User talk:Drkirkby

A few Wikipedia poicies you should be aware of
Welcome to Wikipedia! I hope you're enjoying the experience so far.

I read some of your recent edits to the talk page for the entry on Mathematica and noticed that you might be unaware of several Wikipedia policies. So I'd like to provide you with links to a few policies I think it would be good for you to read.

The first is Assume Good Faith WP:AGF. In general is is best to assume that all of us are trying to make Wikipedia the best it can be. If people have disagreements, it is best to focus on the substance of the edits, and not speculate on the motivations of the editor. Second, it's best not to make what might be percived as accusations of impropriety of one kind or another. See WP:ICA.

I hope you find these links helpful and informative. --68.80.154.174 11:52, 12 October 2007 (UTC)

Wolfram Alpha
Thanks for your note. I made an error in respect of this article and erroneously assumed that you had created the original article, so I've deleted a note that I left you here and replaced it with this message. I've left a note for the creator of the article because I think there is the possibility that you are right and that this article has the potential to be sufficiently notable to remain on Wikipedia. If you're interested, you can follow that discussion by reading the material I'll be leaving at User talk:Lumidek. Accounting4Taste: talk 14:49, 10 March 2009 (UTC)
 * I wanted you to know that after thoroughly investigating the notability of this article, I found some valuable references on the article about its creator. I have added them to the article and re-mounted it, and hope that it will last.  If not, I've sequestered the original material and the new references in a "sandbox" page for the original creator such that the article can be worked on and improved sufficiently to be more "bullet-proof".  Thank you for bringing this to my attention.  I do a lot of new page patrol, examining material that other editors have tagged, and 999 times out of 1000 when I get asked to restore material, it doesn't qualify at all.  I am delighted to know that this is that one case in a thousand where there actually is sufficient notability to yield a useful and interesting article for Wikipedia, and I am happy to be of assistance.  If you have any further questions or problems with respect to this article, feel free to leave me a note.  Accounting4Taste: talk 15:07, 10 March 2009 (UTC)

Summary of personal accusations
The following is copied from the Mathematica Talk pages for the benefit of future editors who may be subject to personal attack following edits that oppose drkirkby. It SUMMARIZES the sequence of events in a dispute over a minor edit:

Cloudruns (talk) 12:57, 29 June 2009 (UTC)
 * YOU inserted a link to a product YOU work on WITHOUT declaring an interest
 * I REDUCED the promotional language in the edit and left the link.
 * You REPLACED the promotional language and accused me of COI edits and bias here and elsewhere and requested a statement from me about myself
 * Another editor supported MY version, which I replaced. I added explanation to the RATIONAL and asked to know which edits other edits you were unhappy with. I did not give a personal statement.
 * You REPLACE your version of the edit, still not declaring any COI status and you repeated your accusation and request for a personal statement from me. You did NOT provide DETAIL on edits on this page that you felt were BIASED.
 * A SECOND independent editor replaces my version of the edit
 * I refused to give a PERSONAL statement giving the apparent COI nature of YOUR initial edit as explanation of my indignation
 * A new editor MightyBig, is created and on the same day inserts Sage AGAIN into the page.
 * You make new allegations against me on Comparison of CAS, and REPORT me to the COI noticeboard also without mentioning your COI status on EITHER
 * The COI Noticeboard editor supports MY version of the edit, and makes reference to YOUR potential COI status
 * You finally declare your COI status here and on the COI Noticeboard but NOT on other pages where you have inserted Sage. As part of your statement you write "I am 100% certain I've never added any links to Sage." which is clearly FALSE:  and of course the one that started this
 * The COI Noticeboard editor supports your view that not making a personal statement generates SUSPICION but concludes that there is NO FURTHER ACTION to take, and warns you about HARASSMENT policies.

Gillian Duffy
To respond to your remarks. We have a principle that we don't cover immediate news stories, and we don't have biographies of people famous for only one small event. The story is covered on the article about the UK General Election of 2010.--Scott Mac 07:59, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Edit warring
Hello Drkirkby. Regarding your edits to wind power, please be aware of the edit warring policy and in particular WP:3RR. Thanks. -- ELEKHHT 04:08, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I fail to see how I'm the guilty party when I put an POV tag, and someone else removes it several times without the issue being resolved. I'd like advice on the best way to solve an issue like this. It really needs a few people who have not edited it to look and see if they feel its neutral or not. Clearly the people editing the page have a disagreement. Drkirkby (talk) 04:13, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * From the edit summary it appears that you put the tag on the article three times in the last few hours, while three different editors removed it. Best is to discuss on the talk page why exactly you think is non-neutral, or promotional and how you think it should be corrected. If others will agree, the article can be improved or tagged. -- ELEKHHT 04:24, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I somehow I think I'll be wasting my time. It's clear there are a lot of people with financial interests in wind power, and will go to length to keep the page promotional.
 * I have looked carefully through the Wind power article and tend to agree with your feeling that it is not sufficiently balanced. There are certainly numerous sources which are critical of wind power farms near populated areas, beauty spots, heritage sites and even along the coast. The proponents may be right that "official studies" tend to play these down but in my opinion they are real enough to be mentioned in the article. Reading quickly through Environmental impact of wind power, I see that the matter has been addressed in some detail on Wikipedia too. I would therefore suggest that the best way of rectifying the situation would be to provide more balance in the wind power article on the basis of some of the documented findings. However, I also agree with other editors that simply tagging the article is not a very constructive solition. - Ipigott (talk) 17:11, 20 March 2012 (UTC)

March 2012
Please do not add commentary or your own personal analysis to Wikipedia articles, as you did to Wind power. Doing so violates Wikipedia's neutral point of view policy and breaches the formal tone expected in an encyclopedia. Thank you. Sunray (talk) 23:32, 22 March 2012 (UTC)
 * This is not personal analysis, but data taken directly form the web sites of the organizations quoted. You have no interest whatsoever in a neutral point of view - you simply want to promote wind power at all costs.
 * On the contrary, I want to see well-written, factual articles based on sources. The wind power article, no doubt, needs some work in that area. However, your approach thus far, which I find confrontational, does not seem to be helping bring improvements. Please argue from sources. That is the simplest way to improve an article. Your POV, and mine are not relevant. Sunray (talk) 23:40, 22 March 2012 (UTC)
 * As I wrote on the talk page, it is probably hard/impossible to find verifiable sources for much of what is claimed in the article on wind power. The onus should be on the author to provide verifiable sources, not for others to try to disprove something for which there is probably no neutral evidence published. I could write that one of the moon of Sirius has life on it, with little green men running around in red hats. I could provide a reference to a dubious site saying this. There might be life there, but you would never be able to find anything to disprove my statement. Drkirkby (talk) 00:29, 23 March 2012 (UTC)
 * You could, indeed write that one of the moons of Sirius has life on it. But if your source wasn't the Scientific American (or something similar), it would get reverted pretty quickly. The objective in the instant case is to write an informative article about wind power. The current article is fairly good (rated "B"-class). It is common to have industry sources in an article, but the better articles also have citations from peer-reviewed sources. I recognize that this is difficult in a new field, such as wind power, so the default is to go with what is available. But all claims do need sources. It is sometimes helpful to keep in mind the following statement in the Wikipedia policy on verifiability: "Verifiability, and not truth, is one of the fundamental requirements for inclusion in Wikipedia; truth, of itself, is not a substitute for meeting the verifiability requirement. No matter how convinced you are that something is true, do not add it to an article unless it is verifiable." Sunray (talk) 01:27, 23 March 2012 (UTC)

Wind power again
Hellp Drkirky once again. I have tried to support your view that the Wind power article is promotional but I am now getting rather tired of your continual harping on the same string. It seems to me that the major contribitors to the article have always acted in good faith and that if your have some justifiable complaints, you should come up with some creative input to the article yourself. All your complaints do little to improve the quality of the article. There are thousands of comparable articles in Wikipedia which may seem unbalanced but the more important ones benefit over time from sensible edits along the right lines. You frequently invoke more reliable resources. Why not use them to improve the article? - Ipigott (talk) 20:32, 25 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I second this. Please see and read tendentious editing.--E8 (talk) 04:27, 28 March 2012 (UTC)

Hello. It may be advantageous to not try to make wholesale changes to an article under contention, but to make a series small changes over an extended period of time. The wind power article, I think, is not nearly as promotional as it was a couple of years ago. Currently some negatives are glossed over too quickly. But also realize, that some of the negatives you may read about in the press aren't supported by studies, or were arguments relevant several years ago but which are no longer relevant today. --Aflafla1 (talk) 05:52, 28 March 2012 (UTC)

Even though you consider the Wind Associations very suspect, I've found that for some information they are the most reliable source available. I don't add something to a wind power article just because I have a source for it. If I know the source is incorrect, because it contradicts other more reliable sources, or if it seems to be 'slanted', I won't add it - or will add it only with an explanation. For instance, it was reported that wind power is 20% in Iowa. As this was not for an entire year, which is important because winds are considerably less strong during the summer months, the article specifically states that its only for a portion of the year. Many news reports ignored this aspect. --Aflafla1 (talk) 05:52, 28 March 2012 (UTC)


 * Oh, and yes, For the United States, I have crosschecked the installed capacity numbers. The EIA has an Electric Power Monthly report which lists all the new generating units that come on line, including type and amount. For the year, the newly installed capacity reported by the American Wind Energy Association is reasonably close to what I get when I add up all the new wind power generation units from the EIA reports. GWEC gets its U.S. numbers from the AWEA. --Aflafla1 (talk) 06:50, 28 March 2012 (UTC)

While I generally support wind energy, I realize it doesn't belong everywhere. I find the wind turbines neither ugly nor lovely. They are simply 'there', functional. I find your opinion reversal about nuclear energy interesting. Until Fukushimi, I was fine with it. Now, less so. --Aflafla1 (talk) 05:52, 28 March 2012 (UTC)

POV pushing and tendentious editing
I support what User:Ipigott has said at the start of the previous section: "I am now getting rather tired of your continual harping on the same string... All your complaints do little to improve the quality of the article". Your views about wind power are clearly in the minority. Please listen to what others are saying instead of repeating your own views over and over again. You are dominating the discussion by pushing your own POV and tendentious editing, when you should be listening to the views of others. Johnfos (talk) 12:27, 28 March 2012 (UTC)

Wind power: A reminder
I notice that you have recently made disparaging personal remarks on the Wind power article page and Talk page, see  and. These constitute WP:personal attacks and are viewed quite seriously on Wikipedia. Let me assure you that I have been working in good faith to do my best to improve the article.

I notice also that you have pointed out several times that you have a Ph.D. in science/engineering. Those credentials are irrelevant to whether or not a specific edit or argument is a good one, see Ignore all credentials. What we really need on WP is WP:Reliable sources rather than WP:Original research based on your own personal experience and expertise. Johnfos (talk) 10:43, 4 April 2012 (UTC)


 * Drkirkby: It appears to me that you have moderated your tone in recent posts. That seems promising to me. I was going to post something on the article talk page about your objection to the GWEC references in the article. Do you still have concerns about that source? I've taken a look at their 2010 report and don't see a problem. Bottom line is that most sources have a bias. GWEC is upfront about being an industry representative. In evaluating their reliability, it is useful to look at their sources. I note that their citations are from a variety of references, including government agencies, opinion research and peer-reviewed studies. Their information on national usage of wind power seems accurate. I don't see a problem with using GWEC as a source (bearing in mind my comment that the article would be improved by adding more peer-reviewed sources, generally).


 * Not only do sources have bias, we all do too. The key is to be willing to listen to other editors when they present facts based on sources or policy. Good luck with your further editing! Sunray (talk) 19:52, 6 April 2012 (UTC)


 * Your concern seems to be that GWEC and WWEA are not reliable because they are industry sources. The applicable policy is WP:VER, which states: "Verifiability on Wikipedia is the reader's ability to check cited sources that directly support the information in an article." In determining whether a source is reliable, WP:SOURCE is the section of the policy that applies. The best sources are third party, peer-reviewed material. The wind energy associations are neither, third party, nor subject to peer review. Does that mean that we cannot use them? The following criterion is given by the policy in determining reliability:
 * "Sources should directly support the material presented in an article and should be appropriate to the claims made. The appropriateness of any source depends on the context..."
 * Using the wind energy associations as a source for the basic information about wind energy seems entirely appropriate. Where else would one obtain such information, unless there are peer reviewed studies that provide it? There is an obligation on editors to check the sources used by the association. I've done this and cannot see any problems with the sources of data used. Unless someone can find a third party source that calls into question information used by the association, it must be accepted as reliable. Sunray (talk) 00:16, 8 April 2012 (UTC)
 * See the notes in the talk page about Germany. It seems one figure they cite as 10%, is more accuratately 7.5%. There are various methods of calculating penetration, and this body will of course pick the most favoruable one.
 * Oh, that is a given, and a warning to editors to be vigilant of sources and statistics. There is something to be said for collaborative editing, after all! This doesn't necessarily make a source unreliable (unless the errors are egregious), but it bears watching. Sunray (talk) 20:29, 8 April 2012 (UTC)

LC circuit
It might help if you yourself did a simple five minute search for sources before littering an article with cn tags along with sarky comments, as you did here. For acceptor circuit there is gbooks, scholar, and IEEEXplore; for rejector circuit there is gbooks, scholar, and IEEEXplore. Thank you,  Spinning Spark  20:00, 14 September 2012 (UTC)

Original "Gauss"'s Law Sources
I've added some original "Gauss"'s Law sources in my recent edits. I hope it helps.--Geremia (talk) 16:53, 3 August 2016 (UTC)

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