Wikipedia:Village pump (miscellaneous)

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The miscellaneous section of the village pump is used to post messages that do not fit into any other category. Please post on the policy, technical, or proposals pages, or - for assistance - at the help desk, rather than here, if at all appropriate. For general knowledge questions, please use the reference desk.

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Racial comment

Moved to Wikipedia:Reference_desk/Humanities#Racial_comment

australian war medal/hat medal found

Moved to the reference desk.

Memes become fact

There's a troubling trend I think needs some attention... namely, attempts to use Wikipedia as a vehicle to legitimize questionable information. I direct the community's attention to this post, which I will now transcribe to save you an extra click (emphasis mine):

I don't edit nearly as much as I used to, but we've both been around here a while and dealt in some cases with controversial and political topics. I don't know if this is a new phenomenon, but based on the last two controversies at the Media Matters article, it seems that some editors are very determined to push memes from conservative media into the encyclopedia. The Hillary Clinton/George Soros thing is such an obvious non-issue to the mainstream press. I suppose that in a lot of ways, this isn't really new--there will always be stuff like this going on in one form or another. What troubles me is that these editors then claim that anyone who does not go along with their conservative meme is a liberal and therefore it's just some sort of political squabble. I don't know if this is happening with left-wing memes; if it is, I haven't seen it. My fear is that editors who don't recognize right-wing memes for what they are or editors who buy into the notion that this is just a political battle will end up unintentionally supporting these right-wing memes. For some people here, the notion that in any dispute, both sides should be forced to compromise is a powerful one. That has obvious deleterious effects when one side is just making shit up.

Before chalking anything up to a political tit-for-tat (the easy way out), read the statement again please. The gentleman has a point -- there seems to be a massive influx of conservative talking points into what should be an objective and balanced encyclopedia. Despite what some believe Fair & Balanced means, in the real world if there are 25 sources alleging the same crock of shit is true, and they're all Beck/Hannity/Limbaugh/Coulter sources (with no support from mainstream sources or academia), I don't think an encyclopedia should give equal weight to sources that seem to publish in bad faith or with the sole intent of generating revenue by firing up their base. I also direct the community attention to the first quote here, which states (in part):

While I'd say it's admirable to try to include all viewpoints and reach mass consensus, blindly seeking this end lets a vocal minority bog down reasonable POVs through technicality.

It would be easy to give the standard "it will work itself out in the end" answer, but I've been editing these tedious sorts of articles for well over half a decade and the issue raised here is becoming much more significant -- I've seen plenty of reasonable editors abandon trying to improve the POV target articles -- eventually, it's my concern that eventually the inmates will be running the asylum (pardon the terrible analogy). I'm not bringing up any particular content issue or event, but there are plenty of examples: Cornell is not the real Cornell, Hillary Clinton founded Media Matters, Obama is not a citizen, et cetera ad infinitum. I guess my point here is to try and start a discussion regarding the long-view effects to Wikipedia, their desirability, and the best way(s) to deal with such. Input is encouraged and appreciated -- any takers? //Blaxthos ( t / c ) 16:23, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Could you explain what exactly the actual problem is? We have to deal with a similar situation w.r.t. astrology, creationism and other popular fringe topics. If something is only discussed by the fringers it's not notable and doesn't get an article. If it does get an article we take extra care to make clear it's not a mainstream view. If it doesn't, we mostly keep it out of mainstream articles per WP:UNDUE.

Is the problem that we are using media that are blatant one-sided tools for producing political opinion as establishing notability? Hans Adler 16:55, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

"I don't think an encyclopedia should give equal weight to sources that seem to publish in bad faith or with the sole intent of generating revenue by firing up their base." This from an editor who uses material from Media Matters for America, Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting, and MSNBC opinion shows as reliable sources for negative information in BLPs of conservatives (see John Gibson (political commentator). At the same time, he says that using newspaper news articles and a book by a Pulitzer Prize-winning NYT journalist as sources are problematic for the liberal organization MMfA's non-BLP article.

He misrepresents even the title of a discussion over at MMfA Talk. It's not "Hillary Clinton founded Media Matters," it's "Assistance in startup by Hillary Clinton & associates." I suppose he longs for the days when the "vocal minority" lefties (mutiple surveys show that the Left represents about 20% of the US) could pretty much run the WP show by themselves.--Drrll (talk) 17:26, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Ignoring Drrll's generalizations and misrepresentations, and in reply to Hans: the difference from other fringes is that there aren't large media organizations with a fiscal incentive to encourage those fringe theories, the ability to generate source material, and the reach necessary to mobilize their ideological warriors daily. In the cases I mentioned above, Rush/Beck/Coulter/Hannity/etc. get more ratings (money) when they stir up their fringe with questionable "facts". Their reach is far greater, and the memes they start end up influencing articles inappropriately. I'm doing my best to avoid individual examples because this discussion should be abstract, and because (as demonstrated) points are often misunderstood, misrepresented, or the subject of burning strawmen. Those of us who spend a lot of time to "take extra care" with regards to WP:UNDUE and WP:FRINGE take a lot of fire from the editors who try and assert those fringe and POV-based views, and as I mentioned earlier I've seen plenty of good, reasonable editors walk away because of having to constantly deal with tendentious editors and POV warriors. Croc's original comment notes that the fringe invariably tries to make it seem like the objections are based on an ideology instead of fact (probably because they assume other editors must also edit with a partisan agenda), and the community writ large just assumes it's partisan bickering and mandates a compromise (which isn't always a good thing -- see Croc's full comment). If those sorts of articles become nothing but a battlefield for those people, most of the reasonable ones will recognize that the battle scars just aren't worth it and walk away, and those articles become a vehicle to give legitimacy to fringe theories and POV influence. Hope this helps. //Blaxthos ( t / c ) 18:37, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

While not going agreeing with everything Drrll says, I have to agree. Blaxthos, your hypocrisy with this topic is amazing. You push MMFA, FAIR, and HP, yet claim that other right wing sources are somehow less significant, noteworthy, and/or accurate. Your argument is filled with fallacies that could just as easily be turned on you and your views.

In the cases I mentioned above, Rush/Beck/Coulter/Hannity/etc. get more ratings (money) when they stir up their fringe with questionable "facts". Couldn't this same argument be pushed for FAIR, HP, and MMFA whose ideological base donations keep them running?

Those of us who spend a lot of time to "take extra care" with regards to WP:UNDUE and WP:FRINGE take a lot of fire from the editors who try and assert those fringe and POV-based views, and as I mentioned earlier I've seen plenty of good, reasonable editors walk away because of having to constantly deal with tendentious editors and POV warriors.

Isn't your goal to push away editors who are part of a vocal minority (translation: those who disagree with you): You'd no doubt agree that editors exist who are editting purely from a desire to push a particular POV? These people have to be marginalized for the sake of wikipedia's NPOV and effecient editting. While I'd say it's admirable to try to include all viewpoints and reach mass consensus, [one who] blindly seeks this end lets a vocal minority bog down reasonable POVs through technicality.

Let me make this clear, I have a bias and so do you. Instead of simply pointing at one, and railing about it taking over wikipedia (which I believe is the source of much derision when it comes from the other side), why not try to come to compromise. I would argue that neither should be used, but you seem to want to have one but not the other. How pathetic. (Sorry if this comes across as a rant but this is truly a case of a pot calling the kettle black) Soxwon (talk) 18:54, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

The notion that Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting, which exerts roughly zero influence over politics, especially day-to-day politics, is in league with people with a daily platform (Limbaugh, Hannity, Beck, etc.) is way off base. Further, you suggest that this is merely some sort of left-right political rigamarole, but my entire point is that it's not. I see some editors trying to push right-wing memes that do not resemble the truth into articles, and I really don't see that happening with left-wing memes. Your attempt to cast this as a disagreement over politics is precisely my issue. There isn't any merit to the whole "real Cornell" meme or the "Obama is not a citizen" meme, but if you want to push them into the article, then it's easy to claim that opposition is politically motivated, which opens the door to getting 50% coverage of something that merits no coverage at all. Croctotheface (talk) 19:52, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Hmmm. That's funny because because from the number of times I see outfits such as FAIR used as a source to criticize conservative political figures in Wikipedia I would think that it was a highly influential political force. Badmintonhist (talk)

Examples? Where is FAIR as the only source for something? Croctotheface (talk) 01:25, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Do you mean when it's one of two or more sources that doesn't count?? Badmintonhist (talk) 02:00, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Huh? Just give me examples. What's so hard about that? Croctotheface (talk) 02:58, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Tell ya what. Croc, YOU do a Wikipedia search of Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting and see what ya come up with. Badmintonhist (talk)

Very mature. It's not my responsibility to make your case for you. You made an assertion, and now you are abjectly refusing to back it up with evidence. Croctotheface (talk) 21:01, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

What would you know about maturity, Croc? I believe YOU made the original assertion. You said that FAIR "exerts" roughly zero influence over politics. Where's your proof? When I did a Wikipedia search of "Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting" over 100 entries popped up and those, of course, would only be the entries in which the full name of the organization was listed, there may be many others where only "FAIR" is listed. Just yesterday I edited the article on Bill O'Reilly and FAIR, unfairly or not, was a source in that one. So, apparently, in Wikiworld FAIR is a substantial player. Badmintonhist (talk) 05:01, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

When video exists of the quote (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dHTydb5js-E at about 2:15), of Secretary Clinton herself talking about "institutions that I helped to start and support like Media Matters and Center for American Progress." (Read more: http://newsbusters.org/blogs/noel-sheppard/2007/10/01/hillary-clinton-told-yearlykos-convention-she-helped-start-media-matt#ixzz0mnyMkVp3) then I would hardly put that issue in with WP:FRINGE things like idiots that believe the President wasn't born in Hawaii (there is a birth announcement in a local paper for him back then). What this "Cornell" argument you attempted to source (please provide real links to support your arguments, not non-sensical ones that a person has to dig for) has to do with anything I have no idea. The examples are not comparable. What you've set up is a strawman argument with the Media Matters issue built into these others when it clearly doesn't belong. Very disingenuous Blax. Rapier (talk) 20:34, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

The replies above only validate my point -- the entirety of the replies above are attempts to personalize the debate and the assumption that my positions are based on a personal political position. My point is that when the profit-motivated meme universe pushes out stuff like the misinterpretation of the "Hillary started Media Matters" quote, or of the "Keith Olbermann didn't attend the real Cornell" fiction, you guys always attack editors who stand up to the bullshit as being ideologically motivated. The quotes I referenced above are to point out that a vocal minority that believes something absurd doesn't mean we always have to include their absurdity (see WP:FRINGE and WP:UNDUE). My concern (and purpose here) is to hopefully start the community towards a path in which we can have balanced and neutral articles without making Wikipedia such an unpleasant place that the reasonable editors simply walk away. //Blaxthos ( t / c ) 20:54, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Blaxthos, seriously, how can you keep a straight keyboard making these statements? Here you are claiming that ideologically motivated editing results in reasonable editors leaving WP, while at the same time pushing the left meme against John Gibson in what is essentially a MMfA attack. If you seriously were interested in WP you would start by not turning articles on conservatives into attack pages. Arzel (talk) 03:59, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Arzel, are you going to comment at all on the content that's being raised here, or are you just here to impugn the motivations of other editors? Croctotheface (talk) 07:54, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

No worries, Croc... Arzel is giving us another example of the behavior I'm talking about -- believing everything must be ideologically motivated (even when policies and reasoning have been provided and 3RR has been violated), and trying to misdirect people to a micro content issue instead of dealing with the larger points rasied. I honestly believe the partisan battlefield is the only way these people can function, which is exactly why I brought this thread here. //Blaxthos ( t / c ) 09:51, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Ooor, we're frustrated by the partisan nature of a certain editor who seems to think that right-wing editors can only have a partisan agenda, rather than being here to help the article. Have you ever considered this? (my guess is not) Soxwon (talk) 14:18, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Evidence doesn't bear that out -- as Croc noted in his original post, the empirical evidence seems to show that it's right wing memes from the Rush/Beck/Hannity universe that is constantly being inserted into Wikipedia, simply opposing the insertion of those memes with equal weight doesn't equate to the level of ideology necessary to propose inclusion in the first place (basically, opposing ideological edits doesn't make one an ideologue on the opposite end of the spectrum). Attempting to insert right-wing memes (the Soros and Hillary obsessions, the Olbermann college fiction, or any of the hundred-other fiascoes that fit this mold) can clearly be traced to certain partisan sources and is clearly and necessarily editing to advocate an agenda; however, opposing those edits and clearly showing the policy-based reasons for exclusion doesn't mean someone is opposing it due to a competing ideology. I'm having trouble succinctly communicating my point here, but I hope this helps. //Blaxthos ( t / c ) 16:41, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

And I can back that up with one concrete example--a few editors have been obsessed with putting information about George Soros into the Media Matters article. It's gotten to the point where there are paragraphs in the reflist quoting descriptions in conservative media about how, while Soros didn't donate directly to MM, he did donate to organization A, which then donated to organization B, which then donated to MM. A completely parallel case, Richard Mellon Scaife, has no such text in articles that he and the Scaife Foundation have donated to. There is no such text in Hoover Institution, or American Enterprise Institute or numerous others. Now, I'm not saying that we should not describe where these organizations get funding. If Scaife or Soros donated, then it's fine to say so, but it's a truly odd step to say that Media Matters received funds from B which received funds from A which received funds from Soros, yet some editors insist on pushing that kind of stuff in the article. Croctotheface (talk) 21:09, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

All of this just serves to illustrate a point I've made a number of times: Wikipedia has no adequate dispute resolution procedure. Peter jackson (talk) 10:14, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Especially when the dispute is with editors who argue in bad faith. Here's a perfect example of what I'm talking about... the comment clearly demonstrates he's here to do ideological battle. What's the solution? //Blaxthos ( t / c ) 20:20, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Actually, it might not actually be that those editors believe they're operating in bad faith. It could be that they've internalized another right-wing meme--perpetual victimhood, wherein anything remotely unflattering to their worldview is perceived as some kind of plot. The "liberal media' is out to get me, etc. If someone begins with that series of assumptions, then it's not surprising that they would be disinclined to hear what other editors say, as they've preemptively discredited any kind of differing viewpoint. Croctotheface (talk) 21:12, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Oh I don't mean to imply they are aware of what they're doing; quite the opposite. Indeed, their beliefs condition them to reject outside viewpoints and to rationalize away things that contradict their worldview. Regardless of the mens rea, our focus should be pragmatic... how does the community recognize and deal with the effects of such? I think it's reasonable to say that editors who engage these areas frequently take a good bit of flack and abuse, and any hope of a sustainable wikipedia model must include some mechanism to deal with these issues without burning out all the reasonable editors. //Blaxthos ( t / c ) 03:09, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

I agree. I can think of 3 possible solutions.

1. Change of culture so that the community descends en masse on disputes, considers them carefully & fairly, reaches a sensible deicision & either enforces it or authorizes somebody else to do so. Not going to happen in the foreseeable future.
2. Set up a body parallel to Arbcom to resolve disputes, but without the Arbcom rules that require a quorum of complainants & give Arbcom the right to ignore a dispute.
3. Abolish IAR & make POV, OR, RS &c so precise/rigid that there can be no question how they apply in any given case. Then let any admin enforce them.

Any others? Peter jackson (talk) 16:49, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Ok, despite the problems that are going on, your idea is terrible. Rigid rules and waiting for admins will lead to back up, even more biased rulings, and endless bureaucracy (after all, if they are so rigid that they can't be question then they must cover EVERY circumstance). In short, no no no no no. Soxwon (talk) 17:03, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Encyclopedia Brittanica has a terrific conflict resolution mechanism: editorial meetings and bosses who say "no". That's a big advantage of a top-down, hierarchical (sp?) system. Wikipeida doesn't want that kind of system, for better or (in this case) worse. There's no way (IMHO) to have wikipedia be otherwise if it remains the encyclopedia that anybody can edit. - DavidWBrooks (talk) 17:31, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Indeed, it's quite hard to have quality and consistent content when there is absolutely no editorial oversight or content rule enforcement. I'm worried the principles upon which Wikipedia are founded are no more practical than communism (note: analogy towards feasibility, not a direct comparison to ideology). What we have now is basically a system where ideologues are rewarded for fomenting endless debate based on misstatements, red herrings, and false logic. The community simply must find some middle ground that retains the openness of Wikipedia without allowing POV warriors to turn talk pages into town-hall shouting matches ad infinitum. They're starting to realize that if they argue endlessly and never acknowledge consensus, eventually all the reasonable editors will abandon those articles ("it's not worth the fight"). The current situation is not sustainable if we hope to meet our lofty goals (especially WP:NPOV, WP:UNDUE, WP:FRINGE, and WP:RS). Thank you to Peter Jackson for the list of alternatives. I agree #1 isn't going to happen -- what do we need to do to get a serious, wide-ranging discussion on the other two? //Blaxthos ( t / c ) 21:00, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

David, you have to distinguish between 2 different types of authority who might resolve disputes.

1. Experts, which is what you were referring to in the context of EB. This is the principle of Citizendium & it would obviously be inappropriate to duplicate that here.
2. An elected committee. Is the Wikipedia community incapable of electing a committee of conscientious people to do the job?

Blaxthos, I'm not sure what the best procedure here is. Wikipedia procedures are quite Byzantine. Peter jackson (talk) 10:08, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

Interwiki links

Am I being silly- or should this be debated. Today I have just watched a slew of articles on my watchlist having another interwiki link added. I use these links- gleaning details from fr: de: es: nl: and other real languages, to cross verify an article. So look at Calvisson, something called war: was added, this appears as Winaray. Then look at Lecques, and we see the exact same template- no attempt even to translate the Infobox, or even to copy the images. So what is Winaray- well, this redirects to Waray-Waray which appears to be a dialect of Cebuano spoken by 3.1 million people, in the Phillipines. Assuming that all 3.1 million folk, are avid Wikipedians bereft of language skills in French, Spanish or Catalan- don't they at least deserve a stub with an infobox. Now the other mystery is Volapuk, a language with 20 speakers- this time the Infobox has been split in two and half appears in the lede. So, what is the point? They just waste screen real-estate, and appear to me to be a bot writers joke. Conversely, to put a interwiki link on the minority language page to the fr: catalan, and es page could be useful. If policy is needed: Links are only made when the page has reached start level, or where 0.1% of the subjects of the page speaks the language. There you are. Discuss.--ClemRutter (talk) 19:55, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

That's a well known problem with some of the small Wikipedias: Enthusiastic users who try to fill them up with mass-produced stubs, often bot-generated. I think the right place to discuss this is somewhere over at Meta, because it takes a cross-wiki admin to put an end to such activities. I will see if I find a good link on Meta for this. Hans Adler 20:04, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

I don't understand the structure of the Meta wiki at all, but by searching I found a page that tells me that, unless things have changed over the last 2 years, there is probably not much we can do: meta:Proposals for closing projects/Closure of Volapük Wikipedia. On the other hand it's quite possible that something has changed and I just can't find the relevant pages. Hans Adler 20:59, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

I disagree that a policy is needed here. For one, if we want the smaller Wikipedias to improve, purposely not linking to them is going to be counterproductive, it will just reduce their visibility. Nothing goes below the interwiki links, so I don't see how any screen real estate is being wasted. Unless you had a really short article with a ton of interwikis that causes the page to scroll when it otherwise wouldn't, there would be nothing other than empty space where the links are. Mr.Z-man 21:42, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

My three year old is now in bed. We had the nightly argument about tidying away her toys- She says that if I want smaller ones to improve, purposely not linking to them by tidying away their toys, is going to be counterproductive, it will just reduce their visibility. She says: 'Nothing goes below the table, so I don't see how any carpet is being wasted.' Śhe says: 'Ybou are being unreasonable to like empty space, and illogical to think that an empty carpet improves your authority as a serious source of information'. OK that was a bit of fun, but I do see a sort of parallel.--ClemRutter (talk) 20:39, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Kama Chinen

Somebody please check out the recent edits of a Wikipedian who claims that Kama Chinen died without providing a source. Georgia guy (talk) 15:00, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

GRG is pretty much the definitive source on these matters, and it lists her as alive. See this. I think the edits were bad. Raul654 (talk) 15:06, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Death now announced on Yahoo. Peter jackson (talk) 10:16, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Dialectic

To find out what Dialectic means, looking it up on Wikipedia is not advisable. May be someone can remove some fog? Talk:Dialectic#Completely_puzzled Joepnl (talk) 21:31, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

I would guess that it means different things to different people. :-) Steve Dufour (talk) 03:20, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

Wikipedia articles often go beyond the scope of encyclopedic articles required by visitors looking for a concise, reasonably short explanation on something they are looking up. This is mainly due to the lack of control on one hand, and the enthusiasm of some Wikipedia editors to show of their knowledge on the other. Such is the case with our article on Dialectic. It does not really mean different things to different people, but it does have slightly different meanings (all within the philosophy of discussion) depending on the context of its use. I agree that the Wikipedia fails to give a clear answer here. While the Wikipeada article seriously needs pruning and cleaning up to make it more intelligible for us mere mortals, it might be hard to achieve this without polemic, and , yes, dialectic! You are most welcome to WP:BOLD and have a try.--Kudpung (talk) 04:51, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

What's the latest gossip on Webcitation.org?

I recently learned about http://www.webcitation.org, and so I was really glad to see that there have been previous discussions ([1] [2] [3]) about creating a bot that takes WP's external links, feeds them through webcitation.org, and ADDS the the result alongside the external links, as backups. I have two questions, which I'm going to deliver in two sub-threads.

Question 1: What's the status of a webcitation.org bot?

I'm wondering if someone who's been involved in the process of creating a Webcitation.org bot, can give the VPM community an update on the status of this proposal? Could use any help to make it succeed? -user:Agradman, editing (for complicated reasons) as 160.39.221.164 (talk) 06:09, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

It's already happened: User:WebCiteBOT. I think there have been technical issues with WebCite that have been delaying its operation recently though. --Cybercobra (talk) 07:50, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

There is some discussion about requesting a second bot here.—NMajdan•talk 13:22, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Question 2: What are the pros and cons of WikiMedia Foundation creating ... WMcite.org?

I'd also like to start a discussion about the pros and cons of WikiMedia foundation creating its own version of Webcite. I say "pros and cons" because am hoping for a discussion in the spirit of a brainstorming session. If I wanted to get my idea shot down I would have posted it at WP:VPP. :)

I see the main Con being Cost. I don't know what that cost would be. But I am hoping it would be offset by the benefits. Linkrot is a constant problem. But Webcitation.org has been known for experiencing downtime (e.g. RIGHT NOW). Whenever that happens, people starting removing links from articles. It would be valuable if we had control over our backup service.

Of course, a lot of details would have to be worked out (e.g., do we make this resource available to the general public, as Webcitation.org has done?). We can talk about those details, but I just want to ask that we not think of those details as Cons ... we should think of them as details. -user:Agradman, editing (for complicated reasons) as 160.39.221.164 (talk) 06:09, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Legal liability of the Wikimedia Foundation would be a significant possible Con; I doubt they'd want to take such liability on. Would be handy though. --Cybercobra (talk) 07:52, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

I'd like to see this seriously considered. The entire print media industry is under financial pressure, and maintaining online access to old references may not always be a high priority. When one recognizes that the worth of WP requires that these links work for decades, it is inevitable that links will disappear. So far, this is simply a recitation of the need for the webcitation concept, but I am quite concerned about having all our eggs in one basket, especially one that has experienced problems. Over time, the need will grow considerably, and I'd like to see us address it soon.--SPhilbrickT 13:43, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

The big con would be the additional technical overhead. This includes the development cost (unless WebCite is willing to share their code with us to make an exact clone) as well as all the additional storage space needed and technical staff time to keep it running. Presumably any technical problems that WebCite is having, we could have too. It would be rather difficult to not make it available to the general public, as anyone can create an account on Wikipedia for free, the only way to do any sort of meaningful access control would be manually granting access on a per-user basis. Mr.Z-man 14:54, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

I think this proposal is only worth exploring if Wikimedia thinks it can do a better job than WebCite in terms of reliability of the service. I have noticed that WebCite has had some intermittent downtime recently, but it seems to be up and running again. As Z-man points out, presumably any problems that WebCite has been experiencing can be experienced by Wikimedia too. But I also think Sphilbrick has a point: having an alternative service as a backup to WebCite is a good idea. But rather than Wikimedia trying to develop its own service, since it is (presumably) a major user of WebCite, perhaps it would be better to work together with WebCite to help improve its existing service? — Cheers, JackLee ^–talk– 15:38, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

I'll comment on both questions. In the short term, I think we need a second bot, because I don't think all the problems with webcitebot have been because webcitation.org has been down. Sometimes the bot doesn't run, and becuase it sounds like a big job, it would be good to have two or more people who can work on issues.

webcitebot's operator has exchanged emails with webcitation.org, and it sounds like they're very nice people. I'm not sure what there problems have been, but maybe we could host their service for them, or they would provide their code. I think it would be a great idea if we had our own archiving service. The legal issues would be the same as archive.org and webcitation.org deal with, which I think are pretty similar to our own. While it would be a lot work, it would be worth it. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 18:08, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

All right -- my take-away from the discussion so far is,
(1) Never break one thread into two sub-threads.
(2) If we were to emulate webcitation.org, it would only make sense if those folks were willing to give us their code. Or their business. (Maybe we should ask. Once we get our bot up and running, we would immediately become their #1 consumer by an exponential margin.)
(3) The people at User_talk:WebCiteBOT#User:WebCiteBOT.2FStats seem to be on top of the process of recruiting people with free time and bot-coding-skills, to assist with the bot, or to create a second bot. I CAN'T WAIT!! this bot is so awesome!!!
-user:Agradman editing for today as 128.59.179.246 (talk) 05:03, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

I'm one of the people over at User_talk:WebCiteBOT#User:WebCiteBOT.2FStats, and what we need is someone who spends a lot of time at their puter putting this all together (I'm not very active anymore). If you wanted to be awesome, you could do three things. Put in a bot request for a second bot, pick thaddeusb's brains about what to do, and email webcitation.org and start a dialog about what they need or can give us. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 05:35, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Elemental emission spectra and Original Research

Following a discussion on my talk page, User:Mrgoogfan has been generating his own elemental emission spectra using a spectrometer that he has access to. This to me seems like (very productive) original research, and I am of the opinion that we probably can't accept the emission spectra as data, having no way to verify it. This is very unfortunate, as User:Mrgoogfan has obviously gone to a lot of effort to really contribute. Does anyone have any suggestions? User A1 (talk) 08:45, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

I should mention that many of his measurements are not visible in the element infoboxes for an assortment of different elements. User A1 (talk) 08:46, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Seems like clear violation of Wikipedia policy. Original research can be posted on Wikinfo instead. Peter jackson (talk) 10:17, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Isn't he just producing images? In which case no-one ever cares about the OR. OrangeDog (τ • ε) 11:23, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

A good way round this might be to link to a reliable source detailing the spectra - it could just be a physics data book listing the major spectral lines for different elements. Then we could verify the spectra (to defend against mislabelling, contamination of the samples used or gross mis-calibration, which are really the only ways you could get something wrong with an emission spectrum). A visual comparison would be all that is needed since the lack of scales on Mrgoofan's images makes them unsuitable for quantitative work anyway. As to whether it's OR that's a bit tricky - it's hardly original thought - most spectra will be very well documented in reliable sources, common ones for at least 100 years. The way I see it making an emission spectrum is simply producing an image of a physical phenomenon which has been well researched in the past (therefore not original) but for which no free image of equivalent quality is available. The real issue is verifiability - easy to do for most photographs, somewhat more difficult for spectra hence my suggestion of linking to a resource describing elemental spectra. It would be detrimental to the encyclopaedia to remove these images as they really are very good, so some way should be found to keep them if possible. 131.111.185.69 (talk) 12:12, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

For what it's worth the ones I know off the top of my head, hydrogen and sodium, certainly appear correct. 131.111.185.69 (talk) 12:18, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

I agree with 131.111.185.69. This effectively mechanical work that's no different from using a mirror or a shadow box to produce images. However, it does warrant a reference to a good source in order to establish that there's no OR here. — Gavia immer (talk) 14:01, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

It is nice if technical images are sourced, but those in question are actually no different to all the other photographs we use. For example, there is no source given to establish that File:White nectarine and cross section02 edit.jpg (today's featured image) is actually a photo of a white nectarine, and not some other variety of fruit (or indeed the emission spectrum of Sodium). OrangeDog (τ • ε) 17:51, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

^^This is true. However if you insist on multiple sources of data, here is what I could find. I'll dig up some more later. http://jersey.uoregon.edu/vlab/elements/Elements.html http://www.amateurspectroscopy.com/color-spectra-of-chemical-elements.htm mrgoogfan —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.88.95.31 (talk) 20:05, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Personally I would say there's no need to dig up any more - the university of oregon link is clearly reliable, and provides both a simple visual way for people to confirm the veracity of your spectra and something to hold up if the OR issue ever comes up again and say "this isn't OR - it's an image of what's published here". 131.111.185.69 (talk) 08:33, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

I agree. The question was an interesting one, but the existence of the U of O link is very helpful. It might be nice if someone in the relevant project did a comparison and noted it on the talk page, but the alternative of checking if anyone raises the OR concern is acceptable.--SPhilbrickT 11:38, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

Help with flags

Hello, I am an administrator of the Basque Wikipedia (eu) and we have implemented the flag template system from the English Wikipedia into our wiki. In the country data XXX templates we have added an extra parameter (as you can see for example in eu:txantiloi:Herrialde info Gibraltar). We want that in a template put that extra parameter (called "nongo"). In English would be "Geography of Gibraltar", but in Basque "Gibraltarko geografia" (that -ko means of). I think I haven't explained myself correctly, here an invented example:

By typing {{geography stub|GIB}}

Gibraltarko geografia

--->

[[{{{nongo}}}|{{{alias}}}]] geografia

Can anyone help us? Is it possible to do it?--An13sa (talk) 08:58, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

I'm sorry, could you try explaining this another way? — Cheers, JackLee ^–talk– 19:22, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

Questionable templates

Hello, i have 2 templates that are questionable.

(at this article) and this one. Both are in violation with basic naming policy and WP:NAME, WP:PLACE. Also it violates the basic conception of the idea of template, a template has to be short and informative not cramped with alternative names. Both templates are introduces silently and not to mention that in Romania only 6.5% of the population is Hungarian or Szekely so minority names are constantly forced by this user like he tried to do here even if the only official language spoken by the 93%+ of the population is Romanian. Also every other template uses one official language even if more languages are official like in Vojvodina and others. Can i get some advice on this? Thank you.iadrian (talk) 13:04, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

Those are the figures for Romania as a whole, but what about Transylvania? I don't know what WP policy is for regions with a different language from the main national one. Peter jackson (talk) 16:31, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

Transylvania is just a geographical region (not a political entity) and there are 19.6% of the population Hungarian and Szekely (together). That means that in the region of Transylvania 80.4% of the population speak Romanian. Even so, it should apply the WP:PLACE since we have an autonomous region Vojvodina where we have 5 official languages and it is only Serbian everywhere and the WP:PLACE stands, in Romania we have only Romanian. In Vojvodina only Serbian language is in the templates where Serb represent 65% of the population and it is a political entity, other languages names are present according to the naming policy. In every similar place there is no minority names presented in this way, which also violates the rules i mentioned WP:NAME and WP:PLACE. iadrian (talk) 16:41, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

Even if it would be the other way around, 80.4% Hungarian and Szekely on wikipedia we still apply wiki rules , WP:PLACE , the use of the official names too, official for every country, for Romania Romanian.iadrian (talk) 17:17, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

Is the rule to use the official name for the place, or the name for the place in the official national language ? They're not necessarily the same. Some states recognize alternative languages on a local basis only. And what about states with more than one official language? Peter jackson (talk) 10:30, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

Wikipedia rules say official names. In this case, in Romania every official name is in Romanian since Romania has only one official language, Romanian. Romania isn`t also a bilingual country (89.5% country population is ethnic Romanian and more than 91% speak Romanian as native speakers). To clarify this i have given the example of Vojvodina that has 5 official languages and it is a political entity (which Transylvania isn`t). In Vojvodina Serbs make up 65% of the total population and in their templates despite the official regional languages the Serbian is the only one that appears. In Transnistria which is even worse, the template uses Romanian names , the names of the most important ethnic group (31.9%) I know that it is not a good comparison since Transylvania is only a geographical region where Romanians make up 80.4% of the population but i used that to show, even by that logic, which has nothing to do with wiki rules (on wikipedia wiki rules are all that matters), this template is wrong.iadrian (talk) 10:52, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests for comment/BQZip01

I started the RfC Wikipedia:Requests for comment/BQZip01 nearly four weeks ago. In that time, I've seen considerable activity on other RfCs. However, on this RfC there's been virtually no activity. As it stands, there are no outside views by anyone. The other four currently active RfCs have an average of 7 outside views. I'm concerned that the basis of this dispute remains unresolved. I am not looking for yes/no people. I am looking for input, whatever your opinion may be. You are invited to participate in this RfC. Thank you, --Hammersoft (talk) 15:02, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

Use of images of nature taken in one place to illustrate articles on another locality

I am wary to incur the wrath of regulars on these high-profile articles by removing these nice pics, but IMO we shouldn't use pictures such as this and many (really many) others, taken in a certain place, to illustrate various random locations (such as Iran, Albania, Sweden, Aggtelek National Park, Tâmpa, Braşov, Prokletije, Lura Mountain, Republic of Macedonia, Geography of the Cucuteni–Trypillian culture and so on). In my opinion, the fact that the species of animals and plants in question presumably occur there is not enough to warrant inclusion of such pictures, often taken in other parts of the world. It would be like illustrating the article on Greeks with a picture of Spaniards taken in Spain, as long as they are all humans. Thoughts?

• Is such use of pictures legitimate or not?
• If not, what is the best way to find out how much stuff of this kind we have to take care of?

Colchicum (talk) 15:23, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

I clicked through a handful of these articles, and the uses are acceptable. The species in question has a fairly large, multi-country range, and it would be beyond silly to require that only images of individual lynxes that were physically taken inside the confines of the artificial political borders determined by humans could be used to illustrate the fauna in each country's article. A lynx on one side of a mountain is not different from a lynx of the same species on the other side of the same mountain merely because some human decided to draw a political boundary through the middle of its territory.

The usual rule of thumb is that if the animal (vegetable, mineral, etc) looks like the subject, then it's okay to use it to illustrate the article or section. The point is educational, encyclopedic illustration, not to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that this species has been seen in a given location. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:09, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

Well, at the very least it is factually wrong that lynxes are all the same across their range. Different subspecies occur in Iran and Sweden, and I am still not convinced that a single picture can illustrate both. Colchicum (talk) 16:16, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

And I wouldn't expect to find such usage of pictures in a paper encyclopedia. Colchicum (talk) 16:29, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

If even an expert couldn't tell you, with a great degree of certainty, whether a given image is this subspecies or that one, then we don't actually care. This is illustration, not a courtroom or a laboratory: we care what it looks like, not what it is. Particularly if the subspecies differences can only be identified by getting out a microscope or running genetic tests (which is true for a number of insects, e.g., this one), then the images are essentially interchangeable as far as we are concerned.

So the question here is: Will the reader glance at this image of a Eurasian lynx and get some idea of what it is? Will their idea of the animal be materially false, if the animal in the image turns out to be, e.g., the subspecies common to the western end of its range rather than the eastern end? If so, is that potentially false idea really any worse than using an image of a lynx that was born and raised in a zoo, with a vet on call every time it coughed, as an example of a wild animal? If no, then editors are free to use the image.

If you don't like it, then I suggest that you explain your personal views on the talk page of each article, in turn, and see whether other editors freely and voluntarily agree to remove the image. Just because this is permitted in general doesn't mean that editors are required to use a given image in a given situation. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:47, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

I suppose I basically agree with this. Mostly I think it doesn't matter; I expect that in a few cases it is absolutely necessary to illustrate an article with an image of an animal from elsewhere. So much for input from the animal project. —innotata 19:28, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

There's an additional wrinkle - what about captive animals? For instance, I've uploaded several images from my own (rather exotic) pets for illustration, but with a few exceptions, most of these animals cannot be pinned down to particular countries or states. This is even more the case with my numerous skeletal specimens, many of which are former pet trade animals with no locality data. Mokele (talk) 22:03, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

In general I think this is a non-problem. It would certainly be desirable to have in-habitat photos for each part of each taxon's range, and in fact I make a point of uploading local occurrences of widespread plant species, just so Commons will have more geographic representation. A more important issue IMHO is the choice of species to depict - I find it implausible that the lynx is the very most notable member of Macedonia's fauna, for instance; it would be better to have a type that is endemic, or has the highest concentration vs other countries. Stan (talk) 23:12, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

Images should be used for fairly specific purposes.

Even if the animal was not photographed in the specific locale of the article, the animal and the local should have a strong relationship. An animal that has a wide range will usually not be an appropriate illustration for any of the countries in that range. Maurreen (talk) 23:50, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

This sounds nice, but would essentially remove all charismatic megafauna. No country in Africa would have an elephant on their page, or a lion, as none of those are endemic. For sufficiently small countries which lack major geological barriers, they're going to be stuck with various innocuous fungi and ants, while neglecting non-endemic species which represent major portions of the biota. Mokele (talk) 00:23, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

I agree that images should normally be selected to highlight differences or unique species, but that should not be the sole requirement. In at least some examples, the "non-endemic" animal is directly named and discussed in these articles, e.g., because of conservation efforts, because of its role as an apex predator in the area, as a national symbol, etc. I doubt that we want to tell editors that they are allowed to discuss the fact that an animal is threatened or endangered, but then prohibit them from including an image of that animal, on the grounds that there aren't enough of them. WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:45, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

Flagged Protection: update for May 6

As requested, here's the weekly Flagged Protection update.

The main news is that the team had a meeting this week with Danese and Erik to discuss rollout plans. Everybody concurs that we're close enough to launch to start a few release-related activities:

1. Starting a discussion with the enwiki community about how they'd like to handle the use of the feature once it's live,
2. Writing the release documentation,
3. Preparing for media interest,
4. Doing a final performance evaluation, and
5. Allocating engineering time to handle the rollout.

This will pull in a variety of people, all of whom we're excited to have involved, including Tim, Jay, Moka, Rob L., Rob H, and even Mike G. a bit. Adam has also offered us to help us solve some cross-browser CSS issues that have been confounding us, for which we are grateful. Keep an eye out for activity relating to these efforts in the coming days and weeks.

The actual release schedule depends on a number of factors, including the results of testing, the speed with which we resolve a couple of remaining UI difficulties, and the extent to which community testing on Labs turns up new issues.

Speaking of which, if you'd like to try out the current software, start on our labs site. Lest you think it has achieved perfection, both User:Tango and Eper turned up interesting issues just this week. Thanks to them and the other testers!

To see what we've changed this week, check out the latest list of items completed.

To see the upcoming work, it's listed in our tracker, under Current and Backlog.

We expect to release to labs again next week, and each week thereafter until this goes live on the English Wikipedia.

William Pietri (talk) 06:08, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

GAR in need of further commentary

Wikipedia:Good article reassessment/Eddie_Rabbitt/1 This has been sitting at WP:GAR since March and no one seems to be pushing either way. Can someone please SAY something at it so we can get something going there? Ten Pound Hammer, his otters and a clue-bat • ^{(Many otters • One bat • One hammer)} 22:43, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

$ Cifrão

Cifrão is a dollar sign with two vertical lines. I would like to change $\mathrm {S} \!\!\!\Vert$ to $ which I believe will work on most (all?) windows and MacOs X systems. I don't know if Linux installations have Garamond. Is this a sensible edit to do? -- SGBailey (talk) 14:43, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

A better solution might be to use an image rather than the latex hack. If you're just relying on a font being installed you should add a caveat that it may not be displayed correctly. OrangeDog (τ • ε) 21:51, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

Uw-mos4

According to the {{uw-mos4}} template series, it sounds as if you can eventually get blocked for a comma or something. If we enforced that, we would lose some of Wikipedia's most experienced editors, such as at this debate. If I actually used those templates, which I can't imagine using without further explanation, would the guy actually get predictably blocked after the fourth warning as if they were vandalism warnings? Or would everybody just laugh? In the latter case, should we delete the uw-mosx templates so nobody makes the mistake of using them? Art LaPella (talk) 05:56, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

The templates specify "disruptive, inappropriate or hard to read formatting", not mere misplacement of a comma. Given that some editors want to take a more... decorative approach, not to say USA Today-esque notion of formatting, these templates are probably helpful and appropriate on occasion. WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:51, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

Is it possible (technically speaking) to create a template ...

... whose input is a page name, and whose output is a URL to the most recent version of that page?

So for example, {{lastchange|dog}} would generate http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Dog&oldid=360687969, which I got by clicking on "Permanent link" at the dog page.

The idea is that this would work by substitution, so that I could put it at the top of an edit whenever I make a comment on a talk page, so that people centuries hence know what version of teh page I was looking at.

user:Agradman, editing right now as 160.39.221.144 (talk) 06:58, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

Here you go: {{freeze}}. It does not make a direct link (that would require a new parser function), but it does make a link to the first item in the page history, which should be sufficient. PleaseStand ^(talk) 17:22, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

• testing: dog (as of now)
• soo coool!!!!! thanks! AConcernedChicken (talk) 19:00, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

Don't forget to subst it. OrangeDog (τ • ε) 19:20, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

One more improvement I made to my template: I created an additional template ({{frozen}}), which could potentially allow a bot to replace the timestamp with an {{oldid}}. Does that seem reasonable? PleaseStand ^(talk) 22:26, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

Actually, I don't understand what {{frozen}} does.  :( Agradman (until the sky stops falling, A Concerned Chicken (talk)) 00:20, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

Is it possible (technically speaking) ... [second question] ...

... to have a "New section" button which is pre-populated with some text?

I am thinking that the WikiProject banners (in article talk pages) could have a button that lets you edit a new section at the wikiproject, whose header is pre-populated with

RE: {{subst:freeze|{{FULLPAGENAME}}}}: ....

which renders as

RE: Wikipedia:Village pump (miscellaneous) (as of now): ...

Except that, instead of using {{FULLPAGENAME}}, it uses the name of the page you were coming from.

user:Agradman, editing as AConcernedChicken (talk) 08:11, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

A simple way would be to create a link like this, but I'm not sure how to pre-populate the section heading, as you call it. — Cheers, JackLee ^–talk– 19:19, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

Right, I know how to create the "new section" link. I want to pre-populate the, ah, "subject/headline". AConcernedChicken (talk) 19:47, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

&preloadtitle= –xeno^talk 18:47, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

Is it possible (technically speaking) ... [third question] ...

... to have a "new section" button which, when you're all done and hit "save", will also edit ANOTHER page, i.e. inserting a simple talkback template indicating that you've put your message on the first page?

I'm thinking this feature should be incorporated into the "new section" button described in the previous post. (All of this is apropos my proposal at VPD.

user:Agradman, editing for the moment as AConcernedChicken (talk) 08:15, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

You really ought ask technical questions at WP:Village pump (technical), if you want the eyes of technically-minded people who can't be arsed with all this miscellany... –xeno^talk 18:52, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

30 seconds and a laptop

You have a potential-editor's attention, and a laptop.

What 2 pages would you first navigate to, to demonstrate how Wikipedia works? (I'll give my own 2¢ later) -- Quiddity (talk) 18:13, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

I'd do three: WP:Sandbox for editing; Talk:Muhammad for consensus; Cow tipping to show how effin awesome we are. Agradman (while the sky falls, A Concerned Chicken (talk)) 18:42, 10 May 2010 (UTC)