User talk:Countersubject

Welcome!

Hello Countersubject, and welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for your contributions. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are a few good links for newcomers:

I hope you enjoy editing here and being a Wikipedian! Please sign your name on talk pages using four tildes (~~~~); this will automatically produce your name and the date. If you have any questions, check out Wikipedia:Where to ask a question or ask me on my talk page. Again, welcome! --Flockmeal 14:39, 6 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Duruflé article[edit]

Hi Countersubject

I've just noticed your comments about the Duruflé article. I'll maybe work on this a bit, or you can just do it. If you simply put your own contribution in, then if it enhances what was there already then that'll be good. Of course this may distort the structure, or otherwise cause difficulties, but that's what Wikipedia is about. If I, or others really hate what gets done that way, we can always revert the article to a previous version, or edit it again. I have written sections for other articles which have been completely edited out of existence. Possibly this resulted in better articles - possibly not. Sometimes one just puts up with that.

I haven't actually noticed that the article has appeared elsewhere without attribution. The good thing about Wikipedia is that it does enable one to get articles written - with help from others. The not so good thing is that if one wants to claim ownership it's not really possible. It's not really possible even if you start an article, and then later on it becomes modified. For example, see the article about Holly Valance, which I started with someone else. Our original article was very minimal indeed - so there is no way we could now legitimately claim it to be our work.

I think you have to take comfort in the fact that at least writing articles may be useful to some people, and sometimes it also helps oneself. You can always later on base a new article on what emerges. Regarding the Duruflé article, it was odd to find that some of the dates and events are a bit uncertain - I remember leaving a note about this on the Talk page. Finding exact details even about relatively recent history can be rather hard. In the end I based the article on a "best of n" approach, in which I chose the dates and events which corresponded to the greatest number of other articles which supported what was written, but this is not guaranteed to be correct.

I'll look at Duruflé again, and see if we can improve it along the lines you suggest, but as I say, in the spirit of Wikipedia you can just go ahead - if indeed you have not already done so.

I hope you enjoy working with Wikipedia. I write less than I used to, but I still think it's a great tool.

David Martland 06:52, 28 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Faversham edit[edit]

Thanks for your contribution re Faversham. Indeed! I tried a more appropriate reference to chavs in the Faversham page this morning.... and also widened the background material about Faversham history and features. Hope someone will now expand and improve it. I became so carried away that I forgot to sign in then (86.137.168.64=--Farsee50 21:02, 1 March 2006 (UTC)!)[reply]

Re: Rants[edit]

If you feel that an article contains "rants" then either change it so its no longer a rant or comment on the talk page of the articles in question. Categories are not the place for it. —Xezbeth 16:06, 1 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Ok, fine, I recreated the category and nominated it for deletion. —Xezbeth 17:16, 1 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Sigh, I don't need to discuss every edit I make. You queried it, and I reverted myself, then did the correct thing by listing it on Cfd. End of discussion. —Xezbeth 20:46, 1 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Please just drop it now. My reasoning for deleting the category is on cfd. I'm not trying to railroad my own POV, I just feel that labelling established articles as "rants" is vandalistic and worthy of speedy deletion. Since you queried it though, I reversed my actions. —Xezbeth 21:45, 1 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Here. Good luck finding anything, I guess. —Xezbeth 22:20, 1 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

King's College School[edit]

The history of this page contained the names of private individuals (pupils etc.) with some disparaging comments. The Wikimedia Foundation received a complaint about it, with claims that we violated the privacy of these individuals as well as child protection legislation.

At the time, I was processing the Foundation's email queue (I do that from time to time). Since we had dozens and dozens of late emails, it is materially impossible for us to do the selective undeletion work or to do a "vote for deletion" or whatever bureaucratic procedure there is every time there is a legitimate complaint. It just does not scale.

What is needed now is selective undeletion of the revisions not containing unsuitable material. I'll leave a message on the admin notice board for getting somebody to do it. David.Monniaux 12:06, 14 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The thing is formalized as follows: there is a limited number of people who the Wikimedia Foundation trusts enough to answer its email complaints, and I'm among them. These people have very limited time to process dozens of messages. As a consequence, they take summary action. If this summary action is highly contentious or other admins dispute it, they may request WP:OFFICE.

When somebody contends that we have on our site, publicly accessible, potentially illegal stuff, we have to get rid of it; answering these people that it will get deleted after some unrelated people vote on it is likely to escalate the matter.

Unfortunately, removing selected revisions of an article is way more complicated than removing the article; one has to carefully sift through every of them and select the appropriate ones manually.

and that your reference to the established deletion procedures as whatever bureaucratic procedure there is doesn't indicate a disregard for the ways in which these things ought normally to be done

It indicates that I think that these procedures, though they may be adapted in cases where we have time to react, are not suitable for dealing with articles that get us legal threats with valid reasons. David.Monniaux 15:08, 14 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Samuel Johnson Page Move Proposal[edit]

You gave an early opinion that helped decide the Robert Johnson move proposal. I am continuing work on the Johnsons. I would appreciate your opinion on the following:

Samuel Johnson → Dr. Samuel Johnson —(Discuss) Since the Feb 2006 page move, 6 new entries have been added to the Samuel Johnson (disambiguation) page including Sam Houston Johnson, a Presidential sibling, Samuel Ealy Johnson, Jr., a Presidential father, Samuel Ealy Johnson, Sr., a Presidential grandfather, Samuel Johnson (footballer), an active footballer, and Samuel Curtis Johnson, Sr. the patriarch of the richest family in Wisconsin. The primacy of Dr. Samuel Johnson versus the remaining field of Samuel Johnsons should be reconsidered. This move would enable replacement of the dab page at Samuel Johnson TonyTheTiger 22:20, 1 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

REDIRECT [[]]== Newman controversy ==

Thanks for your message. The alternative "Newman Society" link was removed because the site purports to be that of "Oxford's Oldest Student Catholic Society founded MDCCCLXXVIII". The Proctors of the University of Oxford do not recognise this body as the historic Newman Society (founded 1878), which is the Oxford University Newman Society (note that the latter is licensed to use the University's name in its title). For that matter, none of the alternative society's listed "Officers" are students in Oxford, and two of the three do not even reside in Oxford!

For these reasons, it strikes me as deception for the site to listed alongside other, legitimate groups. I will remove it for now, but I'd be happy to submit to "higher judgement." NewmanSociety 00:12, 23 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I am waiting on advice from the Society's legal counsel as to how to proceed in this matter, but I will continue to place the Society's link on the Newman Page. One point is that 'The Newman Society' does not say that it is an Oxford UNiversity Society.NewmanPresident 14:36, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Following the controversy that seems to be surrounding The Newman Society and OUNS, I looked at the websites.. and found some information the history... look at [1] and click history. Perhaps this can explain some things. It certainly made sense to me. CardinalPole 15:03, 27 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Having read that "history", I'm afraid that Kissinger's dictum applies. Since the site's content is now of even less interest to anyone outside of that controversy, I think there is all the more reason for not linking to it on the John Henry Newman page. One has to ask whether the Proctors would allow the Oxford University Newman Society to use the University's name and logo on its materials, as it does at present, were those claims true. NewmanSociety 23:34, 28 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Re the Proctors... Perhaps that is what the current appeal is about.NewmanPresident 17:51, 29 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Which "current appeal" would that be? NewmanSociety 02:21, 30 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

It is my understanding that the "current appeal" has now been answered. Those interested (that is one student and the Proctors of the University of Oxford will have been notified."NewmanPresident 05:25, 27 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Style note[edit]

Hi. Just a note. Per WP:MoS#Headings, one should avoid capitals in section headings, so

==Background and Family Life==

should be

==Background and family life==

This is a small thing, but I thought I'd let you know. Cheers, Oleg Alexandrov (talk) 20:07, 7 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Southport.gb link farm[edit]

Am a bit surprised that you've restored this link. The owners of this site are simple link farmers who put a few local news items from other sites that the top of their pages through out the country to disguise it as a news page. Normal policy on wiki is to remove known link farms such as this. Is there any particular reason that this one should be left on? That said, if you're happy with it being on the Southport page then I'm quite content to leave it there as you do most of the maintainence on that page. Cheers. Galloglass 16:50, 25 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I suspect from the details you give on your user page that you may not be happy with the editorial ethos of southport.gb

Hmm well actually the only news links are to my own political party, like that one on Chris Davis. Doesn't mean I'm going to go against wikipedia's policy about removing such links. But as I've said above you tend to the page more than I do so if you're ok with this breach I'm not going to fight over it. Galloglass 21:54, 25 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Images in EU page[edit]

Hi. It's no big deal if you already started deleting the pictures. If you ask for my opinion, there would be only two issues:

- I would retain the picture of Angela Merkel. The Council is still the most powerful institution of the EU, and the country presiding it fixes its agenda. This gives a lot of clout to Angela Merkel for the next few months.

- I would delete all the biggest cities pictures, since they are not even ranked by size of metropolitan population (giving the ridiculous impression that Paris is smaller than Madrid) and only cover the biggest cities. On the other hand, the pictures of European Capital of Culture - which are actually chosen by the EU and not compiled according to an arbitrary size list - give a chance to smaller countries too.

The Galileo picture is good - and it confirms my comment that the EU names everything after famous dead Europeans :-) Luis rib 00:24, 28 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Changes to EU Article[edit]

My discussion and reasoning input is probably three times higher than yours. Its your turn. Now you explain to me why you keep deleting serious content. I´m looking forward to watch that.Lear 21 02:11, 28 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

EU article[edit]

Create serious arguments! Make useful contributions! Stop babbling! Stop deleting content! This is the last personal suggestion of Lear 21 00:57, 2 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for your input regarding the Latin motto of the EU. I completely agree to your arguments and would like to keep the Latin motto in the EU article. Cheers, MikeZ 13:10, 2 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

!Stop constant moaning![edit]

You are an attention seeker, right? Stop it! Stop your constant provocation, you read that! Stick to the issues that are discussed in the EU article, instead of whining. This has an end now! You describe yourself as Eurosceptic, Europhob. Why do you FEEL competent about EU then? To be more precise; Why do you THINK you have the ability to judge? Have you lived in several countries? Are you an academic in one of the relevant topics? Have you read many city or country articles in different languages. Do you know the UN article? The current contributions of yours all indicate, NO! Instead, your edits signalise agitational underclass views. This has an end now! Please consider to contribute to Eurosceptic article, as you are an expert in this field. Or create Europhobia article, must be fun ! If you are unsure about the quality I´m aiming for the EU aricle, read the Berlin article. This has almost reached Featured Article Status, after 6 month work. Almost all references in Berlin are provided by myself, also the complete layout,images and written content in all sections. Was that clear ? Lear 21 21:32, 2 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Stop reinserting disputed EU intro version[edit]

2 editors are in favor, 2 are rather against. Read Wikipedia politics as mentioned in talk. Stop your speculative POV version. Lear 21 18:47, 4 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Unreferenced BLPs[edit]

Hello Countersubject! Thank you for your contributions. I am a bot alerting you that 1 of the articles that you created is tagged as an Unreferenced Biography of a Living Person. The biographies of living persons policy requires that all personal or potentially controversial information be sourced. In addition, to ensure verifiability, all biographies should be based on reliable sources. If you were to bring this article up to standards, it would greatly help us with the current 940 article backlog. Once the article is adequately referenced, please remove the {{unreferencedBLP}} tag. Here is the article:

David Downes - Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL

Thanks!--DASHBot (talk) 00:40, 18 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]