User talk:Gigs/Archive 13

The Signpost: 18 June 2012

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 * EdwardsBot (talk) 02:26, 20 June 2012 (UTC)

Please be careful with AFDs and Prods
Hello! It seems that you've been using Twinkle to nominate articles for deletion that clearly meet Wikipedia standards/guidelines/etc as established by consensus. Examples are Larry Hartshorn (passes WP:NGRIDIRON) Henry Oxley and (passes WP:BASEBALL/N), citing reasons to delete that actually meet or exceed the standards. Such nominations may be viewed as disruptive by some editors.

Naturally, if you do believe that these are deletion-worthy, feel free to continue the process. It just seems to me that this may be an automatic or semi-automatic process that may need some attention. I also ask you to be careful in the future that articles you nominate for deletion do not actually clearly surpass widely accepted practicies. If you disagree with those practices (in this case, WP:NGRIDIRON and WP:BASEBALL/N), I suggest starting a conversation on those pages about the guidelines/rules/standards that they set up and/or establish.--Paul McDonald (talk) 22:39, 21 June 2012 (UTC)


 * Comment I found two more, John Barnes (baseball) and Rob Delaney‎. The Delaney article had already gone through a PROD and then was restored.  As I understand policy, it should have gone to AFD at that point, rather than have a PROD again.  Please be more careful.  I don't think your intentions are to be disruptive, but the actions are leaning that way.--Paul McDonald (talk) 12:05, 22 June 2012 (UTC)
 * The sports notability guidelines do not supersede the general notability guideline. What is disruptive is sports people creating thousands and thousands of articles about non-notable sports players. I apologize for missing the prior prod on on Delaney, that was my mistake.  Gigs (talk) 15:37, 22 June 2012 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the reply. My intent here was not to sway your opinion but to make sure it wasn't an automated process that was "running amok" so to speak. Ignore me!--Paul McDonald (talk) 18:44, 22 June 2012 (UTC)

The Signpost: 25 June 2012

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 * EdwardsBot (talk) 06:22, 26 June 2012 (UTC)

User talk:Niemti
Yes, I reported him they were listed into the Immortals in fiction list. Jeepers Creepers (2001 film) was notably a Category:Road Movie and the user seem to have alot of edit wars with many experienced users trying to stabilize the article.--GoShow  (...............) 15:15, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

The Signpost: 02 July 2012

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 * EdwardsBot (talk) 11:27, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

The Signpost: 09 July 2012

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 * EdwardsBot (talk) 10:55, 10 July 2012 (UTC)

Talkback
Headbomb {talk / contribs / physics / books} 21:33, 10 July 2012 (UTC)

Credo Reference Update & Survey (your opinion requested)
Credo Reference, who generously donated 400 free Credo 250 research accounts to Wikipedia editors over the past two years, has offered to expand the program to include 100 additional reference resources. Credo wants Wikipedia editors to select which resources they want most. So, we put together a quick survey to do that:


 * Link to Survey (should take between 5-10 minutes): http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/N8FQ6MM

It also asks some basic questions about what you like about the Credo program and what you might want to improve.

At this time only the initial 400 editors have accounts, but even if you do not have an account, you still might want to weigh in on which resources would be most valuable for the community (for example, through WikiProject Resource Exchange).

Also, if you have an account but no longer want to use it, please leave me a note so another editor can take your spot.

If you have any other questions or comments, drop by my talk page or email me at wikiocaasi@yahoo.com. Cheers! Ocaasit &#124; c 17:17, 11 July 2012 (UTC)

The Signpost: 16 July 2012

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 * EdwardsBot (talk) 11:20, 17 July 2012 (UTC)

WP:V RfC
I notice that you double-"voted" in the Option D section, with a "support" and a "support with revisions". You might want to combine those two comments into a single "vote" instead of two. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:06, 20 July 2012 (UTC)
 * I support it either way, with or without the revisions. Vote splitting is bad. Gigs (talk) 05:12, 22 July 2012 (UTC)

The Signpost: 23 July 2012

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 * EdwardsBot (talk) 11:29, 24 July 2012 (UTC)

Your free 1-year HighBeam Research account is ready
Good news! You are approved for access to 80 million articles in 6500 publications through HighBeam Research. Check your Wikipedia email: Thanks for helping make Wikipedia better. Enjoy your research! Cheers, Ocaasi 00:45, 28 July 2012 (UTC)
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The Signpost: 30 July 2012

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 * EdwardsBot (talk) 11:50, 31 July 2012 (UTC)

The Signpost: 06 August 2012

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 * EdwardsBot (talk) 09:32, 7 August 2012 (UTC)

The Signpost: 13 August 2012

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 * EdwardsBot (talk) 10:40, 14 August 2012 (UTC)

The Signpost: 20 August 2012

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 * EdwardsBot (talk) 08:43, 21 August 2012 (UTC)

The Signpost: 27 August 2012

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 * EdwardsBot (talk) 05:42, 29 August 2012 (UTC)

The Signpost: 03 September 2012

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 * EdwardsBot (talk) 11:17, 4 September 2012 (UTC)

The Olive Branch: A Dispute Resolution Newsletter (Issue #1)
Welcome to the first edition of The Olive Branch. This will be a place to semi-regularly update editors active in dispute resolution (DR) about some of the most important issues, advances, and challenges in the area. You were delivered this update because you are active in DR, but if you would prefer not to receive any future mailing, just add your name to this page. In this issue: Read the entire first edition of The Olive Branch -->
 * Background: A brief overview of the DR ecosystem.
 * Research: The most recent DR data
 * Survey results: Highlights from Steven Zhang's April 2012 survey
 * Activity analysis: Where DR happened, broken down by the top DR forums
 * DR Noticeboard comparison: How the newest DR forum has progressed between May and August
 * Discussion update: Checking up on the Wikiquette Assistance close debate
 * Proposal: It's time to close the Geopolitical, ethnic, and religious conflicts noticeboard. Agree or disagree?

--The Olive Branch 19:04, 4 September 2012 (UTC)

The Signpost: 10 September 2012

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 * EdwardsBot (talk) 05:02, 11 September 2012 (UTC)

Your help would be appreciated again.
I would really appreciate if you would provide once more an objective third opinion regarding the discussion at Talk:Neoliberalism. I am eager to see this resolved, and I don't see the discussion making any progress. I am not an expert on the topic, and my past activity contributing to Wikipedia might bias my response.JDefauw (talk) 21:34, 17 September 2012 (UTC)JDefauw
 * I'm not sure I can help much more. You could participate more, even if you aren't neutral in the area.  I admit that I have done a little editing of economic history articles, but not that one in particular, and it's not an area I'm particularly active in. Gigs (talk) 22:04, 17 September 2012 (UTC)

The Signpost: 17 September 2012

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 * EdwardsBot (talk) 16:22, 18 September 2012 (UTC)

BLPProd
I was wondering if you could pick my next lotto ticket or goto Vegas with me. Your prophetic words about BLPProd came true, very quickly and big time. Bgwhite (talk) 23:48, 21 September 2012 (UTC)

The Olive Branch: A Dispute Resolution Newsletter (Issue #2)

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'''This edition The Olive Branch is focusing on a 2nd dispute resolution RfC. Two significant proposals have been made. Below we describe the background and recent progress and detail those proposals. Please review them and follow the link at the bottom to comment at the RfC. We need your input!'''

Until late 2003, Jimmy Wales was the arbiter in all major disputes. After the Mediation Committee and the Arbitration Committee were founded, Wales delegated his roles of dispute resolution to these bodies. In addition to these committees, the community has developed a number of informal processes of dispute resolution. At its peak, over 17 dispute resolution venues existed. Disputes were submitted in each venue in a different way.
 * Background

Due to the complexity of Wikipedia dispute resolution, members of the community were surveyed in April 2012 about their experiences with dispute resolution. In general, the community believes that dispute resolution is too hard to use and is divided among too many venues. Many respondents also reported their experience with dispute resolution had suffered due to a shortage of volunteers and backlogging, which may be due to the disparate nature of the process.

An evaluation of dispute resolution forums was made in May this year, in which data on response and resolution time, as well as success rates, was collated. This data is here.


 * Progress so far

Leading off from the survey in April and the evaluation in May, several changes to dispute resolution noticeboard (DRN) were proposed. Rather than using a wikitext template to bring disputes to DRN, editors used a new javascript form. This form was simpler to use, but also standardised the format of submissions and applied a word limit so that DRN volunteers could more easily review disputes. A template to summarise, and a robot to maintain the noticeboard, were also created.

As a result of these changes, volunteers responded to disputes in a third of the time, and resolved them 60% faster when compared to May. Successful resolution of disputes increased by 17%. Submissions were 25% shorter by word count.(see Dispute Resolution Noticeboard Statistics - August compared to May)

Outside of DRN other simplification has taken place. The Mediation Cabal was closed in August, and Wikiquette assistance was closed in September. Nevertheless, around fifteen different forums still exist for the resolution of Wikipedia disputes.

Given the success of the past efforts at DR reform, the current RFC proposes we implement:
 * Proposed changes

1) A submission gadget for every DR venue tailored to the unique needs of that forum. 2) A universal dispute resolution wizard, accessible from Dispute resolution.
 * Similar to the one that was deployed, with great success, to the DRN.
 * Structured based on the specific issues most commonly dealt with at each forum.
 * Designed to improve the quality of requests for DR and the efficiency of DR at that forum.
 * Applicable at following noticeboards: Dispute resolution, Neutrality, Reliable Sources, Original Research, Biographies of Living Persons, Notability noticeboard, Fringe theories, Conflict of Interest, Ethnic and cultural conflicts, External links, Third opinion, Mediation Committee, Arbitration Committee.
 * Forms will merely fill out any existing templates (such as Arbcom's) and create a markup-free form in line with specific noticeboard practices otherwise.
 * Example form fields: What pages are involved? What users are involved? What is the issue? What resolution is desired?
 * This wizard would ask a series of structured questions about the nature of the dispute.
 * It would then determine to which dispute resolution venue a dispute should be sent.
 * If the user agrees with the wizard's selection, s/he would then be asked a series of questions about the details of the dispute (for example, the usernames of the involved editors).
 * The wizard would then submit a request for dispute resolution to the selected venue, in that venue's required format (using the logic of each venue's specialized form, as in proposal #1). The wizard would not suggest a venue which the user has already identified in answer to a question like "What other steps of dispute resolution have you tried?".
 * Similar to the way the DRN request form operates, this would be enabled for all users. A user could still file a request for dispute resolution manually if they so desired.
 * Coding such a wizard would be complex, but the DRN gadget would be used as an outline.
 * Once the universal request form is ready (coded by those who helped create the DRN request form) the community will be asked to try out and give feedback on the wizard. The wizard's logic in deciding the scope and requirements of each venue would be open to change by the community at any time.

3) Additionally, we're seeking any ideas on how we can attract and retain more dispute resolution volunteers.

Please share your thoughts at the RfC.

--The Olive Branch 18:41, 24 September 2012 (UTC)

The Signpost: 24 September 2012

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 * EdwardsBot (talk) 17:24, 26 September 2012 (UTC)