User talk:Mcewan/Archive 1

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Ah...
So, I notice you are not new, but I wanted to leave a message on your talk anyway.

I noticed your edits to the La Fayette article, and also that you have worked on Castelnaudary and for La Fayette's vessel Hermione. I think this is wonderful. I was wondering if you might be interested in joining WikiProject France, which is a group of likeminded editors who collaborate on French/France related articles. Again, good work! If you have any questions, feel free to contact me on my talk page, which is linked in my signature. Kindest, Lazulilasher (talk) 20:03, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

French ship Hermione
What a bizarre naming convention, but I have absolutely no interest in challenging it. So reverted. Cheers! - CobaltBlueTony™ talk 20:15, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Reply
Hi Mcewan, I replied to you on my talk page. Kindest, Lazulilasher (talk) 21:40, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Fair Use Question
I would like to add this picture (context) to the infobox on the French ship Hermione article and I think I can make a 'fair use' argument and fulfill the criteria. However, I suppose that as regards a free alternative, I could theoretically hunt down the museum where it is on display (if indeed it is), and take my own photograph (if so allowed by the museum in question). I'm really just looking for some guidance before doing this - is it worth trying? Is there anything else I should do? Thanks Mcewan (talk) 17:37, 23 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Assuming the original painting is out of copyright, that image is free-content for the purpose of Wikipedia, as faithful reproductions of two-dimensional works of art cannot be copyrighted in the US. Algebraist 18:54, 23 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Many thanks Mcewan (talk) 19:55, 23 August 2008 (UTC)

Image copyright problem with Image:Combatlouisbourg400 004210900 1924 14072007.jpg
Thanks for uploading Image:Combatlouisbourg400 004210900 1924 14072007.jpg. The image has been identified as not specifying the copyright status of the image, which is required by Wikipedia's policy on images. If you don't indicate the copyright status of the image on the image's description page, using an appropriate copyright tag, it may be deleted some time in the next seven days. If you have uploaded other images, please verify that you have provided copyright information for them as well.

For more information on using images, see the following pages:
 * Image use policy
 * Image copyright tags

This is an automated notice by STBotI. For assistance on the image use policy, see Media copyright questions. NOTE: once you correct this, please remove the tag from the image's page. STBotI (talk) 20:15, 23 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Good Evening bot:STBotI. This is a non-automated message from User:Mcewan. Thanks for spotting that. I think I've fixed the problem with a fair use rationale. I see from your talk page that you don't want to be too specific about what you check because otherwise all we evil editors could bypass your omniscient bot checks. Therefore I don't really know whether I've fixed what you see as my problem or not. I added a Fair Use rationale using the template (which didn't seem to cover everything in the policy, by the way) and deleted the 'flagged for deletion' thing from the image's page, but is that enough? Will the bot have another look and decide to delete it anyway? Do I need to keep checking that everything is OK? Well we'll see. It was a courteous enough notice I suppose, and it's not your responsibility to clarify Wikipedia's image use policy, but between you and me, I think it's a mess. I know you've probably got hordes of idiots trying to upload fiercely-protected images of today's hot-property in the pop-culture media, but frankly, when it's a photo of an out-of-copyright painting to illustrate a somewhat arcane article about an 18th century French frigate, I think that the effort that I as an aspiring editor have to go through, is completely disproportionate. I know it's a problem, and I don't have an answer, but believe me, I have tried very, very hard to read and understand multiple help pages - and even asked a question on this very page. I've probably got something wrong, but - and here is the real point - I don't think that I am unrepresentative of a number of potentially useful editors who will be simlarly offput. Useful contributions take a fair amount of time and effort to put together - even researching and uploading an appropriate image, especially when it is all new. It's a bit of a slap-in-the-face to have an almost-immediate response from a bot - how about changing the image upload page to pre-request the appropriate information or tags? Well that's all for now - have a good day, bot. Mcewan (talk) 21:42, 23 August 2008 (UTC) PS This is here rather than your talk page because I don't want or expect a response - just the therapy of sounding off a bit in private.


 * Hey, just wanted to jump in here, I know it can be frustrating initially to figure parts of the system out. Also, guidelines/policies/etc can be difficult to find. However, I think your contributions are valuable. Let me know as well if there are any further questions you might have. Lazulilasher (talk) 00:40, 26 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Thanks Lazi, but don't worry, I was just sounding off a bit in (relative) privacy. I'm gradually figuring it out. Mcewan (talk) 15:56, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

User:78.144.96.28‎ / User:Nimbley6
Hi Mcewan!

I didn't block the above user (I'm an ordinary editor with no admin powers), though I do agree with the block (having said that, I've not checked the block yet). Getting blocked simply for adding images *would* be brutal; however, I strongly suspect that there's more to this than simply adding images. For some time, beginning with a user called User:Nimbley6, a series of editors have edited Scotland-related articles by adding either spurious sub-headings or images of questionable quality (typically many images added as a series of edits, some minutes apart, often breaking the articles formatting). The original editor, Nimbley6, was indefinitely blocked as disruptive, for failing to gain - or even seek - consensus for the sub-headings and images. Since then a series of anonymous editors, presumably the same person but masquerading behind a dynamic IP address (if you do a whois lookup on the IP address you'll see it resolves to Opal, Nimbley6's ISP), have repeated Nimbley6's modus operandi. I watchlist Nimbley6's favourite haunts, and revert when appropriate - I do sometimes (well, probably often really) let Nimbley6's edits go unreverted, but mass image adds and sub-heading nonsense I will revert.

Hope that clarifies - and please don't think that adding images to Glasgow - or any other Scotland-related article is something I'll revert; I always check the IP address and watch for Nimbley6's "patterns" before blindly reverting.

All the best, This flag once was red   07:25, 25 August 2008 (UTC)


 * No worries! I think editors need to be able to justify their actions, and that it's good to be questioned - it keeps us honest, when we're doing things that look controversial.
 * Cheers, This flag once was red   08:36, 28 August 2008 (UTC)