User talk:Khazar2/Archive 14

Hi Khazar2, interested in helping to balance Sysco employee who's participating?
Hi Khazar2, we worked together some on Regents of the University of California v. Bakke, even though I think you and Wehwalt did by far the lion's share. I did do some. And thank you very much for the Barnstar. I do appreciate it. :>)

Regarding the article on Sysco (food delivery company):

1) You may have heard that there's a scandal in the California Bay Area where Sysco was caught using unrefrigerated drop sites for perishable food.  It is a surprisingly clumsy mistake for a such a major corporation.  And so, the story interests me in its own right.

2) In addition, I thanked someone for jumping in and helping out.  And this person told me that they want to be transparent and went ahead and told me they are a Sysco employee, which is fine, at least initially.  And so far they've made a couple of edits, which have been good edits which put more information out there.  And I have shared with them the (evolving) Conflict Of Interest policy:  "  .  .  .   Paid advocates are very strongly discouraged from direct article editing, and should instead propose changes on the talk page of the article in question.  .  .  "

Of course, at a certain point, this participant and I may part company since it's my goal to lay all the information on the table, whether good, bad, or in-between.

Basically, I can use another set of eyes so I will not potentially get swamped. If the topic interests you. And if so, please, come on it, the water is fine. :>) FriendlyRiverOtter (talk) 17:27, 23 September 2013 (UTC)
 * I doubt I'll have time to get involved in the near future--I'm mostly on Wikibreak, and am already committed to a few projects after--but you might post at Conflict of interest/Noticeboard if you're interested in a second opinion. Good luck with your work there, and thanks for all you do! -- Khazar2 (talk) 11:47, 25 September 2013 (UTC)

Dear K-2
Thanks for your kindness to my work. And, of course, congratulations on your new home. Sincerely, MusiCitizen (talk) 12:53, 25 September 2013 (UTC)

Holocaust
Hi Khazar, I wanted to draw your attention to something regarding your note about taking Holocaust to GA. User:Adam Carr, a historian, rewrote the article a few years ago in his userspace, and gave permission for it to be ported over. It had to be sourced and bits of it were rewritten, but quite a lot was added as he had written it. I believe that some or all of it has since been overwritten, so in case his work is of any use to you, you can find it here: Part 1 and Part 2. Best, SlimVirgin (talk) 19:16, 26 September 2013 (UTC)
 * Thanks for this! I don't have much internetz right now but will take a look soon. This could be a huge time-saver. -- Khazar2 (talk) 16:34, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

Indio Comahue
-- GD uwen    Tell me!   16:24, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

Thanks
Thanks for the quick review of the award. Just didn't know whether FLs were sufficient. Since you're a baseball fan (I know this is imposing but hey, I have no shame) would you mind reviewing this DYK hook? I want it to make the front page before the playoffs are over, and the process can be sluggish. Thanks either way! Staxringold talkcontribs 18:26, 2 October 2013 (UTC)
 * Sorry for the slow response. I may be able to get to it in the next few days in between watching the playoffs, we'll see. Thanks for your work on it! -- Khazar2 (talk) 17:19, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

Elimination of Bureau des Avocats Internationaux entry
Khazar:

The removal of the Bureau des Avocats is highly inappropriate. This is an extremely important organization, in a highly critical period. Just next week, the BAI's Mario Joseph will be presented as one of three Finalists, and possibly the laureate, of the Martin Ennals Human Rights Prize, the most important human rights prize there is, at a major ceremony in Geneva, on Tuesday. Later in the week the BAI will file a major lawsuit against the UN for Haiti's cholera epidemic, which will be reported and discussed in major media throughout the world. Last week the website Ozy published an article about Mario being a Rising Star of the human rights movement, http://www.ozy.com/rising-stars/a-hero-in-haiti/1081.article, that was covered on NPR.

BAI is a separate organization from the Institute for Justice and Democracy in Haiti. The BAI is an independent, Haitian-led, public interest law firm, founded in 1995, while IJDH is a US-based non-profit founded in 2004. Forcing a combination of the two on IJDH's page is not only inaccurate, it is also disrespectful, as it implies that a Haitian organization is necessarily subservient to a U.S.-based organization with which it collaborates.

I appreciated last year when you explained your concerns to me about IJDH's website. When we have had volunteers and friends who want to help by adding to the organizations' Wikipedia entries, I always explain your concerns, and request that they comply with the Wikipedia rules, especially those requiring balance and citations. I have also recommended that people look at other human rights NGO's sites for guidance. No one associated with IJDH or BAI has, to my knowledge, ever tried to modify or eliminate any negative or controversial information about either organization.

I have been swamped with urgent human rights work lately, and have not had time to carefully review the entries that our volunteers and friends have made lately. If the entries do not comply with Wikipedia rules, and are in fact different from other human rights groups, I am happy to discuss that and ask our friends to make appropriate modifications. But there is no justification for removing the entry of an organization that is so important, in Haiti and abroad, at such a critical time. I would therefore, appreciate it if you would reconsider the deletion of the BAI entry. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jistis (talk • contribs) 16:42, 4 October 2013 (UTC)
 * Hi Jistis, I'm actually not the one who proposed that article for deletion, but you're correct that I did support the deletion. But your concerns about this being a critical time for this organization to publicize itself just aren't the same as Wikipedia's concerns in building an encyclopedia. If BAI gets more sustained media and scholarly attention in the future, the article can be rewritten and restored on that basis. Cheers, -- Khazar2 (talk) 16:51, 4 October 2013 (UTC)

Khazar:

I really would appreciate you explaining the criteria for sufficient scholarly and media attention. I have taken a look at the criteria for content section, and have not found any criteria for the attention threshold. But as a regular Wikipedia user, I am surprised that the BAI does not meet the threshold. The BAI's leader has been named a finalist for the top human rights award there is, which is chosen by the eight largest human rights organizations in the world. The office has received coverage on NPR, Ozy.com and Al Jazeera in the last month, and has also been on RFI, the BBC and several AP and other wire service reports this year. There will be much more press this week. The office is regularly cited in scholarly articles and books about Haiti. It has been featured in an Al Jazeera documentary this year, an award-winning documentary in 2012, and another award-winning documentary in 2004.

Again, I understand the Wikipedia policies on sourcing and neutrality, and had asked people who were addressing the BAI page to work on that. Undoubtedly there is room for continued improvement. But I do not understand the justification for eliminating the entry.

Thanks for your help,

Brian — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jistis (talk • contribs) 13:33, 7 October 2013 (UTC)
 * Hi Brian, that actually does sound like sufficient coverage. We didn't come across that in our initial searches, but that's exactly the sort of thing, as opposed to BAI press releases, etc., that we like to build articles out of. If you'll give me a list of those sources, I can see what I can do about rebuilding the article. Thanks, -- Khazar2 (talk) 13:36, 7 October 2013 (UTC)
 * On second thought, I probably have too much on my plate to volunteer to rewrite that article for you; I apologize for having offered that a bit hastily. In any case, it would be better to have fresh eyes look at this situation, since I'm a little frustrated by the time I've already had to spend on IJDH-related clean-up.


 * Speaking broadly, of course I understand your desire to publicize your organization, though I'm much less sympathetic to your having altered Wikipedia entries to build cases against your legal opponents. You refer to yourself as a "regular Wikipedia user", but all of your contributions are very nakedly for the purpose of promoting your organization(s), which is problematic. If you intend to continue editing, you might consider looking at the essay WP:NOTHERE--as in, you and the various IJDH allies/employees on these articles just don't seem to be here to build an encyclopedia, but rather to promote a very specific cause. That quite naturally puts you into conflict with Wikipedia's goal of neutrality. But we do want to get the best article possible, so feel free to post links to any sources you think might be helpful or relevant to article talk pages; ideally, an uninvolved editor can then balance your press releases with secondary source material or press releases by your legal opponents. Or you might ask at our conflict-of-interest noticeboard about how to proceed editing an article directly when you're one of the participants in a court case.
 * As for the immediate situation, I'd suggest that you take your request that the article be recreated to the administrator who closed the AfD. She/he can give you guidance for how to proceed with submitting a new draft for review. Hope this helps--wish you all the best, -- Khazar2 (talk) 18:01, 7 October 2013 (UTC)

Million Award for Colin Farrell
Thanks!! Didn't know there was such a thing and that the article had that many readers. --Aichik (talk) 19:51, 7 October 2013 (UTC)
 * Yeah, popular guy! Anyway, my pleasure. Cheers, -- Khazar2 (talk) 19:52, 7 October 2013 (UTC)
 * Popular with vandals too, I've seen. Anyway to know what other articles have that many people looking at it and could use some work? thanks again.--Aichik (talk) 19:55, 7 October 2013 (UTC)
 * You could go to WP:5000 for the most popular articles generally, or Lists of popular pages by WikiProject to see what's popular in a specific area of interest. Let me know anytime you break 250,000, and I'll happily drop by with some user-bling... -- Khazar2 (talk) 20:05, 7 October 2013 (UTC)
 * I've found that 5000 is a great place to check. It will show the most-viewed pages on Wikipedia, along with the number of pageviews they have received in the last 7 days. – Quadell (talk) 20:06, 7 October 2013 (UTC)
 * Thanks guys!--Aichik (talk) 20:27, 7 October 2013 (UTC)

Desert GAN
Thank you for your second opinion. The article has now been promoted. Cwmhiraeth (talk) 13:20, 11 October 2013 (UTC)

Barnstar of Integrity

 * Thanks, that's very kind! -- Khazar2 (talk) 13:27, 12 October 2013 (UTC)

Great work!
Just wanted to thank you for setting a good example on WP. My own little crusade has been trying to reduce Western/Anglophone bias, starting with writing key articles on Madagascar and Rwanda, as well as on major musicians & bands from around the world. But I really like your approach to also improving the most read articles, and I think I might start alternating between writing "my" articles and writing some of the most read ones. It would be great if the Wikicup one year were actually limited to Vital Articles or ones on the top 20 most read lists... As an aside, it feels good to "meet" another Wikipedian with ties to international development. I'm with a bilateral donor and as of next month I'll be in Islamabad for a couple of years, which should provide a good opportunity to beef up some of those articles as well. :) Where are you at, and are you still doing development work in real life? All the best, Lemurbaby (talk) 01:57, 13 October 2013 (UTC)
 * Thanks! This year I've been trying to take an approach much like the one you suggest here, splitting my time between less-trafficked topics that I'm interested in (mostly Amnesty International prisoners of conscience) and high-traffic topics in human rights history. The Wikicup's improving in this respect, too--I think all of the finalists have brought Vital Articles to GA and FA.
 * I used to work in Southeast Asia and then West Africa. I'm back in the US now (where I'm from), and unfortunately my travelling days are probably done; I've developed a serious disability that keeps me mostly housebound. Wikipedia's proved a good outlet to keep me connected to global education, though--ironically I'm reaching hundreds, even thousands of times more people now that I'm "retired".
 * That's terrific that you're heading to Islamabad. Good luck there, and I hope you do use it as an excuse to improve some content! Both Pakistan and Islamabad would be beautiful articles to see at GA or FA... -- Khazar2 (talk) 17:43, 13 October 2013 (UTC)

GA request
Would you be interested in doing History of Chincoteague, Virginia? A bit different from my normal fare, but I was there this summer, and had the idea of doing it. Some people show off their vacation photos to bored guests, I write Wiki articles around them.--Wehwalt (talk) 02:45, 13 October 2013 (UTC)
 * Of course--your work's always a pleasure to read. I'll claim the review now, but it might be 5-6 days before I get to it in detail. Cheers, Khazar2 (talk) 17:44, 13 October 2013 (UTC)

Nathaniel Raymond
Khazar, I need your help reviewing an article about Nathaniel Raymond, a human rights advocate. I substantially rewrote the article a few months ago to eliminate bias, but there have been questions about his notability on the talk page. Can you please review the article? DavidinNJ (talk) 03:08, 13 October 2013 (UTC)
 * I commented on the notability issue, though I'm not sure I'll have time for a more detailed review in the near future; I'm a bit backed up on GA reviews and also am trying to rewrite United Nations. Good luck with it, though! Sorry I couldn't be more help. -- Khazar2 (talk) 17:54, 13 October 2013 (UTC)
 * Thank you for your help. An AfD was just opened for the Raymond article. Can you review it when you have a chance? DavidinNJ (talk) 17:11, 14 October 2013 (UTC)
 * I'm happy to comment there, but you should also ping Juan and other accounts who have previously worked on/commented on the article; notifying only users sympathetic to your "side" would be a violation of WP:CANVASS. Thanks for your work on it, -- Khazar2 (talk) 17:21, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

De Toni
No snarkiness intended, but just to let you know: Giovanni Battista de Toni really was a phycologist. Thanks, :) Hamamelis (talk) 19:57, 14 October 2013 (UTC)
 * Thanks for your courtesy in pointing out my dumb mistake! I'll have to make sure this gets taken off the typolist. Cheers, -- Khazar2 (talk) 19:59, 14 October 2013 (UTC)
 * Not dumb! It is a common error. All the best! :) Hamamelis (talk) 20:03, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

EotW
Thanks a bunch for continuing to search out and nominate editors for the Award. I greatly appreciate your participation. ```Buster Seven   Talk  14:10, 15 October 2013 (UTC)
 * It's my pleasure--I really appreciate all you're doing to keep it going. I think it's a great initiative. -- Khazar2 (talk) 14:11, 15 October 2013 (UTC)

Jefferson Davis
FYI, the Jefferson Davis article is now a featured article candidate. Thanks for your support during its GA process. Omnedon (talk) 10:42, 16 October 2013 (UTC)
 * Hey, that's great news. Good luck with it. -- Khazar2 (talk) 12:19, 16 October 2013 (UTC)

OTD
I remember some missing (top of my talk) and am amused here. I like sharing ;) --Gerda Arendt (talk) 11:21, 16 October 2013 (UTC)

ps: until recently, a Malala quote was in my top position (added by someone who was supposed to be banned, remember?), --Gerda Arendt (talk) 11:28, 16 October 2013 (UTC)
 * Yay, Malala! Thanks for sharing those. -- Khazar2 (talk) 12:20, 16 October 2013 (UTC)
 * I just learned that it's his tenth wiki birthday! We don't count the banned time ;) Did you know that he also took the library pic? --Gerda Arendt (talk) 17:17, 16 October 2013 (UTC)

Talkback
Jburlinson (talk) 18:37, 16 October 2013 (UTC)

Do you want to collaborate in the edition of Jessie J's page?
Hi, I'm JD3rulo. The thing is that I'm a huge fan of Jessie J, I have made changes in her page, but other users have removed them, replying that the links I referred to don't belong to reliable sources. So I'm wondering if you could dedicate part of your time in helping me to fill some topics that are abandoned, such as Jessie J's vocal type, range and also writing updated news about her career lately. I hope you can help me, cause it seems Jessie's page has been forgotten. If you need some help to write about any article or making research, you can count on me, so this is the only thing I can give you: my friendship to make wikipedia a better and updated site. Chao, have a nice day!JD3rulo (talk) 00:45, 17 October 2013 (UTC)
 * Sorry, have to pass on that one. I don't even know who Jessie J is. But good luck with your work there! -- Khazar2 (talk) 00:58, 17 October 2013 (UTC)