User talk:Kilnburn/Early March 2008

Pictures

For your information. Mutt Lunker (talk) 23:24, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

Hi K, your picture entitled "High St (East End), Kirkcaldy" is actually of the west end - the West End Congregational Church is clearly visible. You've evidently been busy with the camera lately! Mutt Lunker (talk) 00:48, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

oops! wrong side, thanks for changing this.

anyway, i wish to add some more. Kilnburn (talk) 09:14, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

just to let you know, i took the last batch of the ones i wanted to do, especially the former Nairn's factory on Nairn Street. most are in the pictures section and some have been added into the article itself. i have finished now and won't add anymore, if you wish to move or delete them if you need to, then i'll grant you permission. give me feedback if you're happy with what i have done

although since the grade 2 listed former Nairn factory on Nairn Street is due to be demolished not too far away, i'm wondering if it should be kept on the article after it is demolished. i have though noted about it's demise. Kilnburn (talk) 22:58, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

Just had a quick look at the photos again. It's certainly made a difference to the article. This is just my personal and non-expert opinion but I'd say they're largely pretty good, particularly as you were quite reticent to undertake the task. If you want a wee bit of constructive criticism, there are a few that are a bit obscured by other objects or have large parts of the foreground taken up by roads, cars or other things but it's difficult if you are trying to frame up a large building and have to get far enough away to get it all in shot, without the benefit of specialist lenses or access to places where you might get a clearer shot. This is just for a minority of them though and there are certainly no stinkers. On the contrary there are quite a few that have shown me new views of familiar places or highlighted things I hadn't paid much attention to before. Well done.

Regarding "permission", you've used the term before and I'm not sure if you mean it in the way I would normally understand it or that you're just encouraging me to take a look and give it some tweaks if I feel it's necessary. If it's the latter, fair enough and thanks for letting me know. Otherwise, as I mentioned before, anyone is free to come and edit Wikipedia so there isn't really a concept of giving or refusing permission like this (apart from extreme cases when people can be blocked for bad faith edits etc., but this isn't relevant here). Mutt Lunker (talk) 00:50, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

refimprove/editing/more re Kirkcaldy

My {{refimprove}} tag was aimed at the whole Kirkcaldy article, which lacks citations in general, credible ones in particular. This was partly to show that although I was asking you to cite some of your recent additions, this was not just aimed at you but is an issue for the article as a whole.

When I talk about credible citaions, you may find this and this useful. You tend to add citations you have found on the internet, newspaper online sites are probably okay. I know this is the easiest way to find references but it can be difficult to tell how reliable these sources are since anyone can set them up and there is almost certainly no peer review. See the section in the guideline on self-published sources. Self-perpetuating dubious facts can pop up all over the internet as one site copies from another. We should try to avoid these infiltrating Wikipedia.

In general books are more reliable. I know this means they are not so easy to come by but the extra effort is repaid with more reliable text in the article. Anyway, have a look at the guidelines on reliability. Mutt Lunker (talk) 23:41, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

agreed. it's a very fair point. that's what i thought thinking it was general problem overall. the problem i have found is, bits of info spread across the article are coming from the same source, that is being used for other bits of info. this is what happens because as far as i have seen, there aren't too many sites about the town on the web outside the main ones

actually talking about books, i actually have books about the town from the Kirkcaldy Civic Society, so it may be actually a good idea to hunt these out.

thanks

p.s. currently adding some photos (only where they are needed) onto the article Kilnburn (talk) 23:47, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

I'm going to add back the tag in the hope that we'll get some more citations. As it stands much of the article (including long-standing sections) is interesting but not credible without the back up of citations. Tagging parts does not (necessarily) mean you doubt them, just a reminder that policy directs that they should be reliably cited.

Go for your life with the books - much better than citing internet stuff which could be correct or a pile of guff with no way of knowing. Civic Society ones should be credible. All the best with the photos too.

Lastly, would you mind going back to your additions today, weeding out any that are affected by issues of verifiability etc.? I was only part way through copyediting etc. of your additions but if we're agreed that some of it needs to be rolled back, I'd appreciate it if you went back and did it. Mutt Lunker (talk) 00:13, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

right that's fine. i'll get that sorted out. Kilnburn (talk) 00:16, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

Hi again, Kilnburn, forgot to mention one thing to you yesterday, which may be helpful. You talk about having “asked permission” to include “a more improved history section”. I’m not sure what you mean by this as anyone can edit – you don't need permission any more than any one else but also there is no special status of permission granted to confer greater status on certain edits, if this is what you mean.

Regarding yesterdays edits, rather than go in and make changes myself this time I thought it might be more helpful first to give you an explanation of (some of) the bits which require some work from your efforts of yesterday (the list may seem long but is not exhaustive). Then you can tackle them yourself, rather than me doing it and you having to follow a series of notes in edit summaries from me. The main issues are introducing uncited material, citing material from sources of unknown reliability, misquoting citations (I assume in good faith), writing things which are not in the citations at all, confusing phraseology, deleting notable material. Here we go:

Intro:

Your sentence “The name is believed to come from a Celtic phrase for “fort on a rocky hill”” – duplicates the fully-cited previous sentence but with a less full explanation. “although there is belief it should be associated with a church hence being part of the name” – misquote from self-published web source (therefore unknown reliability) whose primary aim is accommodation not history. What’s more the source only mentions the supposed church derivation as what “one would assume” – i.e. assume wrongly. Therefore the whole sentence duplicates earlier material then misinterprets the citation about an incorrect derivation – i.e. it should be deleted.

“The burgh of Dysart was merged into Kirkcaldy in 1930, although the former burgh still retains it's own identity. [1]”. The “retains it's own identity” is not stated in the citation (again from the web and of unknown reliability) and could be said to be flatly contradicted where it says “is effectively a north-eastern suburb of Kirkcaldy”. Misquote, POV, this part of the sentence should go.

You removed the (cited, partially at least) section starting “The last ship to enter the harbour was in 1991. Much of the quay area…”, without explanation as far as I can see. Then you removed the sentence “In the 17th century it boasted one of the earliest Latvian consulates, reflecting centuries of trade with Scandinavia, the Baltic States and the Netherlands.”, again without explanation. This was uncited (not sure if that’s why you removed it) but would certainly be highly notable if it can be verified so it would have been better to put a {{fact}} tag on it for a while. I’d recommend this go back in and hopefully someone will cite it.

History:

You removed the well-written but uncited paragraph beginning “Kirkcaldy was gifted to the monks…”. All this is notable so I’d say it should go back but {{fact}} tagged.

Your new paragraph beginning “The modern town of Kirkcaldy…” is uncited and has several parts where the phrasing is unclear and confusing. If the source is the same as the one listed in the following paragraph (internet, unknown reliability), there are misquotes from it regarding the date (e.g. 1075 when you say 1095) and as to what happened (the source states land in Kirkcaldy was granted to the Abbey, not what you have said). Salt was not discovered but the industry was developed. These are not the only examples by the way.

The following paragraph (“Kirkcaldy became an important port “) is also often confusing (“vital in case of a south eastern shore being vulnerable to storm”?), misquotes the source in several instances and states many things not said at all in the source.

There are similar issues with the other edits from yesterday but don't have time to detail them all. Please address them. I hope this was helpful to you. Mutt Lunker (talk) 18:42, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

right, that was a silly thing to include Dysart retaining it's own identity so i'm going to remove it.

what i was planning to do was remove the sentence: "In the 17th century......" and add it into the history section, but again i'll sort that out.

with the mention of "The modern town of Kirkcaldy...." now that is incorrect since it wasn't until 1930 that when Dysart merged, was the beginning of the modern town. so again, have to change the phrasing.

i will also remove the part "vital in case of a south eastern shore...." since it is not important.

concerning the decline of the harbour when "the last ship was in 1991" i will again change the phrasing.

yep, i noticed that my sentence "the name is believed" replicates the word "believed" again. have to re-phrase this too.

also Kirkcaldy was gifted to the monks from Dunfermline Abbey in 1384 will return. Kilnburn (talk) 18:53, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

Oh Kilnburn, please do not re-interpret or rewrite the things you are adding back. You have phrased this really badly and frankly it is quite nonsensical "The town boasted in the 17th century one of the first Lativan connections with trade in the Baltic States and the Netherlands as well."??? That is not what was said (it is about a consulate not some undefined "connection"), you've introduced spelling mistakes and your sentence is effectively meaningless. Go back to the last version of Kirkcaldy before your changes (i.e. at the time of the last edit on March 1st), find the text in question, copy it exactly as written and replace it in the article. Mutt Lunker (talk) 19:20, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

Now "the last ship came in 1991 and recently been boarded up with flats now on the site and the coal mines since the closure of the Seafield Colliery."??? Does this mean that a ship came in 1991, the ship was boarded up with flats recently (rather than boards?) and also boarded up with coal mines. I'm sure that's not what you meant but how is somebody to come to the article and try and understand this? Kilnburn, I'm trying to help but it's exasperating. This is just a stream of phrases and ideas in no cogent order and resulting in no sense. Mutt Lunker (talk) 19:28, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

Ok, the Latvian bit's improved now. Mutt Lunker (talk) 19:29, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

i actually remembered the sentence you see but i had forgotten the word "consenlate" so i subsituted it for "connection" thinking someone would be able to change it for me (which would be a bit selfishness of me). hopefully, it's all right now and you must let me know, if it's not. Kilnburn (talk) 19:34, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

I'm glad you've been honest about this, it's useful to know. Please be more diligent and careful. It would be selfish to make sloppy edits hoping that someone will clear up after you. This would be really hard work for others and a real imposition to expect someone else to do this. I'm not saying this is what you have done with your edits today and yesterday but when I saw all the problems with them that I've partially listed above, it struck me that it would be a couple of hours work to clean them up but it would be much easier to revert to the last edit before you'd started. This would "throw out the baby with the bathwater" in the sense that good material might be ditched with the bad but you can't expect people to make good your mistakes, particularly when there are so many.

"Kirkcaldy in recent times has lost both the legacy of the harbour, the last ship arrived in 1991 and has been since boarded up with flats now on the site and the coal mines since the closure of the Seafield Colliery." is still jumbled up and doesn't make sense. Try "The closure of the Seafield Colliery saw the end of mining and the last ship left the harbour in 1991. The harbour (i.e. not the ship as your phrasing unintentionally implies) has since been mothballed (you can maybe board up harbour buildings but not the harbour), (comma inserted) with flats now on the site."Mutt Lunker (talk) 20:06, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

mmmmm.....right. oh dear! i thought the introduction was going to be removed (as i can see). i actually did what you suggested, i found the info from the sources and tried my best to construct a paragraph in a word documentwith the spell checker and a readover before i even thought about cut and pasting the info. into the article. it really was a good idea, so thank you. the info was probably removed because of a lack of sources and sources having false info being the possible reasons just like you said and for that i completely understand. what i don't understand is why on the board, they are so determined that "Kirkcaldy was gifted to the monks at Dunfermline Abbey in 1384" and that on all the sources i found, that wasn't mentioned one bit, making a huge mention of Kirkcaldy going as far as back as 1095 being used primarly as a coal field area. was that source from a book?

in terms of what is most important here, i know the phrasing wasn't brillant when i was describing: "Kirkcaldy in recent times....." but at least i'm going to take the advice because personally i wasn't happy with the extremely long sentence but i had difficulty trying to figure out how to cut it into two or how to rephrase the sentence. Kilnburn (talk) 23:05, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

To clarify, in the history intro I initially tried to keep as much of your new material as possible by making amendments to it but there were problems with nearly ever part, so I ended up having to just remove most of it - otherwise it would have had to have been almost entirely re-written. There was only one citation listed (the web site - whch seems pretty well written although it isn't clear where it sources its info). Assuming this was your only source: some of your additions were evidently not actually from this citation; some appeared to have straightforward errors (e.g. the citation says 1075, you said 1095); you appear to have simply misunderstood parts; some of your additions consisted of fragments from the source, reassembled to give an entirely different (and incorrect) meaning; you also seemed to put an interpretation on some parts that is either not in or different to the citation.

You have been making gradual improvements in your editing but there is still some work to put in. Regarding citations, please be more careful. As discussed, the article as a whole needs more of them but any new additions you make must be cited and you must accurately reflect that citation. Make sure it's a reliable citation, quote or paraphrase it accurately, don't change it or put your own interpretation on it (even if you are sure what you want to say is true, if it isn't in the citation it shouldn't be in the article) and if you're not sure you understand something in the citation, best to leave that part out.

Regarding Dunfermline Abbey, dates etc., I put that back in for now but there is no citation, put a fact tag on it. Think I have a new reliable source though, in an encyclopedia. Checking it out with a view to adding it... Mutt Lunker (talk) 00:14, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

Found similar issues regarding misquoting the citation in the Linoleum Trade section, hence the overhaul. Mutt Lunker (talk) 01:11, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

that's a very fair and honest statement. agreed. the change in the Linoleum Trade section is absolutely fine.

the thing i'm going to do is find those books and see what they contain for info. at the moment, unless i know exactly what i have in plan, it's best to leave the section as it is. if i feel it is neccessary to add info, it probably will be from the books. i have to very careful i don't give myself too much work and effort trying to create something that backfires. Kilnburn (talk) 01:37, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

I'm glad you are happy with the edits. I think you are right to be careful about taking on too much work and the possibility of things backfiring - in your eagerness you've often been biting off far more than you can chew. It's evident that when you make large sweeping changes to the text, trying to add lots of diverse material all at once, that you tend to get confused, jumble it up, make mistakes, add things that are not in the cited source and express it in a way that is difficult to comprehend. A lot of work for you, then a lot of work for others to try to straighten it out.

Can I suggest that a better course for you in future would be to concentrate on just dealing with one or two facts at a time, taking time and lots of care to make small but really good contributions. Much better to add just a few well-chosen words at a time than huge sweeping changes full of mistakes. It would also make it easier for other editors to follow the changes and spot any (hopefully much fewer!) mistakes. More patient incremental edits will enhance the article and improve it more quickly than big hasty changes and additions.

One good thing I have noticed about your edits lately is an improvement in focus on what is and isn't notable. There may have been other problems with the recent edits but, as far as I remember, they all concerned notable matters. You've evidently been working to curb your earlier tendency to add superfluous and distracting details (for instance on roads or junctions near to notable places). Mutt Lunker (talk) 23:58, 6 March 2008 (UTC)