User talk:Flapdragon

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[edit] Featured article question

Harry - I saw your question on the help desk ("I was considering suggesting an article for featured status, and wondered if the presence of links to as yet non-existent articles is considered a no-no in featured articles.") . I'm the "featured article director" so I know my way around the process fairly well. We have two big rules on the featured article candidates - all objections must be actionable (that is, they can be fixed) and that they must be intrinsic to the article itself (that is, whatever problem you object to has to apply to the article itself, and not to something outside the article). In the case of links to nonexistant articles, thsoe fall pretty much into the latter category. If you have tons and tons of red links, someone will probably ask you to turn them into stubs; but as long as you don't have tons of them, it shouldn't be a problem. →Raul654 07:54, Nov 13, 2004 (UTC)

Hi Raul, many thanks for you helpful post. I'm pretty new to this (not even sure if this is the right place to reply, I hope you'll see it!). But I'm very impressed by the whole Wikipedia thing, in terms of coverage, quality of articles and the largely positive spirit of contributors, so have started cotributing the odd article. I have only one or two red links, very relevant to the article, so I'll just write stubs for them to make them blue. Then I'm not sure if I should submit the thing for peer review as has been suggested or just straight to the featured articles suggestions page? Harry 11:35, 14 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Either way is fine. →Raul654 06:37, Nov 16, 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Did you know has been updated

And an article you created recently has made the line up and is now featured on the main page. Enjoy! -- [[User:MacGyverMagic|Mgm|(talk)]] 21:32, Nov 21, 2004 (UTC)

That was quick! Very flattering to see my article on the front page. Thanks for letting me know (and for choosing it, if that was to do with you). Harry 01:38, 22 Nov 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Louis Armstrong

Thanks for your work in improving the Armstrong article. I do have a concern that in your generally good edit to "streamline flabby and misspelt para" (I fear such flab and misspelling is likely my fault, sorry) some relevent information might have been lost. Specifically, that Armstrong thought that laxatives were good for preserving one's health in general, not just for losing weight. (There were other points as well, such as valuing the practice taught him by his mother. No doubt much more could be written about Armstrong and "Pluto water", Swiss Kriss, etc.) Perhaps we could discuss on Talk:Louis Armstrong? Thanks, -- Infrogmation 13:09, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for the message. My reply posted there. --Harry 13:53, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Pope John Paul II

(moved from User:Flapdragon)

Re Pope John Paul II - "(traditional views -> conservative views, more precise and avoids repetition)" - I was about to make the very same change myself but saw that you'd got there first! Ben Finn 16:26, 21 May 2005 (UTC)

Great minds... Flapdragon 19:41, 21 May 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Emily Davison

I heard the story on a BBC TV programme; there are numerous references to it on the web although without much further detail. These include the BBC's discussion of the Benn story [1]; Hansard also carries a brief discussion of it.

Thanks. Flapdragon 11:11, 26 May 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Re: Careful with that word "vandalism"!

"On 20 Mar 2005 you reverted a small edit to University of Oxford as "vandalism" which was nothing of the sort. The Assassins and the Bullingdon, added by an anon contributor to the list of Oxford "Institutions", are indeed two well-known (not to say notorious) Oxford dining societies."

My wrong. Since Bullingdon was red link, Assasins pointed to Alamut thugs rather than innocent students and there was no description at all I made guess it was all nonsense. When looking on user talk page I saw other complaints, one specifically for Oxford.

Looking to this user page again: it is shared IP with one guy putting a link to his company to Oxford article and another one(s) making good edits. This is situation that makes mistakes very easy. Pavel Vozenilek 17:09, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Category:Wikipedians in Gloucestershire

Have you considered adding yourself to the Gloucestershire wikipedians category? To do so, add this to your user page:

[[Category:Wikipedians in Gloucestershire|{{subst:PAGENAME}}]]

--Celestianpower hab 15:31, 8 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Barnstar

I, FireFox hereby award you this Minor Barnstar for all your brilliant minor edits!
I, FireFox hereby award you this Minor Barnstar for all your brilliant minor edits!

FireFox 17:14, 7 October 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Flapdragons

No idea if this is where you get your name from, but I've just written an article on flapdragons, and if you know anything more about them I'd be delighted if you could add it!

Cheers, Ziggurat 03:10, 13 October 2005 (UTC)

Thank you for the compliment! I first came across the game in The Annotated Alice, and was surprised that there was no good single source for information on the practice (I'm going to try it this Christmas, I think). The article was intended as the best single reference on Snap-dragons on the 'net, so that next time someone looks it up they don't have to wade through lots of Victoriana to get some information! Ziggurat 03:19, 14 October 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Libido for the Ugly

I saw you edited this page...hahaha I cant believe this is a genuine literary work. freestylefrappe 01:50, 21 October 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Taverna

I have expanded this article explaining typical taverna cuisine and operations. I would be grateful if you could have a look at it and see what you think. Capitalistroadster 10:58, 21 October 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Cedars Maths

Should be speedy deleted as vanity. It's already been deleted at least once in the last day. chowells 18:18, 21 October 2005 (UTC)


I made thAT PAGE On Green Fields because i go to that school and i know what it is like. You should thank me for adding the information about the school. (unsigned comment by 68.0.135.203)

[edit] speedy tags

I've just changed a couple of your speedy tags from the last few minutes. They were speedy candidates, but you used the wrong tag. No big deal, but something to watch out for.WAvegetarian 02:43, 27 October 2005 (UTC)

[edit] I Capuleti e i Montecchi problem

I am still not sure what to do about this. No one has been in touch since you swooped very efficiently on it.

What exactly should I do to get it re-instated and find out how I acknowledge my other page? Kleinzach 01:33, 4 November 2005 (UTC)

I have done what you suggested and have been in touch with Permissions. James D. Forrester wrote back to say "your permission has been confirmed and archived" however my I Capuleti page is still in limbo as a result of your action to prevent an assumed copyright violation. Can you possibly take the necessary action to get it released? Thanks. Kleinzach 17:23, 6 November 2005 (UTC)

The copyright violation procedure doesn't seem to have been correctly followed as the article was never listed on the Wikipedia:Copyright_problems. This should have been done by the person raising the issue. --David Woolley 19:07, 7 November 2005 (UTC)

The versoin with extra comment was the last version that I saved. I haven't looked at the speedy process, but there is a two day time limit on that, so it is no longer an option. You would certainly need to have it labelled with the right tag for it to be actioned by anyone. The template you included specifically says that you must add an entry on the copyright problems page. I don't believe there is anything magical about the copyright violation template that prevents it being reverted, although if it were actually listed and were reverted without agreement, it would be considered vandalism.
I don't want to get involved in deciding whether there really is a violation at this stage, but if you still are in doubt, you should list it, but starting from today. He can quite legitimately licence the same content on his web site with a more restrictive licence, if he owns the copyright; the question is does he own the copyright, not what are the permissions on the other site.
--David Woolley 07:38, 8 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Pronunciation

I see you've restored some SAMPA which I'd deleted in favour of IPA. When you say that SAMPA is "much more browser-friendly", what browsers had you in mind? There used to be a problem with MS Internet Explorer, but this has now been overcome provided that the Template:IPA is used. At one time a lot of articles used SAMPA, but almost all of these (apart from technical articles specifically dealing with phonetic transcription) have now been converted to IPA-only, in line with Wikipedia:Manual of Style (pronunciation). SAMPA and X-SAMPA are just ways of displaying IPA on systems which (unlike Wikipedia) can't cope with the IPA characters, and I can't imagine many people will be familiar with them and not with IPA. --rossb 06:32, 4 November 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for the reply. Using the IPA template is easy: {{IPA|[fənˈɛtɪks]}} gives [fənˈɛtɪks] (I hope this appars OK on your browser). As far as SAMPA is concerned, I also think it looks ugly, with the odd mixture of upper and lower case and funny punctuation marks, and some of the characters can be really misleading, for instance V for ʌ or Q for ɒ. And of course it's just as meaningless as IPA to anyone who is not familiar with either! --rossb 17:04, 4 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Peter Hollas

You might be able to help with this. Something odd happened when I listed Peter Hollasfor deletion on 19 November 2005. The formatting magic wouldn't work on that day's AfD page, and failed to put in the header, so that the article sort of disappeared into the melee. Perhaps due to this it attracted no vites even though it's an obvious hoax. Should I relist it? Otherwise it looks as though nothing will ever happen. Flapdragon 15:51, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

The problem was that you didn't include the header. There is no automatic "formatting magic"; it has to be done by manually. I've done so and listed it on today's afd page. —Cryptic (talk) 15:56, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

And how would I do that? The instructions are (AFAIK) to add a line like {{subst:afd3 | pg=PageName}}; neither that nor inserting a new line like line above ({{Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/PageName}}) worked, though it always has in the past. Try as I might I couldn't see how to edit the "source" that produces this effect. Many thanks for your help with this. Flapdragon 16:06, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

It's not step 3 that you missed, but step 2. If you're adding it by hand (instead of the idiotic m:instruction creepy afd2 template), it's a normal level-3 header with a link to the article, like ===Peter Hollas===. —Cryptic (talk) 16:11, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Help please

Hi. I noticed that you put in a nomination for Vinyl siding downspout hanger, which appears just before my attempt to nominate Mamnuts. I don't know what I've done wrong! It's not displaying properly! Please can you have a look at it and see if you can fix it for me? Ta. I was sure I followed the instructions. Zordrac 23:02, 1 December 2005 (UTC) No, it was my fault (sort of). I still think that they should make it explicitly clear that normal brackets are not used - they use squiggly brackets ) }. Can you tell the difference by looking at them? )})})} ({({({. Zordrac 23:54, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Festival du Voyageur

Hey, thanks for noticing the mistake I made with the title. --rolo 02:05, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Festival du Voyageur

Thanks once again. --rolo 02:21, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] ertzainza

thanks for redirect which is what I wanted to do - not worked out how to do that yet Jameswilson 02:48, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] External links(s)

Flapdragon, you wrote in a recent edit summary: "External links" is correct.

That is a point of view, and one you are certainly entitled to... but it is no more than a point of view. From Wikipedia:External links:

[edit] "External links" vs "External link"

Some editors use the header "External link" if there is only one link, but others use "External links" in all cases. There is currently no consensus on which is better. Editors who always use the plural form may prefer it for any of the following reasons:

  1. experience shows that future editors often add links without changing the section heading
  2. people may be dissuaded from adding links to a section titled "External link" since it seems that there should only be one link
  3. using "External links" gives greater stylistic consistency to Wikipedia

The converse arguments are:

  1. Wikipedia's community-editing leads to prompt correction of such oversights.
  2. There is no evidence that a significant number of people would be dissuaded from adding links. Besides, additional links would often be redundant.
  3. Use of "External links" to head a section containing a single link is fundamentally incorrect, a poor precedent to set in an encyclopedia

Picapica 15:17, 11 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Geoff

Two of the delete votes cited the article as vanity and "nn-bio". However, it was neither, as you yourself pointed out. So, seeing as AfD is emphatically not a vote, I decided to close it as a keep. I have also substantially rewritten the article and chucked out everything that the AfD was voting on (so essentially it's the same as deleting it, except that the stuff is still in the history) and moved it to Geoffrey. Johnleemk | Talk 12:16, 15 December 2005 (UTC)

As I said, the new article was moved to Geoffrey, where the original page history can be found. And while I agree that the AfD process should be more transparent, the fact that it is not a vote means there will always be subjectivity involved in interpreting consensus/community decision. Depending on how the discussion goes, different or even the same admins can make different decisions in different debates with the same number of "votes". So my interpretation of consensus in this case was "no consensus; default to keep". I know that's a bit shady, but I think for many people (or at least for me), like the famous US Supreme Court justice who discussed profanity, "I know it when I see it". Johnleemk | Talk 13:30, 15 December 2005 (UTC)
Ah, so that was the issue. Well, I was under the impression that in AfD, consensus is only needed to delete; if there is no consensus, depending on how the discussion went, the article may be kept or merged/redirected. (At least, that's how I read our deletion policy.) So if an article is kept but there's no consensus, it's not too hard to presume that it was kept by default due to a lack of consensus. A 2-to-1 vote is not always consensus, I might add/repeat. (There's a bitter edit war raging over this on Wikipedia:Consensus last time I checked — some people are trying to insist on inserting numerical definitions of consensus into the page.) It depends on how the discussion went. Johnleemk | Talk 14:06, 15 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Oxford and the -ize

The link was malformed in the previous edit, which is why it was asking for log-in information (I logged in and got an error message for my trouble. The correct link is on there now; figured you might be interested to read it since you obviously clicked it before. :-) Jibbajabba 23:53, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Wikipedia:Welsh Wikipedians' notice board

I've created a fairly simple Wikipedia:Welsh Wikipedians' notice board (shortcut WP:WWNB) to try to get things started. Please have a look and consider signing on, adding it to your watchlist and helping to make sure any users with an interest in the subject know about it. Also please feel free to add things and to change anything you feel needs changing – I'm not under the impression that I own it! Rhion 20:10, 27 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Marie Lloyd

So have we lost both instances of the external link, now? Perhaps better to keep one, under "External links"? (Not my addition, btw, just looks useful). :-) JackyR 13:36, 9 February 2006 (UTC)

Cheers, and arrgh! I'm sorry, the "Must use Show Preview" summary was a note-to-self (cos I had to amend the above.) Hope you didn't think I was getting at you... Btw, ta for fixing Lloyd. JackyR 14:01, 9 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Can I ask a favour please?

Regarding the sentence on the Linda Smith page, can we discuss it on our user talk pages please? That wikipedia page on linda comes reasonably highly on a google search. I'd hate for her family, or anyone who cared for/loved her, to click on that talk page and find squabbles about the page. Not that I'm suggesting you're squabbling. You have genuine questions & make valid points. I was just unsure where this may go & wanted to steer it this way. The comment does mean that it was more figurative and less literal, for her than "many". Because she was a humanist, the concept of the devil held little meaning for her. Although, there aren't that many christians in britain today, an awful lot of people regard themselves to be spiritual. Other religous groups, such as muslims believe an the devil too. So the devil holds more meaning to many. I really like that comment. There's something quite affectionate about it. I think if her family & friends read it, they'd probably see the reference. But if you're against it, we can compromise. I like it & stevecov seem to like it also. The guy that deleted it, doesn't like it. And if you don like it we're tied. So the next person to comment can decide whether it stays or goes? Veej 13:36, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Ok, fair enough. I'll just add a little explaination of the phrase on the talk page then. Veej 16:28, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Fuh

Hi Flapdragon.

I thought that fa-SEEN, as in do re me fa sol la ti do, would be better than the possibly ambiguous fuh. I could see someone whose first language is not English interpreting f-u-h by sounding out the letters "ef , ooh, ha: fooh, or fookh". I'm not married to it, so change it if you disagree.

I generally prefer IPA over the ad hoc pronunciation guides which are deprecated by Wikipedia:Manual of Style (pronunciation). IPA now seems to be at least as common as the various old not-quite-consistent systems from my high school dictionaries, and it is familiar to readers of current Oxford dictionaries worldwide, as well as people from Europe and the Far East (a Taiwanese acquaintance learning English was using several "English for Chinese" books relying on IPA transciptions). The ad hoc pronunciation seems to me to be useful only to native English speakers, and in some cases only to either Brits or North Americans; not necessarily to both. I can see how they can be useful to convey trivial English pronunciation, but when possible I prefer to write something like "rhymes with machine" (although I couldn't think of anything right for fascine), or at least use actual short words in the pronunciation (hence fa, not fuh).

An example of accessible IPA for less trivial names is at an older version of Pleiades (star cluster), although someone has since removed the guide under the table.

Great illustration on your user page. Cheers. —Michael Z. 2006-03-13 18:57 Z

[edit] Neurophone article AFD

Someone is trying to delete this article, can you make a vote and write at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Neurophone. --JimmyT 11:53, 17 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] The Magnet Pub

Good day,

I thought you might be intertested to see that the article about The Magnet Pub is [for deletion], as you are the only contributor to its talk page. Regards, *Satis 02:23, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Embarazada

The argument is largely over. But I want to re-emphasize just what an encylcopedia is by asking you to read these definitions from reliable dictionaries: Funk and Wagnall's (Encarta), Oxford Concise, Merriam-Webster's Collegiate, Random House Unabridged, Cambridge, and The American Heritage Dictionary. They all emphasize how encyclopedias cover all fields of knowledge (or rarely, everything about one subject [e.g., literature]). You are advocating moving a two-page article from an encyclopedia onto a site for books. Think about how ridiculous that seems. It doesn't help that moving it there would make the entry nearly impossible to find (as no one would look for it there and few visit the site).--Primetime 18:37, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

Presumably "the argument is largely over" means "I have no answers to give". You are still unable to explain how anyone would find the entry where it is at the moment. You fail to answer either of my questions. You fail to retract or substantiate your unfounded allegation that I misquoted you. And yet again you fail to understand that "covering all fields of knowledge" (ie not specialising in one field) is not the same as including all and any categories of information or giving the reader practical tips on how (not) to do things. Encyclopaedias are not there to teach people how to speak a language. It's very straightforward concept. Can you point to a single comparable entry in an existing English-language encyclopaedia, ie an article about a foreign word that might be the result of a mistranslation? Or do you just know better than all existing encyclopaedias (not to mention those of us whose professional background in language reference publishing goes back a decade or more) what should go into them? Flapdragon 11:34, 12 April 2006 (UTC)
Not true. I can debate this forever with you if you'd like. Many people come to Wikipedia through Google. I have observed that the larger I make my articles on Wikipedia, the more visitors it attracts, and the more prominence it gets in Google searches. Thus, in the future, when someone searches for embarazada in Google, my page will be displayed first. Further, Wikipedia is searched using OneLook Dictionary Search along with other reference works.

As for other encyclopedias that define words, I already mentioned the Enciclopedia universal ilustrada europeo-americana. There's also any of the encyclopedias made by Larousse. As for quoting me out of context, you said "but specifically asked people (most of them very new to WP) to support him 'as a favor' (or even 'a huge favor'): 'I would be greatly in your debt'". That's a misquote as I did not ask anyone to support me.--Primetime 11:53, 12 April 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Tamsin Greig

Personally i am rubbish with IPA, so to me "gregg" is certainly more accessible, however, i was under the impression that it was wikipedia policy to only use IPA, seeing as spelling things out can lead to differences in opinion. Was what you added, really following guidelines? Amo 19:52, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] James Murray (lexicographer) and James Augustus Murray

Please see User_talk:Smallweed. Shyamal 03:15, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Sorry

Remember me from my old vandal days? Especially this range of edits. Sorry for doing that. Now I am a good wikipedian. Thanks, --GeorgeMoney T·C 05:54, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Can you help me with a reference you added?

Hi Flapdragon. A long time ago, you added a reference to the page about the IPA. It was:

  • Geoffrey K. Pullum and William A. Laduslaw, Phonetic symbol guide, Chicago: University of Chicago Press 1986, ISBN 0-226-68532-2.

I know it's unlikely that you'd still have the book, but if you do, could you tell me which facts in the article it should be cited to? If it helps at all, the article looked like this when you added the reference. I ask because we are trying to bring the article up to FA status and we need to cite sources in the text.--The ikiroid (talk·desk·Advise me) 18:56, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

I understand. Perhaps there are some facts in the article that could be cited with the book, though? Which facts could reference it, that could've been from the book?--The ikiroid (talk·desk·Advise me) 01:13, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Rothschild Wife's Death

According to Philippe de Rothschild's memoirs as well as other memoirs of the Rothschild family, his estranged wife, Elisabeth (Lili), was not gassed or did she die of typhus at Ravensbruck. All the histories of the family state that she was thrown alive into an oven. Mowens35 14:23, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

I will be researching this and citing the family's understanding that she died neither of gassing or nor of typhus. Mowens35 13:13, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] 'Patter' not 'patois'

I stand corrected. Cheers, Ron --RDT2 13:20, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Isle of Cumbrae

Hi there Flapdragon, a couple of questions I hope you have the time to respond to - Any reason (apart from the typo and me apparently being "confused and speculative"!) as to why you possibly deleted the following? Seeing as my friend (another Millport resident) was Lynn Ferguson's tutor at art school???

As written - A recent BBC Radio 4 series, Millport (radio show) (written by Lynn Ferguson, the voice of Mac in Chicken Run by Aardman Animations) humorously covered most of the tired clichés about an island community stuck in a cosy 1950s timewarp - but perhaps these sentiments explain why the island is still so popular in the minds of both nostalgia-seeking 30-somethings and fresh-eyed visitors.

Current (completely denuded of local context; have a look at [[2]] to get a flavour) - The island was immortalised in the BBC Radio 4 comedy series, Millport, written by and starring Lynn Ferguson, the voice of Mac in the animated film Chicken Run.

I would also be interested to ask your advice as to why several other edits that have been made to this page since I last visited - clearly from contributors hundreds, if not thousands of miles away - have been allowed to "ride roughshod" over the authenticity of the entry (i.e., removing the work of an actual year-round resident - myself!).

Many thanks cordeaux

[edit] Isle of Cumbrae

Hi Flapdragon, still not sure why you have deleted the entry or why I'm "confused and speculative", it's hardly controversial! Has to be seen in the context of the West of Scotland - try looking up Elaine C. Smith.

""confused and speculative"" cordeaux

[edit] Messa di Gloria

Hi, times ago I had an other talk about this. You are correct: this cannot be called Messa di Gloria because there are other parts. Nonetheless, Ricordi for a long time entitled the piano score (not the full score!) "Messa di Gloria". Just one of the many mistakes of musica publishers! but many people still know and use the wrong title. If you need a bibliographical reference about the Messa, see Dieter Schickling, Giacomo Puccini, Catalogue of Works, Bärenreiter 2003, pp. 69-73.

BTW, I wrote it:Giacomo Puccini, where you can find correct info about his compositions. I am an Italian musicologist. Best, --Al Pereira(talk) 05:21, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

Maybe I wasn't clear. Move to Messa (Puccini): the title Messa di Gloria is wrong! --Al Pereira(talk) 12:18, 19 February 2007 (UTC)
I totally disagree that "the entry should refer to the work by the name that is actually used", but the name that is actrually used is Messa. That's all! If you don't know the most important catalogue of Puccini's works, this is your problem, not mine. I gave you the bibliographical reference. How difficult is working on wiki. If you don't know the question, trust whom knows it. --Al Pereira(talk) 12:52, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] WikiProject University of Oxford

WikiProject University of Oklahoma

As a current or past contributor to a related article, I thought I'd let you know about WikiProject University of Oxford, a collaborative effort to improve Wikipedia's coverage of the University of Oxford. If you would like to participate, you can visit the project page, where you can join the project and see a list of open tasks and related articles. Thanks! Casper Gutman 16:18, 24 March 2007 (UTC)
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