User talk:UninvitedCompany/archive5

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Music clips
I have decided to add audio clips to some articles. Mainly, I would like to record my own playing of certain solo piano and organ works, and add them to the relevant articles. While I am no great performer, I figure I can contribute clean recordings that are not encumbered by copyright. I'm hoping that I can start a trend, and that other amateur or student performers might be inspired to contribute their own clips.

I don't believe that much of this has been done thus far. I would like advice from the "musical Wikipedians" and the general community on how best to do this.

In the interest of specificity, I have at hand a completed recording of the g minor "little" prelude from BWV 558, doubtfully attributed to J.S. Bach. It is 2 minutes and six seconds long, and I have an OGG Vorbis file, recorded in stereo and encoded at quality level 6. At present we have no article on this work, but we could use one for the group of eight little preludes of which it is a part. For organ, I also plan to record the toccata from BWV 565 and perhaps some hymns, also a chorale prelude by Brahms and another by Dupre. And more stuff as time permits. On piano, I'm going to record several Joplin rags and a bunch of the more characteristic classical piano pieces (Chopin nocturnes, Beethoven sonatas, Debussy Claire de Lune, Satie Gymnopedie, etc etc).

So, how best to do this. Here's my thinking:


 * Place recordings of complete works or substantial excerpts on the Wikimedia commons. Make links to these works from the article about the work.  Add articles as needed (e.g. 8 short preludes).
 * Create excerpts that are illustrative of a particular composer, genre, or instrument, typically 30-60 seconds long. Place these here on the English wikipedia and link them from the composer, genre, or instrument articles.

That's it. Please provide your comments, because if this is unhelpful or should be done another way or whatever, I'd like to know that before expending a great deal of effort on recording.
 * Good idea. You might want to browse Sound/list. I decided to start that to catalogue the full length songs on wikipedia. (I've contributed about 5 so far, mostly mutopia conversions). I know there are a few others who have as well. &rarr;Raul654 22:00, Feb 7, 2005 (UTC)


 * Thanks. I hope this will be helpful.  I see from the list that there is only one actual recording.


 * It occurs to me that the GFDL is even more problematic for this than it is for the text. In the case of a musical recording, there really is no "transparent format" because audio can't be extended incrementally; though you could make the case for the best editing tools doing this, even with them you can't go back and change which stops are drawn on an organ or change the attack on a scale from legato to staccato.  I'll be recording in MP3 (which is all my iRiver supports), and transcoding to OGG; if there were such a thing as a transparent format it would be WAV or PCM or FLAC, though an OGG at Q6 isn't bad.  This should be addressed, but I'll continue for the time being.

What is the purpose of having recordings of full pieces? No offense intended. I have only created short audio files to illustrate examples (for example see Riff and Tonality). Hyacinth 00:12, 8 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * Uh, for illustrative purposes for articles on musical theories and techniques, samples are fine. But we *want* to give people full musical songs where possible - how can an article on a song ever be complete without having the song itself? &rarr;Raul654 00:16, Feb 8, 2005 (UTC)


 * I don't believe that it is possible to understand musical concepts without hearing the music itself. Traditional print media, and most musicians, and especially people who write about music or teach it, make an assumption that their audience is engaging in music listening activities independent of the written or spoken word.


 * Because Wikipedia is multimedia, we can and should play to our strengths and include such recordings. I don't know whether or not it makes sense to include every work that is a part of the "standard repertoire" -- I'll leave that discussion to the inclusionists and deletionists.  But at a minimum we could have representative pieces illustrating the major eras, forms, and composers.  The Uninvited Co., Inc.


 * The article on football doesn't have a clip of an entire football game, as the concepts and techniques used in football could mostly be illustrated with much shorter clips. Articles on books don't give the text of the entire book. Hyacinth 22:06, 18 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * True. But football is a sport, not an art.  Accordingly, there are no individual football games that are held up as examples of what football is about -- no canon, if you will.  While we don't have the full text of any books, that is primarily because that mission is fulfilled by other projects, such as Project Gutenberg and wikisource.  We link to those where appropriate.  There is no project that I know of that aims to create a Free library of music. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 04:17, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)

There are literally thousands of audio recordings of classical works performed and recorded by students and faculty at my university, as all recitals are recorded; I doubt it would be much effort to convince the performers to release recordings of single pieces under...::reads up:: er, a suitable license. Problem is, even if the originals themselves are now PD, most performers are playing from copyrighted editions of the sheet music. Someone more knowledgeable than I about copyright willing to comment on the status of such recordings? Mindspillage (spill yours?) 04:15, 8 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * I think that would be great if it could be done, and the quality of the performances would probably be better than what I can provide. Copyright clearance and music department policy on recordings may be more of a problem than you might think, though.  Many music students and faculty are opposed to royalty-free music on principle, because they see it as undermining the professional nature of musicianship.  IANAL so I don't have an opinion on the sheet music matter, though I will point out that most recitalists play from memory after studying a number of different editions, some of which may be public domain; moreover, many sheet music publishers claim copyright where none actually exists. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 17:59, 8 Feb 2005 (UTC)

---

I've added the Short Prelude and Fugue in G Minor. Not much, but I have to start somewhere. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 20:08, 8 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for your kind words. However, I did make a few mistakes during recording which I basically hacked out, so when I get a little more proficient with the work I can reupload a better version. There are a few stylistic problems with that recording also; however it should be suitable for the moment :) Dysprosia 05:40, 11 Feb 2005 (UTC)

A worry about quality
I want to address another issue concerning editor-created sound files, namely the issue of performance quality.

It's a bit awkward to say this, but I think some of the Wikipedia sound files for classical music that I've heard are musically just awful--thumping, clumsy, completely devoid of rhythmic or dynamic nuance. Please, nobody take this personally; I carefully refrained listening to sound files before writing this; so my remarks are based on my general memory and are not directed towards any particular person.

My point, though, is that if we are going to keep quality at an appropriate level, then the recordings should be made people with cast-iron psyches--if you make a recording, you should be ready to accept the verdict of other editors that it's not good enough, or that someone else's recording is better. Is there a consensus that people are willing to adopt cast-iron psyches for the purpose?

Is so, and if the necessary talent is out there, I'm all for as many sound examples as possible, of whatever length.

Cheers, Opus33 16:28, 13 Feb 2005 (UTC)

P.S. I've done a few piano recordings myself--mostly just scales, chords, hymns--and I hereby decree that I wouldn't mind if people want to produce improved versions of them.

I just heard about this. Great idea. If I can figure out a reasonable way to make the recordings, I'll contribute decent renditions of some Scott Joplin works. Isomorphic 20:40, 18 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Requests for comment/Gazwim
Could I ask you to certify this RFC, as you have left comments on his talk page previously? Thue | talk 23:50, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Snowspinner
Geez, just frickin' speedy-delete it. It's not an RFC, and neither was it meant to be a RFDA vote, just a petition. -- Netoholic @ 02:33, 2005 Mar 26 (UTC)


 * If I felt that it fit at all within the deliberately narrow guidelines for speedy deletes, I would. But it doesn't.  The Uninvited Co., Inc. 02:36, 26 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Why are you being disruptive? You've now made an RFC which cannot actually be certified (being that none of the petitioners actually signed it). Now, from the other side, you're also disrupting an active VfD discussion. Put things back the way they were, and let the VfD finish. -- Netoholic @ 02:40, 2005 Mar 26 (UTC)
 * Aren't we all allowed to speak? Who's being disruptive here? KingOfAllPaperboys 02:53, 26 Mar 2005 (UTC)


 * I'm not sure what actions you consider disruptive. It is not possible to disrupt a process that doesn't exist (such as your purported "RFDA" process), and I don't buy the idea that you can't move a page just because there's an ongoing VfD, as long as the VfD page is kept up to date, which I did.  The Uninvited Co., Inc. 03:04, 26 Mar 2005 (UTC)

No clear consensus on my adminship - so I was removed
Thanks for your comments and support. One Salient Oversight 08:13, 30 Mar 2005 (UTC)

ABCD
I rarely vote on the nominations as there is a good likelihood I may be pushing the button or not, so I want maximum freedom to be able to evaluate the pros and cons in a tight situation without someone saying "didn't you vote (yes/no) and now you're making the decision"? But in the case of ABCD, I agree with you, support seems to be turning the candidate's favor without any of the negatives alleging wrongdoing. So if it keeps up like this, I would be inclined to promote, too. Cheers, Cecropia | explains it all ® 22:15, 1 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for your note on my talk, Uninvited.
So have you heard of the band called The Uninvited? They had a couple semi-hits and broke up a year or two ago. The song "What God Said" is worth a download.

(Thanks for your note on my talk. I posted on the requests page.)

Best, - :)Ben Pfwebadmin 20:36, 4 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Baseline ... not-policy
Good addition .. thank you. Some people are all to eager to jump on suggestion and discussion as guideline and act as if it is policy. Courtland 19:11, 2005 Apr 5 (UTC)


 * You're welcome. This seems to have been more of a problem in recent months, and I'm not sure why.  The Uninvited Co., Inc. 19:19, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Countdown deletion
I see you've marked it as, which is odd, because it never was considered a policy in the first place. Is there a time limit to how long proposals can be discussed?

Should I just move it back to my userspace, then? I still want people to see it and edit it, without them thinking "oh well, this was rejected, so there's no point, move on". Obviously it's not policy and I don't want anyone to think it is, but calling it "rejected" seems very weird. RickK is the only one who even ever expressed open rejection of the idea. JRM 20:08, 2005 Apr 5 (UTC)


 * I will rephrase the template text to make it clear that it most often applies to proposed policies that have been rejected by the community. If you believe I have categorized it in error and it is still under active consideration, please change the tag to  .  The Uninvited Co., Inc. 20:13, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)


 * Technically, of course, I can't determine whether it's under active consideration, but since there's never been a vote or any dismissal beyond RickK's, it's definitely not rejected. I've changed it to, which should serve the purpose of alerting people to the unofficial status equally well. JRM 20:21, 2005 Apr 5 (UTC)


 * For what it's worth, there have been a plethora of related proposals over the years and none have been accepted. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 20:27, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)


 * I know. I wouldn't have exhumed this if somebody else hadn't thought it was worth it. It's probably not, but then, I don't consider myself the "owner" of this proposal. If it rots in obscurity for the rest of history, too bad... JRM 20:33, 2005 Apr 5 (UTC)

re: Template:notpolicy
Thank you for taking the time to respond to my concerns. I understand more clearly what you are trying to do. I'll put some thought into next steps for those articles where the the template might not (or no longer) be a perfect fit. Rossami (talk) 21:59, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)


 * You're most welcome. I anticipated some discussion over the wording of each template, and anticipated that the visibility will lead to some recategorization of a few pages.  I am surprised, though, at Netoholic's suggestion that categories should not be used in templates, since as you point out there are many templates so structured.  Hopefully that will be resolved as more people become aware of it.  The Uninvited Co., Inc. 22:20, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)


 * Hi there! I've noticed your new semipolicy and notpolicy templates. I have some concern about the wording thereof, and made an attempt to clarify them. Of course that is still open to discussion so please tell me what you think of it.
 * A small remark on layout... on Wikipedia_talk:Deletion_policy/schools the notpolicy tag refers to the 'discussion' page as 'wikipedia_talk_talk:...'; maybe that could be fixed somehow in the template?
 * Yours, Radiant_* 07:58, Apr 6, 2005 (UTC)


 * I moved the Deletion_policy/schools page from Wikipedia_talk: to Wikipedia. Substantially all the other policy proposals are in Wikipedia: rather than Wikipedia_talk: so that seemed to make the most sense.  The Uninvited Co., Inc. 15:19, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)


 * I was wondering if there has been any discussion prior to creating these four templates, and if anyone other than you is involved in spreading them. Yours, Radiant_* 09:12, Apr 7, 2005 (UTC)

Policy classification
Given our current methods of classifying policies, I believe we may need extra classification, or we may need to rethink it. "Official policy" is clear. "Semi-policy" is not, however - in this case, it refers to something that is commonly done but that is subject to substantial controversy (see RPA talk). In other cases, such as style guides, it is something that nearly everybody agrees to, but that doesn't sound 'official'. Similarly, "rejected" can refer to something that hasn't gathered consensus, OR to something that has gathered significant consensus opposed to it. Radiant_* 17:20, Apr 7, 2005 (UTC)


 * I will reply at Template talk:Semipolicy. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 17:28, 7 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Edit war
You mentioned an edit war in this template on my talk page, and my heart sank when I discovered who was at the heart of it. I know I'm not the sharpest tool in the box when it comes to understanding people's thinking (my spousal over-unit is convinced I'm "asbergal") but it seems to me that a certain person would be much happier if the template transclusion system simply did not exist. Your thoughts? --Phil | Talk 15:42, Apr 6, 2005 (UTC)

3RR
Thanks for your supportive comments on the 3RR rule. This seems to me to be a classic example of the cure being worse than the disease. Since Jimbo blessed the idea that we needed more aggressive action against edit warriors, the 3RR people feel especially empowered. The comments revealed in the current RfA on Chamaeleon (or whichever spelling he's now using) support my contention that 3RR blocking is a tool to be used to support majority opinion. -- Cecropia | explains it all ® 22:06, 7 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Sockpuppets
Hi there! At the RPA page, you claim we should change our policy to expose more sockpuppets. Per recent incidents, I am inclined to agree (since recently, two long-time users are alleged to be the same person, who has two accounts for double-voting; and there have been several recent instances of vandalism that were clearly instigated by a knowledgeable wikipedian who wanted to anonymously make a WP:POINT). However, Talk:Sockpuppet does not seem to be very active. Do you have earlier experience with the issue? Should we put up a talk page and/or policy proposal for this? Yours, Radiant_* 15:49, Apr 8, 2005 (UTC)


 * This has been an issue for quite some time, and my personal baggage from it is rooted in my dealing with User:142, who has had a number of aliases here as well as at other wikis. However, the 3rr is making it far worse, as is arbitration, because before those two things it didn't matter much since people could just be pests with a single login and get away with it.  Anyway, it's a tough issue, because most of the developers are CryptoNauts, and Jimbo has cryptonaut leanings.  This is compounded by the fact that Chinese contributors both here and to the Chinese wikipedia do have a legitimate fear of government prosecution for their activity here if they are outed.  Altogether, as a result, nothing gets done.  All that compounded by the sort of Wikipedia groupthink where people are afraid to stake out controversial positions, all reputation is negative.


 * I have asserted before and will continue to assert that all computer-mediated communications mechanisms where there is no means to identify all contributions that originate from the same source are bound to fail. There's a Clay Shirkey paper on that floating around the net somewhere.


 * There are all kinds of answers technically. UBB handles this very well, logging IPs but only making them available to forum hosts and only for a limited time, and optionally requiring confirmation of an email address.  I don't think either of those are an excessive burden on participants.


 * I've been beating my head against the wall so long on this one that I've given up. Maybe someday someone else will come along and carry the torch.  The Uninvited Co., Inc. 17:03, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Template:Requests for arbitration/Coolcat vs. Fadix
Hi, Thanks for ditching the template; I would ask that you add the most recent changes User:Coolcat made to the template -- probably while it was on your clipboard. I'd do it, but I'm a party to the case, and you've begun the process. I would suggest protecting the template (I have not checked to see if you're an admin). I expected User:Grunt to deal with this. &mdash; Davenbelle 02:22, Apr 9, 2005 (UTC)


 * Sorry 'bout that; must have been a cache issue; really looked that way... &mdash; Davenbelle 02:36, Apr 9, 2005 (UTC)

Mending the social fabric of Wikipedia
I am speechless in awe. -- Thank you; glad you enjoyed it. But I'd rather you were not speechless, but joined with me in speaking for structural changes to our community, to preserve and repair our social fabric. I cannot do it alone -- not had I great power. Social fabric repair must be a group process. &mdash; Xiongtalk 06:25, 2005 Apr 10 (UTC)

BTW, the article I think you indicate is at: Shirky: A Group Is Its Own Worst Enemy. &mdash; Xiongtalk 06:28, 2005 Apr 10 (UTC)

Convention
Would you consider a Charter Convention? &mdash; Xiong &#29066; talk 02:25, 2005 Apr 12 (UTC)


 * Would I consider one? Yes, though I would have to be convinced.  I agree that there is a problem with instruction creep, but I'm not sure a "charter convention" is the best way to solve it.  It is not a new problem.  My ongoing efforts to organize and categorize policy are one of my responses to this.  The Uninvited Co., Inc. 15:27, 12 Apr 2005 (UTC)

User:UninvitedCompany/notes
Please remove (or 'nowiki') the templates from User:UninvitedCompany/notes; the page is showing up on Category:Candidates for speedy deletion. Mel Etitis ( &Mu;&epsilon;&lambda; &Epsilon;&tau;&eta;&tau;&eta;&sigmaf; ) 22:03, 12 Apr 2005 (UTC)


 * Done. Sorry.  The Uninvited Co., Inc. 22:08, 12 Apr 2005 (UTC)


 * That's OK &mdash; easy mistake to make. Mel Etitis ( &Mu;&epsilon;&lambda; &Epsilon;&tau;&eta;&tau;&eta;&sigmaf; ) 22:11, 12 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Peter Kreeft
Why are you deleting the Kreeft links? His argument is serious philosophical one that must be contended with. To remove the links is to silence one part of the argument about personhood and conception.

Peter Kreeft has important point of view that isn't otherwise represented on Wikipedia. The articles on personhood are all biased heavily toward the view that personhood does not begin at conception. Such articles either don't mention the personhood-at-conception POV at all, or they treat it as somehow extreme. This is unacceptable, so I have begun to add Prof. Kreeft's article as merely one example of the personhood-at-conception POV.

You are a silly man
I am reverting the pages because my changes were useful and important for providing a neutral point of view. What is wrong with giving people access to both sides of the argument?

Who are you, anyway?

Uncle G extension
I've extended the voting time on Uncle G for 48 hours for reasons I've stated on the RfA pages. Cheers, Cecropia | explains it all ® 04:04, 17 Apr 2005 (UTC)

What can I do?
What can I do to make it so that you don't feel like you need to attack my character so often? Do you use IRC or an IM programs with which we could talk? -- Netoholic @ 17:00, 2005 Apr 20 (UTC)


 * I don't recall attacking your character either recently or in the past; rest assured that if I have done so at all it has not been often. If you're referring to this edit, it's nothing of the sort and I find it hard to believe that you could read any malice into it.  I believe that my one-time dispute with User:Daniel C. Boyer over the article about him spread to more pages than your present dispute with Xiong over templates has, though at the rate you're both going, you may well catch up.


 * I participate in IRC, albeit rarely; when I'm there I can be found in #wiki and #wikipedia, and occasionally the tech channels. If you have something to say, email works best; I do treat incoming email as confidential.


 * Best regards


 * The Uninvited Co., Inc. 21:20, 20 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Sorry about late reply
UC, I did get the email -- wikifatigue effectively kept me from making any meaningful response. Sorry - I hope you got good responses from others, and I'm going to do my best to chip in once I get over my exhaustion. Thanks for your dedication. -- Jwrosenzweig (editing while too lazy to log in)

WPians who play the [?W]Piano
Please don't put cat tags on user: or user:talk pages. Cats need to be limited to article pages, with a few rare admin exceptions. And is an ugly invitation to vanity pages. --Jerzy (t) 21:38, 2005 Apr 26 (UTC)

Harumph! It's a joke until someone creates the page, then it's a CfD. I'm not gonna hunt down the others, but i expect to feel the same about them if i encounter them. Tnx in any case. [smile] --Jerzy (t) 21:56, 2005 Apr 26 (UTC)

Xiong
Hi there! Because the RFC about Xiong seemed to deal mainly on his disagreements with Netoholic, I thought it best to start a new RFC to see if people have comments on Xiong's behavior that do not relate to Netoholic. Please give your thoughts and/or opinion on that at Requests for comment/Xiong. Radiant_* 08:27, Apr 27, 2005 (UTC)

Forsyth County
My colleagues and I are currently disputing the validity of facts regarding the history section of the Forsyth County article. It appears that you have contributed extensively to this section, and I would like to ask what is your authority / source of information on the matter? ~ Booyabazooka 19:22, 2 May 2005 (UTC)


 * I lived there in the early 1990s. The court case is available from online legal sites, and there are several good summaries of the march and its aftermath.  The best source would be the Atlanta Journal-Constitution newspaper from the days following the march.  The census demographics confirm that little has changed; fewer than 1% of the residents are black -- in contrast to neighboring Gwinnett county where over 13% are black.  Forsyth county remains one of the few purportedly civilized places in the U.S. where it is still fashionable to be a racist.  The Uninvited Co., Inc. 20:01, 2 May 2005 (UTC)

Proposed RfC on User:Daniel C. Boyer
As someone who has had problems with Mr. Boyer in the past, I was wondering if you would care to help compile an RFC against him. We are currently working on a rough draft at User:Plattopus/DCB, which could use any additional documentation of more of the same specific incidents that you can provide. Thanks! Postdlf 00:03, 12 May 2005 (UTC)

Kils
We have a situation with one of our historical users developing, and I think the institutional memory of some of the "old hands" would be useful in dealing with it. If you can help, take a look at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents#Oceanographer and Kils. --Michael Snow 16:55, 25 May 2005 (UTC)


 * And now, Requests for adminship/Kils. --Michael Snow 23:26, 25 May 2005 (UTC)

Relicensing my work
The text of your user page appears to be granting permission to others to use content I have created under a license other than the GFDL. You do not have permission to relicense my work or the works of others beyond the scope of rights and restrictions contained in the license granted to you. We already have some nice templates for doing so, but I suspect that you are already aware of them.. :) The bounding scope of 'collective work' doesn't really affect this matter. You may indeed release your work under as many licenses as you choose, but that does not permit you  to relicense the work of others.  I would suggest that you clarify your user page so that it is clear to others that your license grant only applies to the works where you hold the copyright.  Thanks! --Gmaxwell 00:00, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)


 * I believe that my user page makes matters clear as it stands. I believe that you, me, and many others have created a collaborative work with joint authorship.  I believe that U.S. law governs.  Under U.S. law, any author of a joint work may license that work with no obligation to other authors except sharing of any royalties thus garnered.  Whether or not Wikipedia is indeed a single work with joint authorship is perhaps unclear, and as I state on my user page, I make no warranties that it is.  As far as I know no Wikipedian has obtained a legal opinion as to whether it is or not, so I merely state my views. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 00:59, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)


 * I'm sorry but your views on copyright really are not pertinent to the matter at hand. All of the text in Wikipedia is licensed under the GFDL. Some authors have chosen to license the text they have written under additional licenses as is their right. Since you are not giving legal advice you need to stop attempting to give legal advice. The text of your userpage is misleading and is at odds with our copyright policy. Although I disagree that mere aggregation creates a joint work (i.e. the whole of wikipedia), that issue is completely irrelevant to the discussion at hand: your addition of text into an article I created under the GFDL does not magically remove the conditions of the GFDL from the derivative work. You have no ability to relicense the works that others have created under the GFDL under an arbitrary license of your choosing, to attempt to claim otherwise is antisocial and dishonest. The inclusion of such a claim on a page which is a part of Wikipedia can not be tolerated. I would be glad to work with you to help you find new language for your userpage that makes it clear that your licensing applies only to the work you have created, but the standing text needs to be changed or removed right away and if you are unwilling I will have to go ahead and take care of it myself. Gmaxwell 01:34, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)


 * I would welcome further discussion of the matter with you and others. My user page is a personal statement of my views and the license grant for my work and I would ask that you permit it to stand intact; in any case, the CC-by-SA license it incorporates by reference is perpetual and irrevokable and so any edits you make to that page may not have the effect you desire.  Best wishes,  The Uninvited Co., Inc. 01:50, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Those following this discussion may find some background on the problems with the GFDL to be helpful. Here are some links:
 * an overview from the 1-player.net website
 * Debian's draft position statement on the GFDL
 * Why Wikitravel isn't GFDL

My view is that the GFDL is rapidly becoming obsolete for new documents and projects, which leads to an inability to share content between WP and newer projects such as Wikitravel. The reasons for this growing obsolescence aren't even necessarily germane, because though the inherent problems with the GFDL are very real, the pale by comparison to the compatibility problem. The CC licenses enjoy broader appeal among content creators and this is unlikely to change. At the time the WP license was chosen, the CC licenses were not yet available and so WP chose (wisely, IMO) to use GFDL.

For those who are interested, the main problems with the GFDL itself are:
 * 1) A requirement to include the full legal text of the license on printed copies.  The legal text is lengthy and will not fit on brochures and similar short documents.
 * 2) An overbroad DRM restriction.  Despite lobbying efforts by User:Jimbo Wales and the Debian project, the FSF is unwilling to amend this provision to make it workable.  While the overall goal of keeping the subject document free of DRM restrictions is a valid one, the GFDL goes far beyond this with a restriction that would prevent any sort of encryption or permissions management, such as use of encrypting backup facilities, IPsec links to transfer the content, non-world-readable file permissions, and so on.
 * 3) A requirement to bundle the transparent copy with the text under certain circumstances rather than merely making it available concurrently.
 * 4) The ability of creators of derived works to add invariant sections, hindering reuse.
 * 5) The FSF holding the sole ability to revise the license.  The FSF is an activist organization, and one might say that their mission is to accomplish political change (that is, a power shift) through creation of free content.  In contrast, the Creative Commons is an organization whose goal is to be of service to content creators.  If there were a conflict between politics and the content itself, which organization would you trust with an important work like Wikipedia?

The Uninvited Co., Inc. 02:53, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)


 * To your last point.. The FSF actually has no ability to make the work unavailable under the existing license, so they can not change it but only provide a new one .. since the terms are or any later version. Because of this they could only ever grant new rights and not take any away. If I follow your argument I might as well stick to PD, because you are claiming that any editor can relicense wikipedia. As far as trust goes, I trust the Free Software foundation because they have an very long track record in dealing with copyright related issues and behaving in an ethical, open, and socially responsible fashion. I trust the FSF to protect my freedom related to digital works. I also have huge respect for the creative commons, but after seeing their new 'wiki' license which grants special rights to people operating websites and denies attribution to authors... Well I remember the uglyness from when CDDB took my work and the free work of many others and made it propritary... and quite frankly that has reduced my trust in the CC ever so slightly. Since no one could ever make our work less free because of how it is licensed, I would support the group less likely to remove the restrictions that create freedom for everyone, and today that is the Free Software Foundation.  I have written to the en mailing list whining about you, in it I included some rebuttals to your other claims related to the GFDL... here is the text of my post:

en:User:UninvitedCompany has a user page which contains text with a form much like a standard copyright grant, which makes the claim that because wikipedia or it's articles are a collective work by many authors that any contributor, no matter how minor (as his less than 3k edits are quite minor compared to the size of wikipedia as a whole which he lays claim to), is entitled to relicense the work as a whole under any license they see fit. He then goes on to use this to grant the entire wikipedia under CC-BY-SA because he has issues with the GFDL. Although he has been careful to pad his words with the expected IANALs, it is pretty clear his intention is to circumvent the licensing of Wikipedia and, failing that, to encourage others to disregard our licensing.

When the issue of User:Pioneer12's non-article edits came up ... I didn't care too much because the issue was the licensing of his work, not mine. In this case UninvitedCompany is making an effort to circumvent the licensing on my work that I have chosen, by attempting to relicense that work against my wishes. I consider this to be profoundly anti-social.

Although uninvitedcompany has been more than polite in my discussion with him on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:UninvitedCompany (more polite than I for sure), he refuses to stop attempting to relicense my work via the text on his user page.

I understand that UninvitedCompany dislikes the GFDL and that he is not alone in that position. I, however disagree with his position on the GFDL and his idea of what other people think of the GFDL. For example, the position of debian legal is not as strongly negative as he implies, because the license is setup to only have teeth against distribution so the 'encrypted storage' issue is generally a strawman argument. I specifically prefer the GFDL over the CC-BY-SA because the DRM restriction would make life hard for someone distributing my content using a device which involuntarily locks the content with DRM (http://www.theregister.co.uk/2001/01/10/everything_you_ever_wanted/). The GFDL's strong DRM terms contain an intentional side effect that may help slow the market penetration of devices which subjugate the users of the technology, and I strongly support this protection because it is certan that since I use Free Software I would be unable to access content given to me by users of CPRM devices no matter their good intentions, and because only through creating 'licensed publishers' can the mass-media companies completely close the hole that allows the illegal distribution of their work. Such a future would likely deny me the effective ability to publish altogether, as long as you define effective to mean not providing a special playing device with my work and publish as covering a wider audience than some free software geeks.

... but the arguments for and against the GFDL really don't matter here: My work is licensed under the GFDL and only the GFDL. It is almost certainly not possible for User:UninvitedCompany or anyone else to change that, but it is terribly impolite for him to use space on Wikipedia (userpager or otherwise) to make such claims that disagree with our license text and the wishes of (at least) some of the editors. The argument UninvitedCompany is advocating would allow any editor to distribute wikipedia under any license he wishes no matter how more or less restrictive. Judging by the small number of people who dual license their work as PD or BSD, I suspect many would disagree.

So I'd like to ask the community at large to please ask uninvited company to revise his user page. I don't think his claim has any more merit than pioneer12's disagreement with the form he submitted all his talk text through, but I think it's all the more negative because it purports to effect the licensing of work by authors other than him rather than just his own. [unsigned post by Gmaxwell]


 * Thank you both for your post to wikien-l and your consideration in copying it here since I no longer check wikien-l daily. I would like to add, however, that I tried to initiate a discussion on wikien-l prior to placing the license grant on my user page.  There were no substantive replies.  As the topic is an important one, I genuinely look forward to greater involvement and discussion on the part of the community, whatever the outcome may be.  The Uninvited Co., Inc. 04:30, 20 Jun 2005 (UTC)


 * Hmm, the topic kinda died on the mailing list. Anyway, as for my opinion on your licensing thing, I don't think your assumptions are accurate. People speak of the Wikipedia as 'an encyclopaedia', but really it is just a collection of millions of pieces of text interspersed with Mediawiki markup. The work is not indivisible, because all the separate contributions can be identified (that's what the history pages are there for). By using Special:Contributions you can identify each of the millions of edits, which are essentially individual works released under GFDL. The articles are derivative works, created by the Mediawiki software, derived from the initial edit. Indeed, the whole website is a collection of derivative works (which are themselves GFDL licensed). And whatever your opinion of the GFDL, you really have no option but to release your contributions under it. Indeed anyone who makes an edit implicitly accepts the Wikipedia licensing system. One can choose to multi-license, but any combination of licenses must include the GFDL (with the exception of public domain).
 * Putting that aside, you can redistribute any derivative work (or a verbatim copy) you create from original works under the GFDL, as long as you distribute it under the GFDL also. That means you can't license the whole Wikipedia under, for example, a CC license. You can license your own contributions separately.
 * Finally IANAL, but IAALS, albeit one in Australia and not familiar with United States law. --bainer (talk) 04:17, 24 Jun 2005 (UTC)


 * Bainer, I think you're misunderstanding UninvitedCompany's statement. As I read it, it is a statement of multiple licensing. He's not denying that his contributions are licensed under the GFDL as per Wikipedia policy. Instead, he's saying that he also licenses as much of Wikipedia as he can under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike licenses (due to perceived problems with the GFDL).
 * I'm not going to express an opinion right now about the extent to which this statement might be effective. But I don't see anything seriously objectionable about such a statement being posted. --Michael Snow 15:58, 24 Jun 2005 (UTC)


 * Bainer, I readily acknowledge that many editors think of each edit as a seperate contribution, with each edit creating a new derived work pursuant to the GFDL. According to that theory, each of the 30,000,000 pages (or however many we're up to now) in the history database has its own copyright status.  Some other editors think that each article is a seperate collaborative work, so we have 400,000 of them (+-).  Each of these arguments has its merits, and its proponents.  I do not presume to have the last word on this, and the situation of Wikipedia is unique enough and new enough that there will always be some question until it goes in front of a judge.  But in my opinion, Wikipedia is a single work -- and there is no doubt in my mind that throughout my own participation I have thought of it as a unified thing.  Why else would we have passionate VfD debates, if not for the belief that bad articles detract from the value of the whole?  Why would we care about uniformity of style, categorization, and links?  To put the shoe on the other foot, have I not contributed to an article by proofreading it and deciding that it needs no changes?


 * So, it is up to the courts, ultimately, to decide whether Wikipedia is one work or a mere aggregation of independent articles. Regardless of what the courts decide, I want the portion of Wikipedia that has suffered my authorship to be available under the CC license.  The Uninvited Co., Inc. 19:49, 24 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Polls
Discussion has been taking place, and there is a rising culture of complaint in which you have participated without any attempt to determine how those not directly involved in the discussions feel about the issues. The poll is an appropriate for Wikipedians to express their opinions in a way that has meaning. -- Cecropia | explains it all ® 17:46, 24 Jun 2005 (UTC)


 * a "rising culture of complaint?" I'm not entirely sure I understand what you mean.  It is certainly true that there have been increasing complaints about the RFA process, but I wouldn't attribute that to cultural factors.  And I still don't believe that it is appropriate to cut off discussion on an hours-old proposal by making a poll -- especially one that presents a false dichotomy and implies that guidelines somehow undermine the exercise of judgement.  The Uninvited Co., Inc. 19:35, 24 Jun 2005 (UTC)


 * Yow! I don't know what any of this is about, but I like you both... here's to wikilove and my feature presentation, below:

Wikimania! Media contest
We're having a media contest+ And everyone's invited. This will be the freely-licensed free-format contest to end all contests. You're a musical frood among froods, so I figured I should start here well in advance of other announcements. Attendance is not a prerequisite for entry... Could you help me promote the event? +sj +  22:55, 24 Jun 2005 (UTC)

http://wikimania.wikimedia.org/wiki/Competitions


 * Thank you, Sj. I am inspired.  I have not recorded anything since January having been overwhelmed with live Sunday morning gigs.  I shall polish something up and sneak away to a nearby recital hall or church with iRiver and condensor microphone in hand.  Hmm, I wonder whether we already have all of Joplin's important works.  Or perhaps an example hymn played upon the organ.  Or something by Pachelbel other than that hackneyed gigue.


 * In an illustrative light, perhaps I could record some Hammond wipes.

User:Bank of Wikipedia
Does your admin authority permit you to essentially blank this User page without presenting it at VfD? hydnjo talk 6 July 2005 00:32 (UTC)


 * No. Any user could have done that; "admin authority" is not required.  The Uninvited Co., Inc. 6 July 2005 15:51 (UTC)

UninvitedCompany, I didn't mean to sound too critical of you at the Admin's noticeboard. I'm sorry if I came off that way. func (talk) 7 July 2005 04:29 (UTC)


 * Relax. No offense taken.  The trouble with things like User:Bank of Wikipedia is that it is impossible to know the motives of the perpetrator.  Was it a troublemaker making a long-term effort to influence the Wikipedia?  A bored gamer seeking entertainment?  A fine upstanding Wikipedian making an edgey joke?  A clueless newbie?  I doubt the last, but we will never know for sure which of the others it was, or for that matter if it was something else entirely.  My sense when I blocked the user was that they knew exactly what they were doing and were well aware that it was a violation of Wikipedia social norms, though they may not have been aware of what particular policies might be invoked to justify a block.  I reviewed the user's contributions fairly closely before coming to this conclusion.  Could I have been wrong?  Well, sure.  Maybe I was, and even if I wasn't perhaps I happened to be correct merely by chance.  The Uninvited Co., Inc. 7 July 2005 15:24 (UTC)

Thanks for promoting me
Thanks for your message and I look forward to helping out. :) Also (not that it matters) but you didn't tally up some of the votes. Gotta love your username too. Cheers, Talrias (t | e | c) 9 July 2005 12:21 (UTC)

rfa - dr c
Thanks for taking care of this, u.c. I think you did the right thing, despite all my sad feelings about the whole matter. Uncle Ed 18:41, July 14, 2005 (UTC)

Thanks
For absolutely everything--your kind note at my departure, your cleaning up my talk page, your consistently wise and careful advice, and, even more importantly, for being a friend. A friend to me (which I very much appreciate), but also a friend to Wikipedia--a true friend, who respects and challenges, who encourages and protects, who gives many corners of this site (and their denizens) the "tough love" needed to keep the whole crazy thing on track. If there was a barnstar for innate decency, fairness, and dedication, I'd give it to you. And in fact, I'm going to go looking for one right now. All my best regards and wishes, Jwrosenzweig 20:22, 14 July 2005 (UTC)
 * Nothing like the classic, I suppose. :-) Jwrosenzweig




 * Thank you. As you may know, User:MyRedDice, who brought barnstars to Wikipedia, is, sadly, among the missing; apparently as a result of the reversal of User:RK's ban.  I received my first barnstar at  MeatBall before it jumped the shark, but I'm equally proud of the one you've just given me.  The Uninvited Co., Inc. 03:09, 15 July 2005 (UTC)

Hi there! why you reverted my changes in users talk pages?
Am I not allowed to talk? BoW Bank Employee32 21:54, 18 July 2005 (UTC)


 * If you've got something to say, go right ahead and say it, right here. You're banned, and in general I'll revert your edits on sight.  The Uninvited Co., Inc. 21:56, 18 July 2005 (UTC)
 * ok...I want to ask why my bank is not sanctioned. Could you explain it to me. I am neither WoW nor Iasson. If you are going to give me a reasonable exmplanation (including Jimbo hates nomic Banks) I ll stop. BoW Bank Employee33 17:44, 19 July 2005 (UTC)
 * This is an encyclopedia, not a nomic experiment, and not an experiment in anarchy. In general, the use of the Wiki for social experiments and games unrelated to the task of building an encyclopedia is discouraged.  The Uninvited Co., Inc. 17:48, 19 July 2005 (UTC)
 * Then why you have wikimoney? whats the difference between our bank and wikimoney? The only difference is that our coins are scarce, despite the number of users, while wikimoney increases as long as users increase. Thats all. If we are a social experiment, then wikimoney is also. Why wikimoney is sanctioned and we are not? BoW Bank Employee33 17:56, 19 July 2005 (UTC)
 * Wikimoney is hardly sanctioned; in actual fact it is barely tolerated. One of the reasons it's tolerated is that no one is trying to control or manage it.  Another is that the people who have been involved in its creation are editors who have contributed a great deal to the articles, and we give them the benefit of the doubt.  The Uninvited Co., Inc. 18:00, 19 July 2005 (UTC)
 * We are not trying to manage or control BoW coins, in contrast the Bank's rules are ruling the trusted employees which are commited and binded to rule0. Do you understand what this means? The trusted employees not only cannot manage or control BoW coins but also they cannot postpone Bank's operation, unless a rule says so. So at least unblock the rules, and let the account holders (including the newbie XYZ123) to express their opinion regarding the postponement or the continuance of the operation of the Bank. will you? BoW Bank Employee33 06:33, 20 July 2005 (UTC)
 * I have also another question, why your employees (ex. Angela) dont let our nomic Bank to live inside wikicites, or somewhere else inside wikiuniverse? BoW Bank Employee33 06:52, 20 July 2005 (UTC)
 * And a third question. Have a look at User:Bcat/Bank. He created Bcat's WikiBank, and he (alone) decided about the policies of his own bank. We asked him whether his Bank's policies can change or not, and if they can who is allowed to change them and he said "I won't add any new policies without the approval of the bank's account holders" but in the same time he refused to make this a policy!. He also avoids to answer whether or not he is allowed to change existing polices. He behaves like that simply because (in contrast to our BoW Bank) he is trying to control and manage his own β coins. Why he is tolerated, and we are not? I think your hate against our bank has no reason, or the reason is metaphysical. BoW Bank Employee33 07:50, 20 July 2005 (UTC)


 * Whats happening with our case? Are we barely tolarated now? I hope so. You are more than invited to open an account in our bank in order to better understand what our service is. yours truly. BoW Bank Employee33 14:11, 21 July 2005 (UTC)

you dont need to bother who is the trusted employee
Dear customer. You dont need to bother who is the last trusted employee. It is well known that we are a bank on Wheels. Our employees are usally victims of car accidents. In case an employee is dead, dont worry who is the next one. The new hired employee will contact you, leaving you a message in your account_locker (your talkpage). The only thing you need to know is that only one valid employee can be found at the same time, and he/she is always the last one which contacted to you. We may use public key infrastructure, in case false employees will appear and will try to cheat our(your) bank. yours faithfully. Bang Bang
 * ooops...this was not supposed to be posted here! Damned buggy script! Bang Bang 12:58, 22 July 2005 (UTC)

CSD: Bands
Well, thank you for your comments. It's still floating between 69 and 71 percent :) However, I do have to disagree with your assessment of WP:MUSIC, as it has been stable since february and is widely accepted for VFD voting. The fact is that an article on a band failing WP:MUSIC will be deleted on VFD; hence there may be some point in making it speediable. I've never seen anyone apply WP:MUSIC to classical music, but arguably it would only apply to the players, not the composers. Yours, Radiant_ &gt;|&lt; 11:01, July 19, 2005 (UTC)

CSD proposal 1
It passes by 74.07% on raw counts (120 to 42); and 73.46% if you didcard all the votes to which cryptic noted possible sufferage objections (108 to 39). I have made no attempt to adject for any possible sockpuppets or other exclusions, i don't know of any allegations of such activity. This looks like a pass to me. DES 16:48, 19 July 2005 (UTC)
 * Hi there! I was just about to go and ask for help counting when I realized you had already done so. Thanks. After they all close down I'm going to add a brief list of percentages to the proposal page. I'm also considering writing something for WP:SIGN although I wouldn't mind if someone else did. Radiant_ &gt;|&lt; 17:31, July 19, 2005 (UTC)
 * I added it to WP:A. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 17:42, 19 July 2005 (UTC)

User:Bank of Wikipedia
Well, what started as a little interesting diversion has I see turned into an annoying pebble in your shoe. Thanks for keeping my talk page cleaned-up and I apologise for having encouraged it at all by my "membership". hydnjo talk 19:49, 19 July 2005 (UTC)


 * No problem at all. In my mind, block evaders are in the same league as vandals and trolls. And, I have less patience with them than some of my respected seniors. Best, hydnjo talk 20:44, 19 July 2005 (UTC)


 * And what is your opinion about people who are breaking laws and rules? BoW Bank Employee33 09:14, 20 July 2005 (UTC)

Votes for deletion/Missing Sun myth
Hiya, you closed the above VFD. You stated that the result was "keep and redirect".

My own count has
 * 4 votes to delete
 * 7 votes to redirect
 * 1 vote to delete & redirect
 * 1 votes to keep

No-one who voted redirect also voted keep. So I make it that the result is "redirect" with "delete" the runner-up, and certainly not "keep and redirect". 21:19, 19 July 2005 (UTC)


 * The central and foremost question a VfD listing addresses is whether or not to delete the article. There were four delete votes: You, Al, Elvenscout742, and Cyrus.  There were seven votes to do something that did not involve deleting the article: Scimitar, dab, royblumy, Jtkeifer, Gabrielsimon, Blu Aardvark, and Dreamguy.  Therefore, my first conclusion was that the article should not be deleted.


 * The secondary question was whether or not to redirect the article, and it was clear to me that there was no support to speak of for having two seperate articles. Of those voters who expressed an opinion, the majority felt that Missing sun motif was the correct title.  That would be you, Scimitar, DreamGuy, Jtkeifer, and Blu Aardvark; with Elvenscout742, Al, and Gabrielsimon opposed.

The Uninvited Co., Inc. 21:36, 19 July 2005 (UTC)

Stara navika VfD
In the relevant VfD, I think you didn't subst: the vfd2 template, so the page is locked. It doesn't matter from which direction I approach it (either from VfD or from the article) it doens't want to speak to me. I don't have the necessary magical powers to fix this myself, so I thought's I'd let you know. -Splash 21:44, 19 July 2005 (UTC)


 * Sorry. I fixed it.  The Uninvited Co., Inc. 21:46, 19 July 2005 (UTC)

Stara navika VfD
In the relevant VfD, I think you didn't subst: the vfd2 template, so the page is locked. It doesn't matter from which direction I approach it (either from VfD or from the article) it doens't want to speak to me. I don't have the necessary magical powers to fix this myself, so I thought's I'd let you know. -Splash 21:51, 19 July 2005 (UTC)
 * Ok, I found the right combination of links and have fixed it. Sorry to trouble you.-Splash 21:51, 19 July 2005 (UTC)

Thanks.......
.......for advising me I am now an Admin. Yes I have read the info you suggest, but will certainly consult it if ever I get into a scratch-my-head situation (which happens now and then). Cheers Moriori 02:10, July 20, 2005 (UTC)

re: final cleanup
replied here

Kim Bruning 02:18, 20 July 2005 (UTC)

Opinion wanted
Please look at the edit history of Third opinion and specifically at this Diff. Please also look at my talk page and that of the other user involved. Am I out of line here? What is the proper action at this point. i think the other user involved is out of line, but I am trying to be sensible and not escalate further. DES 03:25, 20 July 2005 (UTC)


 * The whole mess involving the repeated VfD listing of the GNAA, IMO, reflects poorly on everyone involved. The presence of articles such as GNAA is part of the inclusive nature of Wikipedia; part of the charm, as it were, as I have observed in the past.  Wikipedia has been widely inclusive in its coverage of Internet social phenomena, and there is really no reason to make an exception for GNAA just because we don't like them.  See Meowers, AOLamer, Goatse.cx, Rec.music.white-power_newsgroup_vote, and Kibology for other examples of various ephemeral internet-based groups that we cover.


 * I believe, for example, that User:Cyrius, who I respect greatly in general, was unwise to create Kick_the_ass_of_anyone_who_renominates_GNAA_for_deletion_before_2007 in the first place. We don't go around creating policy regarding particular articles.  It isn't done and Cyrius should have been wise enough to realize that no good would come of it.  Moreover, if we learned anything from Don't be a dick it was colloquialisms like "ass" in policy page titles don't do anything to improve the otherwise collegial atmosphere at Wikipedia.


 * User:Ta bu shi da yu and User:Kim Bruning and perhaps others tried to "recan the worms" per ForestFire. Recanning the worms to control a forest fire on Wikipedia does not work for the same reason that Don't feed the trolls does not work.  It's like herding cats, and Wikipedians aren't going to respect the efforts of whoever recans the worms.  MeatBall at one time pointed out this risk in the ForestFire article; it's down now so I can't see whether or not the warning is still there.  In general, MeatBall is no longer a reliable source of advice for dealing with matters at Wikipedia, because a great deal of the best intellect behind MeatBall has moved on, and because Wikipedia is a wiki of unprecedented size that does not behave the same way as the smaller wikis that MeatBall has drawn its lessons from.


 * Trying to manage an ongoing debate through the use of power, as User:Kim Bruning did, is particularly unwise. Admins are traditionally empowered to Ignore all rules when there is some sort of emergency.  But there was no emergency.  It's not as though someone was doing high-speed repeat vandalism and had to be stopped.  It's not as though some adminstrator was roaring around blocking people and deleting images at random.  And Kim made matters worse, because the only ways to resolve conflicts among contributors at Wikipedia are a) through consensus, or failing that b) through a process that enjoys widespread respect.  A PowerAnswer only works against non-contributors.


 * I hope everyone takes a lesson from all this. If you see a ForestFire at Wikipedia, ignore it.  Trust the community to do the right thing.  Link the pages together if they aren't already so that everyone is aware of them and can choose the best place for participation themselves.  Don't try to clean up the mess until after it's over.  Nobody ever got their way at Wikipedia by being in a hurry.


 * As to what the proper action is for you at this juncture, DESiegel, you're aware of the alternatives. You will have to decide for yourself whether or not it's worth it.  The Uninvited Co., Inc. 16:00, 20 July 2005 (UTC)


 * Thank you for your comments, which seem generally wise to me. I agree that using terms like "ass" in the names of policy pages is inappropriate, and I much prefereed TBDY's "de-humored" version of the page. Even so I agree that havign a policy that applies to only one article is unwise and inappropriate. I might support a general policy about renomination of articles to VfD.


 * Kim cited WP:IAR to me last not. I don't think this "principle" was ever intended to sanction violating basic polices on how things are done here, particularly in the face of a non-emergency. I have commented on that page's talk page. I think WP:IARshould be deprecated or clarified. What I msot want out of this is a clear declaration that admins are to follow WP:CSD strictly, and that the kind of situation we had last night was not a good reason to ignore them. I think Kim meant and means well, adn i understand that Kim is a respected admin and has been here longer than I. I think Kim was wrong in this case, and i would like a clear consensus that this sort of thing should not happen in future. I don't want Kim harmed, or blocked, or any such thing.


 * And then I want to get back to working on an encyclopedia. DES 16:14, 20 July 2005 (UTC)

The information as seen by DES is a tip of an iceberg. I deleted not 1 but 3 pages:
 * Votes for deletion/Kick the ass of anyone who renominates GNAA for deletion before 2007
 * GNAA votes for deletion policy
 * Votes for deletion/GNAA votes for deletion policy

And temporarily suppressed VfU entries for same. These pages had together accumulated 129 edits in mere hours, let alone days, and discussion had become fractured between them.

By taking the actions that I did, I started a new, smaller forestfire involving under 10 new editors, at a much slower pace, which at least was managable ^^;;

If I had immediately pointed to a single page to work on, the second -smaller- forestfire wouldn't have occurred.

This shows that recanning the worms is still a viable stratagem, if you don't mind losing a nights' sleep :-) Kim Bruning 17:03, 20 July 2005 (UTC)


 * I was aware of the other pages.


 * The question I have for you, is what terrible catastrophe were you able to avert, through these deletions? The Uninvited Co., Inc. 17:08, 20 July 2005 (UTC)


 * I actually saw all of the above pages, but I felt that the deletion of the second was the least justifed (it at least seemed to be a serious policy proposal, and did not have a possibly offensive title), so that is the one i took tio VFU.


 * I still think you were out of line here. The discussion was split over several pages, perhaps as many as 10, depending on how you count. I have seen split discussions before on here: the spoiler-templates discussion was split over several, as was the TOCright debate, and the recent CSD proposal. ten pages out of how many thousand policy and semi-policy pages? And frsnkly it didn't look to me as if more pages were likely to be created. The people creating these pages, and most if not all of the people posting to them were not vandals nor newbies. Suggestign on the existing pages that the subject be contained, and further pages not created, and maype that discussion be redirected to a single page or a subset of the existing pages, would IMO have met the case perfectly well. I didn't see and I don't see what the emergency was that justified deleting pages outside of policy. Havign just spent a good deal of time debatring the WP:CSD policies, it boterhs me to seem them treated as optional. Many of my argumetns for expanding the criteria were based in the notion that admins should not, and usauly would not, abuse their powers by makinge deletions outside of the policy. Frankly i fell this action hurts wikipedia far more than any amout of ill-considered discussion of the GNAA.  I hope that makes it clear where I was comming from on this. DES 17:20, 20 July 2005 (UTC)


 * I'd actually made a statement headed mildly in that direction, while something like 30-50 edits flashed past. There were obvious trolls involved, I blocked the one who initiated the mess, for starters. People were reacting in real time without stopping and thinking, ourselves included. I don't believe you've ever seen a sequence of vfd- anti-vfd-page, anti-vfd-page-vfd, anti-anti-vfd-page-vfd-page, anti-anti-vfd-page-vfd-page-vfd, before, because I'm sure I haven't! ;-) Kim Bruning 17:28, 20 July 2005 (UTC)


 * I will grant this situation was more extreme than the ones i cited. Do you really think page protection wouldn't have done the job without deletion? and do you still feel the trying to supress mention on Third Opnion and VfU was a good idea, and had any useful effect? I was actually starting to draft an RfC page, and if it hadn't been so late I probably would have posted there. Now I'm going to wait and see what various other people say, but I am still considering the matter. I really really think, that in spaite of the large numbers of edits you mention, deelting pages outside of policy does more harm than good, and we should develop a clear consensus that a 'forest fire" is not a good reason to do so. DES 17:37, 20 July 2005 (UTC)


 * Hmmm, I caught the fire early, I think the potential might have been a > 600 user slugfest :-) I got caught in a smaller forestfire afterwards, where I was basically chasing after you stamping out the sparks before they took hold :-), as opposed to say, simply blocking you. (Which I might add, would have meant that I'd stayed within the 3RR, and no-one would blame me of breaking policy. Quite ironic that!)


 * I'm uncertain whether protection would be good. My original idea was to simply use admin powers as little as possible. I did the 3 deletes and 1 block early, and after that stuck to only normal editing tools, and simply talking with people politely. Kim Bruning 17:45, 20 July 2005 (UTC)


 * I would certianly have complained that blocking me was breaking the blocking policy. It would have avoided the 3RR isssue, yes. Protecting the original policy pages might not have done anything. Protecting VfU insted of deleting, with a note explaining that you wanted a cooling off period, might have done the trick. I understand and accept that you tried to make minimum use of your admin powers, and to do what you thought was right. I disagree with your judgement, but not your motives. What I really want is a wider consensus from the community on what judgement would be right in a situation like this in future. But I don't see a need, now, to rush to get such a consensus today. DES 17:56, 20 July 2005 (UTC)


 * Right, I was getting pretty tired towards the end, and my judgement was flagging forsure by then. Fortunately, experienced wikipedia editors were starting to wake up and took over from me. :-)


 * As to blocking: people get really frustrated by being blocked, it's a really mean thing to do. So even though I had the option, I didn't want to do that ^^;; Kim Bruning 18:12, 20 July 2005 (UTC)

Gabrielsimon and 3RR
I see from user:Gabrielsimon's talk page that he was blocked earlier today for violating the 3RR and that you then unblocked him and let him off with a warning. Considering that was *at least* his 8th block for violating that rule within only four months or so, it would seem that the time for warnings and small length blocks has long passed. He knows of the rule, he just refuses to follow it. I haven't checked other people's 3rr violations, but I know back when he was getting his first couple that other people getting blocked at the same time were getting very lengthy blocks for multiple violations. You of course can make any decision you like, but keep in mind that he's not new to the process. DreamGuy 08:55, July 21, 2005 (UTC)

re: some old comments
On Wikipedia talk:Requests for arbitration, you said "Personality change is rare and comes slowly when it takes place. I encourage arbiters and other interested 'pedians to make a brief review of Netoholic's contributions during the mentorship and decide for themselves whether they, net, further the goals of the project. I would hope that the mentors would share a few words about the time invested and the effort required to keep cool."

I am wondering from what point of view you stated this from. Do you think mentorship doomed to failure because the arrangement gave too much power to the Mentors and intrinsically required personality change to happen too fast? Or was it doomed to fail because I, for example, don't further the goals of the project and because the time and effort required by the Mentors was too much for them to handle me? -- Netoholic @ 22:01, 21 July 2005 (UTC)


 * I believe that mentorship at Wikipedia is intrinsically doomed to failure. There is nothing about you in particular that caused the mentorship experiment to be, well, a disaster for everyone.


 * Maintaining a positive personal relationship with another adult when there is a power disparity is a skill that is very difficult to cultivate IRL and more difficult in computer-mediated societies where there is less of a personal bond and more opportunity to be misunderstood. Your "mentors" are all bright people and well-meaning but I don't think any of them had the least idea what they were getting into, and some of the glaring gaffes I have highlighted before illustrate this.  Principle of constant respect being the first thing.  Principle that you never joke around about power or play with it, it's serious (when you're the one with the power.  The little guy can joke around all he wants of course).  These are basic facets of management that apply IRL particularly when dealing with creative people but also when dealing with factory workers.


 * I also do believe that meaningful personality change requires years when it occurs at all. And one of the first principles is that the person has to recognize and accept their shortcomings and want to change..  I continue to be amazed when old acquaintences who I have not seen for years call me or see me and they still have the same quirks and ideosyncracies and so forth that kept them from being successful back when I knew them.


 * As for the "brief review of contributions," that was indeed a value judgement, but it was particularly about the overall benefit of your contributions compared to the total effort -- including both your effort and that of your "mentors" -- of "mentorship."  I don't think it was worth it, and if you review the contributions and think it over, I suspect you may agree.


 * The main point I was trying to make, and one I still believe in, is that arbitration should be the last measure employed in dealing with editors who get sideways with the project. And it should have a beginning, a middle, and an end.  At the end, they're entitled to apply whatever sanctions they deem appropriate, but that should be that.  No "revert parole," no "POV parole," and most certainly no enforced "mentorship."


 * I realize that you like Wikipedia and I believe that you do indeed have something to contribute. Though you have no doubt received plenty of advice from others, and though you have not asked me for any advice, I nonetheless share with you these two pearls of wisdom:


 * There is more to life than Wikipedia. Nothing that happens on Wikipedia changes the fact that you are a worthwhile person.
 * Think through what will happen next after your edits before you click "save page" just as you would before making a move while playing chess. Think of what others in the conversation will say, and how you will respond to them.


 * Best regards, The Uninvited Co., Inc. 23:23, 21 July 2005 (UTC)


 * Thank you. I really do value the clarification, and the advice. -- Netoholic @ 12:59, 22 July 2005 (UTC)

CSD stuff
Hi there! Now that the last two proposals (P1A/B) also closed, it may be appropriate to contact Jimbo regarding the now-finished policy. I believe the precedent is to request his stamp of approval on official policies. Since I wrote most of the proposal, it may be more appropriate if someone else asks him, from a neutral stance. So I figured I'd ask you and Splash to compose and pass him a short message. Yours, Radiant_ &gt;|&lt; 15:20, July 22, 2005 (UTC)


 * Done. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 17:26, 22 July 2005 (UTC)

Hey, old friend
Thanks for your watchful eye in all corners of this site. :-) A friendly reminder -- use subst:vfd2 instead of vfd2, or else people who try to edit the vote will edit the template. :-)  Best wishes as always, Jwrosenzweig 18:41, 22 July 2005 (UTC)
 * You forgot "in the pouring rain at midnight"....and I'd probably still take the diesel Mercedes over vfd. :-)  I vfd about once a month tops, just to keep my skills in shape.  About the only worse way of handling things would be to force us to manage deletion from a Meta page, thereby logging all of us out when we switched 'pedias. (Look for that one to hit the mailing list in 3-5 days.)  Honestly, it makes Garrett's desire to dodge vfd understandable...though still ultimately wrong, of course.  I do look back wistfully at the fall of 2003 at times. Jwrosenzweig 18:48, 22 July 2005 (UTC)

Thank you soooo much!
Gah these 22 minutes of waiting were terrible :P Thanks for the promotion, Redwolf24 01:40, 23 July 2005 (UTC)

Writing and media contests
Hello, UC! Regarding the writing and media contests, CC-by-SA is also fine for all entries; I updated the rules accordingly. Please do enter your favorite submissions! And don't feel obliged to enter only your own work... +sj +  20:53, 24 July 2005 (UTC)

Is that a phone I hear?
(in the middle of the Schubert Impromptu) No matter, I'm grateful to have some nice recordings added to the collection. Someday I should put together the practice time and the technical necessities to make some of my own. --Michael Snow 05:46, 26 July 2005 (UTC)
 * Well, now that he mentions it, I hadn't noticed it myself; just wanted to say I enjoy your recordings and am glad to see them added. Mindspillage (spill yours?) 06:48, 26 July 2005 (UTC)

There was? I don't remember it, though there was some page turning noise and at one point a few people bumbling around outside the stage door. Thank you both for the compliments. I hope that Wikipedia will soon draw the attention of more serious performers than I, since there are many out there in the wide world that seek a broader audience for their music. I think having some recordings contributed by editors establishes a valuable precedent and hope that more will be forthcoming. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 18:49, 26 July 2005 (UTC)
 * I checked again, not there. Maybe it was something on my end, like my computer deciding to make noises it's not supposed to. --Michael Snow 06:23, 27 July 2005 (UTC)
 * I have a whole lab full of computers like that :-).. The Uninvited Co., Inc.

Missing Wikipedians
Hi UC, the RickK version that you installed was not the consensus version from the talk page. In fact, it wasn't either version. I'll fix it tomorrow, per my earlier comment on the talk page. --Duk 23:47, 26 July 2005 (UTC)


 * Whatever. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 01:34, 27 July 2005 (UTC)

My adminship
Thanks for setting me up as an admin. I will be cautious as I move into using the functionality. -- JamesTeterenko 17:35, 27 July 2005 (UTC)

Zoidberg
Thanks for taking time to explain it to me. I fully understand that it is about time for him to contribute, grow up, be polite, etc. I feel an indefinite ban is a bit too harsh but eventually it has to happen. I hope he learns. --Jondel 09:11, 29 July 2005 (UTC)

-Ril-
You did what you thought was right, however he was being disruptive. Deletion policy states that "An exception can be made if a vote has no consensus and a severe lack of votes." There were 37 votes. If you can explain how that is a "severe lack" of votes, I will concede the point. You should also be aware that Ril was part of the reason why this vote had to be run a second time. I don't feel I was being too harsh, however I knew it might be controversial so that's why I posted the message to WP:AN and WP:AN/I.

The irony here is that I concur the article should be deleted, but I'm not running around trying to force the issue. I might also note that even his sig could be considered disruptive. - Ta bu shi da yu 04:41, 1 August 2005 (UTC)

vfd reform
I really liked your comments at Requests for deletion. Nobody else came up with anything nearly as well thought out, clearly expressed, and to the point. (But I take it you didn't quite agree with my deleting vfd? ;-) Uncle Ed 22:05, August 1, 2005 (UTC)


 * Thank you. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 22:11, 1 August 2005 (UTC)

The rules (which everyone is so fond of) approve of my deletion of the vfd rfc. Surely you read them again, just before admonishing me? Uncle Ed 17:22, August 3, 2005 (UTC)


 * For disputes over user conduct, before requesting community comment, at least two people should have contacted the user on their talk page, or the talk pages involved in the dispute, and failed to resolve the problem. Any RfC not accompanied by diffs showing that two users tried and failed to resolve the same dispute will be deleted after 48 hours.

Sacback
Please don't delete the sacback page. I am trying to make a list of the creatures on Darwin IV, so please leave the page up. I'm just trying to spread knowledge!


 * I didn't delete it, I redirected it. I believe you would be better off adding the material to Darwin IV.  The Uninvited Co., Inc. 21:57, 3 August 2005 (UTC)

Undeletion counter to policy

 * Sorry, Are you trying to claim use of WP:IAR? If so, please explain where your undeletion is common sense, especially since the certifier just shook hands with Ed Poor. I'm redeleting. Undeletion here is counter to policy. Kim Bruning 21:51, 3 August 2005 (UTC)

No. You didn't delete it according to policy, IMO, and pages deleted without policy basis for so doing can be undeleted by anyone. Besides which, deleting an ongoing discussion is always a bad idea, and I don't think the community has satisfaction on this yet. I have listed it at VFU, which may bring clarity. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 21:57, 3 August 2005 (UTC)


 * Certification MUST be provided within 48 hours. If people fail to certify, an RFC is deleted. This is to prevent precicely the kind of unwarrented mobbing that is present here. Do not undelete again. Kim Bruning 22:02, 3 August 2005 (UTC)


 * Certification was provided. What, you think you can "uncertify" something once it is "certified?"  And what about the, how many were there, 18 concurring votes after certification?  And Ed is deserving of far more than he's had already.  We're ticking off people all the time because of the perception that there is a cabal of senior admins to whom a seperate set of rules applies.  That's unfair, and it deserves discussion.  The Uninvited Co., Inc. 22:05, 3 August 2005 (UTC)


 * I'm sorry, the certification was not there, you can view the page. There was one certifier, and he had not provided evidence of discussing with Ed Poor before opening the RFC. Those are the rules. You will have to either abide by policy, or find a reason why WP:IAR applies. Kim Bruning 22:12, 3 August 2005 (UTC)

Re:Ed Poor
I think you hit on a number of concerns I have and still had. Ultimatly it is not Ed's decisions themselves, but how the community seemed to rise up to defend him. While the RFC certainly showed me that more than myself was concerned with Ed's behavior, it also, sadly showed that Ed was not concerned with the community. The fact this does not alarm people, alarms me greatly.

At this point, I am on vacation. Ed has gained a place on my Users to Keep an Eye On list. I will likley come back, Wikipedia is an addiction, but keep my participation on the voting to a minimum.

The fact is though, I have lost a great amount of faith in the workings and structure of Wikipedia's community. I have never entertained the whinings of conspiracy theorists that there is some shadowy old timer's group protecting eachother from rebuke.

I am beginning to reconsider that position, and it is not something I do lightly.

In glancing over his replies (just now) I can see a glimmer of hope that Ed himself is starting to get it. Hopefully. Its hard to tell with this whole internet thing in the way.

Part of the problem may be I am a self described lawful good individual, and I have poor tolerance for people ignoring due processes. Still, I have had my faith shaken in the Wikipedian community's ability to police its own.

Thank you for your time.

--Tznkai 00:15, 4 August 2005 (UTC)

Ed Poor's RFAr
Thanks for informing me. I don't think the wording's changed sufficiently to alter the views of the statement. Thanks for your support; I read your supplementary statement, and I think that's exactly what we (me, Nick and Phroz.) were unable to originally communicate. Cheers. Rob Church 19:08, 4 August 2005 (UTC)


 * Me, Nick, Phroz, and Ed are meeting in an IRC room tomorrow to sort things out via mediation if we can. Number of reasons, but ArbCom part-suggested it. Completely kept you out of the loop, sorry; certainly not intentional. Would you be agreeable to this? If so, let me know and drop in IRC so I can give you the details. Thanks. Rob Church 03:07, 5 August 2005 (UTC)

IRC Conference
Previous meeting was at Monday, August 8th at 11:30 PM BST. That is, 10:30 PM GMT and 6:30 EDT. Please sign below if you plan on attending or need a time change:


 * 1) Nicholas Turnbull: NicholasTurnbull 16:19, 8 August 2005 (UTC)
 * 2) Phroziac: Phroziac (talk) 22:05, 6 August 2005 (UTC)
 * Phroziac has a quickie oral surgeon appointment 2 hours and 30 minutes before the meeting, and MAY miss it or be late, though it is unlikely..
 * That's tomorrow. duh. --Phroziac (talk) 16:32, 8 August 2005 (UTC)
 * 1) Rob Church: Rob Church 14:59, 8 August 2005 (UTC)
 * 2) Uncle Ed: Uncle Ed 13:11, August 6, 2005 (UTC)
 * 3) Uninvited Company:

Arbitration Committee case opening
Requests for arbitration/Gabrielsimon has been accepted and is now open. Please bring evidence to Requests for arbitration/Gabrielsimon/Evidence. Thank you. -- sannse (talk) 22:06, 4 August 2005 (UTC)

Technical details
Hey, I didn't even spam you and still get feedback, thanks. Anyway, I know for certain that the database was ultimately locked (only for a few minutes, I believe) because I was working on something and encountered it myself. But your information is helpful for providing more context, and I'll try to run it by someone with a little more information to make sure our understanding is correct. --Michael Snow 03:35, 8 August 2005 (UTC)


 * I have my spies. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 03:39, 8 August 2005 (UTC)


 * Spies, my foot — I know how to use a watchlist and/or contribution history just as well as you do. Anyway, according to Brion the actual lockdown I had in mind was unrelated. Thanks for helping me get the facts straight. --Michael Snow 15:56, 8 August 2005 (UTC)

Violent Metaphors
replied at User_talk:Kim_Bruning. Could you specify? And hmm, what kind of metaphor might I used to replace? Kim Bruning 16:23, 8 August 2005 (UTC)
 * Oh. Yes. Well, that's more complicated, replied same location again. Kim Bruning 20:56, 8 August 2005 (UTC)

Next admin
Flcelloguy is up for promotion. Do you want to do it? Or do you mind if I go ahead and do it myself? Uncle Ed 19:28, August 8, 2005 (UTC)


 * I should have let you do it, because I seem to have botched the recording process. I can't get Recently created admins to reflect Flcelloguy. What did I do wrong? Am I going senile? Uncle Ed 19:59, August 8, 2005 (UTC)

Ril
He sent me a request, and explained his reasoning, so I unblocked him. -- Earl Andrew - talk 21:58, 9 August 2005 (UTC)

RFC
Your actions in blocking me have resulted in me opening an RFC against you, which has been co-signed - Requests for comment/UninvitedCompany. ( ! | ? | * ) 20:41, 10 August 2005 (UTC)

Motion to withdraw Ed Poor RfAr
Dear UninvitedCompany,

Following comments made by yourself and Ed that mediation is at present unproductive, Phroziac, RobChurch and I have taken the decision to propose a motion to withdraw the request for arbitration. It is our view that there is little to be gained from formal arbitration with Ed Poor, as he has admitted fault on all areas of evidentiary support, and if there is an unwillingness to continue with further discussions it would seem the fairest option. If you would like to sign this motion, please do so at User:NicholasTurnbull/Mediation IRC; your signature shall complete the motion, if you choose to agree.

Thank you for your assistance.

Best Regards,

NicholasTurnbull 21:33, 10 August 2005 (UTC)

Response to Uninvited's concerns
While I agree there may continue to be problems, I also agree that an RfAr is not the best way to go about things. I am taking a reasonable degree of flak for having filed against Ed and I'd rather avoid that. There are plenty of other means of dispute resolution; perhaps the RfAr was a bit too much of a leap. Rob Church Talk 22:29, 10 August 2005 (UTC)

Protected VfD?
The votes page for Combo drive petition is protected. Any clue why? Robert A West 22:43, 10 August 2005 (UTC)


 * I didn't set it up right. Someone else has already fixed it.  The Uninvited Co., Inc. 22:49, 10 August 2005 (UTC)

Deleting footnotes
If you must delete footnotes like this, please complete the job by removing the superscripted tags from the body text too. I also think that it is both courteous and constructive to explain deletions on the talk page rather than simply enacting them. &mdash;Theo (Talk) 23:29, 10 August 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for the prompt fix. &mdash;Theo (Talk) 23:38, 10 August 2005 (UTC)

IRC Mediation Conference 3
With regard to the third (and hopefully final) mediation conference relating to the Ed Poor case, would you please visit http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:NicholasTurnbull/Mediation_IRC#Scheduling and indicate when you will not be available at the usual time for the forthcoming week. I am hoping to propose a time within the next few days.

I will also draw up an agenda for this meeting as soon as possible, which will be on the same page, and as for the previous meeting's agenda, I encourage editing in true wiki-style.

Uninvited: I'm aware of your concerns and tend to agree with your latest comment on Nick's talk page. I believe that should you agree to this third conference, we need to make it quite clear to Ed:


 * 1) What the problem is
 * 2) That "truth" and "love" do not drive the wiki (however nice an idea it is)
 * 3) That if he doesn't adjust, the less-lenient members of the community are going to lynch him

We could consider further mediation post-ArbCom; this is an option I haven't yet discussed with the others. What do you think?

If you have any concerns, please don't hesiate to drop me a note. Rob Church Talk


 * And please see my big statement at Uncle Ed. You have made a big impression on me, and I'm happy to change my ways. I agree unconditionally to all you have asked. Uncle Ed 14:18, August 13, 2005 (UTC)

Why did you vote Combo Drive Petition article for deletion?
Why did you vote Combo drive petition article for deletion? Henri Tapani Heinonen 06:48, 11 August 2005 (UTC)

The Bible and history
You weren't waiting for Noitall to revert before protecting at all were you? I mean, the huge (1.5 hour) gap before Noitall's revert, and the fact that your protection came only 5 minutes after Noitall's revert, are pure coincidence, aren't they. And of course, the fact that you have prior conflict with me, siding with Noitall, about this very article, has absolutely nothing to do with it. Am I right? ( ! | ? | * ) 16:12, 11 August 2005 (UTC)


 * Please see The Wrong Version. I believe this falls under item 6.  The Uninvited Co., Inc. 16:32, 11 August 2005 (UTC)

Guy Montag 3RR
Bit surprised you didn't see an issue with the way that "Kidnapping" seems to keep on being replaced by weasel words - but I guess you call it as you see it. Thanks for looking into this. 62.252.0.7 02:54, 14 August 2005 (UTC)


 * It's not a violation when there is an attempt at different wording. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 02:56, 14 August 2005 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the clarification. I was not sure that this was how it worked. 62.252.0.7 03:45, 14 August 2005 (UTC)

Citing sources
Wikipedia's policy and the GFDL licence, as well as the CCL licence, say to cite sources. If you cannot agree with that please delete our GFDL and CCL-licensed material from your website. Please read our Copyright Policy where we state "We enforce the terms of our copyright policy to the maximum extend permitted by law". Www.wikinerds.org 03:49, 14 August 2005 (UTC)


 * Attribution for GFDL-licensed material imported from elsewhere may be provided on the talk page of each affected article. We do not permit CCL licensed text.  The Uninvited Co., Inc. 03:51, 14 August 2005 (UTC)


 * We contribute our CCL-licensed images to Wikipedia and CCL requires you to include attribution in the same page (not the talk page). The same is true for GFDL-licensed text. I'll refer this issue to Wikimedia Foundation Inc. and the Arbitration Comittee if you continue removing information that must be present due to GFDL, CCL and Wikipedia's Citing Sources policy. Www.wikinerds.org 03:55, 14 August 2005 (UTC)


 * With regard to image attribution, please note that the CC-BY license attribution requirements do not require "prominent" attribution. They require credit "reasonable to the medium or means [Wikipedia] is using:"


 * If you distribute, publicly display, publicly perform, or publicly digitally perform the Work or any Derivative Works or Collective Works, You must keep intact all copyright notices for the Work and give the Original Author credit reasonable to the medium or means You are utilizing by conveying the name (or pseudonym if applicable) of the Original Author if supplied; the title of the Work if supplied; to the extent reasonably practicable, the Uniform Resource Identifier, if any, that Licensor specifies to be associated with the Work, unless such URI does not refer to the copyright notice or licensing information for the Work; and in the case of a Derivative Work, a credit identifying the use of the Work in the Derivative Work (e.g., "French translation of the Work by Original Author," or "Screenplay based on original Work by Original Author"). Such credit may be implemented in any reasonable manner; provided, however, that in the case of a Derivative Work or Collective Work, at a minimum such credit will appear where any other comparable authorship credit appears and in a manner at least as prominent as such other comparable authorship credit.


 * We give image credit on image description pages and not in the articles themselves. This is settled policy.  The Uninvited Co., Inc. 04:27, 14 August 2005 (UTC)


 * You have reverted Erhard Ratdolt three times and Wikipedia has a policy about excessive reverting. Www.wikinerds.org 03:58, 14 August 2005 (UTC)


 * You also delete my external links although all of my links are relevant. I added a link "How to run a freeciv server" in Freeciv. What's wrong with that? You are only bullying me. Please reinstate the relevant links. I'm not going to revert you 'cause I never participate in edit wars. Www.wikinerds.org 04:17, 14 August 2005 (UTC)


 * I believe that your external links are link spam and are a violation of External links, as I have stated before. They are not Reliable sources.  One of the key policies regarding external links is that we avoid linking to content that we would rather have here.  The Uninvited Co., Inc. 04:22, 14 August 2005 (UTC)

In another talk page you said: I don't believe that jnana.wikinerds.org really qualifies as a useful, citable source because it lacks authority. The "citation" was added by the operator of the wikinerds.org web site primarily as an effort to obtain publicity and a higher Google page rank. Take a look at wikinerds.org and decide for yourself. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 04:10, 14 August 2005 (UTC)


 * And my answer: We have a Google PageRank of 6 and many JnanaBase pages have a higher page rank than Wikipedia's pages. We have been slashdotted four times. We do not get higher Google PageRank from links in Wikipedia because Wikipedia includes the nofollow value in the rel XHTML attribute in all external links, which means the links are not visible to Google. We joined Wikipedia to help this wonderful project and we only receive bullying from you. Www.wikinerds.org 04:30, 14 August 2005 (UTC)

Being a bureaucrat
Would I be willing to consider it? Yes, and I already have considered it at various points. Would I be willing to apply is the real question, of course, and a little trickier to answer.

Whether we have enough bureaucrats or not, I certainly don't see why having "too many" would be a problem, so that's not an issue. However, I hesitate for a few reasons. The first is simply that I despise the title of "bureaucrat", and objected to it when this function was first created (although some have sagely argued that the title is actually helpful, as it is a good thing to make the position less desirable).

I also have other more rational justifications. One is that it is useful to have non-bureaucrats who are ready to speak up in support of the way bureaucrats are handling their work, in much the same way that it helps when admin decisions are supported not just by other admins, but by non-admins as well. Another issue is that I still like to influence the RfA process by making and commenting on nominations, and might feel more hesitant about this if I were in a position of acting on them.

Sorry to bore you with my detailed reasoning. In spite of my concerns, I haven't set a decision in stone, so you're welcome to bore me in return with arguments as to why I should apply for the position. --Michael Snow 06:36, 14 August 2005 (UTC)

Copyright
I added again my attribution to Sphaera Mundi. If you remove the attribution and the link again, the article must be deleted from Wikipedia, since without proper attribution it is a copyright violation and its presence in Wikipedia is illegal in all jurisdictions that have copyright laws (IANAL). I'm not going to revert the article again. If you or anyone else removes an attribution notice again I'll just request its immediate deletion. As I said, it is our policy to protect our content, which we give away for free on the Internet under libre licences such as GFDL and CCL, and we also contribute our content to Wikipedia. It is not content we created for Wikipedia, it was written in our wikis and we just contribute it to Wikipedia as a means of inter-community cooperation and friendship between our wikis, which you now just damaged. Your bullying will not be tolerated, especially when you remove links and notices that should be visible on the pages where our content is used by the requirements of Wikipedia's Cite Sources policy and the GFDL and CCL licences. I also removed my photo from the Vodafone article since you removed the link that should be there, as required by CCL, and therefore was a copyright violation. That photo must not be used inside articles without a visible attribution as required by CCL. I have requested mediation about this issue. Also, voting to delete JnanaBase was wrong, too, since the article was not written by me (I just updated it) and this proves that you don't even check article histories, which for me it means your primary objective is to bully and not to implement Wikipedia policies. You should be banned from Wikipedia. Www.wikinerds.org 08:42, 14 August 2005 (UTC)

Image attribution
You are a liar, it is not settled policy to provide attribution in image description pages. See Lev and also this google search. The Lev article says "2003 Bulgaria 100 levs bill. Obverse. Photo courtesy of Bulgarian National Bank ([1])" and also provides an external link. If it is settled policy, give me a link and if it's really settled policy I will delete all "courtesy of" attributions in images used in articles, leaving only the attribution in their description pages. Www.wikinerds.org 09:23, 14 August 2005 (UTC)

FeloniousMonk RFA
Would you mind going and adding a space somewhere or something to Requests for adminship/FeloniousMonk to put the issue to rest? Two of the "neutral" votes were entirely crossed out, but their #'s weren't, leading to an erroneous count of "neutral" votes, which in no way affected the outcome of the RFA. I've reverted Kim's rv of Mel Etitis' correction of the unspeakably minor problem, but I'd like to have you have the last word in "correcting" the problem to put the whole mess to rest. Tomer TALK 10:32, August 14, 2005 (UTC)
 * Happily, the seas seem to have calmed. :-)  Tomer TALK  19:26, August 14, 2005 (UTC)

GFDL
I just found out you are a sysop. That means you have the power to delete the articles, but you didn't. The article Sphaera Mundi is copied from my wiki, and I contributed in Wikipedia under the GFDL, a licence which requires proper attribution. As long as the article carries an attribution with a link back to its source, Wikipedia can use it. If you remove the attribution again, you must delete Sphaera Mundi or otherwise I will consider you personally responsible for failing to comply with GFDL. Wikipedia requires from other sites that copy its content to link back to it, and I require the same thing for my wiki. What you are trying to do is to keep my content without providing attribution and a link, and that would be a violation. I'm not going to allow this. I already informed the Wikipedia mailing lists about this issue and your conduct. Www.wikinerds.org 11:27, 14 August 2005 (UTC)


 * Though I see no licensing problem posed by the page, I have deleted the page pursuant to your request. If you wish to have other articles of which you are the sole author deleted, you may add the  to them and, optionally, leave a note on the article's talk page explaining your request.


 * As always, I welcome discussion of my actions by the broader community and look forward to the advice of the mediators and the mailing list denziens. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 12:58, 14 August 2005 (UTC)


 * Please note that Wikinerd has filed RFC against you on this issue. Radiant_ &gt;|&lt; 13:26, August 14, 2005 (UTC)

Speedy deletion of Sphaera Mundi
Hi, I'm not sure if you are aware of the criteria for speedy deletion, but Sphaera Mundi did not fall under any of them. If it was copyvio, it should be tagged as such. If it was created by mistake, tough luck, other people had edited the article. Kappa 12:59, 14 August 2005 (UTC)


 * I've now deleted the article in order to close the attribution dispute, and created a new one at De sphaera mundi. I added some comments on the talk page there; for future reference, if the original is indicative of the kind of research skills possessed by the user in question, then his contributions would need to be carefully checked even if they weren't a novel kind of spam. --Michael Snow 05:42, 15 August 2005 (UTC)

punitive blocks
"Part of the problem is that we have been suffering a plague of punitive blocks against good users, admin and non-admin alike"


 * I think this is a very important area, and that the wiki ought to be more consequentialist, doing what is best for the community long term, and less punishing, doing what feels best for well connected angry parties in the short term. Punishing people tends to make them resentful, and more likely to lash out in the future. What would be awesome is if there were better ways to reward good behaviour... Just a thought. ¸,ø¤º°`°º¤ø,¸¸,ø¤º°`°º¤ø,¸¸,ø¤º°`°º¤ø,¸ 19:51, 14 August 2005 (UTC)

IRC request
Could you come onto IRC sometime today? I'd like to have a short word with you about the Ed Poor RFA. &rarr;Raul654 20:54, August 14, 2005 (UTC)

Bureaucrat
I'm honored that you think of me for the position. I'm going to go read up on the guidelines and duties. It doesn't seem like a job that requires too many people. Is there a need for more Bureaucrats? - T&#949;x  &#964;  ur&#949;  02:02, 15 August 2005 (UTC)