User talk:Carcharoth/Archive 39

MSU Interview
Dear Carcharoth,

My name is Jonathan Obar user:Jaobar, I'm a professor in the College of Communication Arts and Sciences at Michigan State University and a Teaching Fellow with the Wikimedia Foundation's Education Program. This semester I've been running a little experiment at MSU, a class where we teach students about becoming Wikipedia administrators. Not a lot is known about your community, and our students (who are fascinated by wiki-culture by the way!) want to learn how you do what you do, and why you do it. A while back I proposed this idea (the class) to the community HERE, were it was met mainly with positive feedback. Anyhow, I'd like my students to speak with a few administrators to get a sense of admin experiences, training, motivations, likes, dislikes, etc. We were wondering if you'd be interested in speaking with one of our students.

So a few things about the interviews:
 * Interviews will last between 15 and 30 minutes.
 * Interviews can be conducted over skype (preferred), IRC or email. (You choose the form of communication based upon your comfort level, time, etc.)
 * All interviews will be completely anonymous, meaning that you (real name and/or pseudonym) will never be identified in any of our materials, unless you give the interviewer permission to do so.
 * All interviews will be completely voluntary. You are under no obligation to say yes to an interview, and can say no and stop or leave the interview at any time.
 * The entire interview process is being overseen by MSU's institutional review board (ethics review). This means that all questions have been approved by the university and all students have been trained how to conduct interviews ethically and properly.

Bottom line is that we really need your help, and would really appreciate the opportunity to speak with you. If interested, please send me an email at obar@msu.edu (to maintain anonymity) and I will add your name to my offline contact list. If you feel comfortable doing so, you can post your name HERE instead.

If you have questions or concerns at any time, feel free to email me at obar@msu.edu. I will be more than happy to speak with you.

Thanks in advance for your help. We have a lot to learn from you.

Sincerely,

Jonathan Obar --Jaobar (talk) 21:19, 8 February 2012 (UTC)

Billy Hathorn copyright straggler
Maybe the Billy Hathorn copyright issues closed when he got blocked, but I have a straggler concern. In creating Zaragoza Birthplace State Historic Site, I saw this Google Book link and photo:skip to Page 237 if you can link to this. This is a photo of the Zaragoza statue at the birthplace in Goliad, which is near the site's amphitheater. The only other Zaragosa statue I see in that book is in Dallas. I found a picture of this exact statue here :, complete with amphitheater in the background. This is also on the Wikipedia article for Ignacio Zaragoza, and on the Japanese Wikipedia.. What concerns me is that Hathorn attributed it to San Agustin Plaza in Laredo, Texas. Goliad State Park cannot possibly be confused with a plaza in Laredo. It's not like they're next door, and the photographer isn't sure of where he/she was. I'm not saying that Hathorn uploaded somebody else's work, but this is odd indeed. I think erroneous information like this shouldn't be out there, and thought I would pass it along to you since you were originally involved with the BH copyright issues. Maile66 (talk) 20:56, 9 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Sorry about the delay in replying to this. I took a quick look a few days ago, and there are several monuments and photos around on the internet and on Wikipedia. I'd suggest finding as many as possible and seeing what matches up. Have a look at File:Zaragoza Monument IMG 0995.JPG for instance, stated in the Zaragoza article to be in Goliad. Is that right or wrong? They can't both be in Goliad, can they? Carcharoth (talk) 21:58, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Well, drop it. It isn't worth spending any more energy on. Maile66 (talk) 22:14, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Well, it's either right or wrong, and not difficult to work out. I spent a few more minutes on this and found this page and photo (dating from March 2008, before Hathorn uploaded his picture in October 2008) and that gives the same statue (structure in background as well, though it isn't really an amphitheatre), so I think Hathorn's pictures are OK here (I think the Goliad statue got copied to other locations). Though actually, the USA doesn't have freedom of panorama, so all these photos should be on Wikipedia not Commons, unless copies of a statue donated to Texas by Mexico by Mexican sculptors are OK. Carcharoth (talk) 15:33, 19 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Thank you for coming up with the image on Waymarks. It isn't that I didn't want to look at it, really - it's that I thought I erred and didn't want you to go to anymore trouble about this. It's just that I wasn't sure by the first photo you came up with, that it was actually a second statue. I mis-stated when I said it's an amphitheatre in the background. It's a gazebo as many public parks have in Texas. The Waymark image pretty much confirms that it is a second statue. The statue in Goliad was donated by citizens in Mexico, and I don't know of a Zaragoza connection to Laredo. That doesn't mean Laredo doesn't hold him up as a hero. It's obvious there are two statues, and you've done well coming up with that.  Don't get me wrong about Hathorn.  I think Wikipedia owes a debt of gratitude to him for photos he legitimately took. I've inserted his photos on a number of pages for museums in Texas.  It's just because of what went down with his getting blocked, I was a little leery of this one saying it's in Laredo. I'm so glad you found that, and that it's OK to be on Wikipedia as is.Maile66 (talk) 18:00, 19 February 2012 (UTC)

The Bugle: Issue LXXI, February 2012
The Bugle is published by the Military history WikiProject. To receive it on your talk page, please join the project or sign up here. If you are a project member who does not want delivery, please remove your name from this page. Your editors, Ian Rose (talk) and Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 09:37, 21 February 2012 (UTC)

WikiCup 2012 February newsletter
Round 1 is already over! The 64 highest scorers have progressed to round 2. Our highest scorer was, again thanks mostly to a swathe of good articles on The X-Files. In second place was, thanks an impressive list of did you knows about racehorses. Both scored over 400 points. Following behind with over 300 points were, , and. February also saw the competition's first featured list: List of colleges and universities in North Dakota, from. At the other end of the scale, 11 points was enough to secure a place in this round, and some contestants with 10 points made it into the round on a tiebreaker. This is higher than the 8 points that were needed last year, but lower than the 20 points required the year before. The number of points required to progress to round 3 will be significantly higher.

The remaining contestants have been split into 8 pools of 8, named A through H. Round two will finish in two months time on 28 April, when the two highest scorers in each pool, as well as the next 16 highest scorers, will progress to round 3. The pools were entirely random, so while some pools may end up being more competitive than others, this is by chance rather than design.

The judges would like to point out two quick rules reminders. First, any content promoted during the interim period (that is, on or after 27 February) is eligible for points in round 2. Second, any content worked on significantly this year is eligible for points if promoted in this round. On a related note, if you are concerned that your nomination, be it at good article candidates, a featured process or anywhere else, will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on WikiCup/Reviews. However, please remember to continue to offer reviews at GAC, FAC and all the other pages that require them to prevent any backlogs which would otherwise be caused by the Cup. As ever, questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start receiving or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn (talk &bull; email) and The ed17 (talk &bull; email) 23:54, 29 February 2012 (UTC)

Page Triage newsletter
Hey guys!

Thanks to all of you who have commented on the New Page Triage talkpage. If you haven't had a chance yet, check it out; we're discussing some pretty interesting ideas, both from the Foundation and the community, and moving towards implementing quite a few of them :).

In addition, on Tuesday 13th March, we're holding an office hours session in #wikimedia-office on IRC at 19:00 UTC (11am Pacific time). If you can make it, please do; we'll have a lot of stuff to show you and talk about, including (hopefully) a timetable of when we're planning to do what. If you can't come, for whatever reason, let me know on my talkpage and I'm happy to send you the logs so you can get an idea of what happened :). Regards, Okeyes (WMF) (talk) 23:55, 8 March 2012 (UTC)

New Page Triage newsletter
Hey all!

Thanks to everyone who attended our first office hours session; the logs can be found here, if you missed it, and we should be holding a second one on Thursday, 22 March 2012 at 18:00 UTC in #wikimedia-office. I hope to see you all there :).

In the meantime, I have greatly expanded the details available at New Page Triage: there's a lot more info about precisely what we're planning. If you have ideas, and they aren't listed there, bring them up and I'll pass them on to the developers for consideration in the second sprint. And if you know anyone who might be interested in contributing, send them there too!

Regards, Okeyes (WMF) (talk) 00:25, 14 March 2012 (UTC)

fyi
I followed up on a comment you left at Wikipedia talk:Categorizing redirects.

I have been growing increasing unhappy with the compromises required due to the inherent weaknesses in categories. Geo Swan (talk) 09:26, 19 March 2012 (UTC)


 * May not have time to follow this up, but thanks for the note. Carcharoth (talk) 00:22, 21 March 2012 (UTC)

FAC

 * Thanks. Different perspectives or angles do help, as you say. Carcharoth (talk) 00:22, 21 March 2012 (UTC)

help triage some feedback
Hey guys.

I appreciate this isn't quite what you signed up for, but I figured as people who are already pretty good at evaluating whether material is useful or not useful through Special:NewPages, you might be interested :). Over the last few months we've been developing the new Article Feedback Tool, which features a free text box. it is imperative that we work out in advance what proportion of feedback is useful or not so we can adjust the design accordingly and not overwhelm you with nonsense.

This is being done through the Feedback Evaluation System (FES), a tool that lets editors run through a stream of comments, selecting their value and viability, so we know what type of design should be promoted or avoided. We're about to start a new round of evaluations, beginning with an office hours session tomorrow at 18:00 UTC. If you'd like to help preemptively kill poor feedback, come along to #wikimedia-office and we'll show you how to use the tool. If you can't make it, send me an email at or drop a note on my talkpage, and I'm happy to give you a quick walkthrough in a one-on-one session :).

All the best, Okeyes (WMF) (talk) 21:38, 20 March 2012 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the note. I've never used IRC, so I'll just keep following things on-wiki, when I have time. Carcharoth (talk) 00:23, 21 March 2012 (UTC)

Time for a peer review before FAC?
Hi. I've been working on Smith Act trials of communist party leaders, getting it ready for FA. It is a complex topic, and it needs a fresh pair of eyes to review it before I nominate it for FA, so I've put it up for a second Peer Review. I respect your judgement, and would appreciate it if you could provide some input at Peer review/Smith Act trials of communist party leaders/archive1. If you are too busy, that is okay ... thanks for considering it. --Noleander (talk) 17:28, 21 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Too busy, at least for this coming week. Trying to finish some work of my own, both on- and off-wiki. Maybe in the week before Easter. Carcharoth (talk) 15:02, 25 March 2012 (UTC)

The Bugle: Issue LXXII, March 2012
The Bugle is published by the Military history WikiProject. To receive it on your talk page, please join the project or sign up here. If you are a project member who does not want delivery, please remove your name from this page. Your editors, Ian Rose (talk) and Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 02:03, 24 March 2012 (UTC)

User talk:28bytes
Hi Carcharoth. Would you be willing to take a look at User talk:28bytes? Thank you, Cunard (talk) 09:09, 24 March 2012 (UTC)

Request
I realise Im pushing my luck here, given we had harsh words and all, but hopefully thats behind us; it certainly is from here. You did a very close review for me and helped a lot on the Bouts panel, and I was hoping that if I put up Crucifixion and Last Judgement diptych at PR, and if you had the time, you might do the same again. I sure could use your insight; but if your preoccupied, no worries and for what its worth, best. Ceoil (talk) 14:38, 25 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I'd be happy to look at some point, but as I just said at another other request further up this page, I'm too busy, at least for this coming week. Trying to finish some work of my own, both on- and off-wiki. Maybe in the week before Easter. Carcharoth (talk) 15:03, 25 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Grand, theres no hurry; "at some stage" would be great. Ceoil (talk) 15:41, 25 March 2012 (UTC)

Sopwith
Re yesterday and Thomas Sopwith (geologist), I've done a bit of work on the article. It not only needs more, but I suspect this of being a biggish area to sort out. I've done Thomas Richardson (chemist), one of the ODNB hits for Sopwith and a co-author. The redlinks there say quite a lot about where this could lead. (Richardson was a missing FRS, as well as a DNB VoTM person. The DNB and ODNB show their strengths here.) Charles Matthews (talk) 12:18, 31 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Thanks, Charles. Can you remember the names of some of the others working on this and other articles? I've put some follow-up thoughts on the Wikimedia UK workshop page talk page. Maybe others will post there as well? Carcharoth (talk) 12:31, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

You can find most of the participants from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/Mikenorton I guess. They all seem to be linked from the Workshop page now. Charles Matthews (talk) 13:42, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

WikiCup 2012 March newsletter
We are over half way through the second round of this year's WikiCup and things are going well! , of Pool B, is our highest overall scorer thanks to his prolific writings on television and film. In second place is Pool H's, thanks primarily to work on biological articles, especially in marine biology and herpetology. Third place goes to Pool E's, who also writes primarily on biology (including ornithology and botany) and has already submitted two featured articles this round. Of the 63 contestants remaining, 15 (just under a quarter) have over 100 points this round. However, 25 are yet to score. Please remember to update your submission pages promptly. 32 contestants, the top two from each pool and the 16 next-highest scorers, will advance to round 3.

Congratulations to, whose impressive File:Wacht am Rhein map (Opaque).svg became the competition's first featured picture. Also, congratulations to, who claimed good topic points, our first contestant this year to do so, for his work on Featured topics/1982 Atlantic hurricane season. This leaves featured topics and featured portals as the only sources of points not yet utilised. However, as recent statistics from show, no source has yet been utilised this competition to the same extent it has been previously!

It has been observed that the backlogs at good article candidates are building up again. While the points for good article reviews will be remaining constant, any help that can be offered keeping the backlog down would be appreciated. On a related note, if you are concerned that your nomination, be it at good article candidates, a featured process or anywhere else, will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on WikiCup/Reviews. As ever, questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start receiving or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn (talk &bull; email) and The ed17 (talk &bull; email) 23:14, 31 March 2012 (UTC)