Wikipedia talk:Africa-related regional notice board

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[edit] Notice board is getting long - subpage time?

The noticeboard is getting pretty long. Would anyone object if I split Wikipedia:Africa-related regional notice board#Wikipedians actively working on Africa-related topics off into a /Participants subpage? Picaroon 19:26, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

I would prefer the stub section to be split off. I find the subsections in the TOC maddening. - BanyanTree 19:31, 4 February 2007 (UTC)
I added those in my recent updating so as to give the section edit links - is there anyway to make them not show up in the TOC but keep the section edit links? But anyways, I typed the above before I expanded the stub section (but saved it later), so I guess its as good a candidate for splitting off as the participants section is. /Stubs instead, then? Picaroon 19:47, 4 February 2007 (UTC)
I believe that one can inhibit with NOTOC and then build a customized TOC using the built-in identifiers of the section headers, but that's way beyond my technical abilities. As for my TOC obsession, I believe a TOC structure should reflect relative importance, and the current TOC tells me that half of the good of the board is in stub compilation. - BanyanTree 20:20, 4 February 2007 (UTC)
Alright, I've split off the stubs section and replaced it with transclusion. Noinclude/Includeonly hocus-pocus ensures that section headers don't appear. Picaroon 22:47, 5 February 2007 (UTC)
That's a nice sleight of hand with the headers. I've created Category:Africa notice board as our subpage cup runneth over. However, wasn't the original intention to reduce the length of the page? - BanyanTree 01:42, 6 February 2007 (UTC)
I was going to wait for more people to give their input on whether they'd like it linked or transcluded - this talkpage is so quiet. I just started the process to make editing easier to handle by reducing edit window size. If no one objects in another day or so, I'll switch it to a link. Picaroon 01:54, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] WikiProject Africa created

I've created a WikiProject Africa that has most everything it needs except members. If you're interested, please join. — Emiellaiendiay 23:34, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

Since it is done, we should probably be thinking of which pages, such as the peer review and template list, should be transferred, as well as what end state we want for the board. Since the proposed continent and region projects at the Council subpage have not had their relationships thought out, as far as I can tell, maybe people can add their input. - BanyanTree 01:41, 20 February 2007 (UTC)
I've just added the related country wikiprojects. I am not sure as well how we'd deal with the project. On one hand we have country projects and the general Africa project. It would seem redundant but i believe we can redifine the scope of the African project in a way or another. I'd suggest though that we limit the project to general articles which are not country specific (i.e. Military history of Africa Vs. Military history of South Africa). -- FayssalF - Wiki me up ® 11:35, 20 February 2007 (UTC)
Personally, I'm against transferring sections from the board to the project. It must be observed that the board has a far longer history, and much more members, so I'd prefer to keep the new peer review section here, as also the new articles.--Aldux 22:16, 20 February 2007 (UTC)
Yeah, but didn't you just give a reason for transferring the peer review? It's less than three months old, and I'd hazard a guess that 90% of the people in that list down there don't know it exists. I think we should move the peer review it and the stub messages subpages over the the project, and scale this page back to, well, a noticeboard. Picaroon 00:35, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
I've probably been as forceful as anyone in arguing against the creation of a WikiProject Africa, and I still do not see how a COTW/M can be supported. That said, the project appears to have attracted the taggers and evaluators, which is no small resource. I had envisioned the board having the functions that don't require large amounts of knowledge in common, while avoiding the pitfalls of forcing a group of people who don't have well-meshing knowledge bases to form highly organized task groups. I haven't changed my opinion but it would be silly to maintain WikiProject-esque pages here. This is simply counter-intuitive for editors not familiar with the CSB to board history. I don't know what that leaves the board, and I'm not sure it leaves it with anything but knitting circle duties, but I feel uncomfortable giving the project anything less than the best chance possible for success in improving Africa articles. I !vote for moving all subpages as well as, depending on how people feel, the award. - BanyanTree 06:32, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
I must admit I've had perplexities pretty strong regarding the creation of WP:AFRICA; but its started, and as BT noted, we should give the new project the best possibilities. So I too agree, lets move the subpages.--Aldux 18:57, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Photos for Chad and Niger presidents

The number of images available for Chad and Niger-related articles. In particular, we should at least attempt to provide a photo for the Chadian and Nigerien presidents, that is François Tombalbaye (1960-75), Felix Malloum (1975-79), Goukouni Oueddei (1979-82) for Chad and Hamani Diori (1960-74), Ali Saibou (1987-93) and Ibrahim Baré Maïnassara (1996-99). Of these, Tombalbaye, Goukouni and Diori would be especially appreciated. Please help!--Aldux 23:34, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Massive copyvio problems with new Sierra Leone articles?

I don't have much experience in dealing with copyvio, but I've observed that Sittaconde (talk · contribs), probably in good faith, has committed an elevated number of copyvios, completely copying several article from the biogs in http://www.trial-ch.org/en/trial-watch.html, which have a clear copyright mark at the end of the page. Similar copyright problems (and possibly also WP:RS) come from the use of the book Sierra Leonean Heroes - Fifty Great Men and Women Who Helped to Build Our Nation. The same book is used heavily by Wikiaddict8962 (talk · contribs), maybe, but I'm not sure, to the point of copyvio. Somebody who has a major expewrience in dealing with copyright problems, please look in the topic.--Aldux 12:24, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

I've left a note on the first user's talk page. The standard response is to speedy delete them using {{db-copyvio}} - they are unambiguous. I'll go through and do that. The affected articles (that I spotted - there may be some I missed) are these, if anyone wants to rewrite them - we probably should have articles on most of the subjects.
I've also had a flick through some of the second user's contributions. Some articles (such as Bai Bureh) are heavily based on the Heroes book but are probably just about safe from copyvios. --Cherry blossom tree 13:24, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Very problematic bot actions

Wikipedia:Africa-related regional notice board/New articles is being filled w/ many unrelated Africa-related topics. I strongly oppose the bot automatic additions and would like to stop it and do the work manually as we'd done before. I've already contacted the bot operator (User:Alex Bakharev) but i received no reply from him yet. Could someone please have a word w/ him? Thanks. -- FayssalF - Wiki me up ® 17:12, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

I'm a fan of the bot list. The manual lists missed most newly-created Africa-related articles. The bot's list should be a useful list of articles which are likely to be related to Africa, and may be of interest to contributors to this noticeboard. If it's throwing up unrelated articles, it sounds like its parameters need editing. If you have some examples, that shouldn't be difficult to do. Even if it were decided not to transclude the bot list (and it seems to have lots of support on the talk page), there is absolutely no need to stop the bot operating. Warofdreams talk 01:29, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Wikimania 2007

Hello all Wikipedians in Africa;

Wikimania 2007, which is being held in Taipei, Taiwan on August 3-5, is offering opportunities for travel scholarships to Wikimania for active users of Wikimedia projects from the continent of Africa. Although the original scholarship deadline has passed, please, if you are interested, you may still apply at http://wm07schols.wikimedia.org/apply.php. Sincerely yours, Cary Bass 17:14, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Help with some classifications of Nilotic people

I'm trying to expand the article Nilotic. I seems to me that the classifications Plain Nilotes, Nilo-Hamites, Maa-speaking people, Maasai cluster, Karamojong cluster and Ateker are more or less synonyms. Does anyone have references that can help figure out the differences/similarities between them? If so, drop a note. Thanks --Ezeu 01:22, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Contemporary African Database

I'm sure I'm not the only one who has used the Contemporary Africa Database - while it doesn't have much biographical content per person, it is pretty reliable, and is often the best source for birth dates, death dates, and job titles. Recently it has switched to some sort of subcription-only set-up and a user, 84.70.118.162 (talk · contribs), decided to remove sixty one links to the site. I used the Wayback Machine and, sure enough, a version of the page was right there. So what do you guys think about this? Should all these edits be outright reverted or replaced with an IA link? Picaroon (Talk) 16:50, 12 May 2007 (UTC)

IA links are good (sometimes better than live links because they don't change), paysite references are okay, no references means the unreferenced information may be deleted by anyone. Check out Template:cite web's archiveurl= and archivedate= parameters. -- Jeandré, 2007-05-13t09:12z

Its back online. --Ezeu 02:48, 2 July 2007 (UTC)

> ... a version of the page was right there ... Or perhaps *not* there!

[edit] Muammar al-Gaddafi coma(?)

Muammar al-Gaddafi might have had a coma, but it seems not. If you want, you might put him on your watchlist for a couple days to help keep the page clean, while this report cycles. Best, Smmurphy(Talk) 17:59, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

For the record, this turned out not to be a false report. Picaroon (Talk) 20:17, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Dispute on Imo State

I have been engaged in a month long dispute with Academicigbo (talk · contribs)/Igbigbo (talk · contribs) over the state (no pun intended) of Imo State (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs). I neutralized multiple blatantly biased sections, removed a lot of unsourced information, and removed non-notable individuals and spammy external links from the "Notable residents" section (which he repeatedly renames to "Some Distinguished Natives"). He has positively refused to even acknowledge me, not even using edit summaries while reverting. Could I please get some other opinions? Picaroon (Talk) 20:17, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Resolving disputes. -- Jeandré, 2007-05-19t18:24z
I looked over that entire page and nothing seemed applicable. A third opinion request wouldn't work because Academicigbo would be unresponsive, as always. A request for mediation would fail for the same reason. And requests for comments are reserved for bigger disputes involving multiple editors. Which is why I thought the best thing would be asking some other Africa-editors' opinions. Picaroon (Talk) 19:18, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
Jeez, that page has more activity than my entire (admittedly truncated) watchlist. In my opinion, this is well beyond the point of disruption. It is not a content dispute. Treat it as vandalism - warn, block and protect as needed to keep the page in line with site policies. - BanyanTree 00:19, 20 May 2007 (UTC)
Keep an eye on the redirect Imo state (& others?), too. Bolivian Unicyclist 19:18, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Krio language a "former" creole language?

The other day there was an edit to Krio language by an anon, which changed the lead to say that it is a "former" creole language [1]. I don't think that page is widely watched, so I'm asking this here. What is a "former" creole language, and does it make sense to describe Krio in that way? The other part of that particular edit is ok, assuming that the population of Krio in the diaspora is notable (probably), so... Let me know if you know what that means. Thanks, Smmurphy(Talk) 19:09, 3 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Rwandan Civil War referencing

I'm in the process of expanding and referencing Rwandan Civil War and have a problem. An anon had previously written a detailed account, and by "detailed" I mean with more detail than anything I've ever read. The content looks good and is in line with the less detailed sources I have, and I would love to just reference the anon's work, as opposed to removing it. Does anyone have, or have they ever read, a work that offers such details? Help with citations would be great, but just knowing where to look would help. Thanks, BanyanTree 12:31, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Deletion sorting

Please see my comment at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Deletion sorting/List control#Inactive Africa-related lists, where I've proposed deleting the inactive country-specific subpages (almost all of them) in favor of listing their occasional afds on the main Wikipedia:WikiProject Deletion sorting/Africa page. Picaroon (t) 20:17, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Mo Ibrahim Foundation Index of African Governance

What, if anything, should we mine from the Mo Ibrahim Foundation's Index of African Governance? It ranks African countries in a number of different categories, from "Safety and Security" to "Sustainable Economic Development" and "Human Development" and then assigns an overall rank. Are these rankings something we should consider reporting in articles on African countries? The index is still quite new, if I'm not mistaken, so I'm not sure what it's reputation is. Does anyone have any idea how to use it, if at all? (I tried to add a weblink to the index, but it breaks the page for some reason. Google it. :) — Amcaja (talk) 05:47, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

An article in The Economist about the index spurred me to expand the Mo Ibrahim article, and I redirected his eponymous foundation there for now. The foundation should have its own page eventually, as this and the leadership award both have wide coverage.
As to reporting the ranking in articles, I think this would be a good idea. It is compiled by Ibrahim and two Harvard academics, and the two news reports I've seen so far have not been critical (although they haven't gone in-depth on the selection process, either.) I guess the question is, if we decide to use the info somehow, does it belong in infoboxes, the text of the article, or both? (The top and bottom ten nations can be seen here.) Picaroon (t) 23:17, 1 October 2007 (UTC)
I agree about including the index in articles where appropriate. The "where appropriate" part is the difficult one, as you note, however. For example, the overall index score might be worth noting in the infobox, but the individual rankings would seem to fit better elsewhere. For example, the "sustainable economic development" ranking would belong in a country article's "Economy" section, and the "safety and security" part might fit under "Politics and government". The potential problem with this would be mentioning the foundation over and over in the article. I don't think the foundation has individual country reports available, either; such reports would be more useful as sources than just raw rankings. — Amcaja (talk) 02:12, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Africana Studies

There is some confusion about how to organize these terms:

  • African American Studies
  • Africana Studies
  • African Studies
  • African Diaspora Studies
  • etc.

Specifically, should the page on Africana Studies act as a disambiguation page, or should it describe the field of Africana Studies? I think I know what I'm talking about but I could use a little help here. Please see the conversation at the talk page. futurebird (talk) 17:41, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Wikipedia:Africa-related regional notice board/New articles/Archive 2006

Would anyone object to deletion of Wikipedia:Africa-related regional notice board/New articles/Archive 2006 under speedy deletion criterion G6 (housekeeping)? The page is an orphaned archive that contains a hopelessly-incomplete listing of Africa-related articles created during 2006. Since the main "New articles" page is now automatically updated by a bot, I can see no administrative or other need to retain the archive page. – Black Falcon (Talk) 07:56, 18 February 2008 (UTC)

  • Deleted. If the page has usefulness, or if there is need for discussion, please let me know and I will restore the page. – Black Falcon (Talk) 16:27, 18 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Proposed Wikiproject for Netball

I've started the ball rolling (should that be made the centre pass?) on creating a Wikiproject for Netball (in which a number of African countries participate at an International level). If you would particiapte in this, please indicate your support at Wikipedia:WikiProject_Council/Proposals#Netball dramatic (talk) 00:44, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] An Invitation from the Philippine Wikipedia Community

Hello folks,

The Philippine Wikipedia Community will be holding its 1st Meet-up in Cebu City (the fourth one in the Philippines) on June 23-24, 2008. This coincides with the first Philippine Open Source Summit also to be held in Cebu, and which the Philippine Wikipedia Community is a Implementing Partner in. We invite you to join us in this event. If you are in the IT or IT-enabled services industry, this would be a great opportunity to network with leaders from the 4th best outsourcing city in the world. This is also a good excuse to visit our beautiful beaches :)

If you're interested in joining the Wikipedia meet-up, please join our discussion. To register for the Open Source Summit, please contact CEDF-IT. If you would like some assistance with local accomodations, you may email User:Bentong Isles.

The Philippine Wikipedia Community
WP:PINOY