User talk:Wikremasinghe

Hi Wikremasinghe,

It's nice to see an expansion of the Azed article. I too have been writing one, along with a Jonathan Crowther biography. My versions have been parked for the time being on my User page and its sandbox.

The reason I parked them there was to give Azed a chance to look them over before they went 'into print'. He has had a quick look, was happy at first glance and has said that he will get back to me when he has looked closer. That seems unlikely to be before the January slip has been written so I was going to leave it for another fortnight before contacting him again.

I am dropping you this note a) in case you are working hard at a JC biog yourself and b) so that we can agree peacefully on a merged version of the Azed article. I read that some articles generate 'edit wars' and wouldn't want that to happen in this case.

Regards

Dinoceras (talk) 09:24, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

Hi Wikremasinghe,

Thanks for your reply. Over the weekend, hopefully, I'll change the article on my user page to incorporate the bits of yours which are better than mine and add the bits which I missed altogether. I'll let you know when I've done it so you can check out my changes and suggest further improvements.

Do you happen to know the number of the slip which had eighty HC's? I am trying to put in lots of in-line citations as Wikipedia like them to show that the text is accurate.

On the points you raised

1) I think my preference is that any search beginning "Azed" should go to the crossword article – anything to encourage more solvers. However, we could preface the text of the article with


 * This article is about the puzzle. For its composer see Jonathan Crowther

Nonetheless, if you still feel it should be renamed and "Azed" diverted to Jonathan Crowther, go ahead. I suggest we might then preface the "Jonathan Crowther" article


 * This article is about the crossword composer. For the Azed puzzle in The Observer, see Azed crossword

2) I have two photos of the maestro taken at the AZ 1750 lunch, one for each article. He appears happy to have them published.  I am also hoping to include pictures of the old and new bookplates.  I don't have a usable Victor Verborum cup photo.

There is, however, an issue about copyright (which Wikipedia is fussy about, for ethical reasons and in case it gets sued). As the creator of the AZ photos, I have to give permission for unrestricted reuse of my photo (subject to certain minor conditions – I've spent a lot of time trying to understand the Wikipedia rules on this and think I vaguely understand). Since the photo was not taken in a public place, AZ's permission is also necessary (no problem, I believe). If I photograph the bookplates, the artists who did them and own the copyright to their design will have to give their permissions too (or The Observer, if it owns the copyright). I've asked AZ about this problem (he has a reproduction of the owl bookplate on the cover of his "A-Z of Crosswords") which may be delaying his reply.

The same consideration would presumably apply to a photo of the Victor Verborum cup. One solution would just to put the photo in, with your permission as its creator, and then see if it gets thrown back out again. The makers of a trophy must be expecting people to take pictures of it and I doubt if the title is copyright. Even if so, AZ probably made up the title and the copyright should his, in which case I can't see there would be a problem.

I'll drop you a line when I've had a go at merging.

Regards,

David / Dinoceras (talk) 16:53, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

Hi again,

I've amended my version of the Azed article to include your material and re-saved it on my user page. Have a look and see what you think. It's sometimes helpful to look on the History page and compare the last two versions – changes are then outlined in red. (Sorry if I'm stating the obvious – since you only registered this month I'm assuming you may not have known this.)

I have added Don Manley to your Well-known solvers list and noted those that are setters for The Times. If you feel the latter is inappropriate do remove the additions. I've also produced a compact version of the Champions table - you decide which version should be kept.

If you decide to do more work on the article, would let me know when you've done so, please?

Next Sunday I plan to suggest to Azed that the text to the Azed article is OK to put on public view since any photographs can always be added later. The Jonathan Crowther article may well need to wait a little longer. Many of its facts came from his A-Z of Crosswords and I may not have rephrased enough to escape copyright problems.

Kind regards,

David / Dinoceras (talk) 11:57, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

Hi yet again,

Having now looked at the changes on my History page, I'm not sure it's as helpful as it might be. The left and right columns aren't lining up properly. Sorry.

David / Dinoceras (talk) 16:09, 19 January 2009 (UTC)