User talk:John Dalton

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

You have new messages (last change).

Contents

[edit] Welcome

Hello John Dalton and welcome to Wikipedia! I know you're not really new, but your Talk page deserves a welcome all the same and I'm glad you've chosen to join us. This is a great project with lots of dedicated people, which might seem intimidating at times, but don't let anything discourage you. Be bold!, explore, and contribute. If you want to learn more,

Wikipedia:Bootcamp teaches you the basics quickly,
Wikipedia:Tutorial is more in-depth, and
Wikipedia:Topical index is exhaustive.

The following links might also come in handy:
Glossary
FAQ
Help
Manual of Style
Five Pillars of Wikipedia

Float around for awhile until you find something that tickles your fancy. One easy way to do this is to hit the random page button in the navigation bar to the left. There are also many great committees and groups that focus on particular jobs. My personal favorite stomping grounds are Wikipedia:Translation into English and Wikipedia:Cleanup for sloppy articles. Finally, the Wikimedia Foundation has several other wiki projects that you might enjoy.

There are a few crucial points to keep in mind when editing. Be civil with users, strive to maintain a neutral point of view, verify your information, and show good etiquette like signing your comments with four tildes like this: ~~~~ If you have any more questions, always feel free to ask me anything on my talk page or ask the true experts at Wikipedia:Help desk. Again, welcome! -- Draeco 23:49, 4 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] AWB

Should we have a new page for AWB Limited and move some of the content from the "old" AWB page to that? The AWB statutory body isn't the same as AWB Limited (I think) Albatross2147 01:27, 21 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] West Ryde Railway Station

This is a great article that you have done. I am interested in the date you have given for the change of name. When I was school in the 60s we used to have to travel by train from Homebush to somewhere in the Ryde region on occassion to play inter school sports. This meant buying a ticket and the joke always was to sing "I've got a ticket to Ryde" to the tune of the Beatles song whilst sitting on the grab bars in the carriage vestibules. The tickets were the old NSWGR preprinted ones on sturdy card stock stamped with the date of travel. The tickets were definitely for a Homebush to Ryde half return (- the joke would would not have been as good if the words had been "I've got a ticket to West Ryde"). Is it likely that NSWGR sold very few such tickets and they were 20 year hangovers? Albatross2147 22:43, 2 April 2006 (UTC)

I wouldn't have thought the NSWGR printed tickets in batches to last 20+ years. I guess it is the NSWGR we are talking about here though. I've double checked the date, and the article agrees with the book. The book was published by the railway archives, so is authorative. A typo in the book is a remote possibility, so a second source wouldn't go astray. John Dalton 07:05, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Altitude Data

Do you still have that book with the CityRail station altitudes. If so could you please post them so that others can put them in later. Thanks in advance. Harryboyles 08:01, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

Yep. It's all a matter of my free time! I'll try to do some. John Dalton 11:56, 11 June 2006 (UTC)
Do you still have that book. If so, put the altitudes in, say a subpage of yours. That way others can fill the data in the station articles themselves. Harryboyles 08:31, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Robert Timms in my userspace

Yeah, he was a time travelling child prodigy entrepeneur! Not sure what happened there, but thanks for picking it up. Sarah Ewart (Talk) 01:20, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Languages

Hi There! Can you translate my name in what language you know please, and then post it Here. I would be very grateful if you do (if you know another language apart from English and the ones on my userpage please feel free to post it on) P.S. all th translations are in alpahbetical order so when you add one please put it in alpahbetical order according to the language. Thanks!!! Abdullah Geelah 16:28, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] West Ryde Pictures

Hi - great pics of West Ryde. You wouldn't think about putting your pictures on Wikimedia Commons would you? That way any Wikimedia site can access them... (JROBBO 05:46, 29 August 2006 (UTC))

I'm happy to put them on the commons. What's the procedure please? Do I have to upload them again, or is there a 'single click' way to transfer them? I'm also interested in knowing how to link to material in the commons from a wikipedia article. John Dalton 05:49, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Skaf image

I'm not too fussed about the proposed deletion of this image. It's of poor quality anyway and not been replaced in almost a year and a half. That said, do you know the legal status of mugshots taken in Australia? I don't think they're given the same freedom to republish as the those taken in the US for example. -- Longhair 08:59, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

I'm thinking the same about this image. It's not News Ltd's intellectual property, so I'm unsure why it should be deleted. I don't know about mugshot republishing rules, but the image distribution would originate with the NSW Police Media unit. Tale 01:28, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
My understanding is that the photos are covered by crown copyright, which does not make them free to use. In addition it makes them non-free in the copyleft sense as well. To my knowledge use of the photos in wikipedia doesn't fall under Australia's fair dealing provisions. It is possible that the police have given blanket permission for us of the photo, but this should be checked. John Dalton 02:16, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Mazda R360

Nope, not got one. I'm just a complete Mazda nut! I'd love to correspond with your father though - Love these cars! --SFoskett 17:53, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Try to engage

It's time to kill off this recent cancer of "Notability" within Wikipedia. Notability is simply an excuse by a nosy minority to impose their view of what Wikipedia "should be" (according to themselves) on everyone else. If there is the motivation to write and maintain a well sourced article in Wikipedia what right does some puffed up nobody have to make a judgment as to how important an article is, on a subject they probably know little about? All notability will do is drive people (such as those who have put the effort into the railway station articles) away from Wikipedia.

By the way, did you know that the new notability "wannabe guideline" is heavily disputed? What is going on when a disputed opinion is being used to remove content from Wikipedia? Shouldn't the dispute be resolved before going on the rampage? Better to leave your comments on the notability talk page, letting everyone know what you think about this new "notability" push. If enough people stand up (and ignore the pontificating) these people can be made to pull their heads in. John Dalton 03:11, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

Such passion. Allow me to address each sentence. Notability (as a concept) is not a cancer, it's a guideline. I'm not imposing anything, I'm initiating a discussion - why not engage with it? The railway station articles, in the main, are short and lack credible sources. AfD debates concerning articles that I've put work into have yet to drive me away from Wikipedia. I can see that it's disputed, but that doesn't in itself negate the concerns it raises. That is the purpose of the discussion - engage with it. I have initiated a discussion. Finally, hey, look, maybe. ;) Joestella 04:13, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

JD's reply is here

John - I gotta say if you have an arguement with the proposed guideline why not take your own advice and discuss it at Wikipedia talk:Notability? Many of the articles discussed don't even list a PRIMARY source let alone attempt to say what is so important about - for example - Marayong railway station.Garrie 00:14, 14 December 2006 (UTC)
JD's reply is here
Thanks JD I did have a look but that talk page seems to be fairly high-traffic... I didn't track down your contribution. My own opinion is Notability can only ever be subjective and using metrics to compare subjects in outback New South Wales (where 1 shop makes a settlement!) with New York, New York, is going to be difficult.
What annoys me is that there are so many pages which have been flagged "additional sources requested" (using one of quite a few templates for that task) for ages - they remain stubs and are never improved and nobody provides a reliable source. To me - and many others - if there is no sustained community interest in improving these stub articles then some of the m should be deleted until someone has the inclination to recreate them in a verifiable manner using well cited references from reliable sources.
Unfortunately for Sydney public transport articles, too much foot-slogging has been done which has not involved providing citations - which leads to a situation where there are hundreds of articles in need of references. When the preference is to not use operator's own information (ie primary sourced material) that is a significant hurdle to improving the state of the whole project.Garrie 04:56, 14 December 2006 (UTC)
JD's reply is here

[edit] Your edits to WP Sydney re Transport in Sydney

Thanks John for your contributions - they are often insightful and well thought out. The other user in question there is really getting on my nerves - he's very self-opinionated and won't take no for an answer unless we do things his way. I'm starting to get sick of editing Sydney public transport articles, as much as I like doing it. Apart from you and Harryboyles, I've barely had any help, and yet I have several users who incessantly demand that I cite every single article (most of which I have improved from one-line stubs) and expand everything to a full-size article length within a short amount of time, and when I don't get time to do thatthey merge or delete everything I've done. It's not right. Like you, I'm fed up with weak notability claims being used as a tool to make articles look nice and as a tool to get rid of articles that particular editors don't want. JROBBO 12:49, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] FAC for NSW Rail Line

Hi John, I was wondering if you could make any comments or suggestions on the article I have up for Featured Article Candidacy, on the Eastern Suburbs & Illawarra Railway line in Sydney (see here); one editor in particular on the FAC has just been downright rude (I've been threatened and even accused of vandalism!), so I'd prefer some constructive comments from editors whose judgement I trust. Thanks for any help you can give. JROBBO 11:46, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

It passed - yay! JROBBO 09:59, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] AfD nomination of Use Of Thumbtacks In Professional Wrestling

An editor has nominated Use Of Thumbtacks In Professional Wrestling, an article on which you have worked or that you created, for deletion. We appreciate your contributions, but the nominator doesn't believe that the article satisfies Wikipedia's criteria for inclusion and has explained why in his/her nomination (see also "What Wikipedia is not"). Your opinions on whether the article meets inclusion criteria and what should be done with the article are welcome; please participate in the discussion by adding your comments at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Use Of Thumbtacks In Professional Wrestling and please be sure to sign your comments with four tildes (~~~~). You may also edit the article during the discussion to improve it but should not remove the articles for deletion template from the top of the article; such removal will not end the deletion debate. Thank you. Please note: This is an automatic notification by a bot. I have nothing to do with this article or the deletion nomination, and can't do anything about it. Jayden54Bot 10:20, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

Just wanted to toss you a note and say that I feel your article and yourself are being unjustifiably targeted by a rather bull headed editor. He even started an entry over at the talk page for Wikipedia:WikiProject Professional wrestling where he belittled you and claimed, and I quote, "He needs to get a life" Funny how, when I pointed out that he had been blocked from editing twice in the past (drawn from his talk page, once for vandalism of Torrie Wilson, and once for the comment: "If you want to be a retard, that's your choice, but your vote is total shit.") he decided to wipe it (you can still see the repeated warnings and blocks in the history of the page). Claimed that being blocked "is quite common among established users" which is both patheic and laughable all at once. He also claims to have "Retired" and "left Wikipedia in December 2006" on his user page. Quite frankly, he gives wrestling fans a bad name. --Vladamire Steelwolf 06:59, 8 February 2007 (UTC)
As I stated on the AfD page, I really do have no particular attachment to the article. It came into being when the Thumbtack article got filled up with wrestling stuff that was not directly relevant to thumbtacks. As you might be able to tell from the AfD page I believe deleting material from Wikipedia is a bad thing so I did what I considered the right thing and moved the wrestling stuff to its own article. Personally I have little interest in thumbtacks and wrestling, but clearly some people do as they took the time to write the words in the article. The thumbtacks in wrestling article came under attack for lack of sources so I did the right thing and found some sources for it. Surprisingly to me at the time it turned out that people write scholarly articles on wrestling. Thinking about it, it makes sense as wrestling is another form of media, like movies or plays, and part of 21st century culture. Who knows, maybe in 1000 years todays wrestlers will be looked upon as a ceremonial version of Rome's gladiators? This latest attack seems to be on the basis that the article "just doesn't belong". No reason based on Wikipedia policy has been given. Maybe it is just that some people see wrestling as being below Wikipedia? Either way I'm keen to make a stand against arbitrary deletions from Wikipedia. John Dalton 08:24, 8 February 2007 (UTC)
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org../../../j/o/h/User_talk%7EJohn_Dalton_49bd.html"