User talk:BrianSmithson

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March 2003 – August 2005 August 2005 – November 2005 November 2005 – January 2006 January 2006 – May 2006 May 2006 – July 2006 July 2006 – November 2006

Contents 1 Re: 2 Copyedit request 3 Spelling and grammar 4 How about Charlie "Brown"? 5 J A P A N?! 6 Good work 7 Manual of Style - fiction 8 WikiJET 9 Request 10 DYK! 11 Kaissa 12 Thanks & reply 13 Thanks for the Barnstar! 14 Old Dan Tucker 15 Harlan Ellison - blackface minstrel performer? 16 Some pointers 17 pretentious prose! 18 Kitsune

[edit] Re:

Check Note 6 - it just has the name of the author (no page numbers). LuciferMorgan 23:53, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

Replied there. -- BrianSmithson 04:52, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Copyedit request

Noticing your experience with editing and bringing articles to featured status, can I kindly ask you to copyedit or maybe point out some problems I am not aware of for the k-os article? It's currently a featured article candidate. Thank you. - Tutmosis 00:27, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

I've got the article printed out, and I hope to give it a look sometime soon. Sorry for taking so much time, but things are busy at the moment. — BrianSmithson 12:35, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Spelling and grammar

sorry i did not know that and thanks for help in the furtureOo7565 05:33, 14 November 2006 (UTC) Also one more thing how use can i help on this websie thanksOo7565 09:27, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

Don't worry about making mistkes; we were all new at one point. You'll get the hang of it pretty soon. As for how you can help on this website, you already seem to be doing a good job. Just edit articles that need help. Wikipedia can always use people with good copy editing skills. Look around and be bold when you see something that needs fixing and fix it. And don't hesitate to ask me any more questions you may have. — BrianSmithson 09:44, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] How about Charlie "Brown"?

While B.S. is in Japan.

The American Broadcasting Company did air only two half-hour specials on Charlie "Brown", which is the cartoon dog character I know of, so it is him. I am sure it did INDEED feature him, but I didn't watch these "specials" on television, has anyone seen these comics? - Why? Because it said Charlie "Brown", and who said he should not be aired. - I haven't watched any of the reruns of his own half-hour shows from the early 1990s to today.

--65.54.155.54 03:09, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

Me neither. — BrianSmithson 22:08, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] J A P A N?!

I do not believe you're going to be living in Japan, taking citizenship as part of the JET program (Japan Exchange Teaching) program for only a few years over there?

Well, I'm not exactly a citizen, just a resident alien. It will be for a few years, then I will go back to the US. — BrianSmithson 08:50, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

Too bad, you are going to be living in Japan for only a few years, and they still have no help from me about researching more of the dog character:

Oh, the dog that you are seeing, wasn't ever shown at the Thanskgiving Parade, except Snoopy? - Who is Snoopy.

Unless, the Japanese government has either a right to grant citizenship to Americans. -

Yup. — BrianSmithson 08:05, 25 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Good work

Just dropped by to say I'd seen you out hard at work and that your efforts are appreciated; have a nice cup of tea on me. Keep up the good work, and if there is anything I can do to be of help to you, please let me know. Essjay (Talk) 06:34, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

I'll take it (it's cold here)! Thanks! — BrianSmithson 06:38, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Manual of Style - fiction

Hi BrianSmithson - I've noticed you are an active participant on the MoS (fiction) page & I was quite impressed by your User biography page. Quack688 and I have been working on a revised MoS (fiction) that better encapsulates our views on guiding new Wikipedia users to generate better articles on fictional subjects.

My hope is to generate a guide that is less prescriptive and confrontational. I've noted that some people have very strong views on what they think all fictional pages should be like. I personally feel a balance has to be struck so that we can push for an encyclopedic style while not discouraging the active Wikipedia contributors that have helped made Wikipedia what it has now become.

The current page is also mainly focussed on discouraging an in-universe style. As you can tell from my previous posts, I think this style is not intrisically inferior. I also feel that there are far more important features to focus on when developing a great article about fiction.

If you have a chance, please take a look at our Wikipedia:Manual of Style (writing about fiction)/draft revision. I'd be interested in your comments; feel free to leave them on the talk page and/or make changes to the draft itself.

Warm regards, Dr Aaron 11:23, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the link. I'll try to give it a look this weekend. -- BrianSmithson 06:15, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] WikiJET

Hi there. I thought you might be interested that I've now started WikiJET over at Wikia.com. It's still in the early stages at the moment, but I'd be interested to know what you think so far.

PS. Have you been accepted for JET in 2007 then? Bobo12345 04:55, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

I'll definitely check it out. Have you seen the Wiki they have at Ithinkimlost.com? As for your last question, I was actually accepted to JET for the 2006-2007 year. I'm pretty sure I'm recontracting for another year, though. -- BrianSmithson 06:15, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Request

Hi! Sorry to bother you. I am working on wikipedia for a long time and I had other user names before I started editing under my current user name. I would like to move the contribution list and pages of those usernames to my current page. Is such a thing possible? Would you please help me with this problem. Thanks a lot in advance and sorry for the inconvenience. Sangak 13:23, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

Hmm. Tough question. I really don't know if that's possible. You might try reading over Wikipedia:Changing username and perhaps asking your question there. Sorry I can't be of more help. — BrianSmithson 14:22, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] DYK!

On 25 November 2006, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article Rudolf Duala Manga Bell, which you created. If you know of another interesting fact from a recently created article, then please suggest it on the "Did you know?" talk page.

Sorry couldn't use the picture. --Aksi_great (talk) 18:46, 25 November 2006 (UTC)

On December 4, 2006, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article Sso (rite), which you created. If you know of another interesting fact from a recently created article, then please suggest it on the "Did you know?" talk page.

Thankyou for creating this fascinating article. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 01:06, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Kaissa

Hello there,

I am glad to see that you have written so much about Africa. I enjoy doing the same. I noticed your recent edit to Kaissa added the "Africa-bio-stub" to it. I just wanted to let you know that only people without national templates (like an African from Mayotte but not Comoros) should get the Africa-bio-stub template. Good work otherwise and keep it up!--Thomas.macmillan 04:25, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

Hi, Thomas. I'm not sure what you mean. I'm laying the groundwork to propose a {{Cameroon-bio-stub}}, so I'm going through tagging pages that need it with {{Africa-bio-stub}} and {{Cameroon-stub}}. If and when my proposal is accepted, these will all be replaced with {{Cameroon-bio-stub}}. -- BrianSmithson 04:29, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

That is not needed. All you need to do is do a hand count of the Cameroon stubs with people and then propose it. I am all in favor of dividing the Africa national stubs wherever possible, so you can count on my support for that. Let me know when you propose it so I don't miss it. But otherwise, you should revert the edits adding Africa-bio-stub, as its redundant and says at the top of the category. Check out the category to see for yourself. Also consider moving the stubs to the bottom of the page, as this is proper stub etiquette.--Thomas.macmillan 04:37, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

Greetings Brian

I'm glad you take an interest in the African material. We need a lot more editors like that. The reason I wrote like I did was that Cat:African people stubs was getting completely out of hand. Back when we only created new stub templates whenever we were 100% sure we had 60 relevant articles or more, you can imagine how this category completely swamped with 20 articles from one country, 30 from another and 40 from a third, etc etc. I remember sorting 800+ politicians out of the entire mess, and that was just the beginning. Having all of this material grouped together also made it extremely difficult to check for new potential splitoffs since it meant that I had to count all of it everytime. Even worse, many articles were only tagged with {{Africa-bio-stub}} rather than e.g. {{Sudan-stub}} and it makes more sense to me to sort material by country rather than by continent.

I couldn't see any better way to get this material under some kind of control. It is also a response to some of the criticism we've faced for adding too many stub templates to articles. Since it is pretty easy to browse e.g. Cat:Sudan stubs for articles about persons, we can still get a good idea about the size of this material.

After I wrote this note, WP:WSS has somewhat softened the requirements for new templates, so if you know of a country with a large number of biographical stub articles, e.g. 40 articles or so, feel free to propose an upmerged template at WP:WSS/P. Imagine this is the case for Cameroon. If we create a new {{Cameroon-bio-stub}} template but make it use the existing Cat:Cameroon stubs category (rather than creating a new Cat:Cameroonian people stubs), this will mean that we can begin using the new template before we have the required number of 60 stub articles. Once the material grows beyond the 60+ threshold, we can simply create a new category for the template to use. The benefit of doing things this way is that people can find a template under the expected name, and we can avoid a few high-risk categories from getting completely out of control. Cat:African people stubs was a very bad example of this. Happy editing. Valentinian ^{(talk) / (contribs)} 13:31, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Thanks & reply

Hi Brian, just wanted to let you know that I've responded to your recent kind note at my talk page User talk:Cclowe. Thanks, Chris Lowe 02:13, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Thanks for the Barnstar!

Thank you for the barnstar, it is much appreaciated. I look forward to working with you again on filling in the important gaps on Wikipedia. Thanks again!--Thomas.macmillan 14:24, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Old Dan Tucker

From Old Dan Tucker:

The first confirmed public performance of "Old Dan Tucker" was by the Virginia Minstrels at the Bowery Amphitheatre on February 6, 1843.

On January 28, 1843, The New York Sporting Whip reported that the song had been adopted by a Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, street gang called the Hallow Guards.

These dates would seem to contradict one another. Andrew Levine 06:38, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

Good catch. I'll look over the sources again this weekend and see what the deal is. Thanks. — BrianSmithson 07:39, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

Okay, I've corrected the error. — BrianSmithson 08:13, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Harlan Ellison - blackface minstrel performer?

Hi Brian. I see you added a new category to the Harlan Ellison page. What's your source for doing so? I'd never heard (and I can't find any reference on the page) that Ellison ever performed in blackface. Yonmei 14:49, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

The article includes this line: "As a child, he had a brief career performing in minstrel shows." If this isn't true, the line and category should of course be removed. The article doesn't specify exactly how brief his minstrel career was, so feel free to remove the category anyway if you don't think it's significant enough. I'm not really familiar with the subject. — BrianSmithson 22:16, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

I assume that the line about his performing in minstrel shows is true (or at least, since this is Harlan Ellison, part of his self-created history: it's sometimes hard to tell) - but the page is re-read so many times by his fans that I would have guessed any outright invention would have been removed long ago.

But, we are in cultural miscommunication territory here - I would never have associated "minstrel show" directly with "blackface ministrels". Thank you for responding to my query - I'll ask on the Talk page of the Harlan Ellison page if this category is appropriate for that biographical reference. Someone will know.

Yonmei 08:01, 8 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Some pointers

Hi, i was reading the FAC and noticed you gave a very descriptive response pointing out all the errors and such. I was hoping maybe you could do the same for Slayer, which i have been working on lately attempting to get it up to FA status. I have asked other user opinions and they have said it needs a copyedit so perhaps you could (or direct me to someone) who could give it a good copyedit. If you're busy or its not an area of your interest then no problem. Thankyou for your time! :) M3tal H3ad 08:15, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

Hi, M3tal H3ad. At this point, I can't make any promises, but if time permits, I'll give the article a look. Real life is seriously limiting my wikitime, unfortunately. -- BrianSmithson 04:46, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] pretentious prose!

Yes, it's a problem, isn't it. Many inexperienced writers want to use short-cuts to spruce up their prose with overly formal, difficul-to-read constructions. "Whilst", "amongst", "upon" are words I particularly hate in most contexts. Long sentences need to be chopped up, but here, the boundary beyond which a sentence is too long is harder to establish.

I'm all for providing examples and asking them to fix it. Plain English is very important given the wide range of backgrounds—linguistic and educational—of our readership. Tony 10:50, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Kitsune

I wanted to thank you for putting so much time and effort into copyediting the article. I'm particularly grateful because, even though I've worked as an editor, I tend to have some difficulties editing my own prose. Too close to the text, I suppose. Anyway, I appreciate the support. Shimeru 01:14, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

It was my pleasure; I'm fascinated by Japanese folklore and mythology, so I was happy to learn so much about the critters while I worked. It is indeed difficult to edit one's own prose. I can only really do it if I let the piece go fallow for a while before returning to it, and then it's still always better to have a second pair of eyes go over the thing. I've got access to one other source from which I may add a bit here and there, but I think the piece is pretty solid now. Good work. -- BrianSmithson 02:45, 15 December 2006 (UTC)