User talk:Tony1/Archive 10

Talkback

 * - Kingpin13 (talk) 15:26, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

Hi
Well, I saw an article about someone who'd hacked into Facebook on the BBC, read it, and was surprised to find it involved Wikipedia! I don't see a photo at the top of my talk page, though? What does it look like? :-/ On RfA, I'm not planning to run any time soon. One day, though, maybe!  wacky wace  18:51, 31 January 2011 (UTC)



Septentrionalis PMAnderson has bought you a whisky! Sharing a whisky is a great way to bond with other editors after a day of hard work. Spread the WikiLove by buying someone else a whisky, whether it be someone with whom you have collaborated or had disagreements. Enjoy!

Spread the good cheer and camaraderie by adding to their talk page with a friendly message. Message received at 19:48, 31 January 2011 (UTC)
 * If it's too late to drink in the Great Southern Continent, whiskey keeps. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:48, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

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FAC
Tony, thanks so much for your contributions today (and in general). If you have a few minutes, I could really use a sanity check at Featured article candidates/CSI effect/archive1. It has several supports, but I did a spot check and found problems. -- Andy Walsh  (talk)  16:33, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Nominal group
I have no reason; I just noticed that one page in question was merge-tagged, while another one is not, so I thought symmetry would be good. Loew Galitz (talk) 17:21, 3 February 2011 (UTC)
 * I believe there is no reason either should be tagged. They are from completely different linguistic landscapes, as expressed in the sources. Tony   (talk)  00:33, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

Warren County, Indiana
Likewise, your comments at this FAC review have also been addressed, and I'd appreciate it if you could check it out. Thanks. Omnedon (talk) 05:23, 5 February 2011 (UTC)

Adelaide leak FAC
Hi, I've addressed the points you made in the FAC review and tried to smooth out some other parts. Is there any chance you could have another look, your expertise is much appreciated. Thanks! --Sarastro1 (talk) 21:52, 3 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Thanks again. I've made the suggested changes except one. If you get a chance to have another look, that would be great but I appreciate you are very busy! --Sarastro1 (talk) 11:10, 6 February 2011 (UTC)

Featured article candidates/Economy of Iran/archive1
Hi Tony, thanks for your review of the prose. I have tried to address all the issues you found. Please let me know if there anything else that needs fixing. Regards, SSZ (talk) 07:23, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

Shouldn't it be British Columbia, not British Colombia?
Hi from a friendly tps of Ponyo's, and congrats on writing up such good blurbs on the new admins. betsythedevine (talk) 14:42, 7 February 2011 (UTC)
 * OK, I just made the change, hope that's ok. betsythedevine (talk) 16:26, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

Blurb
Just one correction. My master's degree is from Western Kentucky University; my undergrad degree is from Murray State University. Both are in Computer Science, if you're interested. Acdixon (talk • contribs • count) 15:02, 7 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Done. Wasn't sure if it was kosher for me to make the correction, or if the newsletter was maintained by a select group like FAC promotions. Thanks. Acdixon (talk • contribs • count) 15:08, 7 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Thanks, very happy for you to have done it.  Tony   (talk)  15:36, 8 February 2011 (UTC)

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Rhodocene FAC
Hi Tony... I note your comment at the rhodocene FAC and your interest in particular in Nergaal's comments. Nergaal is now supporting the nomination, fyi, and the article has been through some expansion. I invite you to have a look and to express any view you might have. Regards. EdChem (talk) 15:00, 8 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Congrats on the promotion. Tony   (talk)  14:35, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Did you put me in the Signpost?


Just found out that Painted turtle was in the internal newspaper. Very snappy thing that is, actually. Like the style. TCO (talk) 21:39, 8 February 2011 (UTC)


 * Thanks. I want one as a pet. Tony   (talk)  04:46, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Center HTML tags causing line breaks.
Re and : when I look at the page with the center tags with Firefox 3.6.13 under Ubuntu 10.04 LTS, I see 6 lines in the caption, tho the text below the caption is fine. After removing the tags, it's 4 normal lines (tho left aligned like the captions of the right-aligned images). -- Jeandré, 2011-02-09t03:10z
 * OK, I won't centre them any more. I wonder whether your system is "wrapping" the lines according to how wide you choose your window to be. Tony   (talk)  04:46, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Guild of Copy Editors and others
Hi

I have to bring attention to a problem caused by that discussion on contractions :¬(

GOCE uses your beginners guide from its main page tab on copy-editing basics - How to guides

The problem is that the essay, and I know it is only an essay, says "Do not use contractions". I agree with it, but do not want any more new editors to fall foul of the bickering presently going on.

AWB has just had the regex for contractions disabled due to the ongoing discussion and I suppose that your essay may need to be changed too.

It is a damned strange situation when we have editors trying to de-formalise writing in preference to a narrative version. Anyway, as Shmuel has injected himself into the discussions on the AWB page, I cannot go there for fear of being seen as "bickering" - although it seems to me this is a definite move to de-formalise and I will get involved if POV gets the upper-hand there.

Sorry to have to bring this to your attention. Chaosdruid (talk) 13:38, 9 February 2011 (UTC)
 *  I had no idea that list was there. I feel a little embarrassed, and sorry that I haven't run through those pages in a long while. The "bickering" ... well, normal every few months. I think it's much better for people to let steam off there than to bicker on article talk pages, where it's unlikely to be resolved or monitored. In my view, one of the most valuable functions of the style guides is to minimise edit-warring in the articles themselves. For that reason, a bit of turbulence on the style-guide talk pages is part of the cost of doing business. We do need to be reminded from time to time of the need to be kind to each other, though. Tony   (talk)  13:47, 9 February 2011 (UTC)


 * And I suppose that the MoS has no guidelines on "Narrative" lol. It is strange if inflections are to be used as it can only lead to people writing in more narrative and could possibly add to the whole "Wikipedia is rubbish" arguments (we'll fight on't beaches, we'll fight on't landing grounds, we'll fight in't fields and in't streets, we'll fight in't hills; we'll ne'er surrender lol). Ah well, to be considered a serious Encyclopaedia is not something I feel some editors have in mind when taking discussions to such in minutiae levels. Chaosdruid (talk) 14:03, 9 February 2011 (UTC)
 * By "inflections", if you mean contractions, why don't you say something at MoS talk? Tony   (talk)  14:30, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Your long-lost son or something?
I thought this might make you happy. Adrian J. Hunter(talk•contribs) 12:56, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

Features and Admins
I just looked over the draft for the 14th's F&A. Please don't forget to include mention of the Featured Sounds promoted this week. Information about the set (considered internally to be one featured sound in six parts) is at Featured sound candidates/John Michel Cello-J S Bach Cello Suite 1 in G Prelude. Thanks,  S ven M anguard   Wha?  21:17, 13 February 2011 (UTC)
 * That is for next week. The window is from Saturday to midnight end Friday UTC. Tony   (talk)  01:15, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

Contradiction
Did you notice this sentence contradicts itself, and also contradicts the duplicate passage at MOS:NUM? Art LaPella (talk) 02:44, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

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Magic Flute Overture

 * It wasn't my nomination; it was Sven Manguard's. Tony   (talk)  00:24, 17 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Yes, but he said you pointed it out to him. This is the closest template that existed. :) ( X! ·  talk )  · @077  · 00:51, 17 February 2011 (UTC)
 * I didn't even cast a support for it. I do have qualms about the glitches, and the general standards for music files were raised as a result of this nomination. This is despite my observation that there were some very good things about the performance. Tony   (talk)  01:32, 17 February 2011 (UTC)

Your vote at Talk:Main Page
What I find mist surprising is that none of this ever came up before, despite the fact that getting on the main page has been something of discussion for a while at FS. This comes across as a rather nasty surprise to me. What do we need to do, exactly, to gain your support in this? The only other thing I can say, I guess, is that part of the benefit of getting onto the main page is that it would be the most powerful tool we have in recruiting more musicians to upload to Wikipedia.  S ven M anguard  Wha?  02:38, 17 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Yes, I gritted my teeth at being negative about the proposal of a wikifriend. Talk on IRC? Tony   (talk)  05:55, 17 February 2011 (UTC)

CSI effect
Hey mate, any chance you would be so kind as to have a look at CSI effect before I send it back to FAC? Casliber was helping out, but it seems he's a very busy clam lately. --Cryptic C62 · Talk 02:27, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

Empire of Brazil
Please respond the message left to you in the Empire of Brazil FAC nomination page. Regards, --Lecen (talk) 15:56, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

H-D-R imaging?
Hey Tony, I was wondering why you renamed the HDR imaging article to High-dynamic-range imaging? Please discuss this on the talk page. Thanks. &mdash; Richie 13:27, 19 February 2011 (UTC)

What makes a good or a bad boss?
Anyone who wants to know should listen to this longish talk to the Commonwealth Club of California by Robert Sutton, Professor of Management Science and Engineering, Stanford School of Business. Enlightening. A few lessons for managing the wiki community? Tony  (talk)  04:26, 19 February 2011 (UTC)


 * It's certainly given me a new insight into what's wrong here at wikipedia. But given the lack of a ceo equivalent it's difficult to see how any of the necessary changes can be made. Someone on my talk page yesterday suggested that perhaps wikipedia is "too democratic", and I think they're right. Malleus Fatuorum 14:04, 19 February 2011 (UTC)
 * It's not just having a CEO; it's organisational hierarchy (err ... I think we have that here, or the place wouldn't work properly) and the way people on the same level interact in a workplace. The parts of his talk I felt might have resonance with the WP community are:
 * the concept of "power poisoning", and the self-enhancement bias that status can bring (remember the cookie-eating experiment?);
 * do no harm, as a managerial ethic;
 * creative conflict: minimise/eliminate the back-biting at the start and the end—allow initial brainstorming to proceed without much conflict, and if you disagree with a decision, go implement it to the best of your ability, so if it's suboptimal, you then know the implementation wasn't the problem.
 * the "mom" effect;
 * the balancing act of knowing how to have courage and boldness, but also having the humility to self-doubt after the fact (and the corollary—the notion that in business and government, you often have to make investment and personnel decisions before the decision becomes obvious and comfortable, which means you have to be willing to clean up a few messes afterwards ... hopefully not many, though)
 * the "attitude of wisdom"—as someone with power over others, grasping the dove lightly (crush it and you kill it—don't micro-manage; trust people if you can, and then judge if they screw up);
 * if you feel energised when you interact with someone, it's a good sign they're not a "jerk" (almost a technical term, for him); people who energise others are sometimes dull on the surface; the best employees are the ones who help other employees to gain skills (whereas the opposite is widespread in poorly run organisations in which competitiveness becomes negative)

I thought what he said in the Q and A about how employees should deal with a toxic boss, and how bosses should deal with toxic employees, was really useful. The positive skewing of bad news up the chain of command (think of BP and NASA) was a shocking insight. Tony  (talk)  14:26, 19 February 2011 (UTC)


 * Perhaps where you see an organization hierarchy I see organizational chaos. Certainly I don't think that wikipedia works properly, barely at all in fact. I'm not aware of even a single other enterprise ruled by the dead hand of consensus, which is something that (understandably) Sutton doesn't deal with. Looking back to wikipedia's beginnings, was there ever a consensus on the five pillars, or did someone just decide? Malleus Fatuorum 20:00, 19 February 2011 (UTC)
 * I think it works brilliantly. Nothing is perfect, of course. Tony   (talk)  09:00, 20 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Depends on what you mean by "works"; there are great swathes of no-go areas such as Irish Republicanism that are constant battlefields, and have been for years. The general behaviour and demeanour of administrators is no better than it was a couple of years ago when you were campaigning for reform. The number of active contributors has been in steady decline over recent years, and those "in charge" focus on gimmicky irrelevancies such as gender ratios. I don't call that working, much less "brilliantly". Malleus Fatuorum 17:22, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

Rose of Erin
See. That should be the right link. Adam Cuerden (talk) 04:39, 20 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Yes, thanks Adam. Tony   (talk)  04:46, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

Featured sound candidates/delist/Buxtehude BuxWV 104 – Was frag ich nach der Welt
My God, but you messed up that nomination. Should be fixed now, though. Please follow the instructions a little more carefully next time. =)

For the record, basically, you added a lot of 's that you shouldn't have, and put the filename in the wrong place. Also, try to make sure to call it "delist" nominations, not "delete", because you know someone's going to go "Oh, no! They're about to delete my file!", when, of course, we aren't, we just think it's good, but not good enough for the main page. Adam Cuerden (talk) 05:25, 20 February 2011 (UTC)
 * I still have no idea of the extent of my screwing up, which suggests that the instructions need to be a lot more explicit, for dummies. Sorry to cause extra work. Tony   (talk)  08:56, 20 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Suffice it to say, this is what it looked like: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Featured_sound_candidates/delist/Buxtehude_BuxWV_104_%E2%80%93_Was_frag_ich_nach_der_Welt&oldid=414899783 - Something went catastrophically wrong there. =) Adam Cuerden (talk) 16:17, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

Description-based Opposes
When you oppose a nomination based on it missing descriptions or information, or because the descriptions or information are poorly written on the file's information page, give it a few days and come back. I'm very good at fixing those, and so chances are that there will be a message indicating I have done just that. Incidentally, there are two such messages at FSC (for the Take Me Out to the Ballgame and Over the Norther Mountains nominations) waiting for your review. I see you're at an 8 on the business scale, and with plenty of time before the seven day closing minimum hits, you have some time, so really all I'm asking is for you to keep this in mind. Also, if you find any files that need description page overhauls, feel free to tell me. You can list them at User talk:Sven Manguard/Sandbox and I'll tick them off as I go. Feel better/less frenzied,  S ven M anguard   Wha?  08:36, 20 February 2011 (UTC) Tony  (talk)  08:55, 20 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Of course, Sven. Just buzz me if I'm slack. The workload isn't too bad yet. And I do intend to gradually work my way through the whole repository anyway. I posted at WT:FAC to alert them of the need for more regulars at FSC. It would be good to post on some active classical-music talk pages, too. Tony   (talk)  08:55, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

FLs on mainpage
Hi Tony1, hope you're well and not too snowed under with real-life work. As you may be aware, the featured list community are soon to be following in the wake of the featured sounds brigade in trying to get onto the mainpage on the odd occasion (which I'm tentatively referring to as "FL Wednesdays"). We have a small selection of our recent work sitting at User:The Rambling Man/Main page FL candidates for blurb creation/copyediting to let the community see the sort of thing we'll be suggesting for mainpage inclusion and to demonstrate the diversity of the work we have to offer. We have nearly 2,000 featured lists, and while I accept that several of the older ones need some serious work, we'll be focused on polishing the recently promoted lists, and at a one-a-week rate, I think we've already got a three-month backlog virtually ready to go without much effort. However, I was hoping to beg a favour of you, if you had the time, to check our (currently) ten examples of blurbs to see if they fall into line with the kind of thing you'd expect from featured articles presented on the mainpage. In any case, expect to see our proposal over at Talk:Main page sometime soon. I'd appreciate any feedback you may have before we make that step! All the best, The Rambling Man (talk) 17:40, 20 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Thanks for your help and encouragement so far Tony, much appreciated. The Rambling Man (talk) 11:24, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

The Bugle: Volume LVIX, January 2011
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Hope you don't mind...
that I fixed this. :)  ceran  thor 02:57, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Thanks. Sorry, there are so many fiddly little things to get right at F and A. Sometimes it passes by me. Tony   (talk)  07:23, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

FL proposal
And so it begins.... Thanks for your help in copyediting my overblown proposal, and in going over the various blurbs, very much appreciated. The Rambling Man (talk) 17:09, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

Morning madness
"In the early 1960s, a large quantity of uncirculated Morgan dollars were found to be available from Treasury vaults ..." This has been bothering me all morning. Was found? Or do I need more coffee? -- Andy Walsh  (talk)  16:01, 22 February 2011 (UTC)


 * As the subject is "large quantity", which is singular, you're right; it should be was found. Malleus Fatuorum 16:10, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
 * I think it can be either. Anyone else have an opinion? Tony   (talk)  00:54, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Having just found myself writing this, "That a small number of GA reviews are less than optimal doen't mean that the whole thing is a waste of time", I'm inclined to agree that it's not as black and white as I'd first thought. Malleus Fatuorum 04:03, 25 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Well, I think you'd always say "That is a large quantity of Morgan dollars", not "Those are a large quantity ..." Does that mean it should be "was"? Mike Christie (talk – library) 04:27, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

WLKW edit
I was hurried this morning as I was inbetween traffic reports & it was easier to just undo the previous changes which had gotten rid of the 1956 in radio link, which leads me to ask: I'm not sure what you were talking about on my talk page. It was a query about something & delinking the 1956 in radio link which I didn't do. That's why I undid the edit, to get 1956 in radio back. As for emdashes & endashes, I've never been able to figure out why they're used & why there are spaces around them when growing up 2 things that linked each other were ALWAYS connected by the dash, no spaces. So, thank you in advance for your reply. Again, I'm not sure what your query was but it seemed to be related to the delinking of 1956 in radio from the WLKW page which I did not do.Stereorock (talk) 22:11, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

Span
Hi,

Re. Wikipedia Signpost/2011-02-21/News and notes

Could we just put a &lt;DIV class="plainlinks"> (and &lt;/DIV> around the entire page, instead?

Because the &lt;span>s with no associated &lt;/span> seem a bit evil.

I'd go ahead and make the edit, but I'm not 100% sure I am correct to think that a DIV is the best approach. Cheers,  Chzz  ► 05:40, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Oh, you saviour. That kind of information is gold. Please go ahead and do it! Tony   (talk)  06:28, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
 * It seems to work well; incidentally, what is the evil in not closing a ?template/?syntax like the span class one? Isn't it confined to a single page in its effect? Tony   (talk)  12:12, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
 * The evil is that it isn't well-formed HTML, which some browsers may even reject. Malleus Fatuorum 16:13, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Aren't all these tags autoclosed in the output HTML by mediawiki? Thus the problem is not the client choking on bad code, but mediawiki fixing your bad code in an unpredictable and context-sensitive way, as with chzz's example below. Algebraist 21:59, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

For example (just because I stumbled upon it) - Alison's user talk page (as of now) suddenly changes from normal to a smaller font, just after the "A kitten for you" section. One might look for a problem in that part of the page, but it is actually the result of unclosed &lt;DIV>s in User:Alison/Talkheader, which is transcluded at the top. Problems like that are not easy to pin down.

Often, unclosed tags make no practical difference - but they can. As a breach of W3C standards, it may cause all kinds of unexpected, bizarre, and hard to locate glitches - particularly for users with a more unusual setup, such as an old web-browser, a mobile device, a screen-reader, and suchlike.

In other cases, it can actually slow down access to a web page, because the user's browser is forced to do a little debugging, before it can render the page.

It is much like unclosed parenthesis in nested loops when programming. Tony1 - in terms you can certainly understand - please see here :-)  Chzz  ► 21:46, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Got it! Thanks everyone for your input. Tony   (talk)  02:50, 26 February 2011 (UTC)

The Signpost: 28 February 2011
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Midi changes
File:Frog_Legs_Rag_3.mid Try these. I'll have Juju run it through the synthesizer once it's approved. I have absolutely no objection to extensive changes, but unconstructive dismissal is a bit annoying. =)

Note that the last half has I've added a lot of mild playing with tempos, but I don't want to overdo it, since it's not jazz. Throw up anything you find inartistic. =) Adam Cuerden (talk) 13:08, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Nothing like the kind of swing you get in jazz. Much more conservative than that. Perhaps you've had to do a lot of tweaking of the articulation, the dynamics: if so, it's good, but that's not what I'm referring to. You are being waaaay too cautious with the rubato; I don't know why. You talk of "mild playing with tempos" (I presume you're referring to rubato, agogic accents, etc), but I find it very hard to detect. One runs over the structural joins as though they were in the middle of a period, i.e., straight, unmoving tempo. For example, the marking of the bom bom bom (RH's 2,3,4->) lead into the phrase in the middle I referred to needs to be obviously held up and accelerated during the three crotchets. It needs to be easily perceptible, but only for marking the periodic joins, not once each period gets going, of course (fine as now). The basic motoric, metronomic, "straightlaced" treatment of almost the entire duration of the work will work if you mark the structural points, which are basically the periodic joins. This is the key, I think. I wonder whether you might tinker with just one portion of it (where I suggested a more than mild departure from the metronome), and post it for audition and comment? Just 5 s either side plus the periodic join. I will link my friend to what has been said about him on the page. I'm sure he'll be shocked. Tony   (talk)  15:16, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
 * I've uploaded a new version, with much more pronounced rubato at the joins. I had added a lot of mild changes to the tempo between the joins, but hadn't actually changed the joins much, so.... oh, well. Anyway, see if it's right, and if I missed something, forgive me, the times stopped matching up rather quickly, so I may have misread you.
 * Oh, yes: expect that there'll need to be more tweaking once Juju gets brought in, but it takes him about half an hour to do the conversion, so I want to get it as near right as possible before passing over to him. Adam Cuerden (talk) 17:01, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
 * It's better. Already there's a little life in it; feels like a human is playing. Too much clarity is sacrificed because of the boosted reverb; why not cut it back a bit more? It would still be more reverberant than the original attempt. The LH off-beat chords: didn't someone suggest making them a bit more staccato? You may have done this a bit ... I'd go for a bit more, since the physical act of getting back to the subsequent bass note almost demands staccato (except that I suppose there's the sustaining pedal at work ... try it for one phrase and see what you think, without necessarily posting another version?). The LH is generally good, though. I particuarly like the way you bend one syncopated figure towards the end—it occurs a few times. The last three chords are the problem still poking out: can you slow the pace a little for the fourth-last beat, then successively more for each of the last three chords? It's not just that it chokes off unsatisfyingly for the listeners: there needs to be more weight for those three chords, more finality. Sure, less in this style than most others, but some, and there appears to be no rall. at all. Tony   (talk)  13:20, 2 March 2011 (UTC)
 * There is a slight rallentando at the end, but its not very pronounced I'll boost it a bit. As for the left hand, I'll go through that tomorrow and add any further work. I'm going to ignore the reverb for the moment, though, because the sound quality's likely to change substantially once I hand off to Juju. Adam Cuerden (talk) 13:42, 2 March 2011 (UTC)
 * I'd double your instinct about the amount of rall. You're being too cautious. Also, why not make the final chord of slightly longer duration? Like ... double. Tony   (talk)  13:48, 2 March 2011 (UTC)
 * It's slightly longer, but I keep finding that if I go too long, it sounds like the musician didn't end with enough of a flourish, given the fairly fast song beforehand. It's currently held at 80 c.p.m (In Midi, you can either directly lengthen the note, or change the tempo; tempo gives you a little more control) - I'm actually wondering if it isn't too long, and if it'd be more in the ragtime idiom if it's cut short a little, after rallentandoing up to it. Testing that, I think it actually sounds better (though we'll have to see if it still does after the change in instrument samples). I'll upload. Adam Cuerden (talk) 14:13, 2 March 2011 (UTC)

Adam Cuerden (talk) 14:13, 2 March 2011 (UTC)

File:Frog_Legs_Rag_3.mid - Uploaded a new copy. This is with more ralletando at the ending, but with the last note a little short, and also has some left hand tweaks. I don't want the whole LH to become too detache, as it ruins the phrasing, but I've added it in for all large jumps. Adam Cuerden (talk) 14:20, 2 March 2011 (UTC)
 * And added a little more hand tweaking of the LH. There's some interesting melodic work in there, shame to hide it. =) Adam Cuerden (talk) 14:41, 2 March 2011 (UTC)

By the way, I'd like to try to finish this by Friday, if possible: FL should be passing around then, and I want to switch over to that. Adam Cuerden (talk) 02:32, 3 March 2011 (UTC)

Signpost..
Hey Tony, just wondered if there'd be a notification to the community that the mainpage format would be changing in due course as a result of the FS and FL proposals? Not pushing or anything but would like to know when we'd be expecting some more interest from the rest of the world...! The Rambling Man (talk) 22:17, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
 * I guess until the FL proposal closes tomorrow night, nothing's certain there. And even then I suppose the technical proposal has to be agreed, so I guess I was jumping the gun a little.  Just thought it was worth letting the community know such a significant discussion was going on at Talk:Main page as I'm not sure how many of our regulars pop over there.  The Rambling Man (talk) 17:24, 1 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Certainly worth supporting, in my opinion. Tony   (talk)  13:49, 2 March 2011 (UTC)

Ravel
Luckily, the U.S. Copyright issues only apply to his works after 1922, and en-wiki (though not Commons) allows works that are out of copyright in America, but not their home country. We can't upload it to Commons because of the weird French copyright extensions, but it's fine here. =) Adam Cuerden (talk) 16:34, 2 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Are you sure? The problem is that someone STILL owns the copyright on the score. Tony   (talk)  01:06, 3 March 2011 (UTC)
 * That's what I learned from a rather long time at FP. Copyright is by country, and they don't own an American copyright, only a French one. Indeed, they don't even own one for the rest of the EU, as the rest of the EU does not recognise the French copyright extensions, which kind of ruin the whole "standardization" thing. Adam Cuerden (talk) 02:24, 3 March 2011 (UTC)
 * As far as I know, the WMF has all it's content storing servers in Florida, meaning that the only law Wikipedia has to follow is Florida and United States law. WMF assets in other areas do not affect this.  S ven M anguard   Wha?  03:00, 3 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Quite. Commons' additional rules about the home country of the work are strictly due to its focus, not because it has to. Long, confusing story there. Adam Cuerden (talk) 09:21, 3 March 2011 (UTC)

Tried to explain this over on the image page, but here's the long version:

Application to the Ravel situation Adam Cuerden (talk) 11:43, 3 March 2011 (UTC)
 * In the U.S. works published before 1923 have passed into the public domain, and this also applies to foreign works. After that date, different rules apply, but they're irrelevant to this discussion.
 * In most other countries, copyright is based on when the author died. Life+70 years is fairly common.
 * Most countries (not the U.S., Mexico, and a couple others) apply the "rule of the shorter term". This says that, when you're looking at foreign works, if it's public domain either under the laws of either the foreign country or your own, you can treat it as public domain. Examples:
 * In Vietnam, copyright law says that copyright expires 50 years after the death of the creator. I live in Britain, where copyright expires 70 years after the death of the creator, but I can use works by a Vietnamese person who died in 1955 without paying any copyright.
 * France has some extensions to copyright caused by the World Wars. Maurice Ravel is thus in copyright in France, but as he died in 1937, I can apply U.K. law and come up with the pleasant knowledge that I don't have to pay copyright on his works in Britain.
 * There is no such thing as "rule of the longer term". If the rule of the shorter term isn't applied in a country, only that country's copyright standards are used to judge the work.
 * Commons is a worldwide project, and wants to have things usable as widely as possible. Hence, by insisting that something is in the public domain in its home country, the rule of the shorter term - which most countries apply - mean that it can be used in most countries without any issues. It also considers U.S. copyright, because its servers are in Florida.
 * En-wiki, however, serves a smaller range of countries, and thus it simply requires that image be legal for it to host, and reasonably widely reusable - that is, it must simply be out of copyright in America.
 * Ravel's works published prior to 1923 are out of copyright in America, as with all works published before 1923.
 * Ravel's works are not out of copyright in France, due to France's complicated copyright laws. (Unusually, these works actually out of copyright in the vast majority of the world, as very few countries offer copyright protection longer than Life+70.)
 * However, Commons strictly requires that works be out of copyright in the creator's home country. Hence, Commons cannot host Ravel's works.
 * En-wiki does not have that strict requirement, as said above, and thus can host them.
 * Although we could theoretically apply a stricter standard to copyright on FS's than is required for their use everywhere else on English Wikipedia, there's no particularly good reason to do so. Hence, I believe these files (and the Kodaly, and the Bartok I've been eyeing) are, at least from a copyright perspective, valid featured sounds. Obviously, we'll need to judge them on quality.
 * Note that none of the above discussion applies to works written before 1923, but published after. Those may or may not be in copyright in America, and will need to be discussed in detail, should they come up.
 * Adam, thanks heaps for such a comprehensive explanation. It's stupidly complicated, and clearly we need a world fascist dictator to impose one single set of copyright rules, preferably liberal ones. I wonder why we don't insist that the date of the first publication of the music score not be specified on the description page; it's relevant, yes? Tony   (talk)  12:01, 3 March 2011 (UTC)
 * It might be difficult to find proof in some cases as it's one of those things where, if it's published in the same year, it's not deemed necessary to mention the fact, only if it's published later. But I agree that if there's doubt, one should challenge for proof of publication date. Adam Cuerden (talk) 12:11, 3 March 2011 (UTC)

Moonlight Sonata
Hey, Tony, can you listen to these and give me your thoughts? I'm not sure about them - they're better than what we have, but... well, you'll see.

Also, can you review the latest Frog Legs Rag? I mentioned I had done the changes above, but it's getting rather high up this page, so you may not have seen it. If there's not much more left, I'd like to toss it over to Juju soon. =) Adam Cuerden (talk) 08:17, 4 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Delist. :-) Link  Tony   (talk)  13:18, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

Images
Hi Tony, long time no see. Just wanted to touch base, since I was a bit out of touch for a few months travelling recently. Is there a greater tendency to disallow forced images sizes now that the default has increased? I just ask because I've always tended to go for pics about the 250px mark for clarity and these still seem to pass muster at GA or FAC, but I've recently encountered someone who fails to see any reason to do this except for the most invisible of imagery and, rather than risk edit-warring, I figured it'd be useful to get another opinion if you have a chance. The article in question is Peter Jeffrey (RAAF officer), and I wanted to finalise the images before I take it to A-Class review shortly... Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 05:18, 5 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Hi Ian, no, in fact it's the opposite tendency: the rules now acknowledge the need to make some (many) images larger than the new 220px default—and remember that many users wanted 240px as the default. I think your 250px is often fine. Also, could I say that it's usually good to jam the syntax for all pics in a section just below the title, given that we need to accommodate a huge range of window widths for our readers. The text-squashing and breaching the next section title issues are minimised that way. Tony   (talk)  08:41, 5 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Thanks mate -- I didn't think things had changed for the worse but you never know when you take a sabbatical... Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 09:01, 5 March 2011 (UTC)

MOS for references
Hi Tony, I know you're a busy man, but I've had a query over a change I made to a template which forced the use of spaced hyphens in a title rather than en-dashes. The problem now is that I cannot find anywhere advice on how we should format the references, and whether they should comply with MOS. For instance, at FLC I often remind editors that, say, a title of "MANCHESTER UNITED RESULTS" should be more appropriately formatted as "Manchester United results", the same with other MOS issues in the title, but now I'm at a loss if this is backed up anywhere other than anecdotally. Any ideas?
 * Absolutely agree with you. I'm sure MoS on upper/lower case says to avoid all-caps: a good thing, too—it shouts at you. Tony   (talk)  09:41, 6 March 2011 (UTC)

sentence case or title case?
Tony, I was trying to "sentence case" over at my new FA (oops FL) U.S. state reptiles, following the pattern from painted turtle but got a review changing stuff to title. Maybe I don't have it right though. I was assuming article titles, book titles and web pages would all be sentence case. Of course publishers, authors, departments of governments would always be title. Was I doing it wrong? Is it only articles in sentence case?TCO (talk) 08:36, 6 March 2011 (UTC)
 * TCO, my personal preference is for all sentence case. Why? Because then the functional caps really mean something, rather than being mowed down in a forest of initial caps. Also looks better on the page, IMO. The exception seems to be conference and journal titles ... I've had to accept this (Journal of Musicology; but paper and chapter titles within can be sentence case). If I were working on an article, I'd try to persuade co-authors to go this way, since WP already has a very far-sighted insistence that its own article and section titles be in normal case. At least in that respect WP has moved on from the typewriter era, when caps and underlining were the only way you could mark text.  Tony   (talk)  09:39, 6 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Book titles? Web page titles?  TCO (talk) 09:53, 6 March 2011 (UTC)
 * These are only my personal prefs. Editors on WP, unfortunately, vary in their opinions, and some may even object to changes in an existing ref section. A ref section certainly needs to be internally consistent, though: that is for sure. I would personally use sentence case for book titles (they're marked already by italics). Web site names: I would use the same system for them, but some titles are traditionally given in title case, such as newspaper names. I change new titles from the cumbersome "Wikipedia Vandals Strike From All Jurisdictions" to "Wikipedia vandals strike from all jurisdictions". We certainly need to revisit the rules for the formatting of reference lists, though. Urgently.  Tony   (talk)  12:59, 6 March 2011 (UTC)

Signpost blurb
Hi Tony,

Thanks for notifying me about the blurb in The Signpost about my successful RfA. It looks great.

Happy editing,

Neelix (talk) 17:10, 6 March 2011 (UTC)


 * Hi Tony, thanks for the nice piece for Signpost. To be fair to  User:CT Cooper I've only  been doing  the WP:WPSCH for  about nine months.  C T who created it is very  busy  in  RL but  still  takes an active part. Cheers, --Kudpung (talk) 22:08, 6 March 2011 (UTC)

The Signpost: 7 March 2011
Read this Signpost in full · Single-page · Unsubscribe · EdwardsBot (talk) 15:29, 8 March 2011 (UTC)

We need to talk...
I know you probably have no interest in speaking to me, and I really don't want to speak to you, we're both rather angry with each other, I'm sure.

However, there really aren't any good options at this point, and taking via IRC, as close to face to face as possible, is the only way that this has any shot of getting resolved.

You can, of course, choose to blow me off, but there are things that I have to say, and I think we'd both prefer that they be said in private. There's no reason at this point to make the situation any worse than it already is.

I'll be online and on IRC from about two to about midnight Eastern Standard Time (11 hours behind Perth, 13 behind Brisbane I believe) for the next two days. My IRC nick is Sven_Manguard, and if I'm not in #wikisignpost I should still be in #wikipedia-en when I'm on.

This needs to get done.  S ven M anguard  Wha?  07:58, 2 March 2011 (UTC)
 * About what? If you mean the FSC treatment of the off-wiki guy, let's forget it. I'd have liked some acknowledgement that it was wrong, but your wikifriendship is far more important to me than that. And so is the good working of FSC. I'm desperately short of time at the moment. Tony   (talk)  09:02, 2 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Well part of it was that I wanted to extend an apology to your friend for allowing my anger with you to color my interactions with him. The other part of it was going to involve me making it very clear why I'm so angry with you. As at least two other users can attest to, I was ready to quit featured sounds yesterday, and unless this gets resolved, I still might. However, since you seem open to talking to me, I suppose I can put the conversation off for a few days, or send you something by email. Do you have a preference between the two? Note that I'm only able to spend ten straight hours on the IRC these two days, after that timing becomes more tricky and it would pretty much have to be over email if it waits until Monday.  S ven M anguard   Wha?  20:49, 2 March 2011 (UTC)
 * I can't image what this is about. I have almost no time. I tried to find you last night, but was too late. I may have time in about eight to thirteen hours. Tony   (talk)  01:06, 3 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Yeah, I was at dinner when you were on. As for 8 to 13 hours from your post, that would be from 4:00 to 9:00 AM my time. I will send you an email in about 24 hours.  S ven M anguard   Wha?  03:03, 3 March 2011 (UTC)
 * I keep rewriting the message I intend on sending you... eventually. It started out very angry, and I must say rather nasty, and keeps getting toned down and down. I've got it down to bullet points now, and I'll send you the email when I get around to it. Sorry to keep you waiting.  S ven M anguard   <font color="FCD116">Wha?  21:39, 9 March 2011 (UTC)

Request for assistance
Hello Tony1, I'm not sure if you have any interest in planes, but I'm wondering if you could have a look at Airbus A330 to see what areas I could improve on. I'm thinking of promoting it to FA status. I've read (almost) all of your essays regarding improvements in writing, and I'm trying to implement them to my writing. Since you are an expert (copy-)edittor, maybe you could give me some extra tips on how to write better as well. Thanks <b style="background:SaddleBrown;color:Gold;">Sp33dyphil</b>  (T • C • I love Wikipedia!)  08:51, 4 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Sp, you are very kind to say those things. I'm glad my usersubpages are useful. At the moment I'm afraid I need to prioritise things strictly; my RL work burden will ease after 21 March, so I'll try to remember, and if I don't, you could buzz me again. Tony   (talk)  13:08, 4 March 2011 (UTC)
 * I'll throw it to Juju; It might sound better after conversion. =) Adam Cuerden (talk) 13:53, 4 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Hello, do you think the article has much chance of obtaining FA status? Please visit Featured article candidates/Airbus A330/archive1 for any comments. Thanks <b style="background:SaddleBrown;color:Gold;">Sp33dyphil</b>  (T • C • I love Wikipedia!)  08:20, 9 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Could you ask after 21 March? Tony   (talk)  07:54, 10 March 2011 (UTC)
 * OK ;) <b style="background:SaddleBrown;color:Gold;">Sp33dyphil</b>  (T • C • I love Wikipedia!)  10:09, 10 March 2011 (UTC)

Hi
Please see Featured article candidates/The Texas Chain Saw Massacre/archive5. Am I being too harsh? --Dweller (talk) 13:54, 9 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Dweller, it looks like a very well-judged review! Tony   (talk)  14:09, 9 March 2011 (UTC)
 * OK, thanks. I know too well what it's like to have my work hacked at FAC (!) and Opposes are disheartening even when you've not had 4 previous attempts, but I don't believe FAC should be the same as Peer Review. Thanks for the sanity check. --Dweller (talk) 14:31, 9 March 2011 (UTC)

bad wikilinks in the Signpost Featured Pictures section
Tony, there are several bad wikilinks in the Featured Pictures of the most recent Signpost. The overall "promoted" link goes to a January promotions list. And for my picture, the "nom" link, does not go to the archived discussion itself, but to a section link of February candidates (and since pic was promoted in March, link is bad). Suspect there are others bad in there as well. Did not check, but it looks like overwriting of old content or something like that left bad links. (No biggie, honest, and not pimping my stuff, but thought you'd like to know).TCO (talk) 20:58, 9 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Thx, fixed lead, but nom for the map seems to be right ... Tony   (talk)  01:18, 10 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Since I fixed it, duh. Donno about the others though...there were at least two errors showing cut and past write over mistakes.  May be more.TCO (talk) 04:40, 10 March 2011 (UTC)

You are half pregnant


How about a review of U.S. state reptiles? It's short, fun. And it's a "listarticle". All the cool kids hang in FL, now. ;) TCO (talk) 02:18, 7 March 2011 (UTC)


 * Pretty please with sugar on top.TCO (talk) 17:55, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

FSC
Revamped process, with regular exposure on the main page possible. Could do with more reviewers ... Tony  (talk)  12:46, 26 February 2011 (UTC)
 * Hi Tony, should have replied before, I did have a look but I was rather dismayed to see at least one user nominating her own recordings, That puts me off. I can't see the FSC process ever being one that I am comfortable with. Moreover the problem of calling a recording (however bona fide) a 'featured sound' and then using it in the wrong articles/contexts has never been properly addressed. Of course if the other editors were as scrupulous as you it would be different! So I think I'll pass. -- Klein zach  09:17, 10 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Kleinzach I take issue with every single thing you said in that comment. First, I see no reason why a user cannot nominate her own works. As can be seen, we are under no obligation to promote them, and that user's work has been rejected a few times. It's also done in every other featured process with no ill effects. Secondly, if you're going to make an accusation, back it up. Show us where featured sounds are misused, and then that can be addressed. Finally, as for your last line, the implicit meaning, that other editors working at FS are unscrupulous, is an unfounded personal attack, and I'd appreciate it if you stuck it. If you don't want to come back to featured sounds, that's fine with me. However taking unsubstantiated pot shots at the process from afar, especially pot shots at my friends, is not fine.  S ven M anguard   Wha?  00:16, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

On Ogg Vorbis
From the Syrinx nom:


 * Support—why can no one get into the description page to edit "Ogg Vorbis sound file, length 2m 26s, 201kbps"> The spacing needs to be fixed, as with all such. Tony   (talk)  08:26, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

That's actually hard-coded into Wikipedia software. I'd suggest bringing it up at WP:VP or https://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/ Adam Cuerden (talk) 23:37, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

Review
Hello Tony. Sorry to bother you, but I was hoping you could take a look at this fac Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Tatsunoko vs. Capcom: Ultimate All-Stars/archive2. Its been long, its been drawn-out, so anything from you would be much appreciated. <font color="#666666">« ₣M₣ »  04:50, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Hard until this weekend. Tony   (talk)  08:46, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

Main Page
By the way, if noone else told you, both the FS and FL proposals passed, and they'll be going on the main page ASAP, albeit with a pause in there for approval of the code.

Estimated time scale is another week to get the coding finished, followed by a week to review and take in any suggestions, then a week to seek final approval. Adam Cuerden (talk) 14:28, 14 March 2011 (UTC)


 * I will go to war for you, Adam. No prisoners!  (watch the movie)  TCO (talk) 22:15, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

Posible FSC (The Planets)
Hey tony. I was wondering if you could listen to several moment on the planets and tell me if they could pass FS.

The other issue I for see is that we have only 4/7 of the whole suite. cheers --Guerillero &#124; My Talk   22:35, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

The Signpost: 14 March 2011
<div style="margin-top:10px; font-size:90%; padding-left:5px; font-family:Georgia, Palatino, Palatino Linotype, Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Read this Signpost in full · Single-page · Unsubscribe · EdwardsBot (talk) 02:00, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

Featured article
Back on February 19, Warren County, Indiana was promoted to featured article; but as far as I can see, it has not been mentioned with other featured articles in any of the four Signpost issues since then. I asked about this on the Signpost talk page but got no response. Can the article be included in the next issue, please? Omnedon (talk) 02:07, 16 March 2011 (UTC)
 * OK, sorry about that. I have a clear recollection of its inclusion, but you are right. Tony   (talk)  06:40, 16 March 2011 (UTC)

The Bugle: Issue LX, February 2011
To stop receiving this newsletter, please list yourself in the appropriate section here. To assist with preparing the newsletter, please visit the newsroom. BrownBot (talk) 22:54, 17 March 2011 (UTC)

Credo accounts
Hi Tony, we're about to make a few hundred more Credo Reference accounts available to Wikipedians, courtesy of the company and Erik Moeller of the Foundation who has arranged the donation. We've worked out criteria on the talk page, so that we aim the accounts at content contributors. Now we're trying to work out what time UTC would be fairest to open the page for people to add their names (it's going to be first come, first served, so long as you fit the criteria, and open to all-language Wikipedias). I'm thinking 22:00 UTC, which is 09:00 in Sydney. If you have time, would you mind commenting on behalf of your hemisphere here? SlimVirgin TALK |  CONTRIBS 16:11, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

Economy of India
Hi, would it be possible for you to take a look at the article and see if the concerns that you raised here have been addressed? My responses are on the same page. Also, thanks for this link on your page – I found it quite useful. Regards, SBC-YPR (talk) 18:18, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

Re description page comment Featured sound candidates/Burleske
I simply do not have time to do it now, but once we have a schedule and form a queue for the main page, I will overhaul the description pages one by one when they hit the queue (ideally this would be at least a month before they hit the main page, so plenty of time to double check that it's all in order. I do agree with you that description pages need to be done right by the time they hit the main page. As to the characters, as I am a file mover on both commons and en-wiki (Guerillero is as well) we can make sure those are acceptable during the queue period as well. I'll be gone for the rest of the weekend, so I suppose we can work out the details on the exact thing you're looking for in titles on Monday or later.  S ven M anguard   Wha?  21:43, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

A dash question
Tony, could you give an opinion on the en dash question discussed here? Sandy and I figure you're the one who would know the answer. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 01:54, 21 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Sorry, Tony, I guess I was a bit unclear -- glad to get your opinion on that topic, but what I was hoping for was your opinion on the dashes question at the top of that section. The question is whether a U.S. Public Law gets an en dash or a hyphen in its title; there are links to the relevant places in that sections.  Thanks. Mike Christie (talk - contribs -  library) 11:43, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

Malmö FF images
Hi! I saw your edits on the image sizes in the Malmö FF article. The article has recently been promoted to FA status. No one questioned the sizes of the images in the FAC so I haven't considered the issue before. Out of interest for the general consensus I did some research. According to Images: "As a rule, images should not be set to a larger fixed size than the 220px default". According to MOSIMAGES "Images containing important detail (for example, a map, diagram, or chart), and which may need larger sizes than usual.". I think you are correct for the panorama picture but I believe the other images should be 220px at maximum since they are not detailed images as specified in the manual of style. From my experience pictures in most articles are 200px so that's most likely why I chose that size from the beginning. I won't change the size right now as I'd like to hear if you have any other experiences or arguments as to why the images should be larger than 220px, I'm always open for constructive criticism. Thanks! --Reckless182 (talk) 09:51, 21 March 2011 (UTC)
 * MOSIMAGES says "The thumbnail option may be used ("thumb"), or another size may be fixed. The default thumbnail width is 220 pixels; ... An option such as "|300px|" resizes the image to the specified width in pixels, ... An image should generally be no more than 500 pixels tall and 400 pixels [wide]." The images in that article were forced lower than the default. They appeared unreasonably small to me. Are they not more appropriate to the detail in them now? Thanks. Tony   (talk)  10:01, 21 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Thanks for pointing that out, I didn't notice that sentence. I find it strange that the default size is described as 220px in WP:IMAGES but 500x400 in MOSIMAGES, I guess there is no general consensus. Either way I don't see any harm in 240px size images. --Reckless182 (talk) 10:29, 21 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Reckless, the policy and guideline were both updated last year to move away from the era of small screens and slow downloads; this was around the time en.WP sucessfully pushed the Foundation techs to move the whole 300 projects, gradually, from 180px to 220px default thumbnail size: great!). In fact, for readers with slow connections it's often better to have a larger display in an article, so they are less likely to need to double-click on the original; originals are often huge and take much longer to download. I am generalising here, and individual cases need to be judged on their merits. BTW, I encourage all editors to arrange and size images WRT narrow-to-wide window widths and font sizes/skins, etc. Just move your window through from narrow to wide to see what a difference it makes in the way text and pics interact. For this reason, left-side placements need to be treated with caution when there are right-side pics in the same section. Also, I recommend squashing all of the syntaxes for pics in a section right at the top, unless there's a reason not to. Tony   (talk)  10:57, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

I was going to post this on Sven's talk
But any ensuing discussion there would probably just upset him further.

Yes, I've borne your comments well, as I have thousands before from others. I have developed the necessary callus towards third-party opinions, and have gotten used to the age-old process: read critique, digest critique, practice, stop thinking about critique, practice more, practice more. I've gritted teeth while my own father told me, albeit innocuously, that I "should really seek a career in law or economics." And when I was seven years old, I weathered hearing, "If you continue playing the way you do, you'll never become a decent pianist" (from a judge at a music festival). During some competitions, I literally wanted to kill myself on-stage. I wanted to just disappear into thin air and never come back. Compared to those moments, any affect your words have had on me are minute.

There's just one thing I can't understand, though. One is usually accustomed to hearing criticism when auditioning for a prestigious post, being evaluated for mid-term juries, or entering a competition. Not when volunteering one's own free work to public domain for a volunteer project.

You see, the reason I wanted to join FS in the first place was to escape the pressures of competitions and auditions. I wanted to just record a piece of music that I thought was fairly nice, submit it to featured so my work would get more plays (and FS could get more attention), and ultimately make the present-day Wikipedia get a little closer to the multimedia-rich and promising Wikipedia I love and want it to become. And, of course, spreading music never hurt anyone. So seeing a 20+ line wall of text in response to a four-minute FSC of mine, in a supposedly neutral, consensus-based, and friendly atmosphere, is a significant turn-off to me. There are other ways to make your point.

I admit, FS has standards, and the height of said standards varies from individual to individual. I also admit that you have the right to your own opinion and the right to phrase your critiques however you wish. And I further acknowledge that users knowingly submit their work to public critique the moment they make their recordings a featured candidate. But unless you find a way to smooth your edges, you're going to find it damn hard to find many else willing to participate in your "blood sport." If I didn't care as much as I did about FS, I would have left a long time ago. I simply have better ways to spend my time and effort.

I'm not going to sling personal attacks on you. I'm not going to call you names or anything of the sort. I'm only going to alert you to something that, if you don't consider, will drive away scores of new musicians from FS. Bluntly put, the way you phrase your comments is unnecessarily, excessively analytic and occasionally can be perceived as condescending - whether you mean them to be or not. The latter is especially true for newer musicians. Imagine: they've just dipped their toes into the world of recording art, just produced a slightly-above-average recording and got into their silly heads the strange idea to share it with the rest of the world, for free. And what happens? They're confronted with an almost bar-by-bar analysis where a few general, constructive comments could have sufficed just as well.

Again, the concern isn't mainly me, though I'd be lying if I said I wasn't hurt or didn't care. It's the new musicians that we're probably missing that are easily scared off. You call it having standards, I call it overly-zealous reviewing, they may call it hostility. TL;DR version - please don't bite. &mdash; <font color="gray" face="Times New Roman">La Pianista  ♫ ♪ 00:39, 21 March 2011 (UTC)
 * "the reason I wanted to join FS in the first place was to escape the pressures of competitions and auditions". Ah, I think you have the wrong idea there. This is not an in-house group where favours are passed to and fro: no, your files are treated just as others are. Would you have it any way? "Not when volunteering one's own free work to public domain for a volunteer project."—Makes no difference. You want an accolade, a gold star, recognition. You therefore must be willing to cop criticism of your work. Mine was pretty factual ... you can't get away with wrong notes and dynamics. Might be OK appearing in an article, but not featured. I will be nominating Pour le piano for delisting as soon as it is possible: as you are quite aware, the performance of that very difficult work is not of professional standard, although I think you could do it. "unnecessarily, excessively analytic. "They're confronted with an almost bar-by-bar analysis where a few general, constructive comments could have sufficed just as well."—Sorry, ma'am, that's the way to do it. I'm surprised you're not pleased to have this advice. Why would you react to it personally? You need that kind of feedback, and by nominating your work for featured statement you can hardly be surprised to get it. You're not going to be a serious professional if you can't learn from such feedback.
 * I understand your views. I won't be participating in FS further. &mdash; <font color="gray" face="Times New Roman">La Pianista  ♫ ♪ 22:41, 21 March 2011 (UTC)


 * Pianista, I want to say two things here, not knowing the background to this. First, I listened to your recording of Toccata from Pour le Piano, and it was absolutely beautiful. It brought a tear to my eye, and has made me want to take up the piano again, something I foolishly abandoned many years ago. Please do continue to share your playing with Wikipedia.


 * Secondly, Tony has high standards when it comes to issues he's familiar with, which includes music and writing. He has criticized my writing in the past, sometimes in great detail. But he was right, and I learned a lot from what he told me. Telling someone "this is lovely" is important, because it's encouraging, and that matters a lot; but being told "this would be better if you did X and Y" is of enormous value. Most people don't take the time or trouble to do it, or don't have the expertise, or don't want to risk being criticized for it, so I think when we find someone who's willing to offer that kind of detailed critique, we should grab it and use it. Don't be discouraged by it; on the contrary, be encouraged that he found your work worthy of that degree of attention. SlimVirgin  TALK| CONTRIBS 00:31, 22 March 2011 (UTC)
 * SlimVirgin: I'm flattered. It was my pleasure to play it, and I'm really happy you enjoyed it. :)
 * As I've mentioned, I'm very much used to digesting critiques. I do agree that Tony's reviews are helpful and are, in the big scheme of things, constructive. I've already implemented all of his comments into my playing after a few practice sessions - his advice was useful, and I've never said otherwise (I hope not). My issue was that perhaps his method is too thorough, which can scare off future users and can be construed as hostility by some other participants.
 * Personally, my main problem isn't that. It's just that I get floods of reviews like this elsewhere. I just got back from a chamber music session today and a 90-minute lesson on the Toccata and some other pieces that were FSC's. I will have a concert tomorrow, playing that same rep. The day after, I have another chamber music coaching session, and the day after that, I'm going out-of-state to compete in the national finals.
 * I do not need this from Wikipedia.
 * All that is necessary is a simple "oppose for X and Y reasons." I can sort out the rest myself.
 * In addition, I only have one chance to make my recordings, as the hall's schedule is usually packed. All my recordings I've uploaded, with the exception of the most recent Brahms excerpt - was done in one, unedited take. Perfection cannot be expected under such circumstances and I'm averse to post-performance editing for personal reasons. If that means that my work is not featured-status, so be it, though I'll still upload my recordings for use in articles.
 * I've tried not to whine, but sometimes, excuses (hopefully valid ones) have to be given. Maybe I'm just a little too stressed right now - my apologies to Tony if I've said anything out of line as a result. &mdash; <font color="gray" face="Times New Roman">La Pianista  ♫ ♪ 01:15, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

The Signpost: 21 March 2011
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Italics used in opera article titles
Hi. I see you've been somewhat involved at WP:TITLE. Do you know if the policy on italics in article titles has changed? Someone is using a script to change a whole lot of titles to italics (see ). What is your view on this? Thanks. -- Klein zach  23:09, 24 March 2011 (UTC)
 * I'd have thought opera titles were italicised, but the answer lies at MoS (music), if anywhere. The article titles on that linked contribs page weren't italicised. I'm not regularly involved at wp:title. Tony   (talk)  01:26, 25 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Thanks. I've asked on MoS Music. (Some of the titles on that linked contribs page were reverted by an IP.) -- Klein zach  02:53, 25 March 2011 (UTC)
 * OK, I'll take a look at MoS (music), strangely a place I've rarely gone to, although I think I was there last month about figured-bass notation. Ah, I see, someone has kindly suggested a solution, but the numbers are huge ... oh ... Tony   (talk)  11:28, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

Netball
John suggested I contact you to see if you might have any insight into the pain level that might be involved with trying to get Netball past a featured article review. :) --LauraHale (talk) 11:14, 26 March 2011 (UTC)
 * I wouldn't normally offer, but the need to address the sports gender asymmetry at WP is so dire, I'm keen about such an article (even though men do play netball ...). Tony   (talk)  11:36, 26 March 2011 (UTC) PS Any chance of attracting outsiders to become WPians to pursue this kind of work/topic?  Tony   (talk)  11:37, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

The Signpost: 28 March 2011
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re: picture arrangement on F&A
I actually use two computers with considerably different resolutions frequently. My laptop has a standard 14.1" screen and at 1024x768, the text reached a little past the image of Strauss, leaving very little whitespace between the text and the map of the Chernobyl area. But on my 22" widescreen, the problems you are concerned about are certainly manifest, as the text only goes as far as the cat. That leaves two pictures worth of white space. In the case of this week's feature, I think could remove the immediately above the Chernobyl map, placing it directly below the last Featured Sound entry. I just tried that and on the preview view it fills the whitespace in nicely, leading you directly into the comments. I think that would look similar for most resolution settings. For a series of smaller images, you could probably do the same, setting them side by side below the text. My only worry would be that all the pictures could overwhelm the surrounding text. But it might be something to play with. Cheers! Resolute 04:28, 29 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Thanks, Res. I removed the breaking template (-) as you suggested, then put FS below the map. It does work better for large window widths, as far as I can see, and doesn't damage the display of images and images vs text in narrow-width windows. In previous editions, there have been problems with the centred pic at the bottom overlapping with the side pics. Not this week, though. Tony   (talk)  06:45, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Photos for Signpost
I must apologize. There was another new post on my talk page when you made your request, and I never saw your post until now. I hope this didn't cause too much of a problem, and I'm happy that nice photos were found for the right side. Wouldn't have remembered them, if I'm honest.  Giants2008  ( 27 and counting ) 00:08, 30 March 2011 (UTC)
 * No problem, Giants. Perhaps you might, instead, comment (in a future week?) on the arrangement of images vs text on F and A, which is a challenge in terms of accommodating the huge variation in resolutions, window widths, and text sizes with which our readers display WP pages. Tony   (talk)  05:29, 30 March 2011 (UTC)
 * I'll have to try looking at Signpost on different screen resolutions (use a widescreen with low resolution myself). While I'm here, there's a grammar-related question I've been meaning to ask you. Growing up, I was always under the impression that a sentence shouldn't be started with "But". A couple weeks ago, I was told differently by a couple of FAC regulars who I respect. Are they correct?  Giants2008  ( 27 and counting ) 11:18, 30 March 2011 (UTC)
 * I'd normally avoid in a formal (encyclopedic) register. But I wouldn't say never because someone will surely bounce back and provide an example that might be OK. "However, ..." is usually better; or join the sentence to the previous one with a semicolon? Tony   (talk)  12:11, 30 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Sounds like what I would do. Thanks for the input.  Giants2008  ( 27 and counting ) 19:38, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

Suggestion for article
Hey Tony there is a discussion of qwiki.com at Jimbo's home page. It might be worth an article for the signpost. Try out the site, yes there are a lot of laughable errors, but it is surprisingly good.--Wehwalt (talk) 17:13, 30 March 2011 (UTC)
 * We have covered Qwiki twice already (here and here). If the recent observations that it sometimes ranks higher than Wikipedia in search engines can be substantiated, that might be news, but at the moment they seem still seem to be anecdotal. Regards, HaeB (talk) 19:36, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

Question
Hiya Tony,

Do you know how to alter the sidebar links so that they're also in a darker colour? I like a bit of uniformity and two contrasting colours gives me a headache. Sorry to be a bother. Cheers, —  Ancient Apparition •  Champagne?  • 10:17pm • 11:17, 2 April 2011 (UTC)
 * If you do that, you'll lose the information that tells you that you've already visited a page (distinguished by the different hue of blue/purple). Are you sure you want that? I have toned down the garish blue of links I haven't visited (the default); I suppose you could experiment to find equality. See my user page, further down. Tony   (talk)  14:49, 2 April 2011 (UTC)
 * Whoops, my question there wasn't worded in the best of ways, what I meant was how can I alter the sidebar to use the same link formatting. Apologies for the confusing wording of my statement. —  Ancient Apparition •  Champagne?  • 11:39am • 00:39, 3 April 2011 (UTC)
 * You mean the sidebar that starts with "Main page", to the left? The links all look the same in formatting to me. Tony   (talk)  01:52, 3 April 2011 (UTC)
 * I think it's because I put the link formatting line in my common.css as well as vector.css, I'll remove it from there and see if the sidebar links are changed. —  Ancient Apparition •  Champagne?  • 3:08pm • 04:08, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

Hello Tony, I saw your your comment on the Celebrity talk page and wondered if you could me implement my rewrite of this article. What is the proper process? With thanks, AbelBergaigneAbelBergaigne (talk) 12:16, 3 April 2011 (UTC)
 * Hi Abel. I can hardly remember—it was years ago, wasn't it? I can now recall thinking ill thoughts about the quality of that article, not helped by my hugely POV philosophical hatred of anything to do with celebrity. The article needs to deal with celebrity as a concept, as a phenomenon, via the sources. Perhaps you might google scholar the sources ... and see what's on the booklist at google, too? It's not an easy article to write. Tony   (talk)  12:38, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

The Signpost: 4 April 2011
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New article on Celebrity
Hello Tony, thank you for responding. I have already done some research and have rewritten the article. It is on my user page [] But I am new to Wikipedia and don't know how to switch the old article with my new one. I don't want to make any mistakes. Can you help me with this? Thank you AbelBergaigne (talk) 19:20, 6 April 2011 (UTC)

Minor Fix to The Wikipedia Sign Post
Hi Tony,

I just thought that I'd let you know that I made a minor fix to the Wikipedia Signpost. Great work on it, it's an excellent read!

I was looking at the "Share this page" link and thought it might be useful to add a #wikipedia trend tag to the end of the Twitter post - it wouldn't do any harm but might possibly help (I don't know the guidelines for Twitter, but just a thought)!

Hope this helps,

The Helpful  One  23:22, 7 April 2011 (UTC)
 * Thank you, THO! Tony   (talk)  23:24, 7 April 2011 (UTC)
 * You're welcome! It's what I do best! :) The  Helpful  One  21:53, 8 April 2011 (UTC)

Hi Tony1
Hi Tony, with the link colour changer I've noticed that the colour of interwikis and external links aren't changed. — James (Talk • Contribs) • 1:05pm • 03:05, 12 April 2011 (UTC)

The Signpost: 11 April 2011
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New version notice
See new file at Featured sound candidates/Address Before a Joint Session of Congress (February 24, 2009) Barack Obama (video).--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 04:28, 14 April 2011 (UTC)

AN notice
Hello. This message is being sent to inform you that there is currently a discussion at Administrators' noticeboard regarding an issue with which you may have been involved. The thread is "Topic ban proposal concerning the lame "Mexican-American War" hyphen/en-dash dispute".Thank you.  Sandstein  20:28, 14 April 2011 (UTC)

Feedback request
Hello Tony1, I'm back here to ask if you could review the prose on the article Dassault Rafale? The sections I'm requesting for feedback are "Requirements", "Technology demonstrator" and "Testing and procurement". I've skimmed through much of tips and tricks, and I've done my best to implement your suggestions into my writing, which is good because I'm still a high-school student. Also, the Airbus A330 which I had asked you for comments last month is currently at FAC; it might seem a bit late, but could you have a look, and rate, out of 5, how good the prose is? Thanks <b style="background:SaddleBrown;color:Gold;">Sp33dyphil</b>  Ready • to • Rumble  05:26, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

The Signpost: 18 April 2011
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Classical music
I get your point about being choosy over time with music files. However, now that I have found decent homes for the Debussy pieces, are they valuable enough for FS?--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 16:10, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

Diamond watches and the encyclopedia that anyone can edit
Hi Tony,

I thought this might be worth a mention in the Signpost, as it seems to imply something about the way the public perceives Wikipedia. Exactly what that implication is, I'll leave to your speculation.

Cheers, Adrian J. Hunter(talk•contribs) 16:08, 22 April 2011 (UTC)

Oral history
SlimVirgin TALK |  CONTRIBS 16:20, 22 April 2011 (UTC)

Picture size
Hey Tony, believe it or not I just resized the image because it was blurry. I thought the blurriness would be a little less noticeable if the image were smaller. Sorry I didn't explain that in the edit summery. Kaldari (talk) 17:20, 19 April 2011 (UTC)
 * Nice! Thanks. Tony   (talk)  13:23, 26 April 2011 (UTC)

OK, Tony - I Give Up on
LOL! Sorry if my last message was ALSO too hardcore for you. Just wanna quickly clarify a few thing with regard to your surrebuttal. First, despite your denial, the facts are this issue HAS involved you, and DOES involve you, whether you like it or not, because you took a position in the initial debate. Moreover, you (quite kindly) injected yourself into it in your last message by offering to mediate, by seeing if you could get your friend to chill. Therefore, I WILL be "calling you as a witness" as the process moves forward. Second, as I've tried to explain to you, my occasional use of capitals in single words or short phrases is for EMPHASIS. Admittedly that's not STANDARD Netiquette, but its proven highly useful in conveying more precisely my meaning for nearly four decades, and I figured that you - of all folks - being a professional linguist whose ultimate goal is the betterment of communication, would appreciate it at LEAST a tiny bit!
 * I'm not a professional linguist. I do find the capitalisation a bit in my face, especially in your two previous messages—and your posts have been very long. I am unacquainted with this issue, even though I wrote a few posts somewhere about it a while ago. I haven't looked since you started bombarding my talk page because I have other things much higher on my list of priorities. I did not offer to mediate anything. I suggest you try to find common ground with Kwami: shorter, less frequent posts in whatever forum you're debating this in would be a good start. Try to get to the core of your misunderstanding with him. I'm busy. Tony   (talk)  12:39, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

HUGE apology
Tony:

After further investigation, I see now that I owe you a HUGE apology. You are NOT the person I thought you were. Very sorry, sir. I'm truly embarrassed - I spoke WAYYY too soon.

Humbly: Cliff L. Knickerbocker, MS (talk) 00:42, 25 April 2011 (UTC)

The Signpost: 25 April 2011
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Clinton Lewinsky watermark
I do not know how to remove watermarks. On a single image it would take me an hour to do a half-arsed clone job. At 15-30 frames per second I am hopeless. Basically, my primary strategy at removing watermarks on images is to crop them out. I don't have any video technology that allows me to crop frames. I do not know any other sophisticated techniques that I could hope to do for a whole video.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 13:50, 24 April 2011 (UTC)
 * The other possibility is that you can convince the Clinton Presidential Center (CPC) to give us access to a copy without the Miller Center watermark. I could not find the video on the website during or before the WP:FSC run.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 13:52, 24 April 2011 (UTC)
 * OK; I didn't seem to notice it first time, during the nomination. Now it's a brown blobbish rectangle. I'd have thought a watermark would provide the icon of whoever produced the vid originally—very strange. Could you have go at obtaining a clear copy from them? At least you're a citizen. I'd suggest phoning them to find the best person to email, with a phone call to that person later if there's no response. You could say their organisation/producer would be acknowledged via the main page eventually, if we can get a clean copy ...? Tony   (talk)  14:09, 24 April 2011 (UTC) PS Cropping would be difficult, given the positioning of the blob, I think.  Tony   (talk)  14:10, 24 April 2011 (UTC)
 * I was unable to find a phone number, but left a message with the online contact client.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 21:35, 25 April 2011 (UTC)

Isn't it a Miller Center archive video? If it is then the watermark is for identification purposes yada-yada, if not edit it out. — James (Talk • Contribs) • 3:44pm • 05:44, 26 April 2011 (UTC)
 * So what's the deal with watermarks? If we ID them in the caption and/or the SDP, I'd have thought that would cover their kindness in releasing it. The ID is not legible in thumbnail size, at least not for me. It's an ugly, solid mud-brown rectangle that looks like a technical glitch. Tony   (talk)  06:12, 26 April 2011 (UTC)
 * Apparently it's part of their terms, per Template:Miller_Center their files are watermarked, but it says that the Presidential archives should have better quality files and those should be uploaded in a new location if the Miller Center file is an FS, it doesn't say anything about editing the Miller Center file, but to be safe I wouldn't touch the Miller Center file. — James (Talk • Contribs) • 7:38pm • 09:38, 26 April 2011 (UTC)
 * OK. So would cropping be in the same league? Or altering the contrast level? I think it requires further discussion, or a query to the experts at WP:NFC (the Commons talk page for copyright is also very good). Is there an analogy with featured pics? Tony   (talk)  13:12, 26 April 2011 (UTC)
 * I think altering it in any way is not allowed, the wording of the actual MC template is slightly ambiguous, I'd upload a Presidential Archive file as it suggests and nom that for FS. It'd definitely be a good idea to pay them a visit to get this issue cleared, I don't particularly like the quality of the MC files tbh. — James (Talk • Contribs) • 4:14pm • 06:14, 27 April 2011 (UTC)

True, Miller Center recordings are PD, but the template says new versions should not be uploaded over Miller Center files, so altering of Miller Center files is not permitted, that is one of the conditions of us hosting Miller Center files for others to view/listen. The template for Miller Center files also says that the Presidential Archives have better files and if available:
 * TTT, what do you think? Worth taking this up? Also, it would do the Foundation a favour if you pursued better access with the Miller Center. Are you a member of the US Chapter of the WMF? Tony   (talk)  08:12, 27 April 2011 (UTC)
 * I disagree with James. I believe anything that is PD and allowable on commons is alterable and probably protected by rulings such as Leibovitz v. Paramount Pictures Corp.. --TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 13:25, 27 April 2011 (UTC)
 * In terms of taking this up somewhere, I think the technology involved in editing watermarks out of videos is extremely high-tech and not likely to be achieved on WP.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 13:25, 27 April 2011 (UTC)
 * I don't think a FS is suppose to be altered without going through FSC again. If we were to propose a significantly altered version, it would take over a week to confirm it is still and FS (after however long it would take to produce).--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 13:25, 27 April 2011 (UTC)
 * OK, thinking of the longer term here, and I'm sure if we did have the technology to remove it, there would be no problem in getting a "clean" version through FSC. There's no hurry, anyway. Tony   (talk)  16:03, 27 April 2011 (UTC)

Video files from the Miller Center are watermarked by the center. In many cases a higher quality version of video, or one without the watermark, will be available through the respective presidential libraries. Users with screencasting software are encouraged to upload new versions of the videos if comparable or greater audio and visual quality can be achieved. If the speech is listed as a Featured Sound, please do not upload the new version over the old one, instead upload a new version and inform Featured Sounds at Wikipedia talk:Featured sound candidates. If it's not a featured sound, feel free to upload the new version over the Miller Center version.

— James (Talk • Contribs) • 10:25am • 00:25, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

The Bugle: Issue LXI, March 2011
To stop receiving this newsletter, please list yourself in the appropriate section here. To assist with preparing the newsletter, please visit the newsroom. BrownBot (talk) 04:55, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

National Broadband Network
Since your FA review the article went through changes. Is there a chance you can revisit your review to provide more feedback? Thanks. — <b style='color:#464646'>[d'oh]</b> 06:46, 2 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Just letting you know I have addressed the issues you raised in the second review. — <b style='color:#464646'>[d'oh]</b> 11:35, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

The Signpost: 2 May 2011
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US 131 FAC
Juliancolton has finished his copy editing. Can you pop back to the FAC?  Imzadi 1979  →   00:26, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

incident
Hello. This message is being sent to inform you that there is currently a discussion at Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents regarding an issue with which you may have been involved. Thank you. Dicklyon (talk) 05:58, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

Internet connection crisis
Well, it has finally built up to crisis point over weeks and months, all the more stressful because no one can work out why it has almost ground to a halt and the fixed-line phone has noise. Tried everything. Just to apologise if my presence is intermittent. Drop-outs are frequent and unpredictable. Now it's with the ISP's emergency fault technicians, out of the hands of Australia's hopeless, complacent, still partly government-owned copper-wire monopoly. Tony  (talk)  14:29, 3 May 2011 (UTC)


 * The first result from my Google News search for australia internet connection problems is Australians in suburbs to bear worse Internet connections due to NBN roll out - International Business Times. Wikipedia has more information in the article "National Broadband Network".
 * —Wavelength (talk) 16:21, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

GOCE drive newsletter
Sent on behalf of the Guild of Copy Editors using AWB on 09:06, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

ANI
Just a note to say yes, dropping notes on user talk and ANI simultaneously is a bogus move. Additionally, the implicit idea presented on ANI than an editor should have to review ANI before editing or they deserve a block reaches the realm of insanity. On the other hand, referring to another editor's health wasn't a good move. The best response to unwarranted nonsense is usually to ignore it. Happy editing! Gerardw (talk) 14:59, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

Hi Tony1
I saw your name come across my watchlist, so I stopped in to take a look. I just wanted to say that I am very impressed with your tutorials. I'm a writer who has long been interested in linguistics and in how language leads to comprehension. I found your tutorial to be an excellent guide, highlighting several mistakes I often make. I just wanted to say thanks and, if it's OK with you, I'd like to provide links to them on my own user page. Zaereth (talk) 19:46, 2 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Zaereth, thanks, you are very kind! I need to go through them all when the next RL work deadline passes: the garden needs tending. Also, I have vowed to create a tutorial page for non-native en.WPians on the use of deictics such as "the" and "a", which has defeated me twice before. Tony   (talk)  09:54, 3 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Wow, you want to tackle deixis, huh? I guess, then, that you'll have one heck of a job ahead of you. It's an especially difficult subject to explain to native English speakers, let alone non-natives. I've found the book Pragmatic meaning and cognition to be helpful. The book goes into some of the problems faced when trying to give a universal explanation of deixis, to quote:


 * In the absence of a general theoretical framework of deixis, linguists have generally tended to establish categories of deictics according to their function and the contextual parameter they define. It should be noted that these categories have been identified mostly in relation to Indo-European languages and English in particular. The study of deixis in languages such as Finnish, Yucatec Maya, Tzeltal Mayan, and several Australian Aboriginal and Papuan languages reveals not only different categories from those of most Indo-European languages but also completely different systems of referring to space. Apparently, the conception of space is culturally embedded to such an extent that any claims to universality must await results of extensive emperical investigation before they can be sustained. --Sophia S. A. Marmaridou


 * I checked google books, and it looks like the relevant pages are available. I hope that helps. If I can be of further assistance, please feel free to ask. Zaereth (talk) 20:34, 3 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Not all deictics, but "the" and "a", which are a particular problem for non-natives from many languages. Even Halliday doesn't go into it from the angle that is necessary; native speakers (including me) find reverse-engineering it very difficult; I think I'll start this time from examples and work back to the explanatory text from there, rather than the opposite, which got me tangled up last time. Tony   (talk)  04:06, 5 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Ah, I see. I remembered reading about deixis in other languages but, since I don't speak any others, I'm afraid I won't be much help. I guess I'd better just work on not using commas where a hyphen is needed, and other such mistakes. I often deal with technical and scientific writers, and had thought about writing a little essay specifically to help them. It seems to me that sometimes those who are well versed in the language of math are not always so in the language of words, and visa-versa. I think it would be helpful to explain some of the similarities and differences between drafting an elegant formula and writing an eloquent paragraph. Many of the functions are the same. (ie: "is" means the same thing as =, where "and" is the same as +, etc...) I've come across many articles that rely too heavily on formulas and diagrams to explain the subject matter. It's almost an alien concept to some people that, although it's nice to have diagrams and formulas, an article should be understandable from the writing alone. Oh well, perhaps I'll do something in the future.


 * Anyhow, thanks again for your efforts. I have placed your tutorial box on my page. Hopefully, others who stop by will find it as useful as I have. Zaereth (talk) 00:29, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

Your comments on the logarithm FAC
In case you have not seen it: I have responded to your comments at Featured article candidates/Logarithm/archive1. I'd appreciate your feedback on this. Thank you, Jakob.scholbach (talk) 17:26, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

ESL: "the" and "a"
ESL Links - Learning English is a useful page. I do not know whether any of the resources listed there has anything which can help you in explaining "the" and "a" to non-native speakers, but you might wish to search through them. —Wavelength (talk) 18:42, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

Request clarification at your MOS RfC
Hey, I had a question about your endash RfC; Ohms law and I had a materially different interpretation on your wording, I would appreciate it if you would clarify what you meant. Thanks, ErikHaugen (talk | contribs) 20:22, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

input requested
Hi Tony. I wondered if you wouldn't mind offering your input on this issue? Your views would be most welcome. Parrot of Doom 12:31, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

RFC discussion of User:Philip Baird Shearer
A request for comments has been filed concerning the conduct of. You are invited to comment on the discussion at    :Requests for comment/Philip Baird Shearer. -- Parrot of Doom 10:48, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

Duplicates!
You have Trade dollar and Peace dollar listed twice each, which is why I took them out. Am I missing something?--Wehwalt (talk) 16:55, 9 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Wehwalt, thanks! Time-stressed at the moment, and that page is a TIME SINK. Took me hours, so I guess I become a bit glazed over. Any other glitches, I'd be really grateful if you fixed them. Dabomb should be along soon to do the lists. HaeB wants to publish by midnight UTC. I've got to go to bed: it's 3:10 am. Tony   (talk)  17:09, 9 May 2011 (UTC)
 * OK, done that.--Wehwalt (talk) 17:16, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

The Signpost: 9 May 2011
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Loss of confidence in the RfA process
I'm sorry to be blunt when stability would be preferable for such a vital part of the health of the en.WP community. But the recent RfA reconfirmation scandal has caused me to lose all confidence in the system.

On the RfA page, the words "INVOLVED", "uninvolved", and "involvement" occur:
 * once in the self-nomination statement
 * four times in the closing statement
 * 24 times in the questions to the applicant
 * 57 times in the Support section
 * 89 times in the Oppose section
 * 10 times in the Neutral section.

That's a total of 180 times. Jeez, and the crats waved it through. That system is sick.

Jimbo wants to do something about it, but is "basically at a loss as to what the right solution is". I don't blame him: it's a difficult call, and everything you come up with seems to have significant drawbacks. So right now he needs the community's supportive wisdom to help him develop a better way for the community to manage the admin system.

In particular, I've observed that a painfully high proportion of admins either disregard or do not understand the conflict-of-interest provision in the policy that governs their behaviour. Any reform should address this. We also need to tackle the trigger-happy tendency of an increasing number of admins to block well-established and faithful editors, rather than engaging with the underlying reasons for ruffled waters and frayed nerves. Nowadays, we can't afford to lose good, loyal editors who might happen to get into a scrap occasionally—the trends in the statistics of participation are sobering.

Other discussions:
 * RfA as a case study
 * Crats' noticeboard
 * ANI thread
 * Late surge of admin support alleged. Tony   (talk)  14:30, 11 May 2011 (UTC)


 * As an opposer, subsequent commenter on the talk page, and the person who raised the "late" votes issue, I don't actually find I have lost much confidence myself. The system is what it is, with various quirks and biases. Though Sarek's many promises to improve his INVOLVED behaviour were sometimes pretty ambivalent, I suspect his conduct will change somewhat.  A very large number of supporters made clear they were doing so on that assumption, & if they are proved wrong his position as an admin is likely to be difficult. Johnbod (talk) 14:47, 11 May 2011 (UTC)


 * I had very little confidence in the system to begin with, so I can't say that I've lost much. Malleus Fatuorum 14:50, 11 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Johnbod, I don't disagree with your key points, but by making RfA such an ordeal in the first place, we've made it harder to give admins a break from it. Clearly, the crats need a middle option in such cases, like giving the applicant a probationary period of, say, 6–12 months. Tony   (talk)  14:53, 11 May 2011 (UTC)
 * I agree tony, it looks like they just let him in the side door. As for your probation idea, I doubt that the will do it. Its too logical. --Guerillero &#124;  My Talk  17:12, 11 May 2011 (UTC)
 * It's very simple: you choose to accept a lack of validation of your opinion, or you don't. Whichever choice you make should be the barometer of whether you continue to contribute to WP or not.  If you have no faith in the community or its rules, perhaps you should get while the getting is good, because things won't bode well for you if all you do is fight against policies, etc.  However, complaining about it after the fact because your viewpoint didn't "win" achieves nothing except make you look like a sore loser and agitator. MSJapan (talk) 20:50, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

Future FAC candidate - Bryan Gunn
Hi. I've done a lot of work on this article over a period of time, and it's getting close to being ready for FAC. If you have some time to copyedit or dump some problems to work on at the article talk, I'd be very pleased. Thanks in anticipation. --Dweller (talk) 15:25, 13 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Dweller, keen to do this, and I will if not too late, but my hands are tied until Tuesday (RL work stress-out for client deadlines). It will be a battle to get the F and A page done for The Signpost; I'm dreading it. Tony   (talk)  16:43, 13 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Tony, I think "whenever you're ready" springs to mind. Dweller's been on this for a couple of months now, along with some gnoming from others so I believe it's fair to say we're all happy to wait a few more days for some pointers.  Best wishes, The Rambling Man (talk) 16:55, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

Gosh, no problem. Like TRM says, this has not been a quick project. As I've noted on the article talk, I do still want to add a few more bits to it, to add better balance, but whenever you're ready... it is. Thanks. --Dweller (talk) 13:08, 16 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Last client will be only a two-hour job coming up at midnight (nonsmooth bifurcation theory, online in London). I'm brain-dead already. Give me 18–24 hours and I'll be along. In the meantime, I have a short break and ... phew ... have to do the whole Features and Admins page at The Signpost. :-(     Tony   (talk)  13:23, 16 May 2011 (UTC)

nominal group
I have raised it on talk, Tony, many times. Other people have asked as well. AFAICT, the NG article defines it as a noun phrase. I'll wait till you're back to see if you're able to explain (to linguists) how it's not an NP. — kwami (talk) 06:05, 15 May 2011 (UTC)

Introducing dablinks using scripts
HI, I have noticed several edits from you, for example here, here, and here where you have replaced correct links with incorrect links to dabpages while using a script. Please could you stop doing this, as it is unhelpful to readers. Thank you. DuncanHill (talk) 01:45, 16 May 2011 (UTC)
 * I believe those changes of instances of Launceston, Tasmania to Launceston were made manually. Indeed, a piped link would be more appropriate in this circumstance. -- Ohconfucius ¡digame! 06:19, 16 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Yep, manually. I'm wondering what the technical reason is: server load? So a pipe is OK, but a dab is not—is that correct? Tony   (talk)  13:26, 16 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Well, when a link is intended to go to Launceston, Tasmania, you shouldn't change it to Launceston, as you shouldn't be linking to dabpages anyway, and readers need to go to the correct page rather than to a list of possible pages. Disambiguation pages with links will tell you more. DuncanHill (talk) 13:31, 16 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Ouch, I'm normally very careful about uniqueness in such circumstances. Clearly not on that occasion. Thx. Tony   (talk)  13:53, 16 May 2011 (UTC)

Featured Sounds needs you
Featured sounds was booming with activity in the March/April period, ideally that should be all the time. FS has been a battleground at times, however, it is my hope that that is in the past. I ask you all to reconsider your positions and set aside the differences you may have had with other participants for the good of the project and encyclopedia. Don't let FS become like VP, it is a path that a featured process should traverse. You were sent this message because you are listed at Featured sound candidates/Contributors or have been a past contributor.

Delivered by MessageDeliveryBot on behalf of Featured sound candidates at 09:35, 16 May 2011 (UTC).

The Signpost: 16 May 2011
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The Bugle: Issue LXII, April 2011
To stop receiving this newsletter, please list yourself in the appropriate section here. To assist with preparing the newsletter, please visit the newsroom. BrownBot (talk) 23:52, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

DYK for Badai Pasti Berlalu (x4) and Marga T
I have replied to your concerns at Template talk:Did you know regarding Badai Pasti Berlalu and the associated articles. Crisco 1492 (talk) 13:50, 22 May 2011 (UTC)
 * I have replied. If you want to check the quote in the source, just remember that "fantastic" is spelled with a K fantastik in Indonesian. Crisco 1492 (talk) 14:07, 22 May 2011 (UTC)
 * I'll go there tomorrow (nearly bed-time). Interested in learning how to milk maximum interest out of minimum length in DYK hooks. Tony   (talk)  14:09, 22 May 2011 (UTC)
 * It is difficult. I've noticed this with the Indonesian hooks. Balai Pustaka got only 600 hits or so, even though I thought the hook was pretty good. Alright, good night and thanks for your input. Crisco 1492 (talk) 14:13, 22 May 2011 (UTC)

Response...
Hey Tony, hope you're glad to be back to 3.5 from the 10 I saw earlier! I just wanted to give you a cheeky nudge to say that from small acorns grow great oak trees. You made a comment on a Norwich City goalkeeper enquiring about the meaning of "save". The WP:FOOTY community responded accordingly, creating a mere 112KB of glossary in four days. While it may not be ideal, I think it is a pure example of Wikipedia's principles. In any case, hopefully now you're sorted when it comes to understanding the lingo of the kick-and-run pig-skin-kicking game! My best to you, The Rambling Man (talk) 21:58, 23 May 2011 (UTC)
 * TRM, thank you indeed! I'll read it soon. Tony   (talk)  03:46, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

The Signpost: 23 May 2011
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Template_talk:Did_you_know
Left a reply there. Thanks, --<sub style="border:1px solid #228B22;padding:1px;">Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; talk 18:02, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

Question
Hi Tony, was this yours? "A song writing competition is presumably about the music and lyrics, not the performer. The song has been performed by many other people. Mention of Chrisye should be more tempered. If being such a hit after only being judged 5th is remarkable, then being only placed 5th in a competition of teenage songsmiths is more remarkable, so let's remark on it. Suggest ... that James F. Sundah's 1977 song 'Lilin-Lilin Kecil', which became Chrisye's signature song, only placed fifth in the teenagers' song writing competition it was entered in, but is now considered among the best Indonesian songs of all time?" Just asking because I think it is written in a similar style as your comments on Badai Pasti Berlalu. Crisco 1492 (talk) 14:00, 26 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Never seen it before; imitation is flattery? :-) No sig, I presume.   Tony   (talk)  14:04, 26 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Indeed. Hmm... odd. I'll try and check the history (Although that is one HUGE history to check through). Thanks! BTW, your ALT5 for Badai looks good. Crisco 1492 (talk) 14:12, 26 May 2011 (UTC)
 * I'm glad. What do you think about Volkswagen? That was hard. I find these hooks an interesting art—bite-sized crossword-puzzle-like. Tony   (talk)  14:17, 26 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Pretty good. I left a comment at DYK about the format of your ALT. Writing these is quite a challenge, and I'm still getting the hang of it. Oddly, my second nomination got 15.9k hits, the most I've ever had. Crisco 1492 (talk) 14:34, 26 May 2011 (UTC)
 * On a side note, it was Kevin McE (a good while ago). Thanks. Crisco 1492 (talk) 14:51, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

5th (Scottish) Parachute Battalion
Hi Tony, I know it's a lengthy discussion, but I think they could really use your input at the DYK nomination for 5th (Scottish) Parachute Battalion. OCNative (talk) 13:06, 27 May 2011 (UTC)

Nomination for deletion of Template:English
Template:English has been nominated for deletion. You are invited to comment on the discussion at the template's entry on the Templates for discussion page. Colonies Chris (talk) 13:48, 28 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Thanks; I had it watchlisted and noticed something going on. Will look later. Tony   (talk)  13:51, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

Signpost FC
Hi Tony, I think you're missing two new FAs at Wikipedia Signpost/2011-05-30/Featured content: Banksia marginata and 2012 phenomenon. Ucucha 15:54, 29 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Ah, thanks for the tip-off. I did look twice at the timing of 2012 phen., checking that it was promoted before the UTC window last week. Must have got my times mixed last week, too. Tony   (talk)  15:57, 29 May 2011 (UTC)

Signpost
Cheers Tony for the large image and blurb on the van der Weyden. It looks fine at that res, though scrunched nin the article. Long time no talk bty, hope all is well. <font color="#006633">Ceoil 17:29, 29 May 2011 (UTC)

DYK for Badai Pasti Berlalu (x4) and Marga T
Hi Tony, I was wondering if you could give the nomination a tick (check mark) for ALT5 so that editors putting the queues together can see that all issues have been dealt with. Thanks. Crisco 1492 (talk) 23:19, 29 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Thanks. However, I was referring to this tick: Pictogram voting keep.svg, which is produced by using  . Some editors look for it or the green tick when populating queues, so it might have been overlooked. Thanks. Crisco 1492 (talk) 07:37, 30 May 2011 (UTC)
 * OK, I'm unused to the system and am prepared to let others make the call. But I'll tick it now, sure. Tony   (talk)  09:36, 30 May 2011 (UTC)
 * No problem. I'm still learning some of the finer points myself. As you've brought up before, I need to try and make my hooks more interesting. Hopefully this next multi-article hook will do the trick. Crisco 1492 (talk) 10:35, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

Rupert Inglis DYK
I have attempted to address your concerns about the DYK hook. Are you now able to approve the hook or its alternative? Thanks. -- Daemonic Kangaroo (talk) 07:52, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

DYK TEMA HARBOUR
Thanks for the review. I have addressed the issues you raised. Could you please accord the right tag to the DYK now. Thanks a friend called ---<span style="border:1px solid #000073;background:#4D4DA6;padding:2px;color:yellow;text-shadow:black 0.2em 0.2em 0.3em"><font face="Georgia"> CrossTempleJay  →  talk 13:49, 30 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Check out the new hook. Hope it is ok now. Thanks. <span style="border:1px solid #000073;background:#4D4DA6;padding:2px;color:yellow;text-shadow:black 0.2em 0.2em 0.3em"><font face="Georgia"> CrossTempleJay  →  talk 09:26, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

T:TDYK
Hi Tony, in response to : the reason you sometimes end up in the wrong section when editing at T:TDYK is that section edit links are distinguished by a number, which goes up from the beginning to the end of the page (see the URL, which for example ends in &section=19 for this section). However, between the times that you load the page and the time that you click "edit", the section numbering may have changed, because someone inserted another section or removed one further up the page, so the edit link ends up going to the wrong section. It's a limitation of the way MediaWiki implements section editing. I hope this is clear. Ucucha 16:01, 30 May 2011 (UTC) & 16:03, 30 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Thanks, Ucucha ... can't argue with that explanation. Is there no way of fixing it? Don't other reviewers find the same inconvenience? Should I click only on the higher-level headingss? Tony   (talk)  16:11, 30 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Short of rewriting MediaWiki, I don't know of a solution. There are a few things that help to some degree: incrementing or decrementing the number in the URL may get you to the correct section, but you can't know in advance which of the two you need to do, and you're out of luck when someone added/removed a whole string of sections; you can re-load the page (probably the best option), but that also costs time and in the meantime the section count may have changed again; you can edit the entire page, but that obviously is also a pain considering the huge size of T:TDYK. I don't think editing larger sections (like the day-by-day sections) would help much, since the section count can still change as people add or remove sections higher up. Ucucha 17:10, 30 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Yes, we find it annoying. I think the best way to handle it is to reload the page just before commenting. Crisco 1492 (talk) 03:41, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

Auf Christi Himmelfahrt allein, BWV 128
Copied from the DYK suggestions, because it touches some general questions:

DYK ... that the festive scoring of Bach cantata for the feast of Ascension, Auf Christi Himmelfahrt allein, BWV 128, includes "two horns, oboes of every kind, strings and continuo and latterly one trumpet"?
 * Well, to repeat my comment at the last Bach cantata nom, festive scoring would normally include such a combination. There needs to be a focus of interest for a hook—what is surprising, unusual, punchy, interesting? And I'd use an English translation of the title, too. Tony   (talk)  09:46, 30 May 2011 (UTC)
 * PS Any images? Are external links in running prose allowed by the guidelines? (The alternative to the disruptive blue arrow bump bump is to place the links in the External links section. For a hook, while religion makes me vomit, I have to say that symbolism would be more interesting in a hook ("a signal played first by the strings and oboes, then the two horns" (can you clarify, and have you read Wolff's book on Bach?); or that the trumpet "symbolizes the reign of Jesus". Or both, with the shopping list of instrumentation dropped from the hook. What is "the figuration of the instruments"? Tony   (talk)  09:56, 30 May 2011 (UTC)
 * A few answers here: the instrumentation is highly unusual, I looked at something like 50 Bach cantatas and never saw anything like this, trumpet AND horns AND 3 kinds of oboes. I never saw trumpet and horn in one cantata so far, not even three different kinds of oboes in one cantata, and here you have both. Perhaps you are the one to phrase that. Otherwise, I liked the kind of sloppy approach in the quote. And yes, there were quotes in hooks before. - I read Dürr's book on the cantatas. Please add what you get from Christoph Wolff, if you like. The Dürr book has the music to illustrate how the orchestral music is related to the chorale tune in movement 1. I would have a hard time to phase how all notes of the tune appear in the same sequence in the (much longer and faster) instrumental figuration, but go ahead and look at the score and do it. Trumpet - reign: I simply translated Dürr, it's many other places that the trumpet was the royal instrument in Bach's time, a specific cantata is not the place to expand on that, imo. - Images: the cantata doesn't deal with the Ascension itself (hard enough to depict), but rather with the response of the individual, the poetess for example (harder to depict). I looked and didn't like a single one for this purpose, also Lutheranism was not into pictures. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 11:25, 30 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Why not tell them it's unusual? Dürr? Rather passed over nowadays. Wolff is good. Worth buying. Tony  (talk)  04:14, 31 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Done, ALT1. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 09:08, 31 May 2011 (UTC)
 * in addition: Figuration, --Gerda Arendt (talk) 11:29, 30 May 2011 (UTC)
 * They shouldn't have to hit a link to understand the gist of the sentence. I would gloss it on the spot, too. Tony   (talk)  04:14, 31 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Readers who know should not see overlinking, for the others I will go and explain the term in Bach cantata. But not in every cantata. da capo: at least there is a link. I don't like what you get for Figuration, therefore I didn't even link. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 09:08, 31 May 2011 (UTC)
 * in addition: a translation of the title would make the hook longer, is also available as the first bit of information in the article, in general. In this specific case it wouldn't add much to "Ascension", provided before with a link. The titles of the Bach cantatas are no true titles anyway, just the beginnings of the texts, which in many cases don't make sense even in German, you have to read the complete context to understand them. In this case: no subject, no verb given in the first line, --Gerda Arendt (talk) 13:55, 30 May 2011 (UTC)
 * English-speakers will be turned off a run of German gobbledy. I would still translate it in the hook to get them to the article in the first place. No images? Tony   (talk)  04:14, 31 May 2011 (UTC)
 * I didn't name the cantatas in all German and was quite surprised to see these (also ambiguous) titles. At least I got the BWV addition to every single one, which tells many people it's Bach. In the past, an average of approximately 400 people per cantata were not afraid to click the German from the Main page. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 09:08, 31 May 2011 (UTC)


 * Added after a rehearsal of Handel's Messiah for a comparison of scoring: no horns, only one kind of oboes (but bassoon). - Happy listening to BWV 11 last! --Gerda Arendt (talk) 21:48, 30 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Thank you for your responses. Hoping to please you, I picked Wolff for BWV 183 even before I read them, smile, --Gerda Arendt (talk) 09:08, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

Logarithm FAC
Could you please follow up on your oppose at the logarithm FAC. 131.111.216.60 (talk) 18:53, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

The Signpost: 30 May 2011
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This Month in GLAM: May 2011
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BWV 11
Once more BWV 11 for you, thanks for teaching me English, --Gerda Arendt (talk) 22:22, 1 June 2011 (UTC)

Re: Template talk:Did you know
It appears from your comment that you've been reading your copy of How to Make Friends and Influence People once again. In all seriousness, do you honestly believe I could read that comment & not react as if you just served me a shit sandwich? -- llywrch (talk) 03:43, 3 June 2011 (UTC)
 * I thought DYK hooks were supposed to be interesting. Tony opined that that particular one wasn't, and gave you his view on how it could be made more so. So where's the shit sandwich? -- Ohconfucius ¡digame! 03:48, 3 June 2011 (UTC)
 * DYKs have tended to be boring or to lack the context that will encourage readers to click to the target article. I repeat what I said about yours: put the subject earlier in the statement and try to explain it in terms that will engage visitors. Taking offence just because someone has come along and been critical goes back to the early days of FAC, where reviewers were hounded for critiquing bad prose and poor referencing. We held out. Are you willing to craft the hook? Tony   (talk)  08:45, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

SDUSA DYK
Hi Tony! I responded to your comments at the DYK page. Best regards, Kiefer .Wolfowitz 07:56, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

DYK for SDUSA
Hi Tony1!

Thanks again for your editing help. Would you look again at the nomination (May 25th), because it has been blocked by somebody proposing a major article restructuring. Thanks! Best regards, Kiefer .Wolfowitz 12:04, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

Request
Hello Tony,

I truly respect your opinion when it comes to DYK's, therefore I am requesting that, if you have the time, you take a look at the May 24th nomination of Ambrosio José Gonzales and determine if the article "passes" or "fails" DYK criteria. Thank you before hand. Tony the Marine (talk) 23:00, 3 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Update: It seems as if the article has passed the DYK criteria. Sorry to bother. Take care. Tony the Marine (talk) 06:17, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

BWV 173
I am tempted to follow your suggestion to translate Bach cantata titles for BWV 173/173a. Do you know how to say "Durchlauchtster", a superlative of Durchlaucht, which takes me to "Serene Highness"? The typical sources fail, as 173a is no church cantata (but became one). "Most illustrious Leopold" is the Bach cantata suggestion, but where is a title at all? The addressee was Leopold of Köthen. - btw, BWV 128 - not translated - attracted 1.1k hits from the Main page, almost 1.5k the last 30 days, a nice surprise. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 14:18, 5 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Never mind, I suggested with just 1 translation, --Gerda Arendt (talk) 09:09, 6 June 2011 (UTC)

A Signpost suggestion
Since Brockway Mountain Drive was promoted this past week, you might want to consider using File:Brockway_Mountain_Drive_Panorama.jpg as one of the images in the Features section of the signpost this week. The photo is a panorama of the roadway and the surrounding scenery during fall color season. The road was featured as a part of a segment on the Today show as a fall color destination in addition to the history of appearing in travel columns in major American newspapers.  Imzadi 1979  →   03:53, 6 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Let me see what the field is like this week for pics. It's always a juggling act. I don't want to encourage people to ask. BTW, the Commons file looks like it's been uploaded in a size that is too large for its resolution, don't you think? Tony   (talk)  05:31, 6 June 2011 (UTC)

If you've got a minute
Do you have a minute for a punctuation review at Dancehall Queen (song)? It seems to me that the sentence "The song received mixed to positive reviews from critics" ought to contain a pair of hyphens, but it just looks wrong (equally wrong, both ways). WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:35, 1 June 2011 (UTC)
 * I did a few tweaks; please check. Tony   (talk)  08:59, 3 June 2011 (UTC)


 * It looked good to me. Thanks.  WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:52, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

The Signpost: 6 June 2011
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FSC invite
Since you, and  have been voting, I did not feel the need to invite you. Sorry if you felt left out. I contacted everyone else on all my FS discussions.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 03:47, 9 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Given that I am more likely to oppose, and that you have been nominating a load of stuff, it seems convenient not to alert me that these messages are going out. Please see my recent post announcing that I intend to oppose the main-page display of featured sounds. There is a mad rush to feature just about anything, including superbly played but crappy—really crappy—national anthems I could dash off in an hour with pen and paper, and hour-long rambling political speeches that invite thousands of promotions of any speech by any politician in the English-speaking world. We have no criteria to address quality in these respects, and no culture that says no to the crap and the ramble. Relevance to a single article is enough for featured status, it appears. I note that the FS criteria were completely re-written a few weeks ago without consensus (without even announcing it!). And it is scandalous that if one person supports a nominator's own "support", and one person opposes it, the item is waved through—rife for CoI. On FAC, they seem to have managed the CoI problem well enough, but it took a while. Tony   (talk)  04:04, 9 June 2011 (UTC)
 * You may be interested in this --Guerillero &#124; My Talk  06:03, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Style question
Hi Tony. I was wondering if I might get your opinion on an edit request I made here. It's been denied by two people who regularly edit the article, so I was interested in getting the opinion of someone whose opinion might not be clouded by OWN issues. You're kind of a big style person so I thought I'd ask you. If you wouldn't mind, I'd appreciate it. Thanks anyway if not, though. 68.35.40.154 (talk) 07:37, 9 June 2011 (UTC)
 * It would be preferable if you logged in; new Wikipedians are very welcome. I commented there, forgetting to disclose that I'd been asked here. Oh well. Tony   (talk)  08:04, 9 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Thanks for commenting. I've actually had an account in the past, but I found that being a "wikipedian" was becoming a bit sour and not as enjoyable as it once was. So I just use WP now, and fix things I see as I come across. 68.35.40.154 (talk) 08:46, 9 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Editors will take much more notice of your posts and your edits if you're logged in. I do strongly encourage you to join the fray again. We need to keep up the body of editors. It can be stressful at times, but there are ways of dealing with that, and one's work can have a large footprint in the online world. Tony   (talk)  08:52, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Thank you
Thank you, Tony, for your helpful copyediting to the article Everything Tastes Better with Bacon. Much appreciated. ;) Cheers, -- Cirt (talk) 16:16, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Featured sound candidates/1812 Overture
Your decision was so fast, I did not have time to add an audio file. Note I have added one at Featured sound candidates/1812 Overture.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 08:00, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Overlinking and other issues
Thanks for your comments on my recent DYK submissions. Thought I would respond here, since DYK comments tend to vanish. I have installed the tool to fix dashes and hyphens which is very useful, but am not yet in the habit of always using it. File:Chubais-AB.jpg does have a weird background, but I don't know how to fix it. I see your concern about overlinking, but perhaps don't feel as strongly as you. Ideally there would always links to topics a reader might well want to skip to, never to other topics. The problem is deciding what a reader might want to skip to. I tend to always link names of people, places and organizations when they first appear in the article, but rarely link anything else. Always linking names avoids systemic bias, but I suppose linking the Soviet Union is a bit excessive, maybe, or is it? There are some very poorly educated people around. Thoughts? Aymatth2 (talk) 16:47, 10 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Well, Soviet Union is an historical artefact now, like West Germany, so I tend to leave the first instance of these linked in a WP article (but why in a DYK hook if they're not the DYK article?). In articles, often, Russia and Germany—which should be known to every 10 year old—don't deserve a link; this is especially the case when a linked city or town immediately precedes the country-name, since the specific link is presumably the one the reader would go to first. That is how the web of links works: provide the specific link and allow readers to span out to more general ones from that specific target, rather than packing the original with general links too. I rarely see a hook with a link that does any good at all. The whole purpose of the hook is to funnel readers to the DYK article, which will have all of the links anyway. Think of the reader's process: why would they click on "Soviet Union" first, when "Gorbachev" is the DYK article? You've lost them, then. Tony   (talk)  17:03, 10 June 2011 (UTC)
 * No links in a DYK hook except to the DYK article makes sense. No link to the state and country when they follow the city makes sense too. I could see other examples where a specific target that is linked is followed by contextual terms that should not be linked. Elizabeth I, the Tudor queen of England. I like that. I am less certain that well-known countries should not be linked. A recent vice-presidential candidate for the United States could perhaps have benefited from a link to Africa. But would she have followed it? Aymatth2 (talk) 17:37, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

DYK for Wardah Hafidz
I have replied to your concerns at the nomination for Wardah Hafidz. Could you please take a look and (if possible) review the article? Crisco 1492 (talk) 11:59, 9 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Bump. (Don't forget, if it's good you should use the check mark) Crisco 1492 (talk) 09:14, 10 June 2011 (UTC)
 * OK; it's a pity the descriptors for the check marks, above the edit-box, refer only to articles. If we want nominators and reviewers to be more serious about both, this could be re-worded. (Also, "newly-sourced" above that ... no hyphen). Tony   (talk)  09:37, 10 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Perhaps, but it has been expressed that people may not be reviewing articles that already have comments; they may be thinking that the article is already under review and not willing to review it. Crisco 1492 (talk) 09:44, 10 June 2011 (UTC)
 * I make it explicit as to whether my comment applies to hook or article. If I see a bad hook, it deserves a comment. I don't have time to review a huge number of articles as well, especially as I review more thoroughly than is currently done by most editors there. Tony   (talk)  10:14, 10 June 2011 (UTC)
 * I understand; however, it would be nice if you could say that the hook looks good (if it does to you) so that people do not misunderstand. Crisco 1492 (talk) 10:17, 10 June 2011 (UTC)


 * OK, why not build into the rules that where a nominator's comments apply to the hook or the article alone, this should be stated? Tony   (talk)  10:19, 10 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Interesting proposal. I am not sure how that would be received; I myself would be a little uncomfortable, especially if the commenter did not respond to replies to their comments. Crisco 1492 (talk) 10:38, 10 June 2011 (UTC)
 * I'm surprised that the admins/closers don't make the decisions, and that these ticks and crosses are given seemingly definitive status. This is very different from featured-content processes. I see a green tick given to an underwhelming hook and an article that has problems, and I really wonder whether MaterialScientist et al. will just wave it through. And I sometimes want to raise queries with either that I think the nominator should fix, which is why I sometimes don't put my own svg symbol there. Tony   (talk)  10:43, 10 June 2011 (UTC)
 * MaterialScientist is only one admin, and he pays attention mainly to problems in the queues (only admins can edit them, so this makes sense). I don't know if there are any other admins who are very active with DYK. Reviewing or commenting on articles that have already been reviewed is fine, especially if there are problems that the first review missed. Your comments at the Badai hook, for example, probably helped it a bit, even though it had already been approved.
 * However, I think that it would be next to impossible to keep DYK up to Featured contents review standards. Featured Article and Featured Picture only have to worry about one a day; DYK has to deal with 21 to 32 articles a day. Multiple reviews would help keep the problems minimal, but mistakes will probably get through. Crisco 1492 (talk) 10:55, 10 June 2011 (UTC)
 * These are all getting main-page exposure. The hooks need to be top-notch. I believe four shifts a day is far, far too many, so if the system needs to slow down and be more considered, there's one option. I would make it three 8-hour shifts per day, immediately, and take it from there. Tony   (talk)  12:13, 10 June 2011 (UTC)
 * What are the standards at In the News and On this day? If DYK is changed, it may need to be more like these other, multiple article sections of the mainpage instead of Featured Articles. Crisco 1492 (talk) 15:37, 10 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Standards in what respect? DYK is much more challenging to make the hooks interesting that for the others. But it can be done. And as with the others, there are two quite distinct skill-sets: the hook and the article. I just worry that it's too much pressure to jam through a production line of four shifts a day. I also would love the pic to be just a touch bigger, and one hook fewer in each shift to pay for it. When you say 21 to 32 articles a day, does the number of shifts vary from three to four? Tony   (talk)  16:09, 10 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Yes, that includes the different number of shifts and hooks, 7 * 3 and 8 * 4. It is very difficult to do indeed get things through quickly; however, the backlog with 3 * 6 hooks would be horrendous. I'm already having trouble loading T:TDYK. A proposal like yours would definitely step on a lot of toes and probably require a major revamp of DYK. Crisco 1492 (talk) 17:18, 10 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Most reform proposals step on toes. That doesn't deter me. For one thing, a set of good hooks seems wasted when it's on the main page for only six hours. Doesn't that figure in people's priorities? Can you tell me: who decides whether three or four shifts will occur on a given day? Is it to do with the size of the backlog, or the number of DYKs that the admins have managed to put through at a particular point in time? Tony   (talk)  09:15, 11 June 2011 (UTC)
 * If I remember what Materialscientist said, it depends on the total number of current nominations (both approved and stalled). More nominations, more rotations. As for the time, it can be unfair since some hooks could theoretically draw more attention in the extra two hours, but it is better than not showing up. As for reforming DYK, you should check out this; it may be interesting, although it is more about the nominations process and not the number of hooks. Crisco 1492 (talk) 14:33, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

FAC update
Update: Regarding Featured article candidates/Everything Tastes Better with Bacon/archive1, I addressed your suggestions, made some related edits to the article page, and responded back at the FAC subpage. Cheers, -- Cirt (talk) 23:28, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Since your part of the process
Hello. This message is being sent to inform you that there is currently a discussion at Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents regarding an issue with which you may have been involved. The thread is Featured Sounds Process. Thank you. --Guerillero &#124; My Talk  02:56, 12 June 2011 (UTC)
 * I made a short post there. I'd no idea it had become so heated at FSC. Tony   (talk)  03:55, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

RE: protection template
No problem with the first, and for Christopher Hitchens, I haven't. It'd be a little difficult to me to understand a video with no caption on Spanish/English. ۞  Tb hotch <sup style="color:#555555;"> ™  &  (ↄ),  Problems with my English?  04:40, 12 June 2011 (UTC)
 * I'll chech them when I am able to do it, thank you. ۞   Tb hotch <sup style="color:#555555;"> ™  &  (ↄ),  Problems with my English?  07:24, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

Hundreds of thousands of people
The difference between your analogy and mine is substantial: no matter how many atheists there are, they're wrong, because what they think does not affect the reality that God exists. Wikipedia policies are based upon how we do things: therefore, it's impossible for the vast majority of our articles on a subject to be written in the wrong way, because the right way is defined as being the way we write things. Both the way he wants to write and the way that everyone else wants to write are valid ways to write; the difference is a matter of choice, rather than a matter of fact. A better analogy with atheists would be to say "The vast majority of atheists can't be wrong when they say that atheists reject the existence of God". Nyttend (talk) 12:48, 12 June 2011 (UTC)
 * My purpose was not to push religious or anti-religious views on you, but to demonstrate that it's not a valid premise to argue that anything is true just because hundreds of thousands of people believe it. Hundreds of thousands of men believe it's just fine to have sex with under-age girls. OK? Tony   (talk)  12:53, 12 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Moreover, the vast majority of people working on these articles do not find the demographics bit cumbersome by any means: there's no way that anything could survive in almost all of these articles for so many years if it were found to be problematic. You'll observe that we've had plenty of bot runs through demographics sections over the years, and this wording has never been an issue.  Nyttend (talk) 12:49, 12 June 2011 (UTC)
 * No, just because people don't say anything doesn't mean something doesn't need to be fixed. Your assumptions appear to be a prescription for resisting any change in the world. Here at WMF sites, text is dynamic, and subject to continual improvement. I do wish you the best in contributing to this dynamic enviroment, and hope we can work together at some stage. Tony   (talk)  12:53, 12 June 2011 (UTC)
 * I noticed some comments on Nyttend's talk page and followed the thread here -- the assertion that the vast majority of people working on these articles do not find the demographics bit cumbersome by any means is patently false. While I tend to ignore the demographics data language as exceptionally uninteresting bot-generated cruft, I have many US place articles on my watchlist and numerous editors have made various attempts to refine the rather clunky language in that section. older ≠ wiser 17:51, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

Reject DYK
I just met a DYK nom which was approved, but you marked it red, because you find the hook boring. I think that is taking it too far. I was tempted to change it, but think you better change it yourself to a question or comment. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 09:02, 11 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Ah, a hunt for which one, without a link. Tony   (talk)  09:04, 11 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Ah, I thought you did that only once and would remember. Now I hunted, found Ferugliotheriidae, and yes, you did it only once. Once to much, I think, because a hook can always be improved and is no reason to reject the whole nomination, which the red mark tries to express. (Needless to say, I got one of those last year and turned it to green. But I remember the unpleasant feeling seeing it.) - Language question: "dynamite" vs " "blow up"? --Gerda Arendt (talk) 20:29, 11 June 2011 (UTC)
 * I find this coloured-hook system perplexing: it seems to be an all-or-nothing system. It assumes reviewers are going to review the entire hook and article. This militates against specialisation. I think you've just convinced me not to use the current system of ticks. Tony   (talk)  04:03, 12 June 2011 (UTC)
 * I find it easy: red no hope (your nothing), blue question, green good (all), why not use it, a broad range of blue from minor to severe questions. But avoid red unless the whole thing seems hopeless. Happy BWV 59, --Gerda Arendt (talk) 06:18, 12 June 2011 (UTC)
 * But the table of what these symbols mean says otherwise. TWO sets of symbols are required: one for hooks and one for articles; these two elements require very different skill-sets for nominators, and for reviewers. This system of symbols has arisen to satisfy the review all or nothing way of doing things. On the contrary, we need to attract more specialist reviewers in, and expecting the same reviewer to scrutinise copyright and refs in an article and the interest level of the hook is unrealistic. Tony   (talk)  07:41, 12 June 2011 (UTC)
 * It has been discussed (but not made it to rules) that it is desirable that more than one person has an eye on a hook/article. I don't think the system should be made more complicate by giving additional symbols/colours to hook review. A nomination doesn't "die" because of a boring hook, so I vote for comments without a symbol when referring to the hook alone. As you did. The day of BWV 173, --Gerda Arendt (talk) 17:23, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Today's featured list
I can't remember where you asked me to keep you appraised of the situation, but I'm certain you did, so I'll bring you up to speed. The Main Page has now been edited to include TFL. At the proposal's scheduled closing time (23:59 UTC on Saturday 11 June), there were 48 supports and no declared opposition. The first list to go on the main page – on 13 June – will be List of signs and symptoms of diving disorders. Finally, the submissions page is live for editors to suggest future lists for main page exposure. Hope that helps, and let me know if you need any more info. Regards, —WFC— 00:56, 12 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Not sure what you mean by "grabs", but I'll be online between now and midnight, and would be happy to do whatever you need. If it's a well-written reaction you're after, good alternatives would include Dabomb, User:The Rambling Man, User:Giants2008, User:Edokter (the coder), User:RexxS (writer of the first list to be featured), or to post a general request for reaction at WT:FLC or WT:TFL. —WFC— 15:53, 12 June 2011 (UTC)
 * What you've written looks fine to me Tony. The Rambling Man (talk) 14:42, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

✰
Jorge, you are very kind. The Signpost is keen to embrace native speakers of other languages: there's so much of the wikiworld out there we English-speakers know little of. While on this topic, more copy-editors for The Signpost would be very welcome, not to mention more writers, especially of the more journalistic pages: In the news, and News and notes. We have a superb managing editor in User:HaeB. Please contact him or the talk page of the publication if you're interested. The weekly rush happens Sunday night to Monday night UTC. Tony  (talk)  06:51, 12 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Noted! jorgenev 23:39, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

File:FA on main page (for the Signpost).png listed for deletion
A file that you uploaded or altered, File:FA on main page (for the Signpost).png, has been listed at Files for deletion. Please see the to see why this is (you may have to search for the title of the image to find its entry), if you are interested in it not being deleted. <span class="I_STALK_DAMIENS">damiens.rf 02:32, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Signpost check
Just read what you wrote and it looks good. Great job as usual.  Giants2008  ( 27 and counting ) 16:07, 13 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Indeed, just in case you missed my note above, what Giants said. The Rambling Man (talk) 16:08, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Adams FP
See my talk page, 2 sections up. Cheers. Kaldari (talk) 01:25, 14 June 2011 (UTC)

The Signpost: 13 June 2011
<div style="margin-top:10px; font-size:90%; padding-left:5px; font-family:Georgia, Palatino, Palatino Linotype, Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Read this Signpost in full · Single-page · Unsubscribe · EdwardsBot (talk) 01:46, 14 June 2011 (UTC)

Ping
Hi, I didn't get your email. Should I email you? Thanks! Plastikspork <sub style="font-size: 60%">―Œ <sup style="margin-left:-3ex">(talk) 00:43, 14 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Shot you an email. — James (Talk • Contribs) • 4:02pm • 06:02, 14 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Replied. — James (Talk • Contribs) • 4:45pm • 06:45, 14 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Plastikspork, sorry, I went to sleep while writing it. Have sent it now. James, thanks. Tony   (talk)  06:53, 14 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Sent you another one. — James (Talk • Contribs) • 6:19pm • 08:19, 15 June 2011 (UTC)

Open-source programmer or open source programmer?
I changed the title from "Broken script edit", coz it wasn't a script edit. Tony  (talk)  10:06, 15 June 2011 (UTC)

This edit introduced a number of problems. Some of which are presumably due to your lack of familiarity with the subject matter ("free software" and "open source" are effectively jargon terms and should not be hyphenated outwith direct quotes), while some of them are simply wrong (taking the title of a reference and converting it to sentence case). If the latter has changed, and we are supposed to alter the capitalisation of referenced titles, then I'd appreciate a pointer to the relevant guideline. As for the hyphenation, I'd appreciate it if you corrected your script to ignore the phrases "free software" and "open source" in future. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) - talk 08:56, 15 June 2011 (UTC)
 * I run no script that has anything to do with hyphenation. Almost all of my gnoming is manual. "Free software" is fine by itself, but "free software community" and "free software licence" are real problems for non-experts to parse (it's actually the software that is "free" in a very particular sense, not the community—correct me if I'm wrong. Many writers dispense with norms of punctuation (especially hyphens) when the term in question becomes very familiar to them, and no longer needs punctuation for interpreting or clarifying the sense. They lose track of the fact that it is not a familiar term for others. Wikipedia is written for others, not for experts who already know. In any case, I googled and found quite a few instances where the hyphen is used. Please see the MoS guideline on hyphenation. Tony   (talk)  09:01, 15 June 2011 (UTC)


 * My apologies: I'd assumed the "using a script" part of your edit summary applied to all changes there. The matter of dashes with "open source" or "free software" is not up for dispute: the terms are codified in that format by the bodies who coined them, and there's a strong consensus here (see the talk pages for both terms) that they should be used in that format. If it helps to calm your soul, consider them to be trademarks (the Open Source Initiative originally planned to trademark "Open Source") rather than adjective-noun pairs. It is not a productive use of your time to "correct" this as it's just going to be undone (by me or dozens of other editors) unless a change to the underlying consensus can be established. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) - talk 09:16, 15 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Look, they're not dashes, they hyphens. Please desist from further changes until you have acquainted yourself with the issues. I see you've launched in and changed a second article title. It would be correct to raise the matter on an article talk page before proceding, not to take unilateral action without discussion. Tony   (talk)  09:18, 15 June 2011 (UTC)


 * If this weren't a long-settled matter I'd do just that, but I'm not obliged to take it from the top every time someone comes along and changes things. My apologies for using "dashes" where I meant "hyphens", which was probably due to my takignt he word you used in your own summary without thinking about it. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) - talk 09:29, 15 June 2011 (UTC)
 * It's not long-settled, and even if it were, the length of time programmers and developers have been using bad English (since the start ... apologies, but you know this is true) is irrelevant. When software companies and organisations get editors in who can use typography properly, it's done with a hyphen. Why? Because it's easier for normal people to parse. Tony   (talk)  09:33, 15 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Source software that's free and open. You still haven't explained how your unilateral change from "History of free and open-source software" to "History of free and open source software" ‎does not damage the wording. Tony   (talk)  09:42, 15 June 2011 (UTC)


 * As I said before, "open source" is idiomatic; it is not "source which is open", but a jargon term denoting a particular software development model. Were it an actual trademark (as the OSI originally intended), it would be no different from "Walt Disney" in terms of using it in sentences. Hyphenating it suggests that, rather than being an idiom, it is simply "source which is open". similarly, "free software" is not merely "software which is free", but an idiomatic term referring to a particular type of freedom. The phrase "free and open source software" is really its own idiom referring to the gamut of liberal software development models, and not simply an aggregation of two terms. If I can find it (which is more difficult than I thought; we've an awful lot of articles on the subject, with a lot of talk archives...) I'll link you to the best discussion I can find on the subject. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) - talk 09:53, 15 June 2011 (UTC)
 * One of many. Tony   (talk)  09:57, 15 June 2011 (UTC)
 * OK, continue here, although I've left good links at your page. And another in the cascade: Free and Open-Source Software (FOSS) Evaluation Center. I've got to go for a while. Best. Tony   (talk)  10:01, 15 June 2011 (UTC)

So I've had an initial look and it's a rather mixed bag. I do recall having a deeper discussion of this on WP, but for the life of me I can't find it right now (it may be hidden on a WikiProject talk page, or somewhere in the black pit that is the talk:Linux archives). Here's what I came up with:


 * Talk:List of free and open source software packages (March 2010): ended in no consensus. Opposition primary centred around common usage being unhyphenated. Hard figures are also given suggesting that Wikipedia itself used the unhyphenated form five times more commonly than the hyphenated form.
 * Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive538 (May 2009): User was admonished for making moves to the hyphenated form without consensus to do so (I note that I was the one to revert) in November 2008.
 * Talk:List of free and open source software packages (October 2003): A discussion from eight years ago suggesting that the OSI itself once advocated the hyphenated term (I've looked on their current site and cannot find any such commentary at this time), but that the unhyphenated form was more common.
 * Talk:Open-source hardware (January 2010): successful move to hyphen, but with a strong oppose stating that the unhyphenated form was vastly more common.
 * Talk:Free and open source software (January 2010): no consensus for move to hyphen: opposition notes that unhyphenated form is more common.
 * Reference desk/Archives/Language/2010 December 29 (December 2010): response is that this is a style issue rather than a grammar one.

So the state of play if that a) we're currently inconsistent; b) we still heavily favour the unhyphenated term; c) this has been the case for a loooong time. I'm open to a bigger RfC on this which we could then use to hopefully settle this and then point people at, rather than arguing over first principles as we've done here. If you want to go that route I'll be happy to advertise it. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) - talk 11:42, 15 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Chris, thanks for compiling this list. Interesting. I think User:Kwamikagami is very knowledgeable about the application of hyphens in such contexts. His advice might be sought if there's further doubt. Thanks. You have certainly made me think about it. Tony   (talk)  12:52, 15 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Suffice to say that Kwami's opinion on this matter is well known to me. Anyway, if I do decide to raise a general RfC on this I'll let you know. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) - talk 13:20, 15 June 2011 (UTC)

Re: Linking, Rufus Does Judy
Thanks for the feedback. I wrote a reply comment on my talk page. Based on Ohconfucius's profile/experience and your agreement with his(?) edits, I am satisfied. I just thought it was a lot of unlinking (I always assumed most terms are linked the first instance used). I certainly don't find the word "homosexuality" to be exotic--make your own assumptions about the fact that I expanded a Rufus Wainwright article, if you wish--but like I said I thought most terms were linked. Lesson learned! Thanks again! -- Another Believer ( Talk ) 15:58, 15 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Sure! You may wish to discuss with him the issue of linking publishers' names. I know it came up for discussion a year or two ago at MOSLINK talk. Tony   (talk)  16:01, 15 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Gotcha. Great "pet hates", by the way! -- Another Believer ( Talk ) 22:16, 15 June 2011 (UTC)

Listen to my sound please
Please listen and support/oppose avec comments! 

TCO (talk) 02:13, 16 June 2011 (UTC)

Featured portal review/New South Wales
As requested by you, the FPR is finally closed (after leaving it open for 4 months) with the decision to delist. <b style="color:#0000FF;">OhanaUnited</b><b style="color:green;">Talk page</b> 03:48, 16 June 2011 (UTC)

Text removed from my RFAR statement to remain within the 500-word limit
This is just so I can diff an example of how it might be done neatly. Bloaters beware! Tony  (talk)  05:08, 16 June 2011 (UTC)

Hi
Hi Tony,

I certainly wouldn't mind if you created an edited version of my statement. When I did a word count of my original statement (Google Docs) it said under 500. ??? ... My understanding from reading the talk page and other areas was that any reply (of reasonable length) was not included in the "500 word limit". Am I mistaken on this? If so, then perhaps I'll just move my reply to his talk page. While I may not share your views in this particular instance (the santorum issue), I do fully admit that I admire your writing ability, and would gladly accept any guidance in that area. Thank you for your time and offer, any suggestions will always be appreciated. (although I do have to get some sleep, and may not be back to WP until later tomorrow) Cheers and Best, — Ched : <font style="color:#FFFFFF;background:#0000fa;"> ?  08:33, 16 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Thank you very much Tony. I'll work on being more on being more concise in the future, and re-read your articles on better writing.  Cheers and best, — Ched : <font style="color:#FFFFFF;background:#0000fa;"> ?  19:32, 16 June 2011 (UTC) (fantastic work by the way)

Backup
Yup. First entry on wiktionary; never realized that term wasn't on here. Bench has an entry for essentially the same thing on its dab page if that's easier. Wizardman Operation Big Bear 15:39, 18 June 2011 (UTC) Thx, Wiz. Tony  (talk)  16:48, 18 June 2011 (UTC)

FL blurbs
Would you mind if I added another comment after this to explain that I reverted the copyedit purely because it was pointless to change the draft when the version to be used was already ready to go at Today's featured list/July 4, 2011? Otherwise it does look as though you're having a go at me for no real reason. In fact, I didn't think that you still felt I'd acted inappropriately, after reading your second comment at User talk:Bencherlite (which is why I didn't reply, on the basis of "least said, soonest mended"). Thanks, BencherliteTalk 07:56, 20 June 2011 (UTC)
 * I'll remove it, then. But I am totally confused by this duplication. Why can't it be removed from the list when it's put somewhere else. Others could well come along and in good faith edit that list. Can't a note be put at the top? The reason I added the invisible comment is that I don't want my work to go to waste, and I'm concerned about which list is the real one. Tony   (talk)  07:58, 20 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Fair point; the FL directors are adding a "selected for xx date" note but it might make more sense to remove the blurbs. I'll suggest that.  Regards, BencherliteTalk 08:02, 20 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Thanks. Now, on the current issue at MP, I'm not going to ask someone's permission for my copy-edits to be integrated. Tony   (talk)  10:32, 20 June 2011 (UTC)
 * The Rambling Man has removed the selected TFL blurbs, so that issue is now resolved nicely, I think. I won't reply here to the TFA blurb issue to avoid discussions forking. BencherliteTalk 10:39, 20 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Thanks, Bencherlite. Tony   (talk)  10:42, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

DYKs for dull soccer hooks...!
Hi Tony, thanks for your note against my two Ipswich Town F.C. hooks. I accept they're not brilliantly evocative hooks, so I've tried to improve them a little. Thanks for your time and interest. The Rambling Man (talk) 16:48, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

La Coupole DYK
I've made some suggestions - see what you think! Prioryman (talk) 17:27, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

T:TDYK
Excuse me for saying, but your response to the page creator and your orange "X" were a bit harsh. He's not even a newbie, but an editor who has more than 25 DYKs. All the article needed was a bit of copyediting; all the sources were in place. At most you should have added the copyedit tag to the article, given the hook a "question/no" tick, and left it to someone else to fix it up. Best, Yoninah (talk) 13:41, 20 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Are you responding to my edit there a few minutes ago? Tony   (talk)  13:46, 20 June 2011 (UTC)
 * No, to the first edit you made with the orange X. Yoninah (talk) 16:27, 20 June 2011 (UTC)
 * The hook, too, was problematic, but you've transformed it. I'll have a kind word to the nominator. Tony   (talk)  16:40, 20 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Thanks. Yoninah (talk) 19:07, 20 June 2011 (UTC)

RE: You've got a nerve
Apologies. Was not meant to come across as an insult. 狐 Déan rolla bairille!  20:48, 20 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Apology accepted. Thank, Fox. Tony   (talk)  04:17, 21 June 2011 (UTC)

DYK for Peter Child
Hi, thanks for your review. I'm not sure what you mean about the excessive referencing; it's actually encouraged when you're applying for GA or FA status. As to the linking, I am just following the example of hundreds of music articles which link to musical styles, musical groups, etc. In the lead, "composer" is actually called for, and in the body, locations like "Portland, Oregon" and "Staffordshire, England" may not be so familiar to people who don't live in those countries (I personally have no experience with England, and often click on those links). Best, Yoninah (talk) 09:03, 21 June 2011 (UTC)
 * OK, I hear you. I'm glad the project is moving forward, and I'll try to comply in my articles. Best, Yoninah (talk) 09:17, 21 June 2011 (UTC)
 * That was quick! More feedback appreciated where necessary. Tony   (talk)  09:19, 21 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Re: referencing. This has just been my personal experience at GA and FA, which pretty much wants every statement referenced. See my article Kvitel. (Admittedly, the citations are not as prominent as in Peter Child. I'll try to clean up the latter per your directions.) Best, Yoninah (talk) 09:24, 21 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Yoninah, pursuant to this discussion, I'm going to raise the issue at WT:FAC, because it's come up before and I wasn't entirely satisfied with the way it was dealt with. Tony   (talk)  10:05, 21 June 2011 (UTC)

The Signpost: 20 June 2011
<div style="margin-top:10px; font-size:90%; padding-left:5px; font-family:Georgia, Palatino, Palatino Linotype, Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Read this Signpost in full · Single-page · Unsubscribe · EdwardsBot (talk) 16:17, 21 June 2011 (UTC)

The Case of the Dean of St Asaph
I have reverted your edits to The Case of the Dean of St Asaph, which replaced emdashes with endashes. WP:MOSDASH clearly indicates that emdashes are to be used when indicating a break in the sentence — as I have done in this comment, as an example — and that is precisely what they are doing in the article. Ironholds (talk) 08:20, 24 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Could you read the style guide again, then? I've reinstated it, and note that you undid other edits without comment. I don't care which, but it's either an unspaced em dash or a spaced en dash. Tony   (talk)  08:31, 24 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Rather than insisting I re-read the guide, it might be helpful to explain what I'm misunderstanding. Ironholds (talk) 10:07, 24 June 2011 (UTC)
 * I'll explain on your page. Tony   (talk)  10:10, 24 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Certainly; thank you for having the courtesy to explain. Ironholds (talk) 10:29, 24 June 2011 (UTC)

FS Criteria
Is there anyway that you could present a draft of what you think the criteria should look like? cheers --Guerillero &#124; My Talk  06:45, 25 June 2011 (UTC)
 * OK, but what do you think of the merged "Featured media" proposal at Commons? It has a few attractions, but a few pitfalls. Do you think we should see how this proceeds? Tony   (talk)  08:21, 25 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Emulating Commons for the sake of emulating commons is a very bad idea. Time and again Commons has shown a special ability to take things that seem like good ideas and then warp them into horrible messes. If it does pass (which might happen), and it does work out well (which I seriously doubt), it would be worth looking at as a comparative and seeing if it would fit or could be adapted for Wikipedia. That is, however, a lot of ifs. FS needs a number of policy rewrites, and Tony1 has a good deal of experience in writing policy. As much as I don't feel comfortable with returning to FS, I still watch it and I still want the best for it, and if Tony can write up something to help whip FS into shape and help cut out some of the chaff, I'm all for it. FS needs good, stable leadership, and Guerillero fits the bill, but stopping the chaos is only the beginning if FS is to become main page worth. FS needs the boost, whatever it might become later, FS needs this.  S ven M anguard   Wha?  09:12, 25 June 2011 (UTC) P.S. I'm sorry if you don't want me posting on your page. Shoot me an email if there are any problems.

TFA blurb for Jesus College buildings
Hi Tony, FYI - is it better now? I didn't relink Liz I, although I'm not sure why you delinked her. I don't see it as overlinking - and if your thought is that people can find the link through the lead section of the article, that would apply to all the other links in the blurb! BencherliteTalk 13:09, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

airplane FAC
I'm trying to help the A330 get a star. The writer is a first-timer and a kid. Saw you had reviewed the 747 four years ago. Wondered if you could give it a little help. I am busily Brassoing it as best I can. Thing has a lot of very sound detail, but has the intrinsic dullness of an aircraft article. I'm also going to try to develop a graphic that shows the development progression as I think this will help reduce the pain of the number-letter soup.

I'll still look at DYK, like I said. I just want to help this guy out first.

TCO (talk) 06:58, 26 June 2011 (UTC)

Talkback
—Bruce1eetalk 09:59, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

Centiloquium
Concerned that your re-written hook for DYK may now appear to get the appearance and the reality back-to-front.

I've raised the question at Wikipedia talk:Did you know Jheald (talk) 17:22, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

Image layout concern
Am concerned that there continues to be a view that both alternating sides and default width are "rules" that have to be followed. Also, concerned that it makes the articles often look worse than better. For instance, left justifying a photo in a small section, puts it right under the section break and plays hell with the sections below.

See here for discussion of the issue coming up on A330 FAC. (Also, just came up in the Manhattan Project FAC, a minute ago.) I thought we had moved on from this...

TCO (talk) 21:01, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

The Signpost: 27 June 2011
<div style="margin-top:10px; font-size:90%; padding-left:5px; font-family:Georgia, Palatino, Palatino Linotype, Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Read this Signpost in full · Single-page · Unsubscribe · EdwardsBot (talk) 01:55, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

10 AH urgent
I dont get what you mean when you left that message on my page? --Misconceptions2 (talk) 14:08, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

Discussion pointer
Hello! Please see Talk:Main Page. Thanks! —David Levy 14:51, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

Nice to see...
I am not suggesting you did it as a personal favour but my thanks to you and Dabomb87 for the prominence of the famous St K photo - and indeed your continued fine work on the Signpost. All the best, Ben   Mac  Dui  18:11, 28 June 2011 (UTC)
 * You're right, there wasn't much competition last week! I combed through the featured topic and as soon as I saw that 1880s pic, I knew it was the one. Just as well the res was sufficient for the big-ass one at the top. Congrats on your good work on the topic. Tony   (talk)  04:18, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

Your recent post on Talk:Main Page
I noted your comments in the thread about the DYK yesterday. The WMF Board of Trustees has actually made a resolution with respect to controversial content, which directly applies to this situation: "We support the principle of least astonishment: content on Wikimedia projects should be presented to readers in such a way as to respect their expectations of what any page or feature might contain." This stemmed from the 2010 study on controversial content that you mentioned in your comment. I've posted a comment later in the same thread reminding people of this principle. Frankly, I thought it was a sufficiently well written and researched article that any number of good hooks could have come from it; deliberately selecting the most salacious seems to fly in the face of the WMF principle. I'd be curious to know what your take is. Risker (talk) 06:16, 29 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Thanks, Risker. You've given me the excuse I needed to speak my mind there; more precisely, you've reacquainted me with a key principle in Robert Harris's report to the Foundation Board. I'm certainly no prude in RL, but on WMF projects I'm acutely aware of the real-world political considerations, and not just in English-speaking countries. The main page is hugely exposed, and children see it every day in great numbers in its role as the gateway to WP. The f word is fine in many article contexts where the user has consciously sought out a topic, but the principle of least astonishment Robert Harris so ably examined plays sharply on the main page, where accidental exposure happens every second of the day. Why give individuals and governments a reason to curtail the reach of WP through what I regard as a pointy crusade against "censorship". Censorship is not black and white; it needs to be managed with skill and subtlety by the foundation and project editors. Tony   (talk)  07:15, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

Image width
Because of the past problems, our DYK bot is set up to accept only 100x100px at the moment. It is easy to change the bot (and I'll try to widen that image on the main page directly, if I'm online), but the right way is to gain general consensus at talk:Main Page. Cheers. Materialscientist (talk) 09:13, 29 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Yeah, I know. I hope DYK people will carefully consider whether or not to support a more flexible system when I raise it again on main-page talk. Thanks, Ms, for your consideration. Tony   (talk)  09:15, 29 June 2011 (UTC)
 * BTW, I routinely do image enhancement, at DYK and elsewhere. Ping me if and when. The one in prep4 is easy to fix. Materialscientist (talk) 09:30, 29 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Oh, that would be nice! Tony   (talk)  09:43, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

RFC for Pmanderson
Personally, I would prefer to see him topic banned sooner rather than later. It's trivial to look at his block log to see that he's not working well with others; he just makes whatever changes he wants, and he runs completely roughshod over even majorities against him; people shy away because they don't want to get blocked at the same time he is.

I think if we started an RFC we could probably get him topic blocked from making changes to the MOS-related policies and guidelines, without any further edits by him.

He's just continually bullying the other users.

He's been at the centre of two policy locked down in just a few weeks.

This has to stop, it's no good for the project.

Would you be willing to second an RFC against him? -Rememberway (talk) 10:57, 29 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Hi Rememberway, this is rather more dramatic than I had intended by merely posting a warning on the user's page. At this stage, I don't want to be mixed up in a move to protect the project from the kind of disruption we witnessed earlier today; I'll leave that to the judgement of other editors. Thanks for your message; in a cautionary vein, I do note that you've been involved in drama with this user at WP:TITLE, so it would probably be better if you weren't a prime mover. Tony   (talk)  11:02, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

Macdonald
I think I am going to start a discussion on Raul's talk page.--Wehwalt (talk) 12:43, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

Good faith
Yes, Casliber believed that you, Noetica, and Dicklyon were acting in good faith; one trusts that he will see better. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 13:05, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

IRC preferred
(dupe of my talk page comment)Can we IRC? HERE:  (one to one would be direct). TCO (talk) 18:27, 29 June 2011 (UTC)


 * I queeried you. you should have gotten a direct chat open up.  (I am new to IRC also, just a few days ago.)TCO (talk) 18:33, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

DYK for Vinita Gupta
While I can only answer for myself (I'm not sure the other editor even watches the nomination) I hope I have answered your concerns regarding Template talk:Did you know. It would have helped if you were clearer about your concern. Is it notability? COI? Am I missing something? --Muhandes (talk) 11:36, 29 June 2011 (UTC)
 * The other editor has now also commented. Your continuing review of the nomination will be appreciated. Best regards. --Muhandes (talk) 09:32, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Thanks. --Muhandes (talk) 17:42, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

US 491 edit
Your edit to U.S. Route 491 broke two things. Now, the first I'm willing to overlook as a misunderstanding, but the second I can't overlook. I think that you used a script to perform the edit, but you didn't check your results. If you'll notice, the script changed  in the infobox to. infobox road uses the ISO 3166-1 alpha-3 codes for country names, not the alpha-2 codes. That means USA is correct and US is not just as it would use CAN for Canada, not CA. The second problem that resulted from that edit was that it broke a category at the bottom of the page, changing  into.

The infobox change should have been apparent when the colors in the infobox header bars changed from white on green to black on light blue, and the "Route information" section of the infobox listed "Auxiliary route of [[Template:Infobox road/link/US|Template:Infobox road/abbrev/US]]" instead of "Auxiliary route of US 91". The category change should have been noticeable as well when the stray ", New Mexico" appeared below the navboxes and above the category list. Oh, and it only changed the location formatting of the termini in the infobox, "Shiprock, NM" and "Cortez, CO" were still listed as before for their junctions in the infobox.

You do many valuable things around here, but I think in this case you blindly applied a script and then missed two unintended consequences. The category issue should be fixed in your script for future usage.  Imzadi 1979  →   17:55, 29 June 2011 (UTC)
 * The script doesn't do those; I'm pretty sure I did those manually, and clearly I screwed up. The MoS says US not USA; does that mean the infobox template for roads needs an application to change this? I will test on preview-only mode. But the two-letter abbreviations of US states: you have no objection to the states being spelled out? Otherwise, not many readers will understand them. Sorry to cause inconvenience. Tony   (talk)  18:07, 29 June 2011 (UTC)
 * As I've said on WT:USRD, this is quite ridiculous. U.S. postal codes are referenced all over this country, and frequently abroad as well. Adding the full names to the infobox wastes space for zero benefit. --Rschen7754 18:24, 29 June 2011 (UTC)
 * But how many non-American readers know what CO means? Tony   (talk)  18:28, 29 June 2011 (UTC)
 * The "USA" there isn't displayed, it's used to call up the US-specific subtemplates, just as "CAN" calls up the Canada-specific ones, and "GBR" calls up the UK-specific ones. The infobox uses the alpha-3 code for all countries, with a few "invented" codes for continents, not the alpha-2 codes. The alpha-3 code for the country known as the United States of America is "USA", and the alpha-2 code is "US". This isn't an MOS thing because the input isn't displayed and the template documentation clearly says that the template is using ISO 3166-1 alpha-3 codes.  Imzadi 1979 User talk:Imzadi1979  →    19:07, 29 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Thanks, NOW I understand. Tony   (talk)  19:11, 29 June 2011 (UTC)
 * I'd dare to say quite a few of them. If not, it's quite easy to guess. If they can't even guess, then they can figure it out by looking at the article, where the answer is right smack dab in both the lead and the table of contents, not to mention the full state names being mentioned a few lines down in the same infobox. --Rschen7754 23:43, 29 June 2011 (UTC)
 * And the links were to the "Gallup, New Mexico" piped to "Gallup, NM", etc., so the tool tip popup would provide another clue if the reader hovers the cursor over the link in the infobox.  Imzadi 1979  →   23:47, 29 June 2011 (UTC)
 * I'm really not comfortable with a pipe display of "Gallup, NM". What is wrong with spelling out the state? Tony   (talk)  10:07, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

AN/I notice
Hello. This message is being sent to inform you that there is currently a discussion at Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents regarding an issue with which you may have been involved. Thank you.--Wehwalt (talk) 23:59, 29 June 2011 (UTC)


 * Tony, I've commented there and I've looked at the edit you made here. Would you please consider removing the preamble that you wrote there? From the word 'And' to 'here'. The rest of what you wrote there looks fine, but that preamble is way off-topic for the FAC and also personalises it to an unacceptable degree. If you have concerns of that nature, you should be raising them in the correct location, not dragging them into that FAC. Furthermore, if the review was indeed a deliberate WP:POINT violation, you should consider withdrawing it and asking someone else to do a copyediting review. Carcharoth (talk) 03:26, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Yes, OK. Tony   (talk)  03:33, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Well, striking it doesn't remove the effect it has had (and will continue to have), but as someone said at the ANI, it has the 'advantage' that people can read what you wrote and it might reflect badly on you. Up to you, I suppose. I have to do other things now, but this doesn't look resolved to me. If you can do anything further to help calm things down, that would be good. Carcharoth (talk) 03:57, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
 * I thought it wasn't done to remove text entirely; I've been criticised in the past for doing that. I don't mind its removal, but I'm certainly going to pursue the critiquing of bad text in FACs. Tony   (talk)  04:12, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

Further feedback
Tony, I hope you're aware that I value your prose contributions at FAC and throughout Wikipedia, which is why it is a concern when you let interpersonal conflicts influence your reviews. This latest incident  of an inappropriate commentary aimed at another editor at FAC has prompted me to raise, again, with you an old matter that in my view was a bigger concern. I can overlook an unfortunate Oppose, but an unworthy "green light" for an ill-prepared article from a respectable prose reviewer such as yourself causes a bigger problem at FAC. Because of the respect your prose reviews command, when other reviewers see that you have given a green light to prose, they may apply less scrutiny and go on to Support the article without further scrutinizing the prose. Specifically, please review Featured article candidates/Mauna Kea/archive1 and your uncharacteristically non-committal commentary entered at 13:32, September 17, 2010, which appears to give a green light to the prose of the article, which looked like this at the time of your comment. The deficient prose in that version is quite apparent, typos and grammatical errors were present at the time of your comment, other editors had to point them out, Karanacs had to restart the FAC on 19 October since the article had to be completely rewritten at FAC (diff of almost 500 revisions between the time of your green light and promotion), and the FAC endured almost two months, taxing reviewers and contributing to the FAC backlog. Again, I can overlook an Oppose entered in anger or frustration, but this apparent "green light" to deficient prose carried weight at FAC, and a much bigger concern is reviews that may result in the promotion of a deficient article because of commentary from a respected reviewer. Of note, you appear to have entered that supportive commentary to Res Mar's FAC specifically after and because of an interpersonal conflict in which you engaged with him, against me, beginning September 5, 2010 over similar prose deficiencies in Res Mar's writing occuring at The Signpost. (See User talk:SandyGeorgia/arch74). Another concern is that your support of Res Mar's Signpost writing has been an enabling factor-- he continues writing deficient entries for The Signpost, as the editor had to recently point out. I hope you will understand that the appearance is that you allow interpersonal issues to influence your commentary at FAC as well as your decision-making at The Signpost. Your prose reviews are too valuable for you to allow them to be compromised by interpersonal issues, and the "green light" you gave a deficient article is a much bigger problem than the inappropriate commentary and behavior you showed towards Wehwalt, and I note that your trend towards recrimination of anyone who disagrees with you over anything-- no matter how strong the friendship-- is not attractive. Reasonable editors will disagree at times, and that you take such umbrage whenever any editor disagrees with you-- to the point of lashing out vituperatively at editors who considered you a friend-- is not an admirable quality. I do not condone calls for anyone to be banned from FAC, but I do account for any reviewer's history at FAC when reading their commentary, and I hope you will stop letting interpersonal issues affect your reviews. That you have done this on multiple occasions is now something I have to factor when reading your reviews. I hope you'll accept that reasonable editors will disagree, and acknowledge that repeatedly and vituperatively attacking someone each time you had a minor disagreement is not the way to treat anyone, much less a friend. FAC needs your considered prose reviews; I hope you will return to objectively reviewing all FACs equally, and refrain from supporting your supporters and opposing your opposers, and understand in all areas of Wikipedia that disagreements will occur among reasonable editors. Sandy Georgia (Talk) 14:12, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
 * First, Sandy, let me say what a relief it is that you're talking to me after so long. It's a dialogue I'd dearly like to continue if you could find it within you to move on from your hatred of my work at The Signpost. I've felt very hurt that you've ignored my entreaties to communicate, all apparently because I write The Signpost's "Featured content" page in a way that rewards hard-working FC creators. When I redesigned that page, I thought you'd be delighted; what a shock it was to be battered for my trouble, and thenceforth ignored. Whereas we should be singing from the same song-sheet, as we did from 2006 until this unexpected falling out. I'll respond in point form:
 * "I can overlook an unfortunate Oppose"—But the Oppose itself wasn't unfortunate; it was entirely appropriate in reviewing that FAC, and the issues I raised still need to be addressed—plus any further issues I find in the article. It was the choice of FAC as the first among the ?40 in the queue that was pointy. That was the very reason I was quite open about this fact; worse would have been a pretence on my part that it was not pointy. Now we are faced with the galling fact that Wehwalt not only (1) thinks non-admins shouldn't be allowed to copy-edit blurbs, (2) reverted my improvements to the blurb on what turns out to have been his authored FA (very rude, frankly, not just to reinstate the two issues he had), (3) has demanded that the faulty original be reinstated, (4) has demanded that my "Oppose" at the FAC be overturned (as though my comments were fluff), and (5) has demanded that I be topic-banned from FAC. Give me a break. Relations with him will take some time to heal. It's over the top.
 * "which appears to give a green light to the prose of [Manu Kea FAC], which looked like this at the time of your comment". Looks fine to me at a quick glance through; am I missing something? As I remember, ResMario, a co-writer at The Signpost asked me to go through it before the nomination. I did this as a favour—actually to encourage a fellow journalist—a week or two before the FAC. Perhaps things were mucked up between this point and the FAC, but I felt at least on the clause level it was looking OK when I'd finished. I'd not have re-examined it for Cr. 1a as a reviewer in that situation, having given too much time already to it and in the expectation it would be passable. The diff is to my characteristic disclaimer about CoI, and was quite explicit: "I was please it last week " (my underline). Was this "a green light"? With a CoI, I wasn't going to weigh in: it's not proper. But I thought it was a reasonable nom, and wanted to encourage. Again, I disclose situations when I make entries at FAC (as with Wehwalt). I see now that there was a lot of tension between reviewers and nominator later in the nom period, but sorry, I didn't look again at the time. I apologise if somehow I caused stress through my brief comment (did I?). I'm confused.
 * "similar prose deficiencies in Res Mar's writing occuring at The Signpost. (See User talk:SandyGeorgia/arch74#The Signpost and ownership)"—the previous complaint here seems to be morphing into the same "Sandy is angry Tony is writing "Featured content" each week for The Signpost" thing you've bashed me over, much to my distress. We're going to have to agree to disagree on this: it's journalism, and the community seems to like the page a lot, even though there are a few issues with pics and the occasional glitch. It's a lot of effort that I find hard to sustain in busy periods, and I see it as supporting you and all of the featured-content writers and reviewers; you see it as undermining the system. I'm very careful to present it in a neutral way, even though I choose winners each week in a journalistic sense (the images, and sometimes little quotes by nominators/reviewers). I try to make it good for the readers and faithful to reality. OK, ResMario still needs to improve his writing skills and his attention to detail via the sources (memo to ResMario); but I'm not going to beat him over the head. At least he writes stories for The Signpost, which is more than I can say for most WPians. I'd hardly say I've been "the enabling factor"; our highly professional Managing Editor, User:HaeB (who gives me a talking-to over slip-ups, sometimes) can deal with that. Could you direct your comments to him? And ResMario, don't be discouraged if you're reading this ...
 * "the appearance is that you allow interpersonal issues to influence your commentary at FAC as well as your decision-making at The Signpost."—I think you're being very hard on me. I try to encourage a lot of editors; please remember we have falling participation at en.WP. I encourage DYK editors where I can. I'm old; they're young; mentoring is good.
 * "your trend towards recrimination of anyone who disagrees with you over anything-- no matter how strong the friendship-- is not attractive"—Oh boy, you're being hard on me. I don't know how you're forming these opinions, but is this what you back-channel to people? I'm feeling depressed right now.
 * "I hope you will return to objectively reviewing all FACs equally, and refrain from supporting your supporters and opposing your opposers"—It was an objective review. Could you please point out what, among those ?15 points, was subjective and slanted in any way? I really object to your unfounded smearing. I'm very careful to be even-handed in reviewing, and you know it. Are you out to damage my reputation? Is it something to do with my comment on Giano's page the other day, which I stand by? Remember that every point I made about Wehwalt's fault-ridden lead was written in exactly the same technical terms, irrespective of the authorship. You are being very unfair.
 * I'm not going to be intimidated by your threats to ignore my reviews at FAC. It's an extraordinary thing to say. My reviews are technical, and where occasionally they relate to personal prefs, I point this out, don't I? Sandy, you need to tone down the negativity and tone up the encouragement of other editors. Remember that what you say is very public. And you need to disregard Wehwalt's venomous back-channelling. Tony   (talk)  15:30, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Oh Sandy, I'm flattered! Please, elaborate on your tirade. I read this and couldn't stop laughing! <span style="font-family:Verdana,Arial,Helvetica;"><b style="color:#333333;">Res</b> Mar 15:44, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
 * I can't laugh. It's making me depressed. Tony   (talk)  15:48, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Sandy is stubborn as hell, and hasn't talked to me in a civil tone in years, Tony. I find no surprises with her anymore. It's always the same argument. Do I do crappy work? Sometimes. I'd say HaeB was more of an enabling factor; I used to not worry that I might miss a few things, simply because he always went back over it. I'm more careful, now, and I'll try to stay off of writing it "into the night" so to speak. My temper gets the best of me, sometimes, when it comes to Wikipedia, but I like to think I rebound from it well&mdash;I've yelled at Awickert and you too once, but Aw provides me with a sorts of papers I can't get otherwise via e-mail, and I think we have a working relationship at the Signpost. As for Sandy, I gave up the other day; I've tried to be civil with her many times and got bitten back each time. Sandy has favorites and she plays them well. I'm not one of her favorites. So I get the appropriate snobbish treatment. I take everything she says, now, with a grain of salt.
 * Sandy: if you even bother reading this, I'd like to point out that your abrasive and snobbish treatment of other editors has caused me to lose interest in Wikipedia several times already, and I think that it might well have chased several new editors, possibly very good ones, away. <span style="font-family:Verdana,Arial,Helvetica;"><b style="color:#333333;">Res</b> Mar 16:02, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Now, if you will excuse me, I have far more important matters to attend to. <span style="font-family:Verdana,Arial,Helvetica;"><b style="color:#333333;">Res</b> Mar 16:03, 30 June 2011 (UTC)


 * The latest is that User:Ironholds, who dished out extraordinary abuse to me at main-page talk last week, during my complaints that the last-minute queuing of blurbs effectively shuts non-admins out of contributing to them ("screaming child", I think was one phrase), has said to me:

Tony1, just popping in to let you know that the ANI drama is entirely of your own making, and that if you don't want people to slap you on the wrist for giving an incredibly biased, WP:POINTy and personalised review you should maybe not patrol the wiki swinging your dick around and treating anyone who disagrees with you as your own personal cum-bucket. Just FYI.

Right. How did this person get through his RfA? When was it, I wonder? Why does the community condone such behaviour by admins, but not by non-admins? The statement is there for all of my colleagues at The Signpost to see. Ironholds just ... dropped in, dumped it, and left. Tony  (talk)  16:15, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
 * His testicle-related comments are, like, the antithesis of WP:DBAD. <span style="font-family:Verdana,Arial,Helvetica;"><b style="color:#333333;">Res</b> Mar 16:17, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Forgive my stalking, but unless I'm having a massive brain fart (entirely possible), no such edit shows in Ironholds' contributions. Are you sure it's as it seems? Adrian J. Hunter(talk•contribs) 16:32, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
 * He came into The Signpost's prep room (IRC), dumped it for all to see, then left. Tony   (talk)  16:33, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Gotcha. Wow.  Requests_for_adminship/Ironholds_5 was Jan this year, since you asked. 167/7/8.  Adrian J. Hunter(talk•contribs) 16:46, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
 * I need to get something for IRC, any tips? <span style="font-family:Verdana,Arial,Helvetica;"><b style="color:#333333;">Res</b> Mar 16:38, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
 * ResMario, it was a painful process working it out. Someone at The Signpost newsroom will help. Perhaps a patch is required for your browser. See the "irc" and one other link in the lead. See what it says when you click it. Tony   (talk)  16:55, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

SandyGeorgia has her say. Wow, if I'd known she'd piped in to say she'd support an RfC on me, I'd not have responded in the way I did above. Here it is, from a few hours ago:
 * In the relative scheme of things, Tony1 has done other things at FAC that concern me more than this instance, although again I do understand it's upsetting to you. Should the behavior continue, you may find your co-certifier of an RFC closer than you think."

Nice to know who your friends are. So she's encouraging this Wehwalt character to launch an RfC against me? She'd like to conominate it? This might have been in response to something awful I said about Sandy at DYK yesterday:
 * "I've got to admit that Sandy is just about the most experienced, most professional editorial manager that Wikipedia has. Her advice should be taken very seriously."

Unfortunately, my monthly log-in-again thing meant it was inadvertently signed anon. Tony  (talk)  16:55, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
 * All was "five people", and IRC doesn't include the same rules (nor the same expectation of the rules) as en-wiki. What it does note, however, is "You should not post logs on the wiki, or circulate them without permission from those involved". Ironholds (talk) 16:57, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
 * A note on your above commentary on Sandy, by the way; are you honestly citing "you saying something nice about her" as a reason she shouldn't certify an RfC, or a reason you're not deserving of one? Do you really think that being pleasant on one occasion makes up for impropriety on another? Ironholds (talk) 17:01, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
 * I have nothing against you personally, Ironholds, but that's Wikilawyering. Context does not change the meaning of the message, and you have to admit, you were being a dick. <span style="font-family:Verdana,Arial,Helvetica;"><b style="color:#333333;">Res</b> Mar 17:02, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Sorry; saying that the comments were made in a forum where none of en-wiki's policies apply is wikilawyering? Ironholds (talk) 17:06, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Context does not defeat the meaning of the message. <span style="font-family:Verdana,Arial,Helvetica;"><b style="color:#333333;">Res</b> Mar 17:11, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Not at all; whether it has any relevance or should be brought up on-wiki - particularly in a format that violates policy - is entirely dependant on context. If you have a problem with my message, you are free to note that. On IRC. It has absolutely no relevance to ongoing en-wiki debates which I have no part in, however, and was made in response to Tony's own IRC commentary. Ironholds (talk) 17:15, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Ok, well, picture this: I have three mental lists for other users: "Is a total dick", "Can sometimes be a dick", "Isn't a dick", and you're now on my "Can sometimes be a dick" mental list. That is all. <span style="font-family:Verdana,Arial,Helvetica;"><b style="color:#333333;">Res</b> Mar 17:22, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
 * That shows remarkable naivety. everyone can sometimes be a dick. Many people just have the foresight or appropriateness to not do it where it can come back to bite them on the arse. This is precisely what I did, and I regret that Tony saw the need to not only bring an off-wiki discussion on-wiki, but also do so in violation of policy. I've yet to see you explain how telling them something in bald words to their face constitutes "backstabbing", however; not only is it the antithesis of backstabbing, backstabbing would require me to support or be friends with Tony. Unlike him - or, unlike what his above comments about SG make him seem to be - I do not think of people in terms of "friends" or "enemies", the former to defend me to the death and the latter to be kicked in the ribs. I support and oppose people on individual judgement calls, not simply as a matter of course because they are somebody I do or do not like. The wiki would be a better place if people focused on doing that rather than ganging up. Ironholds (talk) 17:33, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

I'm entitled to my own opinions, irregardless of what you think of them. As for backstabbing, I think that having a good relationship with an editor, and then having them support a RfC on you, is at the least "not nice". I'm not arguing any further. Just don't be a dick and we wouldn't have this conversation in the first place. <span style="font-family:Verdana,Arial,Helvetica;"><b style="color:#333333;">Res</b> Mar 18:09, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
 * I think it's a frighteningly backstabby thing to do. <span style="font-family:Verdana,Arial,Helvetica;"><b style="color:#333333;">Res</b> Mar 17:04, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Making a comment about someone, to their face, is the antithesis of "backstabbing" - it was in fact in relation to his commentary on IRC. Discussions over what happens in other forums does not belong on Wikipedia up to the point where it interferes with the functioning of the wiki or indicates some intent to breach policy on-wiki, neither of which are the case. Ironholds (talk) 17:06, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

What an extraordinarily dysfunctional system is RfA
I say this on the revelation above by Adrian J Hunter that User:Ironholds's RfA was as recent as January this year (167/7/8)—apparently his third try. That an editor is allowed to behave with rank abuse so soon after making promises to the community is hard to fathom—no complaints yet from his colleagues, but maybe they think it's just fine.

Let's see how I reported his counterintuitively successful RfA in The Signpost at the time:
 * "Ironholds (nom), has been a Wikipedia editor since early 2006 and has experience in WP:CSD and WP:AFD. His particular interest is current English law, and English legal history; he says among his best work is a featured article he "brought up from almost nothing", Court of Chancery."

The nom text for Ironhold's RfA claimed that he is "a solid image of a Wikipedian" and "has [never] failed to respond to criticism". Oh, but then the candidate admits, "In my last RfAs, I failed because I was uncivil." OK, so now we see. And then he says he's been on record as saying "RfA is broken, we must fix it".

Actually, he's quite a good writer. I see he did a piece for The Signpost in April on admins, in which I provided image assistance. And there was a co-authored story on efforts to improve editor retention (ironic). Nineteen featured items (and we need more legal articles; he's one I'd encourage). What has gone wrong to make a talented young guy turn so abusive so soon? Is this the effect of raw admin power, and the main-page arrogance that leads admins there to feel it's just tickety-boo that often no one but admins can edit blurbs?

One opposer at his RfA said "not all great contributors are suitable for adminship". Harry Mitchell (neutral) said, Ironholds "writes of policies as though they were legislation". Does Ironholds understand WP:CIVIL and the obligations he agreed to before the community at his RfA (WP:ADMIN)? Tony  (talk)  17:33, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
 * To ask a question right back at you; since when has WP:CIVIL applied to IRC? To ask another; since we know it applies to en-wiki, would you please withdraw your comments alleging that my off-wiki actions are evidence of "rank abuse"? Ironholds (talk) 17:40, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
 * The rank abuse started at WT:MP. It's cited above. Tony   (talk)  17:41, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

List of awards and nominations received by Madonna
Dear Tony, how are you? Probably stupid of me to ask, seeing the above section. Don't worry, keep up the good work. I wanted to ask your opinion regarding something. I have nominated the above wiki-linked article for FLC. I believed everything was all right. Now looking at the lead, somehow the flow from the first para to the second para does not appear correct to me. Can you please help me out as to what I'm missing? — <i style="color:blue;">Legolas</i> ( talk 2 me ) 16:29, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Legolas, I'll take a quick look. Tony   (talk)  16:30, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Tony, were you able to look at the issue I queried? — <i style="color:blue;">Legolas</i> ( talk 2 me ) 15:39, 2 July 2011 (UTC)

FAC
Hi Tony1. I can understand your reasoning for requesting Sandy's recusal on Wehwalt's FAC nomination, given that it's been a centre of conflict and her comments mentioned that review in particular, but why ask her to recuse on something like Missouri River? Do you intend to ask for her recusal on every review you comment on? Cheers, Nikkimaria (talk) 20:37, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Well, no. Much to my disbelief, she has attempted to smear my reputation above on the basis of a conflict-of-interest declaration I made at an FAC last year, as required by the instructions, declaring that I'd copy-edited a nomination before the FAC. This, she interpreted, as giving the "green light" to the nom; I don't know how anyone could come to this conclusion. She has announced she will regard my reviews with prejudice; please read her words above. It's unseemly for an FAC delegate, and she must have realised she'd have to recuse from now on. Tony   (talk)  06:09, 1 July 2011 (UTC)

US 491 TFA
Tony, Thanks for helping to get U.S. Route 491 ready for its time in the main page. This article went through FAC a few years ago, and has a few years of article rot on it. That's in addition to the fact that FAC standards have toughened over the years and honestly am not sure if this article would pass an FAC review today. I know if I had time I'd like to almost completely rewrite it. I appreciate people who try to fix things rather than just complain about them. Dave (talk) 16:49, 1 July 2011 (UTC)
 * You're most welcome, Moabdave. I hope the image audit was ok with you. Tony   (talk)  17:10, 1 July 2011 (UTC)

DYK Oliver Valentine
We sorted out the issues you raised at the DYK entry. :) Rain the One  BAM 11:55, 2 July 2011 (UTC)

DYK subpages
I'm sending this message to editors who commented at WT:DYK and expressed an interest in setting up a subpage-based system for DYK nominations. If you have time, please see WT:DYK and comment there. Thank you, <b class="IPA">r<font color="#8B0000">ʨ anaɢ</b> (talk) 18:56, 2 July 2011 (UTC)

GOCE drive invitation
Sent on behalf of the Guild of Copy Editors using AWB on 09:32, 3 July 2011 (UTC)

hook comment
Hello. I replied to your comment on a DYK hook here. Thanks. Jesanj (talk) 16:54, 3 July 2011 (UTC)
 * I found a NYT editorial that states this: "Varied and Deep-Rooted. Contrary to popular beliefs, this is not a problem driven mainly by the aging of the baby boom generation, or the high cost of prescription drugs, or medical malpractice litigation that spawns defensive medicine. Those issues often dominate political discourse, but they have played relatively minor roles in driving up medical spending in this country and abroad. The major causes are much more deep-seated and far harder to root out.


 * Almost all economists would agree that the main driver of high medical spending here is our wealth. We are richer than other countries and so willing to spend more. But authoritative analyses have found that we spend well above what mere wealth would predict.


 * This is mostly because we pay hospitals and doctors more than most other countries do. We rely more on costly specialists, who overuse advanced technologies, like CT scans and M.R.I. machines, and who resort to costly surgical or medical procedures a lot more than doctors in other countries do. Perverse insurance incentives entice doctors and patients to use expensive medical services more than is warranted. And our fragmented array of insurers and providers eats up a lot of money in administrative costs, marketing expenses and profits that do not afflict government-run systems abroad." Do you have any recommendations for me on how to improve the hook? Thanks. Jesanj (talk) 17:18, 5 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Nice to have it explained in one bundle: it's just as I understood it. But just be a little careful about inciting political flack on the main page. I'm short of time at the moment, so see what the experienced admins at DYK say. If they're fine, I'm fine, and please link them here if you really need to. Tony   (talk)  17:29, 5 July 2011 (UTC)

This Month in GLAM: June 2011
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