Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Biography/Archive 16

Henry Fonda
Henry Fonda has been nominated for a featured article review. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. Please leave your comments and help us to return the article to featured quality. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, articles are moved onto the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Remove" the article from featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. Reviewers' concerns are here. Grim-Gym 02:26, 25 August 2007 (UTC)

ListAs parameter
There is a category called Category:Biography_articles_without_listas_parameter 

What is this? DONE Please post a message at Category_talk:Biography_articles_without_listas_parameter to explain what a listas parameter is and/or why this is important.

I will place the category under a CfD (Category for Deletion) on or around 31 August 2007 if an explanation is not given at the talk page.

If listas parameters do not relate to WikiProject Biography, please message me on my Talk Page.

Guroadrunner 03:34, 21 August 2007 (UTC)


 * I got an answer by investigating myself.
 * listas: This parameter, which is used in the template with the DEFAULTSORT magic word, is a sortkey for the article talk page, e.g. for Prince George of England, you can instead have listas=George of England, Prince -- so that it will show up in the G's. If no listas is provided, the DEFAULTSORT will be PAGENAME (the article title). Some talk pages have DEFAULTSORT placed on them manually, outside the talk page templates. Later placements of DEFAULTSORT on the talk page (inside or outside templates) will over-ride earlier placements. Category piping (in templates or done manually) will over-ride DEFAULTSORT.
 * So why not have a robot work on this a bit?
 * Guroadrunner 03:44, 21 August 2007 (UTC)
 * Please see Bots/Requests for approval/Polbot 3 and User talk:Carcharoth/Polbot3 trial run. The plans have stalled at the moment due to lack of time, but there are plans to get this bot working on this. Carcharoth 20:20, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

Important discussion of "Nationality:" in bio infoboxes
Please see WT:FLAGCRUFT.

Most of the discussion there has turned to "regulating" biographical infoboxes, and I believe that this discussion should be happening WP:INFOBOX talk or here instead, as it is out-of-scope of that essay-to-be-guideline, and off-topic for WP:WPFT. —  SMcCandlish  &#91;talk&#93; &#91;cont&#93; ‹(-¿-)› 20:22, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

Request for peer review of Honoré de Balzac
Hello there. For the past week or so, I've taken Honoré de Balzac to GA status, and I'm trying to get it in shape for an FA nomination. I've made all the suggestions noted by the GA pass review, carefully compared the style to WP:MOS, and now I need one or two experienced editors to have a look before I make it an actual FAC.

Thanks in advance. — Scartol  •  Talk  13:08, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

Elizabeth Keckly article
I'm not actually a member of this wikiproject, but I am wondering if perhaps the Elizabeth Keckly page could come under the wing of this project. It obviously needs a bit more content and a bit of polishing...Thanks for considering. Bardofcornish 14:11, 28 August 2007 (UTC)
 * I've added the banners of the Virginia project and the Biography project, as they both seem relevant to the subject. Unfortunately, both of these projects deal with a substantial number of articles. You might want to consider filing for a peer review or as a collaboration candidate for one of the various collaborations out there if you seek a bit more immediate attention to the article. We can and will provide some upkeep on the article, but can't guarantee much beyond that, given the scope of the project. John Carter 16:04, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

Gilbert Perreault
Debate has been going on at User_talk:RGTraynor regarding
 * RGTraynor edits,
 * TonyTheTiger partial revert,
 * RGTraynor revert,
 * TonyTheTiger line by line item by item revert (see edit summaries). We took this debate to the talk page at WP:HOCKEY and got no responses.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/tcfkaWCDbwincowtchatlotpsoplrttaDCLaM) 01:34, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

Neil Joshi
Could I ask project members to watchlist this article please. There have been a lot of BLP violations by new and anon editors. Thanks. → AA (talk) — 07:55, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

Give your opinion at Talk:Stephen King (paedophile)
It is proposed to move Stephen King (paedophile) to Stephen King (child molester). I'm not sure whether here is the right place to put this advertisement; tell me if I'm wrong. --Acepectif 05:30, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

Plagarism in John Blair article?
The article on John Blair appears to be the same as this one on army.mil http://www.army.mil/cmh-pg/books/RevWar/ss/blair.htm any thoughts? (I posted here because not many people probably go to the article on John Blair; he's not well known.) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.205.180.123 (talk) 17:23, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
 * "Information presented on CMH Online is considered public information and may be distributed or copied for non-commerical purposes. Use of appropriate byline/photo/image credits is requested." http://www.army.mil/cmh-pg/sec-priv.htm Consequently not a copyright violation, but perhaps innapropriate. -Duribald 18:21, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

Charles II of England
Is under Featured Article review. Please help bring this article up to current featured article standard. Judgesurreal777 20:56, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

Eponymous categories
What has been the experience of WP:BIO members as far as the policy discouraging categories named after people? I am having problems in WP:PHILO, a field of study primarily organized around the people i.e. philosophers. There are several wonderful categories Category:Aristotle, Category:Søren Kierkegaard, Category:Martin Heidegger, etc, that house the concepts, and terminology related to the philosopher.

Currently there are some administrative types (in autopilot mode I believe) who are proposing to delete Category:Wittgenstein. I can see that this could be the beginning of a series of battles.

I am proposing to change the policy WP:OCAT on eponymous categories. There are reasonable cases and unreasonable cases where it should apply. The people currently acting on the policy are not listening to a whole WikiProject's worth of objection right now. Be well,

P.S. There is a Philosophers task force at WP:PHILO, I invite your participation, collaboration, etc. Gregbard 00:11, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

Want to share?
There is a proposal to have User:SatyrBot automatically tag articles so that they are in WikiProject Philosophy. This is occurring field by field in a gradual manner. My question to the group here at WP:BIO is: Would you like to piggy back onto our efforts? There is a field in our banner for philosophers. We could have the bot tag those articles as part of both WP:PHILO and WP:BIO at the same time if it pleases the group. I am not sure which work group (if any) would be most appropriate to tag these under. We have plenty of time to work out the details of this proposal. Be well, Gregbard 14:42, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

Anna Wilding
It would be much appreciated if someone could have a look at the above article, on someone who has been involved in the film industry in various capacities. It is in the Intensive Care Unit. I tried to make a start on getting it more factual but someone has reverted my edits and seems intent on turning the page into a fan site. The result is that the article is virtually incomprehensible and useless. Thanks. Itsmejudith 20:57, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Sid Haig
I was wondering if anyone would like to help me in expanding this article. The article was longer prior, but Quatloo pretty much removed 90% of it, saying that the main source (Sid Haig's official website) was unreliable. I'd be willing to help out if needed, but if someone can find what could be considered reliable sources so Sid's biography can be fleshed out more, that'd be great.--CyberGhostface 22:30, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Csaba Horváth
It is my view that the chemical engineer is a more significant person than the canooist, as well as being earlier. I note from the Internet that there are other Hungarians with this name. How should this sort of thing be prioritized?Chemical Engineer 23:04, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

William Wilberforce
I am attempting to get this article up to GA status, and possibly considered as a Featured Article by the end of the year. This would be expecially appropriate, as 2007 is the bicentenary of the Bill to abolish the slave trade. I believe this may have been a candidate for Collaboration of the Month some time ago. Unfortunately, owing to ill-health at the time, I had to leave my contributions to Wilberforce earlier in the year – but I'm now back and would really like to see this article improved as much as possible.

The article has been subject to some vandalism recently, as well as contributors who are intent on POV arguing and edit wars, but I am intending to ignore this and at least improve the body of the article with additional detail and citations. Any one like to comment? - any help would be welcomed! – Agendum 12:21, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Britney Spears
Can someone here do a review of the Britney Spears article? Thanks. Oidia (talk) 11:23, 10 September 2007 (UTC)
 * Please list it at our peer review department if you would like a review. Thanks,  Psych  less   02:29, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Use of "Dictator" in Wikipedia
Please see here for debate, thanks. Tazmaniacs 15:46, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

Adlai Stevenson
I have no idea where I should raise this point, so bear with me if this is the wrong place. Anyway, it seems a no-brainer to me that Adlai Stevenson should be a disambiguation page, given that there are (unless I'm missing one) three notable politicians who have had that name. Yet that page is rather simply and directly a bio of the second such politician, without so much as links at the top of the page to the others. The page for the first Stevenson, Adlai E. Stevenson, does have these links but it's much less likely that someone would input that name when looking for one of the other Stevensons or that they would need further direction in finding those pages. I'll probably wind up putting links to Adlai E. Stevenson and Adlai Stevenson III at the top of Adlai Stevenson (there doesn't seem to be any discussion of this matter on any of the talk pages - and they've gotten no discussion whatsoever in some time), but I rather think it's a matter that should be handled like George Bush, when, ironically, that article probably can be a redirect to one particular man known by that name.

Thanks for your consideration.

Nosleep1234 18:48, 17 September 2007 (UTC)
 * Point well taken, tho initial applies to all three and probably more readers know the correct initial for AES II than know that AES I exists, let alone is notable. I found this discn after having moved AES I and started a Dab page. Check my last hundred or so contribs preceding this timestamp, and my next dozen or so, to see the large number of AES II refs that were mislk'd to AES I bcz of the ambiguity.
 * As to the two-word name, my experience in cleaning up after the move supports my opinion that readers will usually be looking for AES II when using it, and the ToP Dab in the AES II bio article and the Dab page will handle it adequately and efficiently. I would treat the AES name the same way, but IMO the large number of (less used, but appropriate) lks to the AES I bio make it worth having the Dab as a sentry for the uses of two names and initial. --Jerzy•t 09:04, 29 December 2007 (UTC)

Stephen M. Kohn
Was wondering if someone could take a look at this, the biography of a lawyer Stephen Kohn. Relatively new unsourced but well formatted article by new editor. I think the subject is notable, but am not certain. Whoever drafted it has uncommon access to Stephen Kohn's biographical details. The drafter has been ensuring there are plenty of internal wikilinks concerning the lawfirm's cases in other articles see. Cheers Saganaki- 13:26, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

IRC meeting?
I've recently completed a new newsletter for the project which I'll be sending out quickly if there are no objections with it. In it, I've proposed an IRC meeting to discuss the project. What date and time would work best for everyone?  Psych  less   21:21, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
 * In the past, I've seen people saying Sunday afternoon generally is most open for most people. Whether that'd be the case here is another matter entirely, though. John Carter 21:38, 21 September 2007 (UTC)