User talk:Profero

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[edit] A welcome from Sango123

Hello, Profero, and welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for your contributions; I hope you like the place and decide to stay. We're glad to have you in our community! Here are a few good links for newcomers:

I hope you enjoy editing here and being a Wikipedian! Though we all make goofy mistakes, here is what Wikipedia is not. If you have any questions or concerns, don't hesitate to see the help pages or add a question to the village pump. The Community Portal can also be very useful.

Happy Wiki-ing!

-- Sango123 23:34, August 28, 2005 (UTC)

P.S. Feel free to leave a message on my talk page if you need help with anything or simply wish to say hello. :)

Thank you Sango! Profero 09:49, 11 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] == http://www.nationmaster.com/ ==

Anyone – please give me an answer to this: What is the relation between Wikipedia and http://www.nationmaster.com/ ? Profero 18:52, 10 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] nationmaster.com

That's a mirror. You may want to look at Wikipedia:Mirrors and forks. --Phroziac (talk) 19:06, September 10, 2005 (UTC)

Thank you. I see it's a mirror, but how can mirrorsites that also contain commercial content be allowed to use our work strictly intended for non-commercial purposes? Profero 09:46, 11 September 2005 (UTC)
Our content is licensed for any use, as long as they tell that it's from wikipedia and give a way to see the authors. As for your message on my talk, HUH? --Phroziac (talk) 13:19, September 11, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Civility and Development

I am not writing this because of the simple "HUH" above, but as a general reaction to what seems to be a negative language culture many places on Wiki.
Please, for the sake of Wiki, try to stick to relevant facts and leave out words like "Fucking", "Dipshit", "Smackbot", "Screwed, "Huh", "Yeesh", "Shit", "Wow", sarcastic comments, etc., just to mention a few found at quick glance. Words like these are considered slang and mostly vulgar or childish. Wiki is used all over the world, and should be used with wisdom in an as educated manner as possible.
We all make mistakes, don't we. That's a part of the game of development. Use of contemptuous language often gives an impression that the user is suffering from more or less severe immaturity.
I would like to be able to stimulate people that are more knowledgeable and sophisticated than myself to join in the building of a mature community, rather than see them shrug and pass an impression of a kindergarten.
Of course, as long as there is no initial test for admittance, we must learn to deal with this problem as best we can continuously. By the way, I see that abusive use can be blocked in different ways, but how does this apply to similar behaviour in the "upper part" of the Wiki hierarchy?

If you have any constructive comments to this point of view or anything else that is relevant, either to language or substance, you are very welcome to use this discussion page in a polite way. --Profero 12:21, 13 April 2006 (UTC)

For your information, Smackbot is a bot written by Rich Farmbrough. Imroy 21:04, 13 April 2006 (UTC)
Looks like I tripped there when I copied some words. But thanks, that was actually constructive information. Is everything else relevant then, in your opinion? --Profero 21:35, 13 April 2006 (UTC)

No. Lets look at the chain of events, shall we?

  1. You upload some photos and try to incorporate them into the Photo manipulation article. You have some trouble with the layout and ask a vague question on the article's talk page.
  2. I respond with my opinion and some suggestions. I provide a link to Meta:Help:Table, about using the Wikipedia table format. Nothing out of the ordinary here, something I've done dozens of times before. I originally wanted to fix the page, even reverting your work. But I left it so you could work on it yourself.
  3. You revert your additions to the article, and respond to me on the article talk page. You provide links to the Wikipedia civility, etiquitte, and 'No personal attacks' pages, implying I was somehow violating them.
  4. I respond, telling you to be more specific in requesting help. I claim that what I wrote was not uncivil or a personal attack. I add 'yeesh' at the end as an expression of exasperation that this issue has blown up like this.
  5. Apparently incensed by 'yeesh' and other stronger language on my talk page, you fire off a response on my talk page and the article talk page. You then elaborate further on your own talk page, as well as the Wikipedia Village pump talk page. Although you don't name me, you quote some of my more extreme words out of context, as well as some pretty ordinary words. You claim that these words are vulgar and childish, and further imply that people like myself are somehow hurting Wikipedia.

In closing, I must say I can't believe this has blown up like this. Ok, I was probably a little harsh when I said you'd "screwed up the layout". I'm sorry about that. I didn't mean it in such a negative manner. It was a throw-away comment not meant to attract this much attention.

But does that really warrant this personal attack? It's especially hypocritical considering you originally accused me of a personal attack. I may be a little biased here, but I think you've now done much worse than my original comment.

I think we both need to take a break and cool down. Imroy 02:07, 14 April 2006 (UTC)

Yes I agree with your last sentence, and we can let other users judge who has been rude, hypocritical, who has been worse, etc., hopefully as good or bad examples for the benefit of developing polite manners of communication. We have both been criticized at the Village Pump. --Profero 09:00, 14 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] See also

[edit] Copyright of images

Hi Profero,

I see you are unhappy about the removal of attribution information at af:R. D. Laing. We do not take copyright and attribution lightly at Wikipedia. In fact, for each image, a whole page is devoted to specifying copyright, attribution and other information pertaining to an image. This is the way we do it for millions of images over all Wikimedia projects. I believe this to be conformant to the GFDL under which you have licenced your image. If you feel that all Wikimedia projects do not conform to the GFDL by not displaying attribution of each contributor at each use of each image, please raise the matter in the correct legal forums. I do however believe it to be in order to specify this information at the image description page, which ensures that all uses of the picture can reach a complete version of the copyright, attribution and other relevant information. Regards, af:Gebruiker:Alias

Hello Alias. Thank you for your response. I have agreed to the GFDL use of my images, as far as I understand the guidelines – but I must admit that I find the whole matter of copyright issues rather complicated and not very easy to understand without further study, especially as the rules are different in different countries.
My intention, however, is that my pictures on Wiki can be used freely by anyone. This I think is generous and should be appreciated with clear explicit credit – even if I may not be able to, or even wish to, demand credit on any legal   ground. It is just a matter of politeness, and if politeness is not regarded as a relevant factor in such a case, I feel very   unhappy about it, and why should that be a policy   if not necessary? Anyone would feel appreciated if given credit, and why should that be a problem at all? Finally, I think that anyone must agree that lack of such a minimal degree of politeness probably would discourage quite a few uploads of good pictures. And I believe that that   can’t be the intention of any policy. So, if you please, feel free to use my picture(s) with credit under each picture, unless there somewhere is a legal demand not   to do so. And if there is, for some reason, please let me know. Profero 11:40, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
I definitely don't want to appear to be ungreatful or disrespectful for your contribution - obviously we value all contributions. It seems we only disagree on what flavour of attribution is adequate/desirable/just. Your mention of "minimal degree of politeness" strikes me as a bit strange: As I say, a *whole page* is devoted to providing information on each image. More than a mere "minimal degree" of attribution. Your suggestion that it is not polite (ie rude) is unfortunate. It becomes unwieldy if we have to provide inline credits to all contributors to each article. That could easily include up to tens of authors for an article and several contributors to each image (especially for diagrams and maps). It would become a bit difficult if each contributor specified their own, unique demands for attribution. If I make a derived work of the image (say to sharpen it) in my capacity as an employee of a company and I demand that "Copyright 2006 Greater Johannesburg institute for the advancement of multilingualism in the workplace" appear directly at each use of the picture, together with your attribution, don't you think it will become unwieldy? It is therefore not merely a matter of legallity or politeness, but also of practicallity. It seems that you therefore do not accept the form of attribution given for your contributions, and I'm struggling to understand why you demand attribution different from all that given with the other millions of images. Nowhere does any contributor to article text get any more credit than his/her name appearing in the history of the article. I don't want to fight a war, so I'll probably leave the matter, but just wanted to explain my actions. I thought we were doing more than being "merely polite". I believe we are following the GFDL not only in letter, but also in spirit. Kind regards, af:Gebruiker:Alias

I am very sorry to have expressed myself in a way to be interpreted as if I meant you, or anyone else, to be rude. This is absolutely far from my mind in this case, and I realize I have been unclear, which I apologize for, and by continuing the discussion I hope not to be seen as argumentative.
I thought, perhaps, I had, and have, a constructive argument. By saying “minimal politeness” I only mean to say that I think that under each image should be a short line mentioning who is the creator of the image. Having the credit under the picture deleted was absolutely new for me, as I haven’t seen this been done before on any Wiki page in other languages, and found it strange to see it disappear without explanation. (Please understand that I know I am very novice, so I’m really not on a ‘high horse’ here.) That is what triggered the discussion on to the principal level of discussion we are on now.

[edit] Copyright or crediting of images discussion II

I am not convinced of the impracticality of first page credits. Considering the benefits for everyone as I suggested before, isn’t it, on the contrary, quite practical (useful). Let there be no doubt that I agree with you that it obviously would be very impractical to credit everyone who contributes with text, or edits, in the articles. You gave an example of impractical consequences of this, and I take it you understand that I never proposed that kind of crediting.
Your exemplification of impracticality by "Copyright 2006 Greater Johannesburg…” I agree is relevant, but a problem arising from such extremeness would be very rare, don’t you think? If this actually is an experienced problem I give in and instead propose that under each picture there should be an unambiguous and clear reference link to image-credit and other information.

If it is a matter of fairness, though, in relation to text contributors I can see a point there, but I have a feeling that good images would be harder to come by without actually having to pay for them. Perhaps I am totally wrong, and perhaps I am insulting a lot of hard working contributors of text. (Though I am also a text worker.) In either case, I hope not, and apologize if I do seem to. However, I think there is a benefit for Wiki, in that other owners of pictures will let their works be used by Wiki-editors more often if credited explicitly on the article page. That is what I am reasoning for. Perhaps I am underestimating the average reader’s understanding and willingness of clicking the image itself to get more information, and potential contributor’s contentment of such indirect credit though.
Finally, let me say that I am very happy to be a part of the Wiki community, as an editor, a contributor of pictures and as a seeker of knowledge. I also appreciate very much the friendly manners in which I have had the fortune to discuss with, and bee guided by, you and others, on the ‘Wikipath’, and remain open for further reasoning. Thank you again. --Profero 18:28, 20 April 2006 (UTC)


The thing is that a front page text distracts from the main text, especially since it seems to be the standard to not use them. I do agree with you that people who contribute must always be credited (afterall, some of the images that we speak of are GFDL-licensed images, which requires this explicitly). I firmly believe that credits or copyright notices are best off being in the image description, since the image description should contain the data about the image, and the article should only contain information about the article. Copyright notifications don't have a place in the main article namespace.
I don't think that there would be an abundance of images that we may use if we'd give it a front page credit statement. However, it doesn't even matter for almost all images; they can be used either as fair use or without even asking the author if the picture is GFDL or Creative Commons-licensed.
In short, I'm not convinced that a credit statement would be beneficial. There aren't more artists to persuade with and it doesn't seem to be correct to credit picture authors while text authors are credited elsewhere. I'm an artist too, although I only really do text contributions on Wikipedia (I've added some images to Extensible Firmware Interface, though). —Michiel Sikma, 14:43, 7 May 2006 (UTC)
Thank you Sikma for a very informative reply, and to take the bother to board it. Respectfully yours, --Profero 01:40, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] 'Atomic'

Hi,
Wiktionary (here) gives four definitions of 'atomic.' I'm using the fourth. --Smack (talk) 19:13, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

You're right that I'm using the word loosely, because strictly speaking, the bit is the only atomic data type in a computer. However, in a way, something like an int is atomic when compared to an array. How much do you know about computer science?
As for talk-page etiquette, I believe that general practice is to post like we're posting now: all of one person's comments on one page, and all of the other person's comments on the other. However, I like to keep everything in one place. When I post on people's talk pages, I usually watchlist them, and {{transclude}} the boilerplate notice (User:Smack/reply-here). --Smack (talk) 02:54, 21 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Coandă effect

Aloha! I made some changes to the captions of the images, but I like where you've put the images. Of course, I'm biased in that opinion as you put my image at the top ;) I think the animation page can use some tweaking, but it definitely is a good preliminary start! With our powers combined, the Coandă effect will have a proper article! Axda0002 02:49, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] VNC Loop

Sorry but we have clear rules against neologisms and for notability. AlistairMcMillan 19:24, 21 October 2006 (UTC)

Profero, thanks for your comments at Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/VNC_Loop, but a Keep or Delete vote would be appreciated as well. --Amit 20:18, 21 October 2006 (UTC)

No problem. WP:NEO and WP:NOTE. AlistairMcMillan 20:25, 21 October 2006 (UTC)

No worries. I can see you aren't on the list of people he lobbied. AlistairMcMillan 21:15, 21 October 2006 (UTC)

You're right, it is difficult to find where this is specified. I just know it from experience from being involved in AFDs and watching the Admin board. If I find a definitive source I'll update this. AlistairMcMillan 23:41, 21 October 2006 (UTC)

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