User talk:DGG/Archive 5 June 2007

Academics
Thanks for the note. I look forward to working with you. --Kevin Murray 20:05, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

you know what...
Hi there,

looks like we were right about the media attention the SJ incident would get... and its so bad I can't even feel any glee...

Now I think it is time to start thinking about the consequences this should have... if you have any ideas you can count on my input and help Alf Photoman  22:10, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

AfD page for List of conferences
I added a comment in reply to your idea about categories. Basically I think that trying to duplicate all the many existing external lists of conferences is a non-starter. andy 11:37, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

Policy
Policy is very clear in these regards. Your interpretation of begs for closer reading of policy. Blogs and websites are acceptable from people about themselves in a much stricter sense than you suppose. The policy for use of unreliable sources describing themselves means that if you need a citation for why the musical group The Dresden Dolls got their name, their website would be a good source even though it is not published by an outside source or reviewed. You could not use The Dresden Dolls website as a reference for defining cabaret or punk because members of a group of people do not get to speak for that whole group on wikipedia just because they have a website. The same is true of a self published aquaphile journal as is of a forum post. It is very plainly another form of original research. Lotusduck 04:29, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

Policy is not up for automatic interpretation just because it is called attribution not verifiability-- in fact the term is bent harder against use of things that we may agree on as true and promotes more use of cited sources. You do not need to tell me not to fight. You have assaulted my intentions, I have not yours.Lotusduck 05:07, 22 March 2007 (UTC)
 * comment by DG to put this into perspective: what I said in the AfD was
 * The nominator of this article has nominated a number of articles about non-orthodox sexual practices, and succeeding in deleting some of them.
 * The nominator says on her talk p. "This is not an attack on the big paraphilias, this is an annoyance with small chatrooms dedicated to a sub-subgenre of erotica pretending they have a medical problem on wikipedia. All in all, the whole phenomena is really annoying. I would start a special comission on non-made-up paraphilias and fetish if I even knew how."
 * (Given that, I think I accurately described the intentions).DGG 16:33, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

Awesome job on finding some better references for Breast expansion fetish. (Um, that sounds weird now that I've written it...but anyway...) As I said in the AfD, it's not really something I have a personal interest in or even know a lot about (though I know more now from my search for sources) but I at least knew that it was something real and fairly prolific, deserving of at least a brief article as it seems to be a significant subculture. I'm preaching to the choir, here, though, and my babbling is probably ruining the smiley glow. So, have a good day and keep up the great work! LaMenta3 19:11, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

Blood libel
Thanks for your note. I think mentioning his name violates WP:UNDUE, particularly as he himself has recanted his previous views. What do you think? Jayjg (talk) 01:52, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

PNC Template
It looks like we might be on different tacks toward the same course regarding the notability issue. I think it might be nice to discuss our objectives to see whether we have some common ground.

My goal is to simplify the notability infrastructure by the following: (1) eliminate superfluous sub-guidelines, (2) provide as much continuity among the remaining sub-guidelines and WP:N, and (3) develop a more welcoming structure for bona fide information while allowing us to combat the flood of spam and nonsense. Clearly this is no easy task and there are multiple ways to accomplish this or similar goals.

I see the broad inclusion of the pnc template as a good step toward continuity. If you look at the history at the template and at WP:N, you will see that I am not a supporter of the current form which I believe to be overly restrictive and subjective, but I do believe that if the template can be put into use and then prominently discussed in the light of day, more palatable language can be developed.

Your thoughts?

--Kevin Murray 18:04, 8 April 2007 (UTC)

I'm answering here, because it will be a bit of an essay
In general I prefer a small number of flexible rules. The problem is that such flexibility permits an unlimited flexibility in interpretation towards either inclusion or exclusion. On the other hand, excessive specification leads to results not conforming to common sense, and their consequent evasion at AfD.
 * But at present with the same discussions going on in multiple places over the same matters, I am concerned that it is likely to end in an ill-considered compromise adopted out of exhaustion. I very much distrust the current discussion for the confusion about what is being said  :
 * To protect against this, I think the best way is the development of entirely separate guidelines for special topics by people who understand the field and are prepared to defend their guidelines at AfD.
 * The problem with the guidelines for academics is that the majority of WP people do not think academics very notable in the first place.  I therefore think we would do best isolating ourselves from the general discussions, at least until we see how they will turn out. With regard to the notability of academics, it is not a good idea to have rigid requirements--AfDs frequently delete  reasonably good borderline articles. The spammy ones are best handled by editing. DGG 02:38, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

PNC etc.
I agree with you on the single sourcing, and am actively trying to see that acknowledged in the template. I don't like the language of the template yet, but I would prefer to see consistency among the various permutations of the notability infrastructure. I think that if consistency is achieved, then people will join the overall effort to clean-up notability rather than fort-up in their own little domains. Right now a few editors have a lot of influence at WP:N and a few editors have a lot of influence at the individual permutations, but if the proponents of inclusion who work at the permutations get involved in the central effort, the project will become more open and simpler to understand. --Kevin Murray 21:05, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

Master of the Playing Cards
I went ahead & developed this, but it can certainly be expanded - I think you had Helmutt L-H, although others seem a bit sniffy over him! Johnbod 03:37, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

Good idea
Hi David,

I like your idea about a bunch of us tackling a school district a week, merging the stumps. I added a comment at Articles for deletion/Don G. Giunta Middle School saying that if you point one out, I'll help. If we do this, perhaps we should go to individual editors and ask them on their talk pages if they'd be willing to merge one or two school articles a week into a school district article as a team. Wasn't there someone creating huge numbers of these in Alabama a while back? If you decide you really want to do this and can find the districts, give me a holler. Noroton 17:50, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

Articles for deletion/The Conciliation Project
I don't follow what you have said here, probably just idiocy on my part. Would you mind going back and explaining it? J Milburn 16:04, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

Gutenberg
Can I ask you about this? Gutenberg was a goldsmith and an inventor, but rather than thinking "let's put his occupation in the infobox", I think we should say "was his occupation central enough to his fame to be an entry in his infobox"? Is him being a goldsmith among the top 5 or 6 points key to understanding "at a glance" who he was and what he did? I suspect "inventor of a printing press" should be somewhere in the infobox instead. What do you think? Carcharoth 16:15, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

Removing SD tag on Eileen Crimmins
I understand that it says, "remove if you plan to improve the article" but this is the second time that you have removed an SD tag from that article without imrpoving it. The article was a clear copyright violation. Why not let an administrator delete it? Then, let the original author take some time to rewrite it without plagarizing and submit a better article. Why the vested stake in this article? I understand you want to help a new user and I applaud that. But would you have reacted the same to a different article? Why not let the procedure run its course? --Cyrus   Andiron     13:14, 11 May 2007 (UTC)
 * replied on his talk p. I removed the tag when I removed the copyvioDGG 13:51, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

Charles George Arbuthnot
Oh, well done. Just what was required. -- ALoan (Talk) 00:49, 12 May 2007 (UTC)

=)


has smiled at you! Smiles promote WikiLove and hopefully this one has made your day better. Spread the WikiLove by smiling to someone else, whether it be someone you have had disagreements with in the past or a good friend. Happy editing! Smile at others by adding {{subst:Smile}} to their talk page with a friendly message.

List of the writings of William Monahan
Hey, this stupid list is up for deletion again. As someone who voted on this issue previously, please feel free to express your opinion again. Also, billdeancarter has taken the liberty of notifying those who voted to keep in the first debate, so I am doing this to be fair. WhiteKongMan 13:44, 15 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I'll look of course. I think its always appropriate to notify those who participated before. Otherwise it might even look like an attempt to find a completely different quorum. DGG 19:23, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

Welcome to Novels WikiProject
Hi, and welcome to the Novels WikiProject! As you may have guessed, we're a group of editors working to improve Wikipedia's coverage of topics related to fiction books often referred to as "Novels".

A few features that you might find helpful:


 * Our navigation box points to most of the useful pages within the project.
 * The announcement and open task box is updated quite regularly. You can watch it if you're interested; or, you can add it directly to your user page by including WikiProject_Novels_announcements there. While you are updating your userpage, don't forget our userbox   .
 * The project has a monthly newsletter; it will normally be delivered as a link, but other methods are available.

There are a variety of interesting things to do within the project; you're free to participate however much—or little—you like:


 * Starting some new articles? Our article structure guidelines / template outlines some things to include.

If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to ask one of the members, and we'll be happy to help you. Again, welcome! We look forward to seeing you around! :: Kevinalewis  : (Talk Page) /(Desk)  07:46, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Congratulations on your successful RFA
I'm back, and I'm mildly sorry about the confusion regarding my conomination of your RFA. Obviously, it didn't matter in the end. Best regards. YechielMan 21:25, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Congratulations, I'm sorry I missed it while on a WikiBreak. I support you promotion, even though I didn't !vote. Best, Smmurphy(Talk) 22:40, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (lists of works)
I'm working on a policy addition to the above policy page at the head of the Bibliographies section. I would like it if you could take a look at it, fine tune it if you can, so that it could have more consensus. Hopefully this will clarify a pro-bibliography position at Wikipedia.-BillDeanCarter 01:37, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Sure, pro-bibliography is nonsensical, but the question is what is a legitimate bibliography as an individual article? I think simply one that causes aesthetic problems in the main article for the notable subject.-BillDeanCarter 02:28, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I think that's only one of many factors, and by no means the most important. I rate notability and NOR higher than aesthetics, and if there are not pre-existing independent sources discussing just what should be on the list, there is no basis for an article. See the list of examples I just posted to the MOS talk p. DGG 03:54, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Crucifer (disambiguation)
Hello, I have opened an AfD discussion for Crucifer (disambiguation). Please read the rationale I have posted at Talk:Crucifer (disambiguation) and leave your comments at Articles for deletion/Crucifer (disambiguation). Vectro 18:44, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Need you to get back to a couple of articles
Hi DGG, you once left me a message of support on my watch of Global Panel Foundation and Prague Society for International Cooperation. You said I could ask you for help if I needed it. Well, I need it now. I'm running out of steam (ie patience) and now there's a more aggressive user defending his right to keep the original self-serving text. Can you please take a look there? I also left a note at Editor_assistance/Requests, where it was suggested to take it to AfD but we've been there before. Thanks a lot. --maf (talk-cont) 13:16, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Hi again, DGG, I understand you are having some communications probs at the moment, but may I ask you if you are going back to review Prague Society for International Cooperation? I've left it untouched all this time, even seeing the db tag come and go. Thanks. --maf (talk-cont) 18:03, 31 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I'm back online, and I took a look; the first step is to ask for exact references & translations, & I did so on both pages. DGG 01:38, 1 June 2007 (UTC)

Peter Bearman
Good job! Maybe I should just start listing them on your talk page instead of tagging them? Seriously I am working Unreferenced articles and I try and fix a lot of articles, but some just can't be made well and others don't look to me like they should be on Wikipedia. If you have a suggestion on how to we can work together to eliminate the AfD and prod step on articles that turnout to be savable, I would like to hear it. I believe There is no deadline but I also appreciate that WP:V is there for a reason. An article that has been unreferenced and tagged that way for over a year... well you can't save them all and some of them need to go. I do try and reference anything that looks remotely savable (Peter's resume just screamed WP:Vanity to me). P.S. the goal of Unreferenced articles is to ensure that articles meet at least the barest minimum of verifiability, by including at least one reference. So if you come up behind me on a speedy or prod and can find anything, resembling a reference (no blog stuff) I won't be at all upset if you swap my tag for your reference. Jeepday (talk) 02:19, 21 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Response at User_talk:Jeepday Jeepday (talk) 13:51, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

What's your view?
You had some insightful observations along the way during the recent excitement at WP:N, so I was curious as to your thoughts on the developments.-- Kubigula (talk) 03:44, 21 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Fair enough. We haven't hit an impasse recently - things seems to be moving along pretty constructively.  In fact, it's been almost too collegial and constructive; I half expect villagers with torches at any moment.-- Kubigula (talk) 04:03, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

Yes please about citation count
Please yes a citation count would be good. I suspect the count will be high. Wenocur's major work includes the VC-paper, joint with Dudley which established values of VC-dimensions using hyperplanes and other techniques that were new. The paper with Salant is notable work. Her work on order statistics was new. in abstracting ideas of Einstein and Bose on gravitation as gravitation affecting numbers not particles. In other papers, the alternative proof techniques of identities were publically admired by H.S. Wilf. The indices of many books on neural nets contain references to her work with Dudley on VC-dimension. I personally have employed the order statitistic work and the VC work to analyze data and make predictions for clients. Currently, she is either self-employed or retired or semi-retired; she is not a young person, certainly over age 55. She corresponds with me, a humble consultant, but also with others who are noteable. I think she is tutoring now, also she mentioned, precocious children, and those who need to learn VC-theory for their work at universities or industry or consulting. I think she is also using mathematics for investment counseling in new ways. She won several awards from the U.S. Senate, the President of Temple University, New York City as a noteable woman of science and other awards. This is all I can think of, offhand, right now. Back to work now. Thank you. Alfred Legrand 16:08, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

Real name
Hi. I was interested in your remark that you would have used your real name all along if you had understood Wiki better. What did you mean by this? I did it the other way around, I used my real name at first and then decided I should go incognito like others do, so changed my name. What do you think is the advantage of using the real name?

Sardaka 10:31, 23 May 2007 (UTC)


 * I originally didn't use my name because I saw that other people didn't either & I intended to work in a field where I would be recognized; I was uncomfortable about appearing to hide, and so used a slight variant of my initials. Eventually I realized that I would still be recognized by anyone who knew me. I saw people whom I greatly respected using their real names, even when working in controversial fields or in ways that exposed them to possible attack, and not coming out the worse for it. I then put my real name in an inconspicuous place, and a little while before my RfA I moved it to a more conspicuous location, & filled in the details of my bio; this was partly because of the EssJay business. I now feel totally comfortable with it. Another factor is that I sometimes post on the WP-en mailing list, & most (but not all) people there use their full name. DGG 08:57, 24 May 2007 (UTC)


 * I hope I am not butting in, but I am a great proponent of using real names, creditentials and referencing them as best as possible. Essjay controversy is a good example of why this should be done; but primarily I agree with academic studies on anonymity and the net: anonymity discourages good contributions; using real names means you will think twice about what you write and thus raises the level of discussion and contribs. Personally I would make name disclosure obligatory for admins and anybody in any position of responsibility on this project.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus 17:56, 24 May 2007 (UTC)

There are two Christopher Clarks
Hello DGG,

You've added a lot of good material on Christopher Clark, but it's a different CC. Confusingly, there are two historians called CC. The one you refer to is an Americanist and is not Australian. The original subject of the article is an Australian born scholar of modern german history.

My suggestion to fix this up would be to create a new article called something like Christopher Clark (Americanist) place your new content there, and restore the original article. The original article needs expansion to refer to his many other books and TV appearances btw, (just in case you have a little free time). best CoughInInk


 * According to the LC catalog, there is

It is usually a little clearer if they both have middle initials, so I'm going to look a little more, & move the content with the proper links.--I will let you know. Thanks for clearing this up. DGG 01:58, 25 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Clark, Christopher, 1953- the Americanist, and
 * Clark, Christopher M., the Germanist, for whom they don't give dates, who I suppose is the Australian.

Yes, the M is for Munro I think, though he does not seem to use this initial in his bylines, and for that reason it might be preferable to disambiguate them by subfield of history rather than by middle initial, but I will defer to your judgement as a librarian. best, CoughInInk

AfDs/blogs
Hi, the assumption is that I'm "pro" the blogs I'm currently fighting to keep an entry for, but that is jumping to conclusions. I wrote many new entries on Muslims and Islam, and I would fight to keep them. They're there because I think it's important people have access to information about these issues. In any case, a pattern won't be seen since this user first did a "speedy delete" on several entries using an IP and only identified themselves when I argued that an anonymous user shouldn't be speedy deleteing (to point out that it's against wiki policy and an ip user shouldn't be discriminated). The reason I went out directly against him is because of his claim that he's being attacked for something he's only been doing for "two-three" days, and of course, looking at his "user contributions" that's what it looks like, so why accuse him? I am not accusing him that he's anti those blogs, I'm accusing him of abusing the system and I don't like it. As I wrote him directly, his only contributions are nitpicking those of others. I think that's anti-wikipedia behavior.

I think blogs are in a catch 22, since old style newspapers have no interest in writing about them, and at most they'll reach the editorial page. Most blogs are not worthy of an entry, but I just wonder how many entries are going to be deleted before the policy is changed.

About the Fjordman blogger, for example. When the original speedy delete came up I said that if you google, it comes up in amazing numbers. To which I was told by this user "it's a common name in Scandinavia". But then, why does the blogger get top billings on the first 3-4 pagse of Google (at which time I gave up looking). What do I need to do to prove that this guy is immensely popular? Misheu 06:11, 25 May 2007 (UTC)

I am having comunications problems, so please do not expect regular answers until Wednsdday May 30. Thanks for your suggestions and input. I do need somebody with some common sense to tell me this :-) I'm not so anti what you say as you think.  When I told this user that I actually appreciated his speedy delete since it caused me to look up sources he thought I was joking and took it as an insult.  I wouldn't be so "up in arms" this time if it wouldn't be posed as "look up all sources now for all entries or else"   and come as a 'second wave'. There are so many other ways to approach articles you think need sources.  Again, some of the entries he brought for deletion, i agree with, but most of them he's going against established, well known, influential blogs.  Misheu 06:41, 25 May 2007 (UTC)
 * DGG, thanks for your help in this recent mess. I appreciate the good words helping move this process forward. --Edwin Herdman 21:02, 25 May 2007 (UTC)

Howard Mumford Jones
I found a couple references for Howard Mumford Jones looks like a candidate for one of your make overs if you get bored. Jeepday (talk) 14:59, 26 May 2007 (UTC)

Sources in Serials crisis
Can you provide a source for this edit? I know the whole article is badly sourced right now, but we have to start somewhere, and your interesting addition leaves the reader craving for more :-). Please don't take this as a criticism, I'm asking you because I know some of your good work. Rl 10:57, 27 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Thank you for your answer. I'm looking forward to reading what you got :-). Rl 20:23, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

Deletion review
No, my making the decision unilaterally was not the idea at all. The idea was to put forward a solution that would end a discussion that has become increasingly acrimonious, and become a proxy for a whole other debate (amongst the editors who are already part of the ongoing arbitration committee request), and that I hope the original editor of the original articles will be happy with, and happy to use as a basis for expansion. I'd like to help and to encourage Bookworm857158367, who was clearly contributing in good faith. My hope was that that the proposal would allow xem, and other editors, to return to and to continue to contribute on the subject that xe wants to write about, whilst avoiding becoming involuntarily embroiled in the other discussion, which can continue at the RFC and arbitration pages. I also hoped that Bookworm857158367 would have a chance to comment on whether xe found the proposed solution acceptable. I see that that there wasn't the opportunity for that. I'll have a word on xyr talk page. Uncle G 11:31, 27 May 2007 (UTC)
 * "Following Uncle G, we would simply let him decide on N and have done with it. I think he usually makes reasonable decisions, but that's not the sort of project I thought I joined."
 * Replied on his talk p.,, apologizing for tone. DGG 16:34, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

Replied
on my Talk page. :) User_talk:Joie de Vivre Joie de Vivre 22:04, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

DRV
hi David - I'd be interested in what you have to say about this DRV. Original AfD here. I'm concerned about the direction the overall project is going regarding deletion. Tvoz | talk 16:19, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

Marco Casagrande
Before you judge this person and his associates article worthy, you should check the contribution history. There is a serious astroturfing campaign going on here. They should not be rewarded for this. It's spam. DarkAudit 04:57, 29 May 2007 (UTC)
 * William Pietri also sees it for an astroturfing campaign. I've submitted a checkuser request and asked the Wikiproject people to have a look per his suggestions. DarkAudit 05:08, 29 May 2007 (UTC)
 * The admins are aware that something unseemly may be afoot, so I'm comfortable that they can take care of any shenanigans the rest of the night. I can pick up any leftover pieces and send to AfD in the morning if necessary. :) DarkAudit 05:22, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Sears
Thanks much! I appreciate your help. The quantity of self-published information by the individual has me concerned. There's also a who's been jumping into the discussion at Talk:Juice Plus. I'm not certain whether or not it's the same guy, but things are already complicated enough, with two warring factions arguing on the page, and he hasn't been helping matters. Anyway, I look forward to whatever you can dig up! --Elonka 08:32, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Foresight Institute: Your COI tag
Hi DGG. In March you tagged this article for COI. Since WP ought to be decisive, and since three months is long enough for reliable sources to be added (it has none), do you think it's time for an AfD nomination? I've three reasons to suggest this: I know that Foresight Institute has an air of importance, and they sponsor conferences, but Google does not find any journalists writing about them, and Google Scholar couldn't find any references to them in peer-reviewed articles. (I didn't go all the way to the end of the search). Let me know what you think! If you don't recommend AfD, I would accept removal of the COI tag as a solution, with or without addition of a notability tag. EdJohnston 16:44, 29 May 2007 (UTC)
 * 1) It's your tag
 * 2) At WT:COI there have been complaints about use of the COI template, and I identified a 300-element 'COI backlog'
 * 3) I have noticed that you often try to save articles marked for deletion. If you agree it should go then there is a definite case for AfD.
 * They have published quite a lot of things by now; their essential business activity seems to be selling reports and running conferences. Their latest conference is cosponsored with the Society of Manufacturing Engineers and IEEE, which shows mainstream acceptance, and they do get distinguished speakers including from the present Administration, so there are political ties. What will be necessary to look for is references to their conferences and reports, but this is likely to be in the reports literature. The best index for this is a specialized web index called Scirus  -- there's some COI here, because I'm one of their academic advisors :)
 * I am not sure I agree with you about COI tags--my personal feeling is that they can be left indefinitely as a warning--but I see there's a long discussion at the COI talk p., & I'll join it. What I have been saying at AfD, but I'm not sure its the majority opinion, is that we should take good content wherever we can get it. There are on the contrary side some well-establshed people who think spamming should be discouraged by throwing them all out regardless.
 * For these guys, I'll cut down the adjectives & add some links, and I have one ref--a Masters thesis found is Scirus, but that's all I can do now; I wouldn't nominate them for AfD, because a good case could be made for them. I just put a COI tag on another group, Center on Nanotechnology and Society, but they're sponsored by Illinois Institute of Technology and are also probably N.
 * Curious. It's an absolutely valid & important field, but a large percentage of those doing it are peacocks. Maybe it's because there is money available. DGG 19:14, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Teutonic Order
Sorry for the late reply. I am in Europe at the present time and I check my messages only once every few days. I will look into this matter when I come back, but as far as I can remember, I translated the information from the Polish wikipedia.

Norum 11:52, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

thanks
We need more people who actually care about what any of the rules say. Night Gyr (talk/Oy) 23:30, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Calculation of faculty size from student-faculty ratio on Deborah C. Blue AfD

 * Dean & Senior VP of the college at a extremely small college (enrollment 345). Since the class ratio is 15:1, that=23 faculty in all

Hi DGG, just figured I'd comment: on average profs teach fewer courses than undergraduates take, so if, say the average prof teaches 2 classes a term and the average student takes 4, then you'd need 46 faculty to have a 15:1 ratio. Of course lots of universities have course loads higher than 2 for many faculty members, but taking into account sabbaticals, research-only profs in the sciences, maternity leaves, etc., I think the estimate of 2 courses/faculty/term for a non-Tier I research school is pretty good. -- Myke Cuthbert (talk) 02:42, 31 May 2007 (UTC)
 * But this isn't actually a university, it's a small college and that is a different world entirely. Some comparisons from places I know:  At small non-elite colleges, and even good 2-yr colleges, faculty teach 4 courses a term; at reasonably good 4 year colleges, such as Brooklyn College, they teach 3 a term.  At the best colleges, like Oberlin, and average good universities, like Rutgers, they teach 2 a term. At Princeton they teach 2, sometimes 3, a year.  So at Blue's college, the numbers work out at 4 a term for them. Where the faculty there will benefit, as is often the case in very small schools, is having small classes and personal knowledge of the students.  Research-only faculty in science are another matter entirely: only a few stars are actually paid by the college from general funds--they mostly are paid on research grants. The way sabbaticals are paid for everywhere is by hiring part-time faculty, whose average pay is one-third the regular faculty for the equivalent work. Blue, as an administrator, will get a little more than equivalent faculty,  and be expected to teach one or two courses a term as part of the job.  But there's another dimension: full professors at the top of the scale make $150,000 at Princeton--more if they have bargaining power, $100,000 at Brooklyn College, and probably $60,000 at their place. People with grants get an extra 20% for the summer for no actual additional work; people without, get paid proportionately for 1 or 2 courses a summer. DGG 04:28, 31 May 2007 (UTC)


 * The only thing that I question though is that when there's a sabbatical and a replacement is hired for part-time (e.g., my first job), I think most colleges would list both people on their "faculty," thus lowering the student:faculty ratio. Same for other leaves, teaching relief for chairing a dept., being a new hire, etc.  My hunch would be that on these things would actually lower the number of courses taught substantially below the actual number being required.  I've seen a number of pretty unscrupulous ways of lowering Student:Fac ratio even before getting into borderline cases like independent studies (in theory, sounds good; but what about counting "doctoral research advising" as a course, thereby adding a couple hundred one to three person courses on the books).  Chuckle!
 * That place isn't going to have any doctoral students :)   I wouldn't be sure they'd give sabbaticals, either. :)DGG 05:32, 31 May 2007 (UTC)


 * My real disillusionment with the marketing of higher education came with my first job, at a small liberal arts college. The college bragged in all its marketing materials that, unlike at a large university where you'd be taught by graduate students, at "Shady Oaks" college, you'll be taught by nothing but profs!  I quickly realized that almost a third of the "professors" were like me, graduate students at other schools in the Northeast who were hired for a year to teach some classes.  If we taught at our own schools we'd be evil graduate student teachers, but at SOC we were wonderful caring professors.  :)


 * P.S. -- from your own expertise, how long do you think before the humanities journals from the following countries start appearing in electronic forms: France, Italy, Poland? -- Myke Cuthbert (talk) 05:09, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

Re: Reliable sources/Noticeboard
Thanks, although I cannot take all the credit :) Discussions about reliability of individual sources are so common I thought a dedicated discussion place would be a nifty idea indeed - and we are getting one new case per day, so it seems to be working.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus 06:36, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

Gordon MacPherson
Not sure how you did your article search, but I got >120 peer-reviewed articles. Which still doesn't make him notable. What is needed is an independant secondary source specifically referring to 'Gordon MacPherson's important scientific contribution to x'. -RustavoTalk/Contribs 03:16, 1 June 2007 (UTC)
 * There are a number of people by that name, even in medicine. I was being very conservative--clearly over-conservative. I re-did it in Scopus to get a citation count, and found 58 peer-reviewed papers. I agree that I would in general not automatically consider an associate professor notable (that's the equiv. rank), but to my surprise, I found 427, 279, 250, 176, 146 citations for the five top papers.  I think it covers the notability question. (I haven't put it all in the article quite yet.  I find it much easier to cut spam down to size than to build up these over-modest articles.) Fiction writers get shown notable by reviews, athletes by competitions, scientists by citations. I can expand on this. DGG 03:49, 1 June 2007 (UTC)
 * That's not the point. I strongly suspect that he is notable, but that is not the same thing as 1) knowing what he is notable for, 2) having an independant reference that establishes his notability, and c) having content in the article that discusses the thing he is notable for. Deleting an article doesn't prevent anyone from writing an article about that same subject in the future, it simply says that there's nothing in the current article that justifies having it. -RustavoTalk/Contribs 05:08, 1 June 2007 (UTC)
 * I recognize you know the academic world, probably very well, so I don't have to explain why people there are important to start with (smile) (The next paragraph is what I have evolved as my standard reply-- it's addressed to people who do not know how scientists work, and I do not mean to sound as if you didn't know about this stuff--but it is better worded than what I can do on the spot)

this establishes notability much more strictly and reliably than we could here. The profession establishes notability; WP just records the fact.
 * "We don't judge the work, even in subjects where some of us could, because this is an egalitarian place--we just show how other people have judged it. Notability for academics is typically established by their publications. People become professors by writing notable research papers. That the papers are notable is established by their being published in peer-reviewed journals. The review by two or more specialists in such peer review establishes those papers as evidence of N. For appointment, for promotion to associate professor of senior lecturer,  they pass stringent reviews by peers, including particularly peers from other institutions.
 * In general, nobody writes magazine articles on professors, and they dont get a biography until they retire or die. Therefore, since notability in each field is judged by the standard of the field, and notability in this field is established by publications and positions, their publications and positions are always considered suffficient, as is explained more fully in WP:PROF., and consistently maintained at AfD."
 * "The standard there is more notable than the average." To be noticed by 400 peers is much more important that to be noticed by two book reviewers.  To be noticed by more than 200 peers for several different publications is more notable than by being noticed by two book reviewers for several different novels.
 * Answers to specific objections: What he is notable for, is the subject of the papers. The abstracts are on PubMed for a description. There is no need to discuss the plot of a prize-winning movie to show it's notable. The recognition is sufficient. WP articles have to show their subjects are notable, by the standards of the field. They do not have to explain why the field holds them as notable; its best to get in some sort of orientation, but not essential.
 * The independent references are the papers themselves, and the are reliable because they have been published in peer-reviewed reliable journals. (in this case, of the very highest quality, and that can be shown too from Science Citation Reports). As a compromise rule of thumb, it seems to have been accepted that Full professors at research university are almost always notable, assistant professors rarely, associate, it depends. In this case, that many citation and papers would be enough even for an assistant professor, not that I can recall an assistant professor article here where he had such a strong record.
 * There is never much need to re-create an article about a scientist, since by the time enough people show up, it has become clear whether or not it's notable. If I can't get it rewritten or explained in 5 days I go on to the next. I do not defend the non-notable ones. (I do have a list of a few slip-ups when nobody noticed; when people write inadequate article that happens.) The article as it stands is sufficient, and these standards have been shown in multiple prior AfDs --I am not being idiosyncratic  (actually, I should probably go back myself and make a list of informal precedents--there are no formal precedents here). DGG 06:06, 1 June 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the feedback
Thanks for the feedback.

Thanks for the deletion too

Cheers! Geo Swan 02:04, 2 June 2007 (UTC)

Articles for deletion/List of United States Presidents by longevity 2nd nom
Hi DGG, I missed this discussion but wanted to comment. After all these longevity lists were drug through DRV after the Phillipines related nom, I tried to work out an outside-AFD compromise by creating the sortable list List of United States Presidents by age. The list is sortable, so it combines three lists into one. If you search the final column (age at death) it gives you the exact same table as the list of presidents by longevity. I'm frustrated however, I created this list earlier in the month, asked for input on the U.S. presidents wiki project and a variety of talk pages. I'm sick of all these IDONTLIKELISTS nominations going through AFD, but I'm a little confused why my attempt at compromise was just completely ignored. What can I do? Or should I just give up on lists and go back to editing hippos -- at least the major orders of extant mammals are more or less safe from deletionists for the time being? --JayHenry 15:23, 2 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the thoughful response, and I'm flattered to have my talk page be the site of essay development! I think, however, that you may have misread List of United States Presidents by age.  The first column in the list is OO which the introductory paragraph explains, stands for "Order of Office."  Therefore, the 1 should always be next to George Washington, the 3 next to Jefferson, the 43 next to GWBush, etc.  This is not a sorting error. --JayHenry 17:06, 3 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Hmm... I took some screen captures and uploaded them to Photobucket. Here are screen captures of the list sorted by ascension, by birth, by longevity and by name.  But this isn't working for you, and the list just doesn't sort at all? --JayHenry 20:31, 3 June 2007 (UTC)

Re: User:GK
The reason I prodded the subpages (aside from the user being retired since 2005) is that, in almost all cases, the content was copy-pasted from other pages (usually talk pages). Also, none of the pages have any significant incoming links, so I doubt anyone else knows about them. So, though I see little value to keeping most of the subpages, I have no problem with retaining them ... they certainly contain no objectionable content or anything that would require their removal.

If any are kept, I think three most obvious candidates would be: "/Contributions", "/On adding trivia to the main body of an article", and "/Systemic bias in stubs?". These seem to be original creations in the userspace rather than copy-paste moves from elsewhere. Again, I do not feel strongly either way. Cheers, Black Falcon (Talk) 22:02, 2 June 2007 (UTC)

Re:Jerzy B. Lewandowski
Umm, maybe its some memory block, but I have no idea what article we are discussing :) --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus 05:16, 3 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Ah :) My memory, see, I knew :) I am getting old :) Anyway, he passes my personal Prof test - which is having at least one academic publication. Thus he can be cited on Wiki, thus his reliability can be discussed, thus we should have an article about him for ease of reference :) --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus 06:30, 3 June 2007 (UTC)

Adolf Slaby
See User talk:Anthony Appleyard. Anthony Appleyard 05:51, 3 June 2007 (UTC)

Earlsheaton Technology College
Hello ... I honestly don't know what to do about this one, which seems to give Wikipedia is not for things made up in school one day a Whole New Meaning ... my first thought was to take it to Conflict of interest/Noticeboard since it is an article about a school apparently written by one of the students, but I can't make a connection to justify the allegation.



The only edits to Earlsheaton Technology College have been made by Bumblebeeman92, except for my adding  tags.

Also, the sections Recent Inspector's comments and Pupil and Parent Comments are copied directly from the Comments section of http://www.earlsheatontc.org.uk/about/wider.htm (the copied material is mostly in purple, italic text), but the site is not copyrighted, so it's not a WP:CSD.

I just thought that I should bring it to the attention of someone with more experience in this kind of thing than me, because it has obviously fallen under the radar. &mdash;72.75.100.232 12:29, 3 June 2007 (UTC)

ACE
There are actually several editors who are against leaving the tag in and one editor trying to keep it. If you want to bring up edit warring, the fact is that a user who is obstinately fighting against the consensus is the one edit warring. -75.179.159.240 14:30, 3 June 2007 (UTC)

Question
Thanks for both comments. In this same theme, I would like to ask if you both could kindly look this article : Bernardo Sorj - had a previous AfD, but somehow I guess they missed the central point in the AfD discussion. He is in a well-known University in Brazil, but the criteria for being in well-known Universities in Brazil are very political sometimes. Although he looks to have a long list of articles and books (most in conjunction with some other writer), his claims do not seem very notable to me; at least this is my understanding of the "visiting professor" chairs I saw in his article. Something I am not very clear too is how the number of publications change the notability or not, since they can be very bad or useless. Same applies to writers/artists in general - if a book is not a best seller, how can we judge him besides good reviews? Examples: this guy or this guy. Or even, how do I verify notability for somebody like Barnaby Dorfman, who is some excutive that had some mentions in the media mostly by fame-per-association (like, he was the person designated by the companies he worked to talk to the media) but not somebody specially notable? Stellatomailing 06:00, 3 June 2007 (UTC)

Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Stellatomailing" That was a marvelous essay! Thank you~. Stellatomailing 01:17, 4 June 2007 (UTC)

Please take a few minutes to read this
I am User:YechielMan, and I am editing from my alternate account so that the hawks at my current RFA won't notice (I hope). I will wait for the week to run its course, but I have already prepared a strong rebuke of the community process which has caused me so much frustration. I trust you more than most others, so I'd like you to please read it and make sure it's strong enough to move people to action, but that it won't backfire and hurt my reputation even more. Placeholder account 04:45, 4 June 2007 (UTC)
 * I changed the "next steps" section to address points 1 and 2 in your comments. Ultimately, though, I feel that the only way for people to understand the problems with YechielMan, and the problems with RFA, is to be shown the full context.  I will shortly withdraw the RFA and send the standard thank-you message to all participants with a link to my page.  It may not be a great idea, but it really is hard to receive the quality of adversity from people I thought I trust, and not sit for hours finding the best way to prove them wrong.  Thanks for your help. Placeholder account 20:38, 4 June 2007 (UTC)

Claude Dauphin
I've removed the tag on the page as he was a former member of the National Assembly of Quebec for 13 years which easily passes notabiltiy for WP:BIO. I've expanded the article in consequences and provided cats and external link.--JForget 14:00, 4 June 2007 (UTC) You are perfectly correct--I was merely trying to save it from speedy, at wanted to be gentle to the guy who put the speedy tag on/. But I should have looked more carefully in the first place. Any member of a national or provincial legislature is notable, according to what people say at AfD, and so are mayors of large cities. DGG 17:29, 4 June 2007 (UTC)

Re:Wichita North High School speedy tag
You are right, I see, after I took a look at the A7. I knew that it was not really an A7 candidate, but what tag is there for schools? Furhtermore, wasn't there a rather large debate over the classification of notable and non-notable schools? --tennis man 16:31, 4 June 2007 (UTC)

Opinions about art articles
Hi Dgg, how are you? Please, I would like to have your opinion. I saw two articles that at first glance are not important subjects (Fareed Armaly, Julie_Ault), but I do not feel confident to AfD them without an opinion for somebody closer to the arts subject. Do you know how can I contact a knowledgeable editor? Thanks.Stellatomailing 18:02, 4 June 2007 (UTC)

Ravenshaw family
I didn't entirely understand the point of your sudden appearance in the PRODding of this article, which didn't mesh with my understanding of how the process is supposed to work. However, this has ceased to be relevant, as the PROD tag has now in any case been removed. I am probably going to put the article on AfD - but to save myself unnecessary work perhaps you'd be so good as to let me know now if you are also intending to do so? HeartofaDog 23:51, 4 June 2007 (UTC)
 * I wasn't asking your permission, but thanks for the explanation.HeartofaDog 00:45, 5 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Sorry - I have flu and it's making me both stupid(er) and (more) irritable.HeartofaDog 14:48, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

Jim Deacon
Thanks for the comments re: AfD for Jim Deacon. I did notice the lead, which struck me not so much hoax as somebody trying to be witty, similar to the lead of Mark Twain's Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. As to the copyvio, I have in the past marked things for CSD by copyvio from university pages such as this and received negative feedback on the explanation that its not the sort of copyvio anyone would care about. Given that there seemed something fishy here, I though AfD rather than CSD the proper channel. I was not aware that being a full professor was in and of itself an instant keep, but will review WP:Notability. Thanks again. &mdash; Gaff ταλκ 17:16, 5 June 2007 (UTC) Persons attempting to find a motive in this narrative will be prosecuted; persons attempting to find a moral in it will be banished; persons attempting to find a plot in it will be shot.

– Mark Twain, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, "Notice", p. 1

After reviewing WP:PROF, I think that I would have still nominated that article for deletion as lacking sufficient notability. &mdash; Gaff <b style="color:MediumSlateBlue;">ταλκ</b> 17:27, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

Sound and Vision AV
Why was this entry deleted? It is fully verifiable and how does it differ from any entry in the companies section??? The article only stated facts.

Slobodan B. Iwanief
Thanks, I have nominated him for deletion as you suggested. DuncanHill 22:42, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

Pledge Paddle
The article at Pledge paddle is proposed for deletion, not just noted as being unsourced. It has little chance of being a useful article, and, in my opinion, should be deleted--hence the tag. &mdash;ScouterSig 04:45, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

My RfA ...
Hi. My RfA was closed as "successful" a little while ago and I have been sysopped. I want to again thank you for your nomination and your confidence in me and hope to live up to your exceptations. Best, Black Falcon (Talk) 05:21, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Google books
Hi, did you go and check both those books in a library as the full text doesn't seem to be availiable on Google Books (only snippet view?). Also you stated the source says that Alexander Arbuthnott represented Bervie until 1707 but he died in 1705. Gustav von Humpelschmumpel 12:30, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
 * User:Kittybrewster has confirmed that the Alexander who represented Bervie was a different Alexander Arbuthnot. Gustav von Humpelschmumpel 16:31, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

You caught me--I forgot to check the dates, even though I am aware of the high error rate of the printed works from that period. But at a quick look I can't identify the other Alexander Arbuthnot either the the SP or in KB's table of occupations--what are his b. and d.? As you know, Google Books has copies of many of its books from multiple libraries--they do not check for duplication; the various libraries have different rules for what will be available--(I am not even sure that this will not depend on the country you search from--I imagine you're in the UK? if you can see different books than I it would be very interesting to know that, as getting info. about the actual practices in GB requires induction from experience)  The following urls are for me in the US a full text google book:
 * Scots Peerage, v.1, 1904 KINGS, ABERCORN-BALMORINO from Stanford University Library--this is the copy I used.
 * v.2 BANFF-CRANSTOUN, Stanford
 * v.3, 1906 CRAWFORD-FALKLAND, Stanford
 * v.4, 1907, FIFE-HYNDFORD Stanford
 * The same eds. from other libraries are not full-view, and nothing after v.4 is.

I haven't yet used printed sources. I would use the NYPL & Princeton.(I would feel more comfortable knowing who you are--my email is enabled.) However, I think the discussions here shows the limitation of purely genealogical research--I am certain further information on at least some of them would be available to a proper search from an historical viewpoint, using MS sources for the institutions, etc. Their bank, for example, must have archives. However, doing it in the US is a little absurd. In a yet more general sense, I, like some others, are stopping work on this family -- in my case unless it's one of the few people who happened to be an academic. I think it is usually harmful to put in large numbers of articles within a short time on what will seem to WPedians to be an esoteric subject. I'm really concerned that there will be a spillover from this into other fields of history. For history, I'm an amateur. The best way forward will I think be to fill in the missing people from the DNB. DGG 18:02, 6 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Jumping in on someone else's conversation here, but just wanted to point out that (as US editors) you may not be aware that 1707 was the date of the Act of Union - arguably the single most controversial - and most influential - law in British history, so politicians active at the time (particularly in Scotland) are likely to have had their lives recorded in far more detail than would usually be the case<font face="Trebuchet MS"> — <font color="#E45E05">irides <font color="#C1118C">centi   <font color="#5CA36A">(talk to me!)  18:27, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Always glad to hear from you. I'm aware of the different political structure of Scotland both before and after, unlike the people who said that post-Union Scots peers had the right to sit in the House of Lords. I deliberately did not say I would have to be in England to do the work. But it is the case that the people I know about best are from the age of Boswell. DGG 19:06, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
 * So it seems like UK users get a short deal with Google books- presumably something to do with differing copyright laws between the UK and US? Re:Iridescenti's comment the particular Alexander Arbuthnot in question actually died in 1705, two years before the Act of Union and stopped being a shire commissioner in 1702. Gustav von Humpelschmumpel 13:08, 7 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Do you confirm that those 4 links I sent you do not actually get full text in the UK? If I send you some more, will you test them? I want to try material from other source libraries. It's my understanding that each library can set the parameters. I'm guessing that the problem is 1900-1920. The status of material in that period is a little unclear. The only thing I am sure of is that  Australian publications from that period are not PD, because this happened to be discussed intensively here, but I forget just where.
 * I also know that some libraries, are definitely not releasing material in that period, and some are not even filming it for use within that university or as snippets--my own Princeton, for example.DGG 18:56, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

Jane Harvey page deleted
I was very pleased to see your recent message on the discussion page for Jane Harvey, as I had thought that the page was doomed, despite doing my best. But now the page (and your comment) has been deleated. I am a new user, so relatively inexperienced, and I am wondering what is going on. Is this the famous wiki 'vandalism' at work? Or a mistake? Should I re publish the article again?

You wrote: "I think at this point the article seems to not just assert but demonstrate notability,so I decline to delete it as speedy--Good job, Chrischmoo. DGG <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:DGG>"Any help/advice you can give would be appreciated. Thanks Chrischmoo 20:29, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Neil Siegel
With this edit you explained yourself as "Link fixed" when you also "just happened to" remove the prod from this article.

Given you didn't mention why you removed the prod, I have assumed it was an error and I have tagged the article for speedy deletion. It has been tagged as not asserting notability since September 2006, so tagging it as A7 now should hardly be suprising.

Looking at your past contributions, you know what to do if you disagree with my speedy tag.

Garrie 06:17, 7 June 2007 (UTC)


 * From the log:
 * 23:25, 7 June 2007 Tone (Talk | contribs) deleted "Neil Siegel" (content was: ' Neil Siegel is a professor of law and p...')
 * Personally, IMO, the whole point of WP:PROF is, saying somebody is a professor is not an assertion of notability, and as writing journal articles is what they do for a living, then it has to be shown that the journal articles a given professor writes are actually considered worthwhile by others in that particular field.Garrie 03:14, 8 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Well, of course they have to be considered important. This is accomplished by the peer review system for publication, with attention to the quality of the journals--publication of multiple articles or books by highly reputed publishers or journals is a demonstration of perceived importance. This is further proven by the system of citation--where the references by large numbers of other scientists is the demonstration of notability.
 * More specifically, it will surprise you perhaps to know that on further examination I myself do not think him necessarily notable primarily as an academic, because it turns out from the cv once I corrected the link that he is still an assistant professor, and many or most of them have not yet published enough or been cited enough, though some have. I think the notability is primarily as a lawyer, and shown by the details of his career and his extremely prestigious appointments--which were not in the article.
 * But I am sure that claiming a professorship or any other similar position in any field is an assertion of  notability, and asserted notability prevents a speedy.-- read WP:CSD.  It's not proven notability, and the original prod was not unreasonable, and what I expected you to do if still concerned about it was to nominate it for an AfD, where i would then expand & defend it--going to speedy was, quite frankly, not correct in my opinion.  Speedy is for no show of notability whatsoever, and prod is for non-controversial, and in my opinion any good faith challenge to a speedy or a prod is cause for going to Afd. I deliberately haven't looked who did the deletion--I do not go looking for quarrels--, but he probably did that somewhat in a hurry, as is one of the problems about speedy.  I myself when checking speedies on patrol remove the tags in such cases and remind those placing them to choose another method of questioning notability--as I have learned from the more senior admins whose methods I follow.
 * I have also learned not to get over-involved with particular articles, either defending or challenging. What I intend to do with this is to expand the article when I have time, and reintroduce it. If i think it somewhat dubious, I will simultaneously reintroduce it and send it for AfD to get the consensus. I do not think one person's individual opinion likely to be always correct, especially my own. We will be working with each other a good deal, & I hope not against each other,if you continue at AfD-- as you should.DGG 03:44, 8 June 2007 (UTC)
 * I'm certainly not here looking to argue, more discuss the merits...
 * "claiming a professorship is an assertion of notability". Honestly, that is news to me, and exactly the type of thing I was looking for so I don't end up misusing the various speedy deletion templates (which I am still coming to work out what the different ones are for - I think I'm still pretty much hitting in all my nails and screws with the biggest sledge hammer I own).Garrie 03:56, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

Editor review
I have responded to your comments on my editor review. <font style="background:#7FFF00">Reywas92 <font style="background:#00ff7f">Talk <font style="background:#BFFF00">Review me 20:25, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

The Bus Uncle featured article review
The Bus Uncle has been nominated for a featured article review. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. Please leave your comments and help us to return the article to featured quality. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, articles are moved onto the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Remove" the article from featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. Reviewers' concerns are here. -- Jonel | Speak 20:35, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

Bothering you again
Hi Dave. Abusing a bit of your patience, I would like your help trying to understand when a book author is notable or not. My understanding is that at least one of his books would have to be notable. (WP:Book). Is that a valid approach? What are the other factors determining the notability of an author?Stellatomailing 20:43, 7 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Right now, I was thinking about Julian Sprung, but there may be more to it than what meets the article. :-) In this particular case, he looks like to be a frequent source of information for other aquarists and a lecturer, but I asked help from people involved in aquariums (I got some help in the fishes wiki), Another example would be Valdeck de Almeida. But there are several other authors in Wikipedia that have a couple books (or a lot of them) that just like to do Wikispam (I guess I am so averse to Wikispam that I would like to take they all out) and I would like to have a good argument to put in the deletion pages.Stellatomailing 23:51, 7 June 2007 (UTC)
 * I decided not to participate in the afd. I consider it likely that he is an important author in a minor niche, and I think the afd is wasted effort whether or not it succeeds. But I'm not sure in this case where the balance lies. I think that an afd on this would be confusing the problem of hard to find references with that of no references, & the same is true of many special fields. The authors I am itching to have the time to go after are the authors of single self-help books. I really suggest that you think of things a little more selectively, and go from the bottom up--there is enough at the bottom.  If you try to establish a boundary using test cases at the dividing line, you will have a much harder job--at the dividing line it is reasonable to expect it to come out as some are, some aren't, and you will not get a principle established by that. When I decided to start in on non-notable schools i started with the weakest look elementary schools I could find, and similarly with malls. (but I appreciate your asking me, because you must realise that I have a higher tolerance than you). Suggestion in the spirit of WP: see how many you can reference instead, and take pride in doing that. Consider the advice   Edison gave you, & take satisfaction in an afd discussion leading to an agreement.  In any event, I think you will find both more successful & find it more satisfying nominating only one or at  the most two a day. Try not to get a reputation for making nominations that get overturned.  DGG 00:07, 8 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Exactly. My goal is to keep the articles worth keeping, not deleting the most articles I can. I started with the autobiographical articles, since they looked the most likely to not be necessary. Thanks for the advice! Stellatomailing 00:20, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

Personal user pages
Done. and emailed, too. &mdash; Rickyrab | Talk 23:58, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

RfC and desysopping
So why not file? Just curious. &mdash; Rickyrab | Talk 00:00, 8 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Um, ok, even though I'm not quite sure I understand what you are saying. &mdash;  Rickyrab | Talk 00:17, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

One teensy weensy little issue before I can put anything up on Uncyclopedia. I had made the mistake of sockpuppeting in favor of an independent BJAODN wiki (I'm usually "Rickyrab" on Uncyclopedia, and I had created an account to promote my wiki as "Badjonica", something which was not allowed and which got me blocked for a week. The admins being more pressed for time than Wikipedia's sysops, they took their time getting to my comments, with the results that I have a 1-week block on me over there going to June 11th.) &mdash;  Rickyrab | Talk 13:49, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

Broadwater Farm
(Crossposted to assorted "people I've run into and whose opinions I respect")

I realise it's totally outside your field, but if you get the chance could you take a look at the article on Broadwater Farm I've recently created? I do think it deserves it's own article - yes, it might be most famous for events that happened 22 years ago, but having it as a redirect to Broadwater Farm riot seems to me as ludicrous as redirecting Germany to World War II or Northern Ireland to IRA. However, now I've set up incoming links it's likely to be a beacon for POV-pushing, so I'd like to get opinions on (a) what a NPOV will be on something like this where the two POVs are likely to be diametric opposites, (b) whether you think it can/will ever be stable (and whether it's worth trying to keep stable) and (c) how much of a focus ought to be on the riots as opposed to the place itself. If any of you feel the urge I'd also appreciate anyone who feels able/willing putting it on their watchlists, as I suspect it's going to be heavily vandalised & spammed<font face="Trebuchet MS"> — <font color="#E45E05">irides <font color="#C1118C">centi   <font color="#5CA36A">(talk to me!)  00:06, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

Ananthabhadram needs copy edit
Please, could you take a look at the article Ananthabhadram? It needs quite some copy editing job. In case you are interested, do not begin before 10 June. I am making some improvements to the article. I hope to get the article to a GA status and eventually to an FA status. Aditya Kabir 08:20, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

What's WP/EB?
Just curious.... and, yeah, lol about the uncyclopedia b7. &mdash; Rickyrab | Talk 19:05, 8 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Oh. &mdash;  Rickyrab | Talk 19:09, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

Currenex
Did you add a tag when you meant to add a  tag? -- Finngall <font color="#D4A017">talk  20:16, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

== My RfA :) ==

Classic american literature,
I don't think that refernceing the book itself is reliable or third party, but somehow I missed it being written by DH Lawrence. Oops. :) DevAlt 22:59, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

Cafe Montmartre
I will beef up the article later this afternoon when I get home from school. Julian Maestas 13:59, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

Anchors and tenants
Hi. Trying to get some more feedback on this issue. Your initial comments were helpful, and any additional thoughts and comments would be most welcome at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Shopping Centers. Thanks. Skeezix1000 18:13, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

John O'S
How about this BBC article?. It details the crime and the sentence received. SteveO 23:31, 11 June 2007 (UTC)
 * The article is actually nothing to do with me. I only noticed the SD because a warning was placed on the original creator's talk page. Thanks for your help, though. SteveO 23:40, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

Tom Anderson
Ooops. Good looking out. Natalie 09:12, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

Thanks very much for your interventions on this article, which as you can see by its edit history I've put a lot of hard work & effort into it & to making sure it was properly sourced. I'm completely okay with your edits on Anderson's relationship history & Northeast Community Council -- it's good to have other eyes on these things for just such improvements.

WikiEditor appears to be a single-purpose editor whose only contributions have involved blanking this article -- the first time s/he did it, it was to blank it section by section to eventually restore it to the unsourced stub version it had been before I started working on it. Perhaps WikiEditor is a friend of Anderson's? -- I don't know -- but Anderson is coming up for trial this month, & he is but one of several former & current Alaska legislators facing trials on corruption charges right now.

Thanks again. --Yksin 16:36, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

NWA Hawaii deletion review
Thank you for reviewing this deletion. You suggested an AfD and I am not sure of the best approach since the article was redirected and then protected. I plan to do the following: 1) request unprotection, 2) restore the content and 3) add an AFD notice. If you can unprotect the article and restore the edit history (so I can notify frequent contributors to the article of the AfD notice), that would be helpful. Antonrojo 12:48, 12 June 2007 (UTC) Never mind. I just figured out how the deletion review process works. Antonrojo 21:25, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

Thank you
Hi DGG,

Thank you very much for spending time on finding sources. Cheers, --Aminz 05:05, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

The Novels WikiProject Newsletter - Issue XIII - June 2007
The June 2007 issue of the Novels WikiProject newsletter has been published. You may read the newsletter, change the format in which future issues will be delivered to you, or unsubscribe from this notification by following the link. Thank you.

This is an automated delivery by grafikbot -- 14:47, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

Request for comments
Hello, ... About a month ago, we had contact regarding my drafts for protocols to "slow down" the proposed and speedy deletion processes ... I've been busy with other projects since then, and used the time to let ideas percolate in the back of my mind, but I have recently readdressed the protocols from a fresh point of view, and took the time to learn how to make templates.

Please see User talk:72.75.70.147 and give me your feedback on the templates I have created for boilerplate warnings to be placed on editor's and articles talk pages prior to placing a PROD or CSD on an article. Happy Editing! &mdash; 19:07, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

Re: Sonia Naomí
Yup, far too much quarrelling. I'll go to PROD, and then if necessary AfD, to seek consensus. --jbmurray (talk|contribs) 20:12, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

Kew Gardens Interchange
My sympathies on your unfortunate familiarity with the Kew Gardens Interchange, a steel and concrete disaster I am also far too familiar with. Alansohn 22:13, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

Saginaw, Alabama AfD
For what it's worth I do not believe that you "did not get it". Like I stated in the nom, the demographic information looks rather legitimate, and given it was in the first version of the article before the more spurious mayor info, it's a very simple error to make in assuming the info added later was the erroneous info while the demographics were legit. If it appeared that my comments were affimring the "You don't get it" line, then I apologize for the miscommunication, as all I meant to agree with was the fact that the whole article was bogus. I don't think you "don't get it" and don't want to perpetuate that sort of notion. <font color="#0000FF">Ark <font color="#6060BF">yan  &#149; (talk) 23:10, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

My speedy noms
Thanks for the note on why you removed the speedy tags. I was originally going non-speedy but saw the "no content" criteria and thought that would apply. I've gone back and done non-speedy nominations. Zubdub 05:57, 14 June 2007 (UTC)

Articles for deletion/Ben Going
What's your position on Articles for deletion/Ben Going? The placement of your comment is ambiguous. Ichormosquito 06:58, 14 June 2007 (UTC)

Articles for deletion/Lauran Gangl
Please check the additional info someone added to the talk page for the artifcle, since additional info is given about the claimed PhD. Her PhD was while she was married to Jake Mancini, so apparently the name would be J. L. Mancini or Janet Laura Mancini or Janet Lauran Mancini. It is claimed to be from June 2003, Univerity of Newcastle, England-- Ophthamology Sciences. This would relate to research she is claimed to have done on the eyes of sharks. The comment also mentions St Andrews University, Scotland-- Marine Sciences, but it is not clear if this is related to some joint study related to the PhD or to her undergrad work. The poster says her subsequent professional work was as "Dr. Lauran Gangl-Plant" after her second marriage. If you have access to dissertation abstracts could you now confirm this. Thanks Edison 20:46, 14 June 2007 (UTC)

re: qy re librarians
I apologize for the delay in responding. Unfortuantely, I am unsure. I was interrupted in what I was working on and have been away for some time; many of my bibliographic notes have been lost, frustratingly. I simply can't remeber what I was working from, and never got around to entering the relevant citations, thereby making much of it rather useless, I realize. I wish I had a more helpful answer, but I have been unable to find any of the relevant notes. -FZ 21:39, 14 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Will do. -FZ 23:16, 14 June 2007 (UTC)

The Universal
On the deletion review page, you said: "Most of the refs originally offered were to directory listings, but the ref. to a listing in the christmas issue is said in the AfD to be substantial (2 pages). Considering the subject I thinks it might be sufficient. Personally, I think number of registered accounts (the ed. says 13,000) can be used as factor N, just as circulation is used as a factor for newspapers. I'm just commenting because i know mine is still not the accepted view. DGG 23:09, 29 May 2007 (UTC)" Would this, a full page about The Universal (back when it was called A Tractor) from the February 2003 issue of PC Gamer (UK) be enough to bring back the article?VDZ 15:48, 15 June 2007 (UTC)
 * The article shouldn't be written as 'A Tractor', because 'A Tractor' is now only a part of The Universal; The Universal is just A Tractor with a whole space-travelling thing that is now used to move from server to server, instead of a list with just 4 worlds. There's no connection to the song, as far as I know. Thanks for answering my question.VDZ 07:45, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

Walton
Thanks for the repair of the article. I don't know how I missed the links thing but I appreciate your repair. <font color="#FFFFFF" face="Arial Bold"> Jody B talk 00:54, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

DRV not broken comment
You missed the point. Jeff's argument was that that the deletion was proper and DRV should not have brought it back into a redirect. FCYTravis 04:57, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

Actual usage of the European Library by librarians?
Hello DGG. Please see my my question for you over on WP:COI/N, regarding the European Library. EdJohnston 21:07, 4 May 2007 (UTC). You asked me about it sometime back, and I've been noticing announcements that it is finally now becoming actually useful; union lists are not used until they have almost as much content as the national ones. It's like OSX, it was obviously going to be universal, but wise people didn't switch over for a while. I waited for 10.4. DGG 20:41, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

Comment at Articles for deletion/Oxford University Chess Club
You have questioned my integrity at that AFD, as I asked there, what do you believe I've done wrong? Do you believe I'm acting with malice or bad faith? Why the suspicion? What are your particular concerns? How can I address them? Believe it or not, I honestly feel these articles represent a problem. Would you have me deal with them in some other way? FrozenPurpleCube 06:14, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

Talk:Marc S. Ellenbogen
Hi DGG, could you please copyedit your last entry on Talk:Marc S. Ellenbogen? A comment of mine also got deleted on the way; if not by accident, please explain. Thanks. --maf (talk-cont) 13:23, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

Deletion review
HHO gas and Brown's gas were deleted, in spite of a majority of editors voting to keep. As an admin who voted in the AfD, can you comment on the deletion review? — Omegatron 14:02, 16 June 2007 (UTC)
 * WP:CANVAS alert. -N 14:24, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

Nicholas Lemann
This article needs help Nicholas Lemann but is safe Jeepday (talk) 16:17, 16 June 2007 (UTC) -- doneDGG 04:56, 17 June 2007 (UTC).

ExtraDry
Please see my comments on ANI. One Night In Hackney 303  01:03, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

False warning intimdation threat nonsense
You put this ridiculous nonsense on my talk page:
 * Mass removal; of links against consensus is disruptive editing. If you think policy is being ignored throughout WP, place a RfC. Discontinue, or you will be blocked. DGG 00:52, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

Don't give me that nonsense... it's not against consensus, and it's not anything that there's any legitimate purpose to block someone over. Those links are completely against WP:EL, and I left a message on that talk page about it as part of a group effort. This is "warning" is a totally bad faith attempt to try to get what you want through intimidation. Do not put such nonsense false warnings on my talk page again. DreamGuy 01:05, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

DreamGuy just contacted me asking me to unblock him since you apparently hadn't responded to his request. His abrasive and dismissive comments here aside, he does seem to have stopped removing links shortly after you warned him so I said I'd ask as well on his behalf. I figured I'd better not use my admin tools at all since I'm involved in the dispute directly. Bryan Derksen 01:55, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

Mannatech
Today, IP 76.105.197.64 deleted content from the Mannatech article. KPH2293 restored the article. At that point, new user User:Cosmochao began editing the article with a distinctly pro-Mannatech POV and without sources. I reverted these changes, going back to the last stable version of the article, and warned Cosmochao. Cosmochao reversed my revert. I have warned Cosmochao again, but I did not revert the change yet; I wanted to see if you would look into this and tell me if I'm going about this the right way. Thank you. Ante lan  <sup style="color:darkred;">talk  04:37, 17 June 2007 (UTC)
 * I have just reverted to your edit, and protected the page for 24 hours. "to stop revert war". I am posting on the talk page that the article will be stubbified if the nonsense continues. The last sentence to the lead paragraph about pharmaceutical manufacturers' conspiracy has I hope made it clear about what is happenning. DGG 04:47, 17 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Thank you for averting an edit war. Ante  lan  <sup style="color:darkred;">talk  04:57, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

Why
Why are you picking on me?

Ck lostsword's RfA - Thanks
ck lostsword • T  •  C  17:59, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

Jessie Penn-Lewis
This woman, it turns out, is completely fascinating. Would you keep the article on your watch list, though, and do POV edits as necessary? Although I got the information from a website that speaks against cults and the theologically "aberrent" I double checked the information I used with a Christian historian, and with other web sites, and will get the original sources. She's controversial enough that second-guessing any POV might be necessary, yet she's obscure enough I doubt she'll be on many other editors' watch-lists. KP Botany 18:24, 17 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Thanks. It was good information, poorly written as all get out, some inaccurate.  The subject is controversial enough that issues may arise, though.  Controversial on the Scientology level.  KP Botany

Deletion review Kari Schull et al
You participated in the AfD for Kari Schull where the nominator is attempting to overturn the "keep" decision at [deletion review Kari Schull]. This discussion is linked to 3 others the previous day, where the author of the articles is attempting to use the "keep" at Kari Schull to overturn the rejection of his other similar articles. Interesting potential precedents for the applicatrion of BIO, or for the reform of special case notability criteria --Kevin Murray 18:48, 17 June 2007 (UTC)
 * This won't by itself be more o a precedent than the 1000 or so this year claiming similar incompatibilities between the two--I've argued both ways from time to time, for the contradiction can be used to get any desired result. If anything, it shows we need flexible rules, for after all the real point is "suitable for an encyclopedia such as WP", & if WPedians disagree on what that is--as WPedians do, & in very basic ways, there is no way we can juggle fixed rules to gloss over the differences.  Current idea: 2 RSs only as the default in case there is no decision on other grounds. Personally, I'd add, keep if its in the de WP (except perhaps for purely German figures) I trust them more than en WP not to include if not appropriate, and why should we try to decide everything in every separate WP. DGG 20:37, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

Thank You
Thank you, and I will remember your advice. Hanoi Girl 00:36, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

RfA comment
I don't remember which RfA I commented that at (please remind me). I just remember really being irked by the weak answer to the question and tried to formulate a better response than "that answer was weak". In regards to a better way to phrase it, maybe by pointing out that it's IMPOSSIBLE not to disagree with someone on the wiki, whether it be over image inclusion (see Talk:banhammer) or whether a site violates WP:EL, or whether a non-free image is actually defensible under the WP:NFCC. Hell, one of the spats I had and was right about (whether a vandal masquerading as a newbie was actually a newbie) was used against me in my RfA because of how aggressively I hunted the user. Anybody who has never had even a minor spat isn't ready to take the mop. Perhaps the best way to say it is just to do so. -N 02:03, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

"A&P" AfD
Hi, you voted "weak delete" on the A&P (story) AfD on the basis of no sources. I have added some scholarly sources to the article intro which discuss a couple of takes English professors had on the story. In light of that I was hoping that you would take a look at the revised article and reconsider your vote. Thanks!--Bigtimepeace | talk | contribs 03:01, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Dept of Math & Compt Appl (PSG Tech)
Please find the response in Talk page.

Raymond Apple (rabbi)
I have further rewritten the article and added sources. I would be grareful if you could take a look. Capitalistroadster 06:42, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Further to your comments, Who's Who in Australia is generally considered to be a fairly reliable work. Capitalistroadster 06:53, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Nicholas Saunders
Since you altered the links to the various Nicholas/Nick Saunders they seem to be doing funny things. Cany you sort them out. ThanksCastlemate 06:45, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

All good now. Thanks Castlemate 00:14, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Year Books sentence
I've just removed an ungrammatical sentence that you added Jan. 17 to Year Books. I would have repaired it myself, of course, but I didn't want to risk misinterpreting it ("Originally a manuscript, they were"? "Originally the manuscripts were"?), so I figured I'd better take it out for now. --zenohockey 06:52, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Articles for deletion/Gohar Shahi
I have drastically stubbified the article in question...I wonder if you might give it a look. Thanks, &mdash; Scientizzle 16:52, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Editor review/FrozenPurpleCube
As I said on the page, it wasn't you at all I was thinking of, but rather another editor. I had assumed that issue was settled already, and gave it no actual thought when I made the request. If you want to remove your comment, I have no objection to removing my reply there as well, but I am concerned that you thought I was thinking of you. Why was that? Was the diff unclear, or should I have done something else? I didn't want to name names, and I was reluctant to even give a link, but I decided it would be acceptable enough. I've got no problem with you, I may not agree with your position, I think you're mistaken, but I respect that you've been civil and at least giving some reasonable thought to the subject. Your concerns are, if not necessarily applicable, at least a genuinely respectable position. More so than some other editors who have adopted an unfortunately hostile attitude that I think has colored their perceptions and lead to some troubling behavior. Still, I decided to make the best of it and see what others think instead. FrozenPurpleCube 19:41, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Active user verification
Hello,. Due to the high number of inactive users at WP:WPNN, we are asking that you verify that you are still an active contributor of the project. To do so, please add an asterisk (*) after your name on WP:WPNN. Users without one by the next issue in 2 weeks will be removed off the list. If you have any questions, please contact me on my talk page. Thanks. Diez2 03:35, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Standards of German Wikipedia higher?
Hi, I've seen a few comments by you stating that the standards for admission at the German Wikipedia are higher than those of the English one. I do not have that impression, and I'd be grateful if you could point me to some material about this. Thanks, and best regards,--Biologos 10:52, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

If I may butt in, I quite often compare articles between different WPs - most often artist's biographies but also others. I can make a stab at most Romance and Germanic languages. I would say that the English WP most often has the best coverage, even of "away" articles (ie compared to German WP on a German artist). The German is usually 2nd best - the French often much weaker. But relative coverage is highly unpredictable. My new articles often get translated fully into Spanish - sometimes very quickly - and also other languages. The German WP often has a formidable reading list clearly copied from somewhere & not actually read. Other languages like Polish & Dutch can be pretty good occasionally. Johnbod 16:19, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

I meant this in different ways but I recognize that I'm judging now by coverage of academic figures, history, some technology, some para-science; pop culture is obviously harder, especially because I do not know what's important there. I have not looked at art.
 * 1) Their higher & more consistent standard for inclusion
 * 2) The general quality of their articles with respect to appropriate length and organization.
 * 1) their quality of sourcing is not as detailed, and many articles list none at all or a very general one, or as Johnbod mentioned, a list from a library catalog. I thus have the impression they too use cribbing from encyclopedias.
 * I have slight familiarity with the French one but have never compared coverage--I have not looked at the others except incidentally--and since it's always for local subjects, I found them.
 * Caveat about language fluency: I have the librarian's ability to decipher things I can barely read or even not read at all, going by form (eg I can figure out which of a Hungarian list of references are books and which articles)  I have a good reading knowledge of French--I can read  French articles here without a dictionary; a fair one only of German at the graduate-school reading exam level--but as I remarked, it's improving, and I do need a dictionary. (thus, while I have the impression that the quality of writing is higher in the German, I am not fluent enough to really tell)
 * So I am talking about a language where I am not fluent and need a dictionary, and am therefore likely to make a fool of myself, not that this stops me from getting discussions started with over-broad generalizations.
 * First part is the easiest, coverage. But you can't go just by the inter-language links, because there are corresponding articles without links, even if they're clearly translations. To be continued.

Kazimieras Garšva again
Sorry to disturb you, but as you have been neutral editor of Kazimieras Garšva article I do have a question. In this edit Piotrus restored what seems to be dead links. Can this kind of "information" be used on WP:LIVING and ow does it comply with WP:VERIFY? Same dead links were restored in Vilnija article. Pease note, that here are no valid naming of those documents, only dead weblink. Thank you.--Lokyz 17:52, 19 June 2007 (UTC)
 * see WP:EL. Replied on talk page for article in more detail DGG 18:01, 19 June 2007 (UTC)
 * For the record, the ref has much mor ethen 'only dead weblink', there is a lot of 'valid naming': Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs (10 2006). ""Antypolski tekst K. Garsvy" (Anti-polish text by K. Garsva)". Commentary on K. Garsva article "Kiedy na Wileńszczyźnie będzie wprowadzone zarządzanie bezpośrednie? (When Vilnius region will have direct self-government?)" in Lietuvos Aidas, 11 -12.10". Media zagraniczne o Polsce (Foreign Media on Poland) XV (200/37062), allowing the editor to either go to the Polish MSZ print bulleting or Lietuvos Aidas original article. Such misinterpretations are not helping.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus 18:16, 19 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Umm, not sure if I understand why, but your comments are, as always, highly appreciated.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus 18:33, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Model UNs
I generally go through and prod/afd all model un conference articles to be consistent. All of them ostensibly fail WP:ORG because the membership of the organizing committee is almost always < 100 and there, as far as I know, aren't any stipulations for conferences to be notable. And while WP:V isn't explicitly a part of requirements for articles, it is an intrinsic part of establishing notability. Essentially, until there is a guide, I think it's only fair to delete all conferences, as to prevent arguing shades of gray. As to the blanked pages, I probably should have RfDed them, and in the future I will. I don't really think its a good idea, however, to redirect all the conferences that aren't notable to the main article. Redirects are cheap, but at the same time I don't think SpringfieldHSSpringMUN07 needs a redirect, it all just gets crufty.

Mystache 03:26, 20 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Even if we are going to continue to disagree, as I think possible, we should at least try to narrow down the field.
 * You may be right about redirects in these cases--they probably only served to console the supporters where the article was deleted--its not as if they were individual's names, or as if something about the local conference were there. They should all go. I suggest you simply propose all the US College ones in a batch at RfD, as the first step. It's usually better to keep them all of one type, & to start with the agreed and obvious.
 * From where do you get the N greater than 100 requirement? I see nothing of the sort on the present page, WP:ORG, although I haven't checked back in the earlier versions. In the talk page there is discussion about the disadvantages of using fixed numbers. (I sometimes like them myself, but I've not been successful in getting consensus to accept them) If we are going to use a fixed number, it would make more sense to use the number of attendees. But this varies so much that I don't think its a good criterion.
 * Where I totally disagree with you is the way to proceed until there is agreement about what to do. It should absolutely not be to delete articles. The default at AfD is that non consensus means keep, and I think most WPedians think it best to keep articles of borderline notability around until their status becomes clarified. (From the viewpoint of an admin, I find that the amount of link-checking involved when deleting, especially if there are photos, as there usually are, makes deleting on a trial basis a real pain.)   You certainly don't have to take my advice, and I have been wrong often enough about where the consensus lies.

A request
Hi David, I'm wondering if I could get you to move Pete Hurd to Peter L Hurd with it's edit history intact, and delete the superfluous Pete Hurd. If there has to be an article it might as well have my correct name. Best Regards. Pete.Hurd 04:07, 20 June 2007 (UTC)
 * I'm sorry to bother you again, but is there some way to make the talk page point to the old AfD?  Thanks. Pete.Hurd 04:49, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

Christian Bartolf / Gandhi Information Center
Dear David, thank you for your vote concerning the article on my person. The same process of deletion has now been started with "Gandhi Information Center". Now I am quite unfamiliar with Wikipedia procedures. And I do not know how to "rescue" information in this wikipedia universe which has been like "hell" to me twice (similar debate went on concerning "Gandhi Information Center" six months ago, then I brought official Berlin sources, and the adversaries stopped their attacks). So, what to do? Even if I find any more "secondary sources", the "procedure" (as "Kresspahl" called it) might go on. As you might have noticed, I am not a member of a wikipedian clan. Maybe you know any way out of this dilemma? Thank you! Chrbartolf 20 June 2007

Thank you! I read you very sound advice on my page. You are, indeed, very kind. I already started following your advice ... Chrbartolf 20 June 2007

Now hopefully the many additions and changes of the website will suffice. Chrbartolf 20 June 2007

Dear David, thank you for the good clean-up. I do not know the best way to treat "Laughing Volcano" and "Kresspahl"'s provocations ref. the Gandhi Information Center's website. They would perhaps never stop that, it seems to me. Do you have an idea? Chrbartolf 21 June 2007

Now I think I can do nothing else than to observe what is happening at the end of these five "procedure" days. In case you have another good advice for me, please write to me. Otherwise I try to keep cool and just observe ... Chrbartolf 23 June 2007

Now someone deleted the "Gandhi Information Center" website - what to do? Chrbartolf 27 June 2007

Thanks for all your efforts and explanations. I always use as signature Chrbartolf - will this be right in future. To be sincere, I do not understand the complicated procedure now, and I am afraid this might take a long time, a long time of absence of the wikipedia article on "Gandhi Information Center". Would be a real pity ... In any case, if you need some info, I will be prepared to give it to you, because Gandhi Information Center's "organizational notability" should be obvious to everyone, after all these activities and years ... It is just a matter of proper wikipedia text. Please go ahead soonest! Chrbartolf 28 June 2007

Thank you again for your kind cooperation, translation is no problem for me, but there are no additional "completely independent unquestionably reliable publications" (whatever this might mean in our societies), they are all in the hands of these responsible people who suppress good news by ignorance and indifference - this is it. I need not explain you why. It is quite easy nowadays to marginalize someone (and who?), and they (whoever they are) succeed daily! Now do not recommend to me professional PR management - this is a matter of "do-re-mi" (if you know what I mean). Chrbartolf 28 June 2007

Of course, you find entries in the library collection databases of the "Swarthmore College Peace Collection" (500 College Avenue, Swarthmore, PA, 19081-1399 U.S.A., 610-328-8557 (curator) - http://www.swarthmore.edu/Library/peace/ - and in "The Commonweal Collection, c/o J.B. Priestley Library, University of Bradford, Bradford, West Yorkshire, BD7 1DP, Telephone: 01274 233404" - http://www.bradford.ac.uk/library/services/commonweal/index.php - (these are the two major university-linked peace library collections as far as I know) for "Bartolf" as well as for "Gandhi Informations Zentrum" - but I do not know if this helps you ... Chrbartolf 28 June 2007

Now "Prodego" deleted the "Christian Bartolf" article, in addition - what to do? Chrbartolf 28 June 2007

"LaughingVulcan" and David Goodman ("DGG") and "Seraphimblade", thank you for your efforts and explanations - I appreciate them very much! First of all, I do not intend to do PR work or become famous, but the readers of "Wikipedia" should be informed about the "Gandhi Information Center" and "Christian Bartolf", do you not think so? Second, those who are allowed to inform the readers could be you or someone else, but not me - according to wikipedia guidelines, as far as I understand. This is the reason why I have abstained (after grasping the rules) from "autobiography", "self-advertising" or else. Third, even if I change the text in the sandbox (during the next hour), I do not really know who decides when the new article will be restored, because I suppose the "rough consensus" could destroy anything, although notable, because of reasons you might better know about. Fourth, what other webpages will prove authenticity or notability except from government-related webpages or quotes in scientific works already found out during the past busy week - please explain to me! Fifth: Will there a chance or a way to represent these two articles in a new shape soon - by cooperation (and if yes, with whom?) - for the sake of the Wikipedia readers. Chrbartolf 29 June 2007

Now I edited this "sandbox" page :User:DGG/sandbox/Chrbartolf. Link from outside Wikipedia: - what else is missing and will be necessary? Chrbartolf 29 June 2007


 * You might want to do some cleanup and organization to the information, as it is currently in DGG's sandbox, I can't make a whole lot of sense of it. Maybe some sections and headers would help? I think DGG's suggestion of combining all the information into a single article is also a good one, it's certainly possible one article can be supported better than several. Seraphimblade Talk to me 09:03, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

Thank you for the advise, Seraphimblade. Now the only way to cleanup for me was to remove the "nowiki" tags (in spite of LaughingVulcan's advise), but as I mentioned just before, this was the only way to cleanup. Now by following your advise, I could not follow the wish of LaughingVulcan although I would have wished. So, this is not my fault. In addition, I think that now it might only be a matter of possible improvements (but in which way and how and what?) and then to restore the articles soonest. Everything else would become a farce, in my humble opinion. In case, there is any other way for cleanup, please do it your way. Thank you again! Chrbartolf 29 June 2007

I would like to ask (according to Seraphimblade's advise of today) if the two rewritten articles could be restored. You find them at the moment here: [[User:DGG/sandbox/Chrbartolf] or outside Wikipedia: . Thank you for your kind attention and soon responses. [[User:Chrbartolf|Chrbartolf]] 30 June 2007

The combination of the two articles to the one now on "Gandhi Information Center", successfully prepared by LaughingVulcan, will do. In case you agree, please roll it back to Main Space. After all, I am too shy to do so - thank you! This message goes to DGG, Seraphimblade, LaughingVulcan. Chrbartolf 30 June 2007

After reading your fine comments (DGG and LaughingVulcan) I think the best continuation is to follow your proposal, LaughingVulcan when you just wrote: "I'd rather take a day or two now to reduce the chances of it being deleted again, then take the risk and see it disintegrated instantly by a passing Admin." This is why I remain without action during this day, before you will have finished your editing of the text for which I am very grateful to you, of course. After all, I just want to express that I do not complain about other editors at all. On the contrary, I am lucky about your cooperation and willing to follow your advice. To avoid any further misunderstandings, I communicate openly on the talk pages. It would have been easier for me to observe and just resign. But I identify with Wikipedia readers - that's it. The better the article, the higher the standard of the article, the more the article fulfills the criteria, the better for all. So, please inform me about the result. If there is anything I can do for you, please inform me as well. Chrbartolf 1 July 2007

Response
Hello DGG.

I responded to you here. Greetings, —DerHexer (Talk) 10:48, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

Library
I just added Physics because I like it and thinking back that was the only reason it was a stupid edit and would like to apologise for it. 89.242.158.22 15:27, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

Thanks, and another request
Thanks for your help there. I'm considering filing a user conduct RfC over 's continuing OR battles. I thought I'd ask an active level-headed editor for a second opinion before proceeding. Pete.Hurd 20:36, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

Reversion of Peter L. Hurd
Hello DGG, User:Pan_Dan made a series of edits to Peter L. Hurd on 20 June 2007 in an attempt to force a merger of articles with the page on Digit Ratio. I think this has something to do with the article being keeped at AfD, whilst user:Pan_Dan opposed the article. The edits have been reverted by an administrator, user:Trialsanderrors once already but he has just reverted the page back again. I considered this to be vandalism and editing in bad faith as it goes against community concensus, so I reverted the edit back. Once again it has been reverted back by user:Pan_Dan. Normally I would have contacted user:Trialsanderrors in regard to this, but he is on a wikibreak. I am not experienced enough to handle this situation and would like you to take action to preserve the inclusion of this academic. Thanks R:128.40.76.3 15:01, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
 * I've restored the page. I suggest you comment also at the merge discussion on the talk page for digit ratio. DGG 15:12, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
 * DGG, I don't appreciate your reversion. I explained my edits and referenced the relevant Wikipedia policies in my edit summaries. You did not explain your reversion except to say the removal of content was "undiscussed." This is contrary to WP:BOLD; good-faith edits rooted in policy don't have to be "discussed." Pan Dan 15:17, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
 * You know, you are wrong, go back at see what it says at BOLD," But anything you end up doing that turns out badly can be reverted, often quite painlessly. Don't be insulted if that does happen". Discuss he removal of the material on the Peter L. Hurd page. Don't edit war. The best course would be to wait a month or two, and then renominate for AfD. DGG 15:21, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
 * The point is that my edits were explained and rooted in policy, and your reversion was totally unexplained except for a misguided admonishment about the need to "discuss." On your other point, I have no intention of going back to AfD. You will recall that my recommendation in the AFD was to merge, not delete. Merges don't require AFD's. Pan Dan 15:24, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
 * That may have been your recommendation, but the decision was simply keep. I've added a comment to the merge discussion at finger ratio, and, if you like, will explain further there, and of course you can discuss it as you like.One editor cannot force a merge If after adequate discussion you want to proceed via that route, the dispute resolution process should be followed. But removing content first and then proposing a merge of what remains will not necessarily suggest good faith to an uninvolved party. DGG 15:32, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Your last sentence is really silly. If I thought the content at (the long version of) Peter L. Hurd was A-OK, then of course a merge would be a bad idea. The reason I think a merge is needed is that when content offending WP:NOT, WP:NPOV, and WP:OR is removed from the article, all that's left is content on the digit ratio study. My removal of the content, and the explanations in my edit summaries, demonstrate, using Wikipedia policy, why I believe a merge is necessary. (For the record, I proposed the merge before, not after (as you suggest), I removed the offending content--not that that matters.) Pan Dan 15:39, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

I will move this thread to the merge discussion at Digital Ratio. DGG 17:06, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Thanks, I agree that's appropriate. Pan Dan 17:21, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

[Moved here from my talk page:] I see you reverted the attempted removal of material from the page earlier today. I've found it necessary to do it again already. If it happens another time, perhaps you could revert and protect the page. DGG 15:24, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
 * I only check WP every couple of days currently, but if you need my input let me know. It seems we have a rough consensus that the long version is policy-compliant. I don't see any interpretative claims that are not backed by multiple outside sources, and we routinely use CV's for declarative claims unless we have reason to distrust their veracity. Fwiw, I don't see any evidence of vandalism on Pan Dan's part. This seems a normal content dispute where s/he holds a minority opinion. The merge proposal is nonsense btw. If an academic is deemed notable it means s/he has reached a level of exposure that warrants a biographical article. ~ trialsanderrors 18:50, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
 * You mean a biographical article where the biographical details are sourced to the subject's website? Any CV is a self-released promotional autobiography--nothing to write a neutral, reliably verifiable, Wikipedia article with. And no, there was no consensus at the AFD that the long version is policy-compliant. There was a majority who declared Prof. Hurd "notable," but failed to explain how a policy-compliant encyclopedia article could actually be written on Prof. Hurd in the absence of multiple non-trivial third party sources about him. (BTW thanks for exonerating me of vandalism.) Pan Dan 19:38, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
 * I'm not involved with the Peter L. Hurd page but since I stopped by here, I note with interest trialsanderrors' comment that 'we routinely use CVs for declarative claims unless we have some reason to distrust their veracity.' This would indeed make life simpler for editors of biographies. Just lately the COI noticeboard is discussing Joseph Hilbe, an article where some of the details are unsourced, but they don't seem terribly important to have 'proof' of. E.g. he worked as a personal assistant to Rudolf Carnap (unsourced). So I await with interest the outcome of this idea. EdJohnston 20:58, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Academic CV's are, unless they contain interpretative claims, not "promotional". They tend to make declarative claims (claims of fact) of the "X is Associate Professor at Y" and "X published a paper in Z" variety. Interpretative claims (claims of opinion) are claims such as "X is the foremost researcher in the field of W". If we want to write a neutral biography there is no reason to remove declarative claims sourced from a CV by reputable researcher or the department website. There is generally no dispute about the neutrality of a claim that X is an associate professor at a reputable university, so we don't need to reflect varying viewpoints. Interpretative claims on the other hand tend to be disputed, so we resort to outside sources to give a panoramic view of the claim. "Professor X considers himself the foremost researcher on W (source: W's CV), a claim that is disputed by Professor Q (source: ABC)." ~ trialsanderrors 22:16, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
 * I think it's just 2 steps more complicated. We are first of all talking about CVs at official university sites. People usually don't dare lie on those. (There have been cases of academics with false credentials--they usually make the Chronicle of Higher Education. That kind of investigation is usually beyond what we'd do.) But in addition CVs are acceptable as evidence for purely routine facts,such as what year a degree was awarded, etc.; they are also presumptive evidence for a degree being awarded, etc., unless disputed. I've seen them disputed, and there was recently an article at AfD with a claim to a PhD that could not be verified & the article was deleted (actually, many other facets of the bio could also not be verified, & it was just a personal web page.)   In the example mentioned, that someone worked as a personal assistant to a famous person, it would not be unreasonable to ask for additional evidence if notability depended on it. In the article that started this discussion, there was no reason to question--it was basically obstructive. DGG 22:32, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
 * T&E's distinction between declarative and interpretative claims is well taken. But neutrality doesn't just mean that we should fairly represent all points of view on interpretive claims. Neutrality also means that we should include (a fair representative sample of) all declarative claims made by third party sources. For example, "X received a Ph.D. from the University of Knowitall" is a simple declarative statement that might be found on an academic's website. "X has struggled with alcoholism" and "X was found by a University Committee to have committed plagiarism and was forced to transfer to another university" are simple declarative statements that would never appear on the same academic's website. Now, if all three statements on X above are verifiable in third-party sources, then maybe we could use those items to build a neutral article on X, including both positive and negative content. Or, if X is squeaky clean and is the subject of non-trivial third-party sources which have found nothing negative on X, then the Wikipedia article will of course reflect that. But in the absence of non-trivial third-party sources on X, a neutral article is impossible: even given verifiable declarative statements about X on X's university website, neutrality requires including information from third-party sources that have investigated X more thoroughly than the author of that university website. Pan Dan 09:16, 22 June 2007 (UTC)

Note, I've moved the entire conversation to Talk:Digit ratio. Please comment there. Pan Dan 12:50, 22 June 2007 (UTC)

as per your request
From: Articles for deletion/Sergeant Bluff-Luton High School:


 * Keep since all high schools are inherently notable. Noroton 15:41, 20 June 2007 (UTC)
 * quite seriously, perhaps you can try to convince us of this, or at least outline why. ?DGG 01:31, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
 * I've been doing just that, ad nauseum, in the past 200 deletion discussions I've participated in, so I guess I figured everyone knew it. But I guess I should do it every time. Here's the argument: User:Noroton/opinions. Noroton 20:12, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

(continued in the interesting discussion at Noroton's talk page)DGG 22:32, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

Response:
 * There's more in what yo say that I want to respond to when I have a moment, but I wanted to mention this:
 * After having seen the long discussion at WP:ORG a while back, I'm less inclined to propose this, but if you have the interest, I'd like to get your reaction to this idea on notability standards for high schools (the controversial part) and school districts and hospitals. I'm thinking now that it might be useful to suggest a lower notability standard for all but the high school part: User:Noroton/draft proposal. Then I might suggest the high school part separately. Suggesting all schools are notable is just not going to go anywhere. Do you think an "inherently notable" standard for school districts, hospitals and local government units would pass? Would it be a good idea?
 * A lot of our opinions on what to accept in an article is based on how we think Wikipedia is working and what dynamics are more or less important, in this case: Do school lousy articles attract vandalism and lousy editing or are they seeds that will eventually grow into good articles? Personally, I'm inclined to believe most high school articles are likely to become progressivley better and starting a stub tends to be useful rather than destructive. For elementary and middle schools, I'm not optimistic. I suspect, unless someone did some convincing study that showed most school articles follow one or the other pattern, that most editors will be either inclusionist or deletionist on schools and we'll never get a consensus.
 * When it comes to schools in other countries, I'm uncomfortable even participating in the discussion. My own proposal, as thought out and written, is pretty much American-centric and I'm not sure how to deal with that except by eventually proposing it and hoping for input from others. Noroton 22:35, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Local Government districts in general, it depends on the size and the nature of the district. Each state, each large city, is different. Local schools districts, almost always, as a place to put the schools without any content of their own, but again there's a level of aggregation question--in less populated areas there has sometimes been one per high school, with sometimes 2 or 3 feeder schools. I think there are some with one elementary school only, sending the high school pupils to a neighboring district. Perhaps some statement like "are notable, unless very small."
 * Hospitals are a problem. I've tried to document some and had a very difficult job, except for incidental notices in crime stories. Again, there are many small ones & specialized ones--the trend is away from them, but ...

I'd be glad to have a statement that the bias is towards notability, though we need a better word than bias, & presumption is too strong.
 * I think there would be problems for a US standard only unless very delicately worded.
 * Agreed about the problem of getting consensus--after the last proposal collapsed I tried to get a simple statement that there was no consensus, and couldn't get consensus for even that, & a very carefully crafted shopping mall proposal couldn't get consensus just a few weeks ago. Depending how it goes, one or two determined opponents--however irrational--can block things; alternatively, a 45% almost majority can get snowed under. I'm going to start saying that "encyclopedic" implies a certain degree of consistency. DGG 23:10, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

My RfA
You recently !voted neutral at my RfA and you asked about two specific edits that I have made. I have now explained my rationale to these edits. Thanks! <font face="Lucida Calligraphy">Greeves (talk • contribs) 16:27, 22 June 2007 (UTC)
 * I made a reply to your reply. <font face="Lucida Calligraphy">Greeves (talk • contribs) 18:39, 22 June 2007 (UTC)

Thanks
Thanks for the advice on the speedy deletion. In future, I'll just add the delete tag. Thanks for your help! Pleased to meet you. User:Pedant 23:37, 22 June 2007 (UTC)

Re: AfD spa
No problem, I just wanted to put everything up front to have a clean AfD. — Swpb talk contribs 00:27, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

PeaceNT and Edtropolis
Hello DGG - I saw your note on my talk page, and I thought I should let you know that I was, in fact, inexcusably wrong and premature to suspect any kind of malfeasance on the part of PeaceNT. She was, in fact, creating those accounts as a service to users who had requested them at Request an account (a page of which I was unaware). Anyhoo, in the interest of making amends to PeaceNT for my ignorance there, I thought I'd let you know that I was totally off-base and out of line to suspect anything there, and she's done nothing wrong (in fact, has been helping out at an understaffed page) and has no connection to Edtropolis' abuse. MastCell Talk 02:29, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

Reply
Wow-- thanks for the compliment, David. From what I recall, there's no bar to editing an article that's up for deletion, other than to not wipe it out. I'll follow your advice and see how far that goes. (Mark L. Ford a/k/a Mandsford 00:59, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

Its me Samir, Pls help me Improve
Dear DGG, Do you remember me? I am samir (user: Shoovrow) from Bangladesh, author of the huge controvertial article - Philosophy of Death and Adjustment! I remember you and Mattisse as some very helpful and nice person.

Will you pls see my "Death and Adjustment" - article where a notice has been tagged for the need of wikifying. I am not much expert on that matter. Pls help me if you can.

You can also send e-mail to me at hmanjur@bttb.net.bd.

Regards Samir Shoovrow 15:50, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

Mandsford again
Note: This comment was moved from your userpage to your talk page.  Cheers,  Mystytopia  18:48, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

I did version #1, then took it back to the old title in version #2 because there was a misunderstanding-- on person said that there was nothing to show "that the hoax is notable" in the form of having books written about it, and another even said that there's "no proof that it's a hoax". Honestly, some of the stupidest people in the world post on the Articles for Destruction page. And the hell of it is, they all think they're geniuses. As you say, you can't convert people, you can only try to convert their audiences. Mandsford 18:45, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

Addendum
I wish to add that the comment referred to the person who wrote that Wikipedia should not brand this as a hoax without a "reliable source" that it was a hoax, a tall order for something just discovered. For the benefit of that person, I point the way to reading the daily news from 1904 online, at www.nyt.ulib.org;
 * which now contains 1860-1866 and 1900-1907. Low quality, no index--if one has access to it on Proquest or otherwise, use that version; but this is still enormously useful if one knows the date (and I had not known about it.)
 * a general way to prove non-existence (not prove 100%, but pretty near) is to cross-search: If you find other things about the town of equal & lesser significance, but not this event & similar and less mining disasters, but not the one here, it is reasonably certain not to exist. I once startled a faculty committee at Princeton by showing them this--none of them had thought of it. DGG 20:32, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

Thanks and....
I will try my best with you beside me!Shoovrow 01:24, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

Louis Olney on AfD, has improved, might merit a look
You removed the Speedy from this article, when it was only one sentence and indeed a pitiful article! It has since improved, but is now sitting on AfD with very few votes. EdJohnston 02:57, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

Shane Hagadorn AfD
Now unbundled, you may wish to use my contribs to track down the seperate articles. Darrenhusted 00:19, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

AfDs - adding refs
Thanks for your suggestion. I'll aim to do so in future. Regards. → AA (talk • contribs) — 07:47, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

Speedy Delete
I decided to AfD the Photo Sharing List, though after your post i was unsure whether it even deserved removal. I guess that will be decided so no harm done if i am terribly wrong, thankyou for removing the Speedy and advising me. -- Jimmi Hugh 12:50, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

Spam in TATE ETC.
Hello, this is a message from an automated bot. A tag has been placed on TATE ETC., by another Wikipedia user, requesting that it be speedily deleted from Wikipedia. The tag claims that it should be speedily deleted because TATE ETC. is blatant advertising for a company, product, group, service or person that would require a substantial rewrite in order to become an encyclopedia article. To contest the tagging and request that administrators wait before possibly deleting TATE ETC., please affix the template to the page, and put a note on its talk page. If the article has already been deleted, see the advice and instructions at WP:WMD. Please note, this bot is only informing you of the nomination for speedy deletion, it did not nominate TATE ETC. itself. Feel free to leave a message on the bot operator's talk page if you have any questions about this or any problems with this bot. --Android Mouse Bot 2 07:24, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

I declined to delete, since i think there was useful content. I removed the long list of articles, which is not really encyclopedic content. If youcan add any information, such as where it has been indexed, please do. If you can find a reference from anywhere published outside the Tate talking about it, It would very much help. DGG 13:35, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

Please reconsider how encyclopedic it is to list all the subjects that a magazine addresses. These are the kind of finely detailed facts (not opinions) that give a reader in the field of the arts an objective grasp of the magazine's treatment. This also provides an extremely valuable resource to locate published material to source new and emerging artists and writers. The latter is what I'm using this for. Honestly you cannot say it is too much detail when every millimeter of the Simpsons and Star Wars and pop culture has been wikipedia'd to death. Give the arts a chance on Wikipedia. They're floundering and I can't think of a better way to provide opportunities for resourced articles than by outlining the resources available. This is NOT spam. Do you really think I'm trying to sell magazines? OatmealSmith 13:49, 25 June 2007 (UTC)


 * It may not have been clear that I am interested in improving the material on WP in this subject--one I personally care about, not trying to remove it. "spam" is a sort of general term, and may not have been the best word. Sorry about that. But the listing of content is not encyclopedic--it is material for an index. Consider long standing journals in art with hundreds of volumes with tens of articles in each. The material makes the article a conspicuous candidate for deletion.  I see you have similar listings of individual issues on other pages, Dot Dot Dot for example has a list of issues, and you have an article titled "List of Eye magazine issues".  It is appropriate to mention specially significant articles, but a list of issues as references for that does not help the article, and an article just listing issues is altogether impossible. (It is otherwise done only in the case of comics, which has a very strong lobby, but even there is has been challenged & will probably be challenged again)  My motive in this is both to improve articles by following the conventions,  and to keep articles by not giving excuses for those who do not see the significance to delete them. Had I not removed the list of articles, I would not have been able to keep the page from deletion-- I certainly could have removed the tag, but it would have been deleted anyway.


 * I myself am not interested in the video game content, or the comics content, but many people are, and it is not useful to complain about excessive detail in other fields--such arguments are always ignored & are better not suggested. What is needed is to have more content on the fine arts. I looked at this article because it is one of my own interests. The most important thing wanted here is more articles on contemporary artists that meet WP standards, by having non-copyviolating content and having actual sources for their significance--such as having multiple works in exhibits at the Tate or similar museums. A great many of the articles submitted on artists are deleted because they are simply copies from a personal, gallery or school web site. Unless the artist goes to the actual formality of donating the content according to WP:Copyright, there's no choice but to remove the content--and the typical content of such articles is much too self-advertising to be used anyway & . Do you think such articles are upgradable,  or hopeless?    DGG 15:01, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

Overthrow vs Overturn
Do you mind if I ask what the difference is? Cheers Spartaz Humbug! 14:06, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

RE:RNAS Merganser
Perhaps i'm a bit insecure about these things I don't want to decide whats sensitive and whats not to be honest. My opinion is that its probably ok but the only way i would know otherwise would be when the police are seizing my laptop- at which point its too late to have an opinion either way! (I am the sole contributer to the article bar someone else removing selflinks) Bobbacon 14:16, 25 June 2007 (UTC)


 * I have been persuaded (having looked at other bases) that it is most likely fine. Thanks for taking a look at this, I appreciate it. I will leave it up to your discretion as to what does/doesn't removed once it has been investigated. Bobbacon 14:56, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

Lisa Davis
Why did you remove the speedy on Lisa Davis? Not only was the article about it's author but she admitted on the talk page that it was purely created as self promotion. -- Jimmi Hugh 18:48, 25 June 2007 (UTC)
 * I can't argue with that kind of logic. And i am trying to use the AfD system instead of overusing speedy deletes, will remember not overkill A7, thanks. -- Jimmi Hugh 19:04, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

Earth Institute
I do not think the various parts of this center can possibly survive as separate articles. Even at major universities like Columbia, only the most important and comprehensive research centers have individual articles. I have therefore edited them all into redirects to the main page, where it would be reasonable to make sections for each. When there was apparently non-copyvio content, I used it for the section. Before you go to any more work on this elaborate et of pages, please stop and consider. See WP:WALLED GARDEN. Based on practice at AfD, this is probably the best way to handle it. DGG 20:36, 25 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Probably should have made test pages first. People are deleting everything before I can rewrite anything. Stopping for now. --Allstar86 20:46, 25 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Hi. Could you see if anything is there in the deleted records of Center for International Earth Science Information Network? I think something was there before I edited (and then it was subsequently deleted).--Allstar86 20:12, 26 June 2007 (UTC)

An edit > a revert > a mess > fixing.
Your edit to Quizzing.co.uk was reverted (not by me), and the names were put back. Unfortunately, the result was a mess. I fixed the mess to stop the article having messy formatting, but the names remain. If you still have a difference of opinion with the person who put the names back, I suggest you take it up with him. Jw6aa 00:41, 26 June 2007 (UTC)

Speedy Deletion issue
Thanks for giving your input on the issue with Walk Away (Movie) and its deletion. I would like a little clarification though - If there is no good catergory to put a CSD in, where should it go? Trusilver 00:57, 26 June 2007 (UTC)

Wikifur
Considering that discussion on the External links talkpage has fully documented (through the responsible parties' admission) that links to Wikifur were not added by any "consensus" but through a clear and conscious coordinated spam attack/conflict of interest by site owners, I am planning, per discussion there and agreed upon by the editors who had participated in prior EL page discussions (as compared to the spammer and his furry friends who only showed up to support the cleared spammed article) to start removing the links again. Considering that you improperly blocked me in the past over this, can I expect you to have learned from your mistake and that you will stay out of it this time, or do I need to worry that you will once again be jumping to using your block power to try to enforce the pro-furry linkfarming side? DreamGuy 04:20, 26 June 2007 (UTC)
 * If I do get involved in the discussion, I will not act as an admin. Recently I've been working on other issues & I had not been thinking about this. As you know, my interest in this is not Wikifur specific, but on maintaining flexible linking policies in general--I primarily have different purposes in mind. As I have not been following the exchange, I just now checked back on the talk page, & I do not think there is a consensus at WT:EL.  On this specific question, I suggest, as I always do, that the matter be compromised, and that some sites be used --and clearly identified-- when most appropriate and needed, and unnecessary ones removed.   DGG 05:16, 26 June 2007 (UTC)

Just wondering
Do you think we could have a deletion discussion without you accusing me and everyone else you disagree with of disruption and "rampant paternalism"? I may have expressed an opinion on the categories, but nowhere that I remember have I made disparaging comments about the people using or supporting them. Dmcdevit·t 04:23, 26 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Please AGF and do not overinterpret. I think we would find it very easy to get angry with each other, and I do not want that to happen. it's gotten late in NYC, and it wouldn't be a good idea to continue now.  I hope I have not made any personal comments about you, and if any of the wordings came out that way, I fully apologize. I try never to do that, and if I've slipped, I'm sorry. But I consider paternalism a fair comment about the tendency of the arguments used. I wouldn't have meant to say anything about the people.  DGG 05:10, 26 June 2007 (UTC)
 * To be honest, it seems to me like you have a way of disagreeing that makes it seem like you think I am a nutjob. I'm glad if that isn't on purpose. Just so you know, WP:POINT seems to me to necessarily imply an accusation of disruption, as that is what the page is about. It seems like you are one not assuming good faith. And the cries of "paternalism" do feel unfair: you've never, so far as I know, said that about any other category deletion discussion before now, have you? It looks as if you disagree with a deletion with a routine nomination, and suddenly it becomes "paternalistic" to even nominate categories for deletion. Dmcdevit·t 06:55, 26 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Again, not intended. Considering the frequency that WP:POINT is used at Afd, I didn't think it implies anything about the individual--but if people do take it that way I thank you for correcting me.DGG 20:05, 26 June 2007 (UTC)

Need help to delete the unnecessary redirect page for Tosca
DGG, the aria page is meant for aria details and not for a redirection page to the main article. Please look at the history in Tosca. On 23rd June, this user (Daniel Newman) added a hyperlink to one of the arias “Vissi d'arte” (in noted aria list) and created a page called “Vissi d'arte”. But instead writing the aria details, the user redirects the page back to Tosca. I deleted the link at “Vissi d'arte” in the noted arias list in Tosca article (refer below)
 * 17:11, 23 June 2007 Whjayg (Talk | contribs) (23,856 bytes) (Undid revision 140127354 by Daniel Newman (talk) - why redirect "Vissi d'arte)

And then requested the page “Vissi d'arte” to be deleted. I have used rfd, but it was restored back and then i used speedy deletion and you restored it back. Tell me what to do? The page does not serve any purpose at all. Tosca is the opera tite while "Vissi d'arte" is the aria. This is a sample for an aria for Tosca (E lucevan le stelle). The user should have done this way instead of redirect the empty page back to the main article. Thanks - Jay 16:37, 26 June 2007 (UTC)
 * I apologized and deleted the redirect as housekeeping. 20:01, 26 June 2007 (UTC)
 * I have reopened the article and write the intro, aria and the translation - Jay 06:05, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

Father Hugh Barrett-Lennard
Thank you for your helpful suggestions about this article. Actually, I have no strong feeling one way or another as to whether a baronet is notable. Another editor added a red link on the page about the Belhus baronetcy; I simply placed a few facts to start the page. I can certainly provide a citation that shows information was published about Father Hugh prior to his death, although I'm not clear that this would make him more notable.

WikiProject Baronetcies implies that some of the people involved in this project are looking for an article on every baronet as well as every baronetcy. In addition, the talk page for that project shows that there are at least some editors who believe that no article on baronets should be deleted. I feel as if I have wandered into a family quarrel Rjm at sleepers 19:51, 26 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Thanks, Rjm at sleepers 20:34, 26 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Another editor has added some interesting information about Father Hugh's career. I think this justifies removal of the delete tag, so I have boldly done so. Perhaps you could look and see what you think. Rjm at sleepers 17:25, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

over-deletion and possible RfC
I am considering an RfC on User:Naconkantari the admin who deleted several of the speedies that I and others have recently challenged on DRV, including Kim Amidon. (please see User talk:DESiegel and User talk:Naconkantari for more on the background. Do you think that this is justified? Can you offer any advice? DES (talk) 20:22, 26 June 2007 (UTC)
 * "and by the way, do you know about WikiEn-L?..." I know about it, but for both practical and policy reasons, I neither read nor write to it, and i would shut it down if the decision were mine. My email in enabled only 1) for communiction by people I may have blocked, 2) to get my attention when i may be on a wiki-break, or 3) for the rare case where people have wikipedia-related but confidential info to send me. In any ordianary case, i won't discuss wikipedia matters off-wiki. DES (talk) 15:59, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

personal attacks by User:867xx5209
Hello, ... my request for intervention at WP:AN/I regarding the personal attacks against me by  on the DRV page for CLSA (and several article discussion pages) is being ignored ... is it because I'm using an IP account? I have also discovered that I cannot post the complaint that I have been documenting about their activities onto the Suspected sock puppets project as an IP account. <Sigh!>

I'm asking you, and a few other admins who are familiar with this incident, for any advice/assistance that you can render ... please reply on my current talk page so as not to fragment comments by others ... BTW, my recent inactivity (and possibly slow response) is due to a medical emergency involving a family member. Thnx! &mdash; 22:16, 26 June 2007 (UTC)

TFD
Please just explain to me what I'm doing wrong isntead of just doing all of these changes without any explanation. You are not really acting like an admin, I've barely been here a week and this is how you treat people, this is definitely against policy, and just in general mean and elitist. I don't see how you became an administrator if this is how admin's act then I'm not sure how anything gets done around here, each admin just enforces their own rules however they want over subject matters they think they own. pw 23:46, 26 June 2007 (UTC)

Users Page
Please write on the discussion page and not on User:Rjm at sleepers -- Simplicius 00:02, 27 June 2007 (UTC)
 * oops. 16:59, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

Re: Narayanan Shivakumar
I was looking through the DumbBOT incomplete AfD page and saw it had an AfD tag but no actual AfD page, hence why I made that summary. <font face="comic sans ms"> Kwsn (Ni!) 03:55, 27 June 2007 (UTC)
 * when the AfD was added, AfD page is redlinked <font face="comic sans ms"> Kwsn (Ni!) 03:58, 27 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Well, I'll give it a day, if an AfD isn't around by then, I may restart it. <font face="comic sans ms"> Kwsn (Ni!) 04:02, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

Rhymesayers_South
That's okay, it was worth a try before sending it to AfD though. It is on AfD now Articles_for_deletion/Rhymesayers_South. MartinDK 05:35, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

Again
Didn't we just go through this? Again, I'm concerned about the mania for deletion. Will enter my objection tomorrow when I'm more awake, and thought you might be interested as well. Tvoz | talk 05:39, 27 June 2007 (UTC) -- commented there. DGG 16:59, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

FYI
AfD 69.150.51.11 18:37, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

Dilbert episode
The problem was that it wasn't obvious to me what it was. I finally figured it out yesterday when I noticed it hadn't been deleted like the other things I have tagged for speedy deletion. I wasn't sure at that point whether to self-remove the template or just let somebody else look at it since it took me about 3 looks and I think a couple of days to figure out what it was about. If I think about it and look back into my history to find the article, I may do as you suggest with it. Erechtheus 20:52, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

I Found Two Articles On What Is More Or Less The Same Subject
List of ships of the line of Russia and List of naval ships of Russia. Should one of them be prodded and/or merged into the other? -WarthogDemon 21:56, 27 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Heh, I actually came to the same conclusion myself. I just now checked their history logs and discovered they were both created by the same person. Glad I didn't make any unneeded proposals. Thanks for checking 'em and next time I'll remember to check the histories. :) -WarthogDemon 22:16, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

On Gandhi Information Center
I've been telling Chrbartolf a little bit about userfying. I don't have the time (nor inclination) to take Gandhi Information Center into my userspace, but I'm wondering if you'd be willing to hold it for him. (He says he does not have the time to edit it at present, either.) You can follow our conversation at User talk:LaughingVulcan. Thanks. <span style="background:	#ADDFAD;color:yellow">Laughing Vulcan 23:13, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

Thank you again for your kind cooperation, translation is no problem for me, but there are no additional "completely independent unquestionably reliable publications" (whatever this might mean in our societies), they are all in the hands of these responsible people who suppress good news by ignorance and indifference - this is it. I need not explain you why. It is quite easy nowadays to marginalize someone (and who?), and they (whoever they are) succeed daily! Now do not recommend to me professional PR management - this is a matter of "do-re-mi" (if you know what I mean). Chrbartolf 28 June 2007

Of course, you find entries in the library collection databases of the "Swarthmore College Peace Collection" (500 College Avenue, Swarthmore, PA, 19081-1399 U.S.A., 610-328-8557 (curator) - http://www.swarthmore.edu/Library/peace/ - and in "The Commonweal Collection, c/o J.B. Priestley Library, University of Bradford, Bradford, West Yorkshire, BD7 1DP, Telephone: 01274 233404" - http://www.bradford.ac.uk/library/services/commonweal/index.php - (these are the two major university-linked peace library collections as far as I know) for "Bartolf" as well as for "Gandhi Informations Zentrum" - but I do not know if this helps you ... Chrbartolf 28 June 2007

Now "Prodego" deleted the "Christian Bartolf" article, in addition - what to do? Chrbartolf 28 June 2007 Not unexpected. I try a reasonable amount to rescue articles that have a decent chance, particularly on sympathetic or interesting subjects, -- especially if they raise interesting policy questions; I have now done as much work as is reasonable, though I will always give honest advice. So best wishes on becoming really famous!DGG 22:49, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

"LaughingVulcan" and David Goodman ("DGG") and "Seraphimblade", thank you for your efforts and explanations - I appreciate them very much! First of all, I do not intend to do PR work or become famous, but the readers of "Wikipedia" should be informed about the "Gandhi Information Center" and "Christian Bartolf", do you not think so? Second, those who are allowed to inform the readers could be you or someone else, but not me - according to wikipedia guidelines, as far as I understand. This is the reason why I have abstained (after grasping the rules) from "autobiography", "self-advertising" or else. Third, even if I change the text in the sandbox (during the next hour), I do not really know who decides when the new article will be restored, because I suppose the "rough consensus" could destroy anything, although notable, because of reasons you might better know about. Fourth, what other webpages will prove authenticity or notability except from government-related webpages or quotes in scientific works already found out during the past busy week - please explain to me! Fifth: Will there a chance or a way to represent these two articles in a new shape soon - by cooperation (and if yes, with whom?) - for the sake of the Wikipedia readers. Chrbartolf 29 June 2007


 * You might want to do some cleanup and organization to the information, as it is currently in DGG's sandbox, I can't make a whole lot of sense of it. Maybe some sections and headers would help? I think DGG's suggestion of combining all the information into a single article is also a good one, it's certainly possible one article can be supported better than several. Seraphimblade Talk to me 09:03, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

Thank you for the advise, Seraphimblade. Now the only way to cleanup for me was to remove the "nowiki" tags (in spite of LaughingVulcan's advise), but as I mentioned just before, this was the only way to cleanup. Now by following your advise, I could not follow the wish of LaughingVulcan although I would have wished. So, this is not my fault. In addition, I think that now it might only be a matter of possible improvements (but in which way and how and what?) and then to restore the articles soonest. Everything else would become a farce, in my humble opinion. In case, there is any other way for cleanup, please do it your way. Thank you again! Chrbartolf 29 June 2007

Walk Away (Movie)
Just wanted to let you know that just to make sure that everything is being done above-board and to make sure it's all by the rules, Jmlk17 has reverted the deletion on this article and I resubmitted it under AfD. Thank you for your advice and assistance on this matter. Trusilver 03:55, 28 June 2007 (UTC)
 * 'chuckles' Less than a day after I AfD'd the article, another admin speedy deleted it under A7. Sometimes you just have to laugh... Trusilver 19:10, 28 June 2007 (UTC)
 * There are some admins here who simply ignore the rules and speedy what they thing speediable.. There is an RfC in preparation against the most blatant offender. (I haven't checked who did this or the argument used). There is nobody here who is perfect altogether or always right, including me. And there is nobody here whose interpretation of policy is always accepted,  most certainly including me. In unfamiliar territory, I tend to play it safe. In particular, as some people think I am a little bit of a deletionist, I am extremely cautious in what I delete as an admin. DGG 19:20, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

Librarian stuff
Hi DGG, I recognize your username from around the wiki (recently at some Afds I'm watching). I see you're an admin and a librarian, and that you've contributed to similar discussions in the past, so I'd like to point out the discussion at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Spam. I think it's about time we developed a clear policy about this sort of thing. As an established wikipedian and wannabe librarian, I've taken a great interest in this debate. Thanks for considering it! Latr, Katr 02:02, 29 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Hi, thanks for your thoughtful reply. There seems to be a lot of hostility and misunderstanding around this issue, so I hope we can reach a satisfactory conclusion. If I go for my MLIS, I'll do the UW's distance-learning program, since I don't really want to move to Seattle. It sounds like a lot of fun, but I have to do my research and determine if the extra money I would be making would be worth the extra debt I'd be taking on! Latr, Katr 16:21, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

P.S. There is a similar thread that I moved just below the one in which you responded that you might want to check out. I'm taking everything related to that off my watchlist, as I seem to have unknowingly created some hostility between myself and one of the editors involved. If you would, please keep me posted if any new policies or guidelines are developed out of this. Thanks! Latr, Katr 17:02, 29 June 2007 (UTC) (dp)

Postprandial Sedation
Thanks for the tip on the redirect.

your comments
I am aso an inclusionist. Thanks very much for your support. I think the Gather entry is useful. see you. Steve, --Sm8900 13:17, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

The Kathleen and May
hi, have found the pages where the article is from, it is a word-for-word copy of the web-pages http://www.kathleen-and-may.co.uk/History/History.php and http://www.kathleen-and-may.co.uk/History 1998-2007/History 1998-2007.php. so have copyvio tagged it.--Jac16888 12:13, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

Merge
Hi. I created a page at TOP500/2007 for temporary updating of the page because it is all so dependent on the current years event and didn't want to cause a split in the content if editing took too long. Could you merge the new article back into TOP500, or should i just copy the new article over the old one? -- Jimmi Hugh 16:07, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

Hetoum - Congrats
Hello,

I was coming in to ask another question, but noticed that you recently became an Admin, congrats! You deserve it. Hetoum I 18:03, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

A little :). Admins are busy people, and I am afraid of busy people. Hetoum I 18:18, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

SV Dynamo
Have many thanks for editing the Sportvereinigung Dynamo article. Thanks also for saving this article! --Kay Körner 20:22, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

Recent comments to Chas.tanner
Thanks very much for your recent posting on my talk page. I'm new at this and am trying to do the right thing to get appropriate listings for some Reed Business Information trade publications added to Wikipedia. I genuinely appreciate your guidance.

Articles for deletion/Erik A Williams
Hey DGG. I just wanted an admin to take a look at this article - preferable one that is completely uninvested in it. This entire AfD's big problem seems to be that half the article has been written by the subject of the article which is obviously a huge WP:COI problem. But worse than that, as the AfD states, he's been going around the internet soliciting help to come to Wikipedia to argue against his page's deletion.

I had planned on posting to his talk page and giving him a warning for canvassing, but he's already got it firmly in his head that I am there to personally attack him and get rid of his page at all costs. (which is patently untrue. I certainly hope that his career takes off and he makes a good name for himself - he just isn't notable right now.) Therefore, I would rather a neutral third party handle this, I've already made the decision that the facts have been laid out in this AfD and I'm not going to contribute further unless specifically questioned or if new evidence supporting his notability comes to light.

Thanks :) Trusilver 01:05, 30 June 2007 (UTC)

Itta de Gascogne and Grimoald d'Aquitane
I will do some searching in my university library soon, but Gregory of Tours mentions only that Theudebald died and both his kingdom and his wife were "taken" by Chlothar and Fredegar mentions nothing of Itta's parentage. Considering Theudebald's young age and Chlothar's propensity for assassination, it is highly unlikely that a child was born of his marriage, which seems to have been short. Itta is only mentioned in an "incident" in Fredegar and nothing of her relatives is given. Hummer (2005) talks about Itta's dowry (p. 30), but nothing of her relatives besides those through marriage. Another point worth mentioning is that Grimoald is not a known Merovingian name and the term "Gascony" is anachronistic (Collins, 1993) before the seventh century. It is difficult to give better evidence for a negative assertion! I have long planned to clean up and beef up the Merovingian articles with well-sourced statements, but I have yet to get around to it. Srnec 04:04, 30 June 2007 (UTC)