User talk:Felicity4711

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[edit] Welcome!

Hello, Felicity4711, and welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for your contributions. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are a few good links for newcomers:

I hope you enjoy editing here and being a Wikipedian!

In light of the changes you made at County Cork, I especially want to point you to Wikipedia:Manual of Style (headings)#Capitalisation: only the first word of a heading (as well as any proper names) are supposed to be capitalized. Also, for a long time only “straight” quotation marks and apostrophes were allowed on Wikipedia; there is some feeling that “curly quotes” should be allowed too, but you have to be careful when changing them inside links, because some links won’t work with a curly quote. I’d say the general feeling on straight and curly quotes is that it’s fine to use whichever you like in your own writing, but it’s probably better not to edit a page that consistently uses one type to make it use the other.

If you have any questions, check out Wikipedia:Where to ask a question or ask me on my talk page. Again, welcome! --Angr (tɔk) 23:21, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

P.S. Your above statement of who you are is most appropriately put on your user page. This is your talk page, which is for other people to leave you messages, and for you to answer them. You can also answer people on their talk pages if you want to be sure they see your answer. --Angr (tɔk) 23:23, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Reply

I hope I’m doing this right, editing the page to reply to your comment—I guess I’ll have to re-read the manual to make sure! In the meantime...

I read the linked point about capitalisation and stand corrected, and will happily conform to the Wikipedia standard of header capitalisation from now on.

However, I’m fanatical about directed quotes and apostrophes; as long as Wikipedia allows them, I plan to fix every single one, one random article at a time. I just think that directed quotes and apostrophes look more professional, more like an actual published work; plus, aesthetically, non-directed quotes really, really bother me, and make me want to not use Wikipedia—which would be unfortunate, because I learn so much about so many things just by going through articles replacing quote marks!

Thank you for the welcome and I will certainly read the links you suggested. :-)

PS: I forgot to mention that I’m very careful to leave links that contain undirected apostrophes intact and use the | (pipe) so that the directed version is only the displayed version. :-)
Hi! Thanks for the answer. Another convention at Wikipedia is to sign comments on talk pages by typing ~~~~, which leaves a link back to your user page as well as giving the time at which you left the message. Or you can click on the “signature” square (the second from the right) above the edit box. Now, as to apostrophes and quotes; the only reason I complained about it at all is that at this edit, you didn’t fix a link with a straight apostrophe in it. You changed Sheep's Head to Sheep’s Head (note the change from blue to red). In this case, the best thing to do is to make a redirect from Sheep’s Head to Sheep's Head. Do you know how to do that? You click on Sheep’s Head and in the edit box you type #redirect [[Sheep's Head]]. After you do that, Sheep’s Head will turn blue and clicking on it will take you straight to Sheep's Head. --Angr (tɔk) 08:18, 12 January 2006 (UTC)
Oh my goodness, you’re right. I didn’t catch that one. If I understand your instruction correctly, I’d be creating a page called Sheep’s Head that would then redirect to Sheep's Head...is it simpler if I just say Sheep’s Head? I’m happy to do either one. Felicity4711 16:38, 14 January 2006 (UTC)
Yes, you did it exactly right! Now you can link to either Sheep's Head or Sheep’s Head and both will go to the same article. Making a piped link will work too. There’s also an easier way to insert curly quotes now. Instead of typing ’ every time you can just click on the quotes you need under “Special characters” underneath the “Save page” button below the edit box. Angr (tɔk) 18:17, 14 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Please don’t unilaterally impose stupid “smartquotes” on articles which previously didn’t contain them

See Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style#Look_of_quotation_marks_and_apostrophes AnonMoos 17:00, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

I suspect that was accidental. Felicity is probably using an external editor which automatically replaces normal quotation marks with typographer’s quotes. Now that her attention has been drawn to it, I doubt it will happen again. -- BBlackmoor (talk), 2006-02-20 T 14:35 Z
Ack. After reading her comments above, I see that it was intentional, after all. Felicity, typographer’s quotation marks belong in printed material, not on the web. DO NOT REPLACE NORMAL QUOTATION MARKS WITH TYPOGRAPHER’S QUOTES IN WIKIPEDIA. -- BBlackmoor (talk), 2006-02-20 T 14:38 Z
Typographer’s quotes belong anywhere that they’re possible. The lack of directed apostrophes and quotes on the net is a flaw that is finally starting to change. I care how apostrophes and quotes look. I wouldn’t have bothered creating an account on Wikipedia if it didn’t offer directed apostrophes and quotes. Felicity4711 09:06, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

If you’re going to do this, at least use the Unicode characters ‘ “ ’ ” instead of the HTML entities. android79 14:38, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

I can do that if that’s what everyone would prefer, but it was my understanding that the Wikipedia standard was [ampersand] rsquo [semicolon]. This is as opposed to [ampersand] [octothorpe] 146 [semicolon], which is what I would consider to be “HTML.” Felicity4711 00:59, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
Nope, those are both HTML entities. Please use the Unicode. android79 01:53, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
I’ll consider it. Felicity4711 02:40, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

By the way, are you using a script or other wise (semi-)automated process to do this? android79 14:44, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Nope! Doing it all by hand. :-) Felicity4711 00:59, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
Before you continue, I would suggest that you make sure that there is not widespread opposition to this change. Since typographer’s quotes don’t appear anywhere on a standard keyboard, the only way to enter them into articles is through HTML entities (very annoying) or with the special characters box (slightly less annoying). Please post a new discussion at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style describing your plans. android79 01:53, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
Unfortunately, there is some opposition, though I don’t know whether I’d call it “widespread.” The fact that typographer’s quotes don’t appear on a standard keyboard is part of why being able to enter them in other ways, such as HTML, the special characters box (extremely inconvenient to use), or combinations of keystrokes in Windows and Macintosh, is so important. I’ll consider posting a discussion. Felicity4711 02:40, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
Update: I’ve posted to the existing discussion on directed versus non-directed quotes. Felicity4711 03:18, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
Please don’t add smartquotes to articles. Many people don’t know how to add them, and others don’t feel it’s a good use of their time. This makes for an inconsistent look within articles. There is also the danger that people will use them incorrectly. HTML entites make it especially difficult to read an article’s source. There may not be an explicit rule against smart quotes, but most Wikipedians don’t use them, and I’m guessing that most Wikipedians don’t think they should be phased in. Rhobite 02:06, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
I don’t see how the fact that most people don’t know how or can’t be bothered to add directed quotes means that I can’t. I do know how, and I consider it a worthwhile use of my time to make Wikipedia more aesthetically pleasing and professional-looking. If we’re going to stop using markup because it makes the source code harder to read, let’s talk about not doing tables and charts instead of picking on directed quotes! I’m guessing that the fact that directed quotes are possible on Wikipedia means that some Wikipedians thought they should be used. Felicity4711 02:40, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
It makes the source code harder to read and edit if you use HTML entities. It makes it harder to edit when you use Unicode. “More aesthetically pleasing and professional-looking” is an opinion that not everyone (including me) will share. Why don’t you take this discussion to a larger audience to gauge editor opinion on the issue? android79 02:43, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
OK then...if we’re going to stop using markup because it makes the source code harder to read and edit, let’s talk about not doing tables and charts instead of picking on directed quotes! :-) As I said in another post, I’ll consider starting a discussion on the MOS talk page. [nod] Felicity4711 03:02, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
Update: I’ve posted to the existing discussion on directed versus non-directed quotes. Felicity4711 03:18, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
Can you at least use unicode, then? HTML entities make the source unreadable, with no apparent benefit. Tables, on the other hand, are absolutely necessary to articles, and any unreadability in the source is a necessary evil. Rhobite 22:34, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
I’ll try to use Unicode. It’ll depend on what terminal I’m on when I edit. Cluttered source code for tables is a necessary evil to you; cluttered source code for directed apostrophes and quotes is a necessary one to me. Felicity4711 03:04, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Al Leong

Thanks for adding They Live to the Al Leong article. I went back and watched it again, and noticed Al for the first time. -- BBlackmoor (talk), 2006-02-20 T 14:35 Z

Did I add that? I don’t remember. Well, you’re welcome! :-) Felicity4711 09:06, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Net Follower

You appear to have attracted a net follower http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Bblackmoor who has made it their task to follow behind you and undo changes that you make.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/Bblackmoor The user posts links to the Wikipedia Manual of Style to give the appearance of an official Wikipedia correction, but the Manual of Style link given has no relevence to the correctness of their action.

The user’s talk page http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Bblackmoor contains his manifesto in which he claims “the vast majority of the human race should not be allowed near a computer, much less be allowed to use one to edit an encyclopedia.”

Good luck.

[sigh] Nothing good ever lasts. Well, thanks for the heads-up....Reading his talk page, I notice that he claims to have stopped editing Wikipedia except for two pet articles, and that he considers Wikipedia a waste of time since a persitent crank can simply lurk and undo someone’s changes. Kind of ironic, considering that he’s following me around reverting all my changes. Felicity4711 09:12, 2 March 2006 (UTC)
I didn’t follow you around or anything of the kind. After you replaced correct quotation marks with typographer’s quotation marks in one of the few Wikipedia articles in which I still maintain an interest, I corrected a few of your other misguided edits as a general service to Wikipedia. I hadn’t given you another thought until today, when someone brought your continued...“vandalism” is too strong a word, but not by much...to my attention, and pointed me toward the administrators board where the complaints about you are being collected. -- BBlackmoor (talk) 02:13, 28 June 2006 (UTC)
OK then. As a service to Wikipedia, I’ll just have to check periodically to make sure my directed quotes haven’t been changed to non-directed quotes as part of your continued...“vandalism” is too strong a word, but not by much... Felicity4711 02:58, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Curiously enough, the anonymous coward who posted this warning about Felicity4711’s alleged “net follower” has never made any other edit on Wikipedia. That strikes me as a little odd. A little creepy, even. It would seem I have my own “net follower”... -- BBlackmoor (talk) 02:21, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

So some anonymous coward posts something about you once on my talk page and you have a “net follower,” but you change multiple articles, explicitly to undo my edits, and I don’t have a net follower? Heh. Felicity4711 02:58, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Directed Quotes: Why They Matter to Me

Directed quotes are 90% of the reason I bothered to register for a Wikipedia account. Directed quotes make the difference between actual, professional publications and something someone churned out with no care for how it looked. A “professional” publication that doesn’t bother to have directed apostrophes and quotes is an insult to one’s intelligence; the author is, in effect, saying, “I didn’t bother to make this a look like a real publication because I don’t think you’d have the sophistication to know the difference.” It’s frustrating that, after having to grit my teeth and do without directed quotes on-line for such a long time (for example, Usenet), they’re finally here, thanks to HTML, and they’re still not being used, even on professional Websites. I’m willing to permanently sacrifice time out of my finite, mortal lifespan and put them in where other people didn’t know how or didn’t have time, because the trade-off is that Wikipedia looks professional, is something I can be proud of having contributed to, and is something I would want to read. If the rules of Wikipedia changed so that directed quotes were not allowed at all, I’d delete my account and would only read Wikipedia by first downloading the text of the Wikipedia entry, then opening it in Microsoft Word and globally replacing all the apostrophes and quotes with directed versions before I started reading. Not being able to use directed quotes (in the world in general, not just on Wikipedia) is like being a second-class citizen. There’s something better, something more true to the experience you want to have, but that’s only for the other people who are lucky enough to belong to the ruling class. You only get non-directed quotes, because you don’t matter. You’re not important enough to have the freedom to choose. Felicity4711 03:00, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Why attempting to force the broad general use of “smartquotes” is not advisable at this time

1) They’re a pain from the point of view of article maintenance. People editing the article after you may not always use them, and this will result in an inconsistent mixture of quoting styles, which somebody will have to eventually come along and fix.

2) There are technical issues. Some web-browsing software (older versions, it’s true, but still used by many people, and by no means antediluvian) won’t display “smartquotes.” Some web-browsers will display them correctly when a user views an article, but won’t handle them correctly when a user tries to edit an article. More generally, adding “smartquotes” to an article in many cases transforms it from using only 7-bit ASCII characters or 8-bit ISO 8859-1 characters into using Unicode characters with a variable-width UTF-8 encoding, and this drastically increases the number of things that can go wrong. It’s not really desirable to unnecessarily force an article to use Unicode when its subject matter doesn’t require it.

3) Many people seem to disagree with you. You may find this deeply wounding and traumatic, but I’m afraid that part of participating in Wikipedia is dealing with such disagreements. You may think that “smartquotes” add “professionalism,” but many people who were around the Internet during the first half of the 1990s have deeply negative associations with on-line computer use of “smartquotes,” since back then they were a proprietary Microsoft thing, whose implementation by Microsoft did not conform to any publicly-recognized character-set standards, and which kept messing things up in on-line forums by intruding into contexts where most users would not see them as they were intended to be seen (but instead as empty boxes, blanks, or strange diacritic-accented characters). AnonMoos 10:32, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

(1) Noted. Ideally, I would be that someone, but I couldn’t promise it.
(2) Noted.
(3) I don’t find disagreement intrinsically wounding and traumatic; I’d expect some resistance/debate on Wikipedia. However, it goes both ways. If I have to acknowledge other people’s styles, then they should have to acknowledge mine.
Since I myself used to browse the Web with Lynx in the early 1990s, I understand how those negative associations could develop. Even today, using Firefox, I still see empty boxes, boxes with numbers and letters in them, and strange diacritically-accented characters on some pages. But the fact that directed apostrophes and quotes are more possible than they used to be is part of what inspires me to encourage their usage. Felicity4711 03:04, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

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OK. I think I’ve got it fixed now. Felicity4711 02:16, 25 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Please pause for the moment

You’ve gone on a roll today imposing your idea of what quotes should look like on dozens of articles, without discussion. It’s quite clear from your talk page that this style is controversial and many disagree with you; at the very least you’re making the source extremely difficult to read and edit. I also get the feeling that you’re deliberately avoiding doing this on high-traffic articles in an attempt to sneak this in “under the radar.” A discussion has been initiated at the ANI; I think it would be a good idea to pause what you’re doing and discuss your plans there.—Merzbow 23:57, 23 June 2006 (UTC)

I guess I’m used to HTML source code being somewhat harder to read than plain text, such as when I write ’ to get a directed apostrophe in, for example, my LiveJournal, so it hadn’t occurred to me that other people looking at source code would be unused to it. As for the choice of articles, it’s much less sinister than trying to sneak it under the radar. I’ve been hitting the random article link and editing the shortest articles first, since I know I can get through them in one sitting and therefore won’t have to stop halfway through and leave the article an inconsistent combination of directed and non-directed quotes. I guess the fact that I’m using the random article link is why I’ve ended up on some relatively obscure articles. :-) Felicity4711 14:20, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

I’ve given you some support with a plea for sanity on the ANI—you are not entirely alone in your views (though you may be more passionately committed to them than most). Doremítzwr 03:39, 24 June 2006 (UTC)

Thanks! :-) Felicity4711 14:20, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
I admire your zeal for wishing to improve the standard of wikipedia, but wiki works by consensus, and there is a consensus against using HTML for quotes. If you feel this consensus is wrong, then this should be addressed before you carry on using HTML. As it is, your work is only going to be changed back, as has already happened with Monochrome painting. This results in a waste of your time and that of others. Tyrenius
What should be stressed is that the administrators are only opposed to html smart quotes; they are perfectly happy for you to institute unicode smart quotes. I’m sure that this is a satisfactory compromise for everyone concerned. Doremítzwr 19:42, 24 June 2006 (UTC)
It is indeed. I’ll be sure to use Unicode quotes from now on. I had resisted doing so before only because I do a lot of my article-editing on a Linux box on which there is no keystroke (such as Alt+0146) to produce typographical characters as there is Windows. To get Unicode characters on that computer, I have to keep a text document on the desktop that contains the special characters, then copy and paste them into the articles as I edit. This is more of a hassle than simply typing ’. However: as I said, I’ll be sure to use the Unicode quotes from now on. Felicity4711 14:20, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
Please take a look at this screenshot of the article Calvin Trillin that you edited. It shows how the directed quotes appear on the latest version of Internet Explorer for the Macintosh when the user has logged in in Japanese. The quotes appear twice as wide as they should because IE has rendered them in a two-byte Japanese font. I suspect that similar or worse problems occur on many currently used Japanese, Chinese, Korean, and other non-English operating systems. Is this how you want these quotation marks to appear to the tens or hundreds of millions of people who use those systems? Tomgally 22:44, 24 June 2006 (UTC)
I suppose not. I hope using Unicode directed quotes solves this problem, however, because as much as I don’t want Asian users to have to look at weird spacing, I also don’t want Western users to look at undirected quotes. Felicity4711 14:20, 30 June 2006 (UTC)
The Unicode directed quotes in Japanese Internet Explorer for the Macintosh look the same as the HTML directed quotes: twice as wide as they should be. On Japanese IE for Windows XP, they look fine. Tomgally 11:57, 1 July 2006 (UTC)
In that case I’ll be sure to use Unicode ones from now on. Felicity4711 02:36, 7 July 2006 (UTC)
Please read Tomgally's message carefully: "The Unicode directed quotes in Japanese Internet Explorer for the Macintosh look the same as the HTML directed quotes: twice as wide as they should be." -- Jeandré, 2006-07-18t19:26z

[edit] A Working Man’s Barnstar for your instituting directed apostrophes and quotation marks

The Working Man's Barnstar
Awarded for the meticulous institution of directed punctuation; it can’t be much fun to do, but it does make articles look better (particularly in titles). Though, it’s just a little ironic that this award carries the offending undirected apostrophe!
Ex animo, Doremítzwr
Thanks! Felicity4711 13:26, 7 July 2006 (UTC)
You’re entirely welcome. Doremítzwr 20:51, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Repairing Felicity4711’s damage to Wikipedia

It has become obvious that Felicity4711 is going to continue to damage Wikipedia despite being asked nicely by numerous people to stop this destructive behavior. Since, yet again, the Wikipedia administration is failing in its responsibilities, it falls upon the rest of us to undo her damage. The easiest way to work together on this, I think, is to work chronologically from past to present. I started with the Inseminoid article, which she damaged on 2005-09-18, and have repaired everything up to 2005-10-21 20:02:22, Blaxploitation. It was actually easier than I expected, because about half of those articles had already been repaired. So do not be put off by the apparent size of the task--Wikipedia’s other editors have already put quite a dent in it.--BBlackmoor (talk) 15:51, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Repairing Bblackmoor’s damage to Wikipedia

It has become obvious that Bblackmoor is going to continue to damage Wikipedia despite being asked nicely by numerous people to stop this destructive behavior. Since, yet again, the Wikipedia administration is failing in its responsibilities, it falls upon the rest of us to undo his damage. The easiest way to work together on this, I think, is to work chronologically from past to present. Felicity4711 22:51, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] There’s no damage to repair; stop being ridiculous — the both of you

BBlackmoor — an amicable compromise was reached concerning this issue on the Administrators’ Noticeboard, where it was decided that HTML directed quotation marks and apostrophes were not be used, as they make the source script unintelligible and cause display problems for a significant number of users. However, Unicode directed quotation marks and apostrophes were not disallowed, as they do not negatively affect the source script (which it could even be argued to positively affect) and cause very minor display problems for a very small proportion of Wikipedia users. The decision reached on the noticeboard represents no failure of the Wikipedia administration in its responsibilities; arguments were advanced by both camps, and consensus was reached. This is how Wikipedia is governed; thus, you ought to accept and respect the decision made on the noticeboard. Stop being intransigent.

You’ve matched Felicity4711’s zeal for instituting directed punctuation with a comprable zeal for using solely primes. Though both efforts are, in the grand scheme of things, fairly inconsequential, yours is the misguided one; " & ' may look like a quotation mark and an apostrophe, but they are, in point of fact, primes, representing ‘inches’ & ‘feet’, respectively. You may argue that the differences are negligible; however, so are the differences between a háček (as in ǎ) and a breve (as in ă) — but they are not interchangeable, so why should primes and directed punctuation be?

Felicity4711 — being an echo is not helpful. I did not reply when I first noticed BBlackmoor’s post here, as I believed that I could expect a mature response from you. You should have shown that BBlackmoor was acting contrary to consensus by citing the recent discussion on the noticeboard and/or citing the policy at Wikipedia’s Manual of Style. Unfortunately, all you have done is bring yourself down to his level.

—Raifʻhār Doremítzwr 01:50, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

I apologise. I’d hope to show Bblackmoor how it felt to have one’s contributions called “damage” by reflecting his own flame back at him. It was an echo of sorts. It certainly wasn’t literally meant as a critique of administration, FWIW. Felicity4711 02:19, 1 August 2006 (UTC)
Don’t worry about it. I just wanted to prevent a pointless flame war (though perhaps I was a little harsh on both of you). In all fairness, if BBlackmoor goes around converting your unicode directed punctuation into primes, he is doing damage. However, none of his other contributions (of which I am aware) can be considered damaging in any way — the few articles he continues to edit are of exceptional quality. What he must realise is that Wikipedia is run by consensus, which, though being flawed in many ways, is such a fundamental element of its modus operandi, that noöne should expect to be able to change it. It is always difficult to accept consensus when it runs contrary to what one believes, but accept it is what one must do. Raifʻhār Doremítzwr 15:38, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Silverwolf

I think it is great that you added the stuff about the computer lettering in Silverwolf. I remember that striking me quite a bit as well back when I was reading some of them. I did not know the font was Geneva from Apple (I became an Apple user in 1999, so I loved this tidbit). I always thought they did it to save money and wasn't sure if I liked it or not, though it was certainly an improvement over some of the lettering I saw in other independents now that I think of it. I do think your addition is a little long and some of it sounds a little unencylopedic, and I might edit it a little some time in the future if you don't mind. Malnova 01:30, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

By 1999, the font Geneva had changed quite a bit in its journey from bitmap to TrueType, so it’s understandable if you weren’t struck by the resemblance right away. :-) Yes, you’re welcome to tighten up my addition. :-) Felicity4711 02:14, 1 August 2006 (UTC)
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