concerned editors, policy-based rationales, which count most toward an acceptable decision and closure.
Anyway, if you have come to ask about one of my RfC, RM, MRV or other discussion closures, you are very welcome here! I am usually inclined to reopen a discussion if the outcome was "no consensus" and when I amspecificallyandintentionallyasked to do so! (Not so much if I found a consensus – that doesn't mean I cannot be persuaded with a good, sound argument.) Please be very clear about your intentions and do not beat around the bush. That just means please don't expect me to read your mind; I have enough trouble reading my own mind sometimes. Thank you beyond words for your deeply respected concerns! – Paine
Editing WP helps me to continue learning, so one vital, very important role for Wikipedia and some other websites on the Internet is...
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The following are closed discussions. Please do not modify them. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section. ⸎
Local administrators can now add new links to the bottom of the site Tools menu without using JavaScript. Documentation is available on MediaWiki. (T6086)
To editor Marksaeed2024: I didn't protect that page, because I do not have the tools to make page-protection changes – as a page mover, I can only transfer existing protection when I move a page. Administrators (admins) have the necessary tools. You can make a request at WP:Protection requests to lower the protection level, and then see if an admin will approve it. Thank you for coming to my talk page, and hope this helps. P.I. Ellsworth , ed.put'er there22:03, 19 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Hello. On 21 July, you closed the Requested Move of 13 July 2024 Al-Mawasi airstrikes as Moved to 13 July 2024 al-Mawasi attack. However, besides the nominator, there was only one vote supporting the move and the reasoning for it was not based on policies or guidelines. So, your close is premature and the discussion should have been relisted since the discussion only went on for one week with very few participants. Please revert your close and relist the discussion. StellarHalo (talk) 02:27, 2 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
To editor StellarHalo: thank you very much for coming to my talk page! I don't mind doing this work for you – moving the page back, reopening and relisting the move request – but then what? Even if you were to oppose the page move, another editor can come along, close the request, and move the page anytime after relisting if they see a consensus. So unless you intend to oppose with a strong, policy-based argument, the page will be moved anyway. The move request went a little longer than the seven days minimum required. There were two supports, the nominator counts as one support and another editor also supported. There was no firm opposition. One other editor just made a suggestion as to the use of "massacre" instead of "airstrikes" or "attack", but did not support nor oppose anything else. On Wikipedia, that is consensus. The only way this should be reopened and relisted is if you can write a strong, policy-based opposition argument. What would that be? P.I. Ellsworth , ed.put'er there09:25, 2 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I would not have asked you to reopen and relist this if I have no intention of contesting the RM myself. I will oppose the move with a strong argument based on WP:COMMONNAME showing that most English-language RS refer to the subject event as an airstrike. I will also be arguing against any support argument that is just WP:OR. StellarHalo (talk) 22:14, 2 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Users wishing to permanently leave may now request "vanishing" via Special:GlobalVanishRequest. Processed requests will result in the user being renamed, their recovery email being removed, and their account being globally locked.
It was a "hidden" discussion. The community should have been pinged. 2 people should not have been enough for the change. At least change it back to the Peasant family until new consensus. There are already now more people that want the flag instead. --Supreme Deliciousness (talk) 04:03, 7 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I agree that more of the community needed to be part of the consensus. The change has already been made to use the flag for now, but I still encourage boosting the discussion in appropriate places to reinforce the longevity of the consensus. Tule-hog (talk) 04:14, 7 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Hi, I've seen you add {{Permanently protected}} to multiple pages with the edit summary "include Permanently protected notifier". Nothing wrong, despite me using MediaWiki:Protectedpagetext instead.
Hi IP 142+, and thank you for coming to my talk page! I've never actually made a bot request in all my years. And I don't come across the need for the template all that often. It applies to all higher forms of protected pages (not just templates) from extended-confirmed-protected on up. If it is put on a semi-protected page's talk page, it just stays invisible. And the text changes for different protections, and so forth. It's really not all that time-consuming. When I find a rare page that needs it, I add it and move on. Like magic! Thanks again, and thank you very much for noticing!P.I. Ellsworth , ed.put'er there13:44, 20 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Ah, understood "needs editorial discretion." Btw, I really like the refreshing rotated exclamation mark, talk header, and editnotices. If there existed a Category:Wikipedians_who_use_rotated_text, I'd be interested and curious about the history. 142.113.140.146 (talk) 15:54, 20 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Well, thank you so much! The exclamation mark is just in italics, as in ''!'', or <em>!</em> – the headers and edit notices are the result of my coming across the rotation code and shamelessly copying it from Alexis Jazz's talk page. So I know nothing of its history, but perhaps AJ knows something? The code for template rotation is:
Edits like this one and this one mess up the record of what the article titles were when the RM was proposed. Can you please stop doing that? When I submitted the RMs, these article titles had a hyphen. I also don't see anything wrong with the original location of the RM at Talk:Charles de Chambrun. The RM instructions describe how to put an RM discussion in a different place than one of the articles proposed to be moved, and I thought hosting it at the dab page would naturally show which article titles needed to be disambiguated from each other. — BarrelProof (talk) 05:38, 23 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
It appears that several people have done similar edits. Maybe there is some reason to do them that I'm not aware of, but I think it confuses the record. — BarrelProof (talk) 06:33, 23 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
To editor BarrelProof: those edits are the result of a move request appearing as a "malformed request". These show up regularly near the bottom of the WP:RM page and are fixed by several editors who, like myself, monitor them. When a multiple move request is made, then the request should be placed on the first article's talk page. If a different page needs to be referenced, such as a dab page, then a link to that page can be made in the nomination statement. Sometimes, to centralize discussion, a move request is placed on for example a WikiProject's talk page. That is the reason for the rare exception noted in the RM instructions. Thank you for coming to my talk page!P.I. Ellsworth , ed.put'er there14:54, 23 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for the reply. I guess I'll put RMs on one of the affected articles in the future. I had thought that putting it on the dab page would be friendly because people would need to consult the dab page anyway in order to understand the motivation for the RM, but that has other downsides as well. In the future, when someone renames an article after I submit an RM, I may revert their move to avoid this "malformed" categorization. I don't like the RM record to misrepresent the status quo ante. I just added comments to the User talk pages of two editors who did that recently to discourage it in the future. — BarrelProof (talk) 16:43, 23 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
To editor BarrelProof: just had a thought... you have probably already considered this. Wouldn't it be better if you were to go ahead and move an article from an incorrect hyphen to a correct endash before you begin an RM? That would solve the problem of editors taking it upon themselves to move the article (against the RM tag which specifically sez to NOT move an article while it's undergoing an RM). I wouldn't make a move like that, but some editors seem to be passionate about fixing the hyphen-to-endash when they see it, which results in your RM becoming malformed, which prompts other editors like me to "fix" your RM. So just curious, would it be against your principles to make the minor move first? Thanks again!P.I. Ellsworth , ed.put'er there10:30, 24 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, it crossed my mind, but I've had a couple of reasons for not wanting to do that in the cases where I think opening an RM is desirable. Leaving it where it is makes the dashed title less of an incumbent and helps show that it needs some kind of change, and I only open RMs when I think a simple change to a dash is not the right approach. There also may be no need for the dashed redirect if it doesn't already exist. Maybe I'm being obstinate and should reconsider, but I'm already done with all titles that contained hyphenated date ranges since 1700 (only a few remaining that currently all have an RM opened), and each century moving backwards has fewer titles like this. — BarrelProof (talk) 17:26, 24 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Okay, I don't have a problem with that, but you might have to continue to put up with those editors who are passionate about correcting the "little things" without looking at talk pages for open formal requests. I've edited the lead of WP:RM to clarify and to support the RM tag that gets placed at the top of the article's page. P.I. Ellsworth , ed.put'er there21:55, 24 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
The latest comments and Polyamorph's relist showed a consensus towards Piecewise function and against my nom target. It's unfair to them to have a procedural close just because I edited my nom to match consensus. There was no P&G wikilink in the close. IPs can't close, and this may look like a improper proxy close on behalf of me.
Well ... the moves weren't malformed until my edits were partially edited. More details are on my talk page. Paine, I know you tend to take the same type of care, so I know you know what I mean there. Steel1943 (talk) 00:21, 25 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
About that reference to your edits being partially edited, please note that some of your edits that you're referring to were edits of someone else's remarks on Talk pages. It's generally considered inappropriate to change the record of what someone else said and when they said it. — BarrelProof (talk) 17:55, 25 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I don't consider changing what needs to be changed to make the procedure and bot work right a WP:TPA violation, and never will. Also, I did not change any remarks; I changed the text before the arrow, which is not a remark, but rather the text that the bot needs to be correct for it to work right ... which needed to be updated after I made the move I made. And all of this has already been explored in thorough detail on my talk page. Yet another late hit in this convo ... I thought we were done here. Steel1943 (talk) 12:51, 26 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for coming to my talk page, editor IP 142+! I have reread your move request and have decided to change it. Please be patient as it will take a little time. Thanks again!P.I. Ellsworth , ed.put'er there23:33, 24 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
You can also chose to selectively revert my RM retargeting on that article and talkpage. This is if you believe it is possible to move to Piecewise function. After all, the evidence that I am 174.92.25.207 is circumstantial.
Following an RfC, there is a new criterion for speedy deletion: C4, which applies to unused maintenance categories, such as empty dated maintenance categories for dates in the past.
The arbitration case Historical Elections is currently open. Proposed decision is expected by 3 September 2024 for this case.
Miscellaneous
Editors can now enter into good article review circles, an alternative for informal quid pro quo arrangements, to have a GAN reviewed in return for reviewing a different editor's nomination.
Hello and welcome to the September newsletter, a quarterly digest of Guild activities since June. Don't forget you can unsubscribe at any time; see below.
Election news: Project coordinators play an important role in our WikiProject. Following the mid-year Election of Coordinators, we welcomed Mox Eden to the coordinator team. Dhtwiki remains as Lead Coordinator, and Miniapolis and Wracking returned as assistant coordinators. If you'd like to help out behind the scenes, please consider taking part in our December election – watchlist our ombox for updates. Information about the role of coordinators can be found here.
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Progress report: As of 05:14, 11 September 2024 (UTC), GOCE copyeditors have processed 233 requests since 1 January, and the backlog of tagged articles stands at 2,824 articles.
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Following a discussion, the speedy deletion reason "File pages without a corresponding file" has been moved from criterion G8 to F2. This does not change what can be speedily deleted.
Hello, Paine Ellsworth. In 2015, you've created template {{R rcat example}} with the edit summary create example rcat for use with Template:This is a redirect/rcat on all rcats. It seems that these plans didn't materialize – there is only one actual but broken transclusion of the template on the page Nxm.
Hi @Andrybak:, it's DB1729, I've been perhaps clumsily dealing with the redirect Nxm at the same time you've been. I wish I had just let you handle it all now but I was not aware you were active. Would you prefer I self-revert my efforts so that what you are doing makes more sense? --DB1729talk11:55, 8 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
DB1729, I don't think any self-reverts are necessary. The speedy deletion of Nxm will or won't go through, and we'll see if MikutoH reacts on their talk page. I've subscribed to the section you've started there.
Thank you both very much for coming to my talk page! Editor Andrybak, I agree that there is little to no use for this template anymore. Just to be on the safe side, I've userfied the template and removed it from template space. Thanks again!P.I. Ellsworth , ed.put'er there01:37, 9 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for taking the time for reviewing this lengthy move request. Now although indeed my original proposal did not garner consensus, I think the middle ground solution of Gaza War (2023-present) that was proposed in the new subsection did indeed garner consensus. Can you please clarify why this middle ground proposal and compromise by most editors was not taken into consideration? Makeandtoss (talk) 12:49, 27 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Okay, editor Makeandtoss, another tough offline job is done, and it's a genuine pleasure to have tackled that interesting move request discussion. Yes, I actually did find a consensus in the Common ground subsection, but not so much for the "Gaza War" with daterange as for making that article the primary topic at the Gaza War title. So one reason I had to consider was that it would require a page move from Gaza War to Gaza War (disambiguation) to make the Gaza War name available. But that page had not been tagged by the RMCD bot. Also I did see a significant opposition to the title with or without dates (about 34%) in that subsection and the opposers had strong arguments. When that happens, I usually stick to the rationales and results of the original move request. When another page is suggested that has not been tagged by the RMCD bot, it usually means that another fresh move request will be needed for the new suggested name. I would still recommend the waiting period in my closing statement, though. Again, thank you so much for your time and trouble!P.I. Ellsworth , ed.put'er there16:17, 27 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Can you elaborate what you mean with the RMCD bot thing, as there has been plenty of move requests that were moved by proposals other than the ones suggested originally? Makeandtoss (talk) 11:39, 29 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Hi, I just posted a request for a re-evaluation to the Israel-Hamas section when I should have come here. Posting it here instead of a new section since I see this section is relevant.
As I pointed out in the above link, there is consensus for a move away from Israel-Hamas. The ones voting against the move incorrectly interpreted data for WP:COMMONNAME and were offered corrections by commenters. From your comments here it does look like you already took that into consideration.
Hi editor CoolAndUniqueUsername and thank you for coming to my talk page about the RM and the closure! I mentioned the RMCD bot because it usually has to tag any page that editors might decide to rename in order to let other editors know of its status. The exceptions are when the suggested name is a red link or a redirect with no substantial editing history.
We will have to "agree to disagree" about the consensus. You see a consensus to move away; however, I see no consensus either to keep the old title or to change it. And that is after spending a large amount of time reading and evaluating the survey of editors. While there is some agreement, overall editors were not able to come to consensus. I made a meticulous and extensive data analysis of the evidence (links) provided by editors to get a good handle on the strength of their arguments and found that they tended to be consistent with a decrease of the "Hamas" part of the common name and a growth of "Gaza"; however, as was noted by many opposers, more time is needed before Gaza, as a term, overtakes Hamas. I have reevaluated the move request and have come to the same conclusion as before based upon my research. Thanks again for coming!P.I. Ellsworth , ed.put'er there15:53, 29 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Estar8806 has given you a cookie! Cookies promote WikiLove and hopefully this one has made your day better. You can spread the WikiLove by giving someone else a cookie, whether it be someone you have had disagreements with in the past or a good friend.
Nice close at Israel–Hamas war. That's a tough discussion nobody else would want to touch. :)
To spread the goodness of cookies, you can add {{subst:Cookie}} to someone's talk page with a friendly message, or eat this cookie on the giver's talk page with {{subst:munch}}!
Thanks for closing the big RM here. I would request that you expand on what you believe were the strongest policy-based arguments on both sides that lead you to the no-consensus closure. For example, I did a source analysis on the issue, but it was late in the RM, few users commented on it, and one user potentially made it unreadable, so I'm curious if you took that into account or not. But there were other source analyses too, so I'm wondering how did you weight competing analyses. I'm asking these questions for the purpose of understanding " editors can strengthen their arguments, discover new ones" for a future RM. Also, when you mean "While support for such a title change appears to be growing" are you referring to a change to Israel-Gaza war or Gaza war? That clarification would help what should be the target of a future RM. VR(Please ping on reply)15:29, 30 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for coming to my talk page, editor VR! And please forgive me for being away as I've been very busy offline. Closing that interesting discussion was more of a pleasure than a chore. Part of the answer to your questions is within the discussion above, as other editors have also inquired about that closure. That editor's misplaced vote was a bit confusing but not so that your rationale was not coherent. And yes I did take it into account. In this case, "editors can strengthen their arguments, discover new ones" applies mostly to rebuttal arguments because both sides had their share of very strong rationales. As for the growing common-name support, as you know, "Gaza War" is a bit ambiguous, but both terms, "Gaza War" and "Israel-Gaza War" are growing, yet neither seems to have surpassed the term "Hamas" in this title and context. So I still recommend a customary waiting period of a few months before opening a fresh RM. Thanks again!P.I. Ellsworth , ed.put'er there20:09, 2 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
No worries about the delay, we all get busy. The above is exactly why I'd like you to add more details to your closure statement. You said:
"yes I did take it into account" in reference to this table that, on its face, would show Gaza war as more common than Israel-Hamas war
" but both terms, "Gaza War" and "Israel-Gaza War" are growing, yet neither seems to have surpassed the term "Hamas" in this title and context"
Now it is entirely possible that my analysis was flawed, so a detailed closing statement would show why that is, and how I can alleviate those flaws in a future RM.
Further, it was also argued that WP:NDESC, not WP:COMMONNAME, was the more controlling policy in this case, which is why a lot of !votes focused less on common usage, and more accurate and neutral description. WP:NHC says "If the discussion shows that some people think one policy is controlling, and some another, the closer is expected to close by judging which view has the predominant number of responsible Wikipedians supporting it, not personally select which is the better policy." So I would like the closing statement to indicate which policy was more controlling and why.
Having all these details in the closing statement would immensely help in making a future RM result in some sort of consensus, which is what we should all be aiming for. Thanks again.VR(Please ping on reply)19:33, 5 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Mass deletions done with the Nuke tool now have the 'Nuke' tag. This change will make reviewing and analyzing deletions performed with the tool easier. T366068
Friend Andrewa, perhaps when you are able to find the time, the following has given me pause. I am now perplexed by the whole NAMECHANGES policy situation, and I will not attempt to close another similar RM until I can figure this out. Please help when you can. P.I. Ellsworth , ed.put'er there00:18, 1 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Distressing indeed. A blatant and unprovoked personal attack didn't help I am sure. Looking at it... may take a little while as I am frantic IRL and it's now quite involved. Wikipedia is not perfect. Andrewa (talk) 10:26, 1 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I am compelled to wonder about how to go forward. What happened here is that a local consensus at RM was not sufficient to override the WP:NAMECHANGES article title policy, and yet another local consensus at MRV did override that policy and had the article moved to the new "official" name before it has become the WP:COMMONNAME as prescribed by the NAMECHANGES section of the policy. Was I not using "common sense", as at least one editor at MRV suggested? Well, that's done and in the past, so my question now must be: how should we go forward?
Should we ignore the plural "sources" that the NAMECHANGES policy requires? That policy requires "sources" that use the new name "routinely". When I closed that move request, there had been no – zero – independent sources given that used the new name routinely. There were several primary sources that noted the name change, and there were some secondary sources before the name change that announced there would be an expected name change, but there were no independent, secondary sources found after the name change that used the new name routinely. After I closed the RM, an editor was able to produce one independent source, patch.com, published the same day, 1 July 2024, that I closed the RM, that used the new name routinely. One independent, secondary source. To date, that is the only independent source that uses the new name routinely. Our policy says "sources". I've run into editors who think there should be 10 or 12 good, independent, secondary sources that use the new name routinely before that new name becomes the common name. In the past, I've been happy with 3 or 4 of those sources. Now I just don't know. The policy isn't specific as to the number of those sources needed, it just says "sources" – plural, more than one. Yet in this case, a page was moved to a new, official name based upon only one independent source that used the new name routinely.
I should also note my respect for WP:IAR, but I've always thought that to ignore a policy or guideline, and the community agreements that built them, requires very good reason. Nobody, not in the RM nor in the MRV, nobody gave a good reason to ignore the NAMECHANGES article title policy. Yet they did ignore it. So...
I don't know how we should go forward with move requests that have proposed a title change to a new, official name when there are no independent sources, or only one source, that uses the new name routinely, when there should be at the very least two "sources" as prescribed by the NAMECHANGES article title policy. Can anyone see this dilemma clearly and give me guidance as to how we should go forward?
After rereading [this other policy] about primary and secondary sources, maybe I was being too restrictive about using specifically secondary sources that used the new name routinely? I'm still at a loss to understand how to go forward. We are still supposed to give "due consideration to the relevant consensus of the Wikipedia community in general as reflected in applicable policy, guidelines and naming conventions",[1] aren't we?
One last thought... there is no way I would take this to the next level that would follow a MRV decision with which I disagree. Not my style. Worst comes to worst, I will just refrain from closing this type of RM and hope that whoever does close them will do a better job than I have done. P.I. Ellsworth , ed.put'er there00:18, 1 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
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