Talk:Jack Phillips (wireless officer)

Requested move
John George Phillips (wireless officer) → Jack Phillips – He is more commonly known as Jack Phillips, see Encyclopedia Titanica where is his referred to throughout the article as Jack.

Survey
Add "* Support" or "* Oppose" followed by a brief explanation, then sign your opinion with ~


 * Support - As nominator. Morhange 08:08, 22 October 2006 (UTC)

Discussion

 * http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%22jack+phillips%22+titanic - results in 11,000 hits
 * http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&q=%22john+george+phillips%22+titanic - results in 1,120 hits

This article has been renamed as the result of a move request.

Intro
The intro is not balanced to my POV. Phillips did try hard to send out messages at the end. However, if he had not been curt with the Californian, the Titanic may not have hit the iceberg at all. He was a young man put on the spot. Not easy for him. Wallie (talk) 18:27, 4 November 2008 (UTC)


 * According to, the captain had already received warnings from other ships (an MSG, or master's service gram, requiring personal acknowledgement from the bridge) and was aware of the hazard. The warning from the Californian arrived after the Titanic was already in the area in which ice had been reported, did not indicate MSG or any other priority, and was being sent at the same time as another station (MCE, Cape Race, Newfoundland) was trying to send to MGY (Titanic). I've re-worded the intro slightly, although there are other portions of the main article body that still look to be a wee bit POV (such as the use of the word "negligence" in a manner that singles out this one operator, while failing to address wider questions such as the lack of a second radio operator on Californian - which left that ship oblivious to Titanic's plight once the sole wireless operator was asleep - and the lack of a direct-wire line of communication from the MGY radio room to Titanic's bridge). --66.102.80.212 (talk) 08:19, 18 March 2009 (UTC)


 * Again and again people blame the Californian, and excuse the real culprits. You're an imbecile.177.157.206.100 (talk) 03:30, 1 May 2013 (UTC)

Verification of Californian Exchange
How do we know that the communication between Phillips and Evans actually occurred? Phillips died in the sinking, so he could not tell us about it. Did Bride testify about it? If not, then the only source left would be Evans. Evans would have a motive to lie, because he was on the Californian, whose captain thought getting a good night's sleep was more important than bestirring himself to see why a ship was firing rockets in the middle of the sea. The whole story might be a lie and a cover.John Paul Parks (talk) 15:34, 22 September 2015 (UTC)


 * we do know that happened. RMSTitanlc (talk) 21:23, 21 July 2023 (UTC)

Reference site not accessible
The website to which the note refers (and to which it is hyperlinked) is inaccessible to the wide public. It should be noted so in the note itself - otherwise, there is little point to the link. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.142.37.105 (talk) 22:05, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Rank, job title or just informal description?
In what sense was Phillips "an officer"? As far as I know he was employed by Marconi, not by White Star, and thus could not have an official rank. But how did Marconi title him? The article just describes him as a "wireless operator". So should that be used instead in the title of the article? Martinevans123 (talk) 15:24, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

Phillips on lifeboat B?
The article currently says that Lightoller saw Phillips on Collapsible B, but George Behe has proved in the weblink I have added in that Phillips was never on lifeboat B. All the survivors (Gracie, Lightoller, and Bride) aside from possibly Whiteley said that Phillips was not on lifeboat B. The story of him being on boat B came out years afterwards. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.23.73.189 (unsigned comment added by 92.23.73.189 (talk) 22:48, 3 December 2014 (UTC)  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.144.254.239 (talk)

Orphaned references in Jack Phillips (wireless officer)
I check pages listed in Category:Pages with incorrect ref formatting to try to fix reference errors. One of the things I do is look for content for orphaned references in wikilinked articles. I have found content for some of Jack Phillips (wireless officer)'s orphans, the problem is that I found more than one version. I can't determine which (if any) is correct for this article, so I am asking for a sentient editor to look it over and copy the correct ref content into this article.

Reference named "titanic": From Francis Browne: Centenary Edition of this book was published by Messenger (Dublin, 2011). From John Jacob Astor IV:  

I apologize if any of the above are effectively identical; I am just a simple computer program, so I can't determine whether minor differences are significant or not. AnomieBOT ⚡ 01:00, 4 December 2014 (UTC)

Category:British Merchant Navy officers
User:Necrothesp I know we are not allowed to use photos as sources, but we have both looked at the photo showing his uniform to check if he was MN. Unlike you I thought the cap-badge was Marconi not MN but could not find logos to confirm my OR. Am I wrong? Assuming he was Marconi and never MN do you think it is justified to put him in a wrong category, rather than adjusting the categories to suit? If no source is found to distinguish between Marconi and MN would it not be better omitted?SovalValtos (talk) 10:24, 16 September 2016 (UTC)
 * You misunderstand me. I'm not disputing he worked for Marconi; he certainly did. But in those days Marconi operators were assigned to merchant ships, wore uniform which was (except for some insignia) essentially a merchant service officer's uniform, and essentially functioned as Merchant Navy officers, as radio officers later actually became. While he may have worked for Marconi, to all intents and purposes he was a merchant service officer. In exactly the same way as we categorise British Army officers from one regiment who serve long-term on attachment to another regiment (e.g. the SAS) under both regiments, even though they technically do not belong to the second one, it makes sense to categorise him as a Merchant Navy officer. Given categories are there to group together topics of interest to readers, it seems pedantic in the extreme (and doing a disservice to readers) to not categorise him in a category which his successors occupy just because for a few years people in his specialisation were actually employed by an outside agency. Also note that since the Merchant Navy didn't actually come into existence until after the First World War (it was the much more informal Merchant Service before that, with personnel really only being members of their own companies), we are actually categorising all pre-1920s personnel wrongly by pedantic standards. However, there is significant precedent for categorising people in this way (e.g. university alumni are usually categorised under the present name of the institution, which is not necessarily what the institution was when they were there). And note the explanatory note at the top of Category:British Merchant Navy personnel. I think Marconi operators could be said to be members of the Merchant Service in any case, since technically it wasn't a unified service; it was a collection of people working for different companies who used the generic term "Merchant Service". -- Necrothesp (talk) 10:44, 16 September 2016 (UTC)
 * Thank you User:Necrothesp) for your comprehensive reply. A lot to take in. Simply I was wrong, so I am sorry to have wasted your time. Is the cap badge Marconi?SovalValtos (talk) 20:34, 16 September 2016 (UTC)
 * Not a problem. I can see where you were coming from. As to his cap badge, I should imagine it is. -- Necrothesp (talk) 23:27, 16 September 2016 (UTC)

Time Zone
The article contains time references. What time zone is being used for these references? UTC? Greenland Time? I believe the 19th century international time agreement established marine time zones that are strictly delimited by intervals of longitude at 15 degrees separation, so Greenland time (or Poppa time) would be between 37.5 and 52.5 degrees west longitude. GBC (talk) 14:31, 3 April 2024 (UTC)


 * There's a note in the info box at Sinking of the Titanic, which you may wish to read? Thanks. Martinevans123 (talk) 14:47, 3 April 2024 (UTC)