User talk:WilyD/Archives/2006/August

I'm stealing your bit.
"Wikipedia, she be many things..." cracks me up so much that I plan on using it when I prod articles. :) -- Merope 15:36, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

This Article is hard to write?
What does "this article is hard to write" mean? Mike33 12:44, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Its not a "little obtuse" it is completely meaningless. You have a completely different understanding of verbum sap sapiente. Explaination saves time. it also saves you replying to missives like this. Be clear be bold EXPLAIN what you are trying to say. Mike33 13:00, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

I list the Afd purely because the amount of editors involved would take months to resolve. verbosity is not clarity, and clarity is not vague phrases:

"Keep articles for deletion is not cleanup, nor is this article is hard to write a good criterion for deletion" Mike33 13:11, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Now this was verbose:


 * Given that two editors "dittoed" me, I'm not sure my sentiment was as vague as you found it. Whilst it is almost certainly the case that I could've been more precise, it ain't my natural inclination to write long essays about articles that are obvious keeps. I'm not sure it'd be possible for me to adopt a verbal style that would never confuse anyone. For what it's worth, articles for deletion is a discussion, not a vote - if it is the case that my arguments are poorly reasoned or incomprehensible, then they'll be discounted anyhow. In general, I would expect (although it may be foolish of me) for anyone reading my comments to be familiar with the rational for deletion - so I'm not sure it's all that beneficial to reiterate them in my discussion. Short and sweet can also be too short or rot your teeth - and I'm sorry if I wasn't clear enough for you - but I would worry that rehashing too much will just clutter up the discussion. WilyD 13:19, 11 August 2006 (UTC) 

Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Mike33"

Clearly we have a misunderstanding. I have no gripes about a keep (by the way when have i ever suggested that Afd was a VOTE?). You didn't make an argument, a simple keep would have fulfilled the goal. Italic this article is hard to write implied that i made the statement. To anyone not familiar to admin parlez, it is just a meanless string of words. Editors surely "ditto"ed your Keep not this article is hard to write (see All your base are belong to us). It can't only be me, that didn't understand what you were trying to say. I am not asking for a gold bull, all i need to say is that a string of words is not necessarily as meaningful to the viewer, as it was the writer. Mike33 16:30, 11 August 2006 (UTC)
 * ok sweet, my apologies too. hope we meet in wikipedia in happier circumstances, your friend, Michael West Mike33 16:44, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Spam
It's still heavily processed chopped-up meat, no matter how you serve it or waht you serve it with. Lurker oi!  17:20, 16 August 2006 (UTC)

Comments at Talk:Canada
Was interested in your comments re: linking to message forums. My understanding is that external links should be presented only when they lead to an alternate source of information that will expand the reader's knowledge on the article in question. Is there a specific policy on links to forums? I recently debated the article on army.ca and suggested it be deleted. The result was "no consensus", but I find that most of the links in the article are to forum postings. In other words, this is a self-referential article about a web forum (non-notable, in my view) that uses its own postings as 'evidence' of some of its claims of notability, and as the sole reference to other claims such as forum membership. Is there anywere I can go to see a discussion of the use of web forums as external links and as "source" material. It's an interesting subject, and I think I may agree with your assessment that they should "never" be used as an external link but would be interested in seeing the views of others. Would also be interested in your input at the army.ca article re: the use of self-referential footnotes from the forum itself, considering the article is about the forum to begin with. At the very least, the use of an external link as a footnote to the description of every single subforum should be removed, but I find my edits are being reverted there due to personality conflicts. Would welcome your thoughts.Michael Dorosh 17:30, 16 August 2006 (UTC)

Justin Bonomo
In the AFD of that article, you 'voted' to delete because of verifiability problems. Please note that the article is now referenced, and that many more sources were discussed in the first AFD and the deletion review. Grindingteeth 22:10, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

Lists
I don't want you to get the wrong idea that I'm just going after lists for the hell of it. Like you I believe they can serve a useful purpose. I just don't think that the two we happen to ben voting on do.

I'm interested why you particularly feel that the composers list is an "obvious" keep. This isn't a challenge or a confrontation. I'm interested to know what utility it has that I'm overlooking. I'm perfectly willing to admit I could be wrong, and if I am I'd like to be enlightened. Cain Mosni 17:23, 30 August 2006 (UTC)


 * I have to say I'm still not getting it. As I see it you're saying that any simple list - cars, composers, aeroplanes - you name it - is perfectly legitimate.  Now as I see it, that function is better served by (taking the cars as an example) - tagging the Lambourghini Countach and Ford Cortina articles with category "motor car" and using the category as your self-maintaining reference list, or indeed lists because of course you can tag any article with any number of categories (so you could have "performance cars", "production cars", blah blah), and the lists track the changes automagically.  Manual lists are inherently messier, simply because they have to be changed explicitly to track article changes.  It's just extra maintenance, which in the case of a simple list I don't see any benefit in for the cost of the extra effort.


 * Where I see lists having greater utility is in carrying secondary information (e.g. in the case of the composers the years of birth/death, although I still don't thing that the list of composers is inherently useful, not because it is incomplete but because it is so generic and will consequently likely always be incomplete, amd I don't see the dates as particularly helpful so the secondary information aspect is lost too). I only see lists as being useful when the dataset is closed, and relatively small (e.g. "Formula 1 championship drivers in 2003").  I agree with you, though, that redlinks or incompleteness alone are not necessarily reasons for article deletion.  You basically said the same as I did in the argument over the singers lists - Wikipedia is organic, and if you deleted everything that was incomplete, there would be nothing to complete.  I guess we'll just have to differ in this particular instance and await the outcome.  I still can't help thinking I must be missing something.


 * Thanks for the discussion. Cain Mosni 22:28, 30 August 2006 (UTC)


 * I took a look at the featured lists, and I take your point. Nevertheless, I'd still say that useful open-ended lists are the exception, rather than the rule, and even then only when they are maintained in a state of near completeness and fully populated.  Lists such as that for composers with it's high density of red links  just encourages people to add still more names willy-nilly, without developing the articles, and hence without any appreciable added value.  As I've already agreed, redlinks are not in themselves a bad thing, quite the reverse, but when they become the expectation rather than the exception the exercise is - purely IMO - somewhat pointless.  It's at that point you need to take a step back and re-consider the worth of the thing.


 * As for the issue of manual effort, it's not about the effort per se, but the implications it has for maintenance and human error. The fact is that requiring said deliberate effort to maintain the integrity of the list there is more scope for error to creep in, unlike categorisation where the link is immediate, and reverse relationship is maintained as a natural part of the process.  (I'm a database techie by trade, and such things bug me, particularly when there's a minimum error/effort path available.)  Cain Mosni 00:47, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Your list IS worthwhile
The list (art magazines) you created is/was up for deletion. I want you to know there is a place for it: http://wikitistics.com. No one will be able to nominate it for deletion because it fits one simple rule: it's a statistic, list, or figure. Good luck with your endeavors! Joe 18:15, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

Laura Bush
I don't know what that list said, but see Michael Dutton Douglas. --Dhartung | Talk 20:15, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

External Link
Thanks, I think I will approach RIC. Cheers. Joe 21:06, 30 August 2006 (UTC)