User talk:Bcnviajero

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Hello Bcnviajero! Welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for signing up. Here are some recommended guidelines to facilitate your involvement. Best of luck. Have fun! --ElectricEye (talk) 12:08, 12 June 2006 (UTC)
Getting Started
Getting your info out there
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Getting Help
Getting along
Getting technical


[edit] FC Barcelona

I notice you undid my edits with the edit summary "Repairing damage from repeated vandalism"; I think if you looked carefully, the edits you undid were really just formatting and spelling (Wikipedia uses the proper, Dutch, spelling of Johann Cruijff's name for example). I can see that you are fairly new here, so I will gently ask that you do not label edits as vandalism unless they actually are vandalism. Thank you. --Guinnog 15:29, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the message. The comment on vandalism did not relate to your changes, I am sorry your edit got taken out as well. I was referring to the anonymous user who many times a day undoes everyone's work and places edits which are reptitive, inaccurate or irrelevant.

That said, I am not convinced by your edits...adding links to years, for example, does not really help any user. But they are certainly not vandalism, that is for sure, so shall we discuss them on the talk page for FC Barcelona? --Bcnviajero 15:39, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

I quite agree with your comment about years and in fact I was taking them out as I agree they add nothing. Only full dates need to be wikified, like 14 July 2006, so that readers' date preferences work. --Guinnog 15:48, 14 July 2006 (UTC)
Although you have a valid point about removing those extra dates and results that the 'sherrif' keeps adding in, please refrain from entering into edit wars. Djdannyp 17:02, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Template:FC Barcelona Squad

Thanks for giving a reason for omitting Saviola. You didn't do this the first time, and since there was no evidence to omit him otherwise, I reverted your initial edit. The template is still on Saviola's article, btw.  Slumgum T. C.   22:55, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Sardinia

I have noticed that you have taken a broad axe to the external links within the Sardinia article. Please do not. These links have been in place for some time and are excellent further resources for information on Sardinia. I understand that you may consider Adsense an indication of a commercial website but many website owners use this product to cover their hosting costs and nothing more and neither the Sarnow or going to Sardinia sites are hotel or holiday booking sites. I have both contributed and kept a continual interest in this particular page and will continue to as regards link spam as well as many other regular visitors and users of both this page and relevant subject matter. I would not dream of just visiting the Barcelona fc page and making broad chops without prior usage and knowledge of the page and subject matter I thank you kindly and if you wish please reply either on the discussion page for Sardinia or at --kirk11

[edit] Linkspam, Umbria

¡Amigo Viajero! Yo tambien voy a hablar del machete que tomaste con los enlaces. . . .

Before we start, just for fairness, I'll admit to being one of the interested parties that you've included in the category. I don't hide under weird screen names, and therefore I'm easy to identify, I'm the Bill Thayer with the site you don't like.

That said, as you will see from my recent edit to Perugia, which only partially reverts yours, and my edit comment there (and other edits of mine) I have no particular vanity — for example, though I have a largish site on the Lazio, you'll notice that I didn't include it among the external links there: it's not comprehensive enough by any means, and I'm the first to recognize it.

So now that we've got that out of the way, I hope, I think you should examine the sites you've categorized as "linkspam", a term which you've used correctly (commercial traps, vanity blogs) but misapplied. My own site on Umbria will do nicely as an example. There is no commerce involved — site hosted by a university, and no advertising or request s for money anywhere on it (unlike Wikipedia might I point out, which frequently asks for money on all its pages); so I assume you feel my site is a vanity blog of some kind. We can also, as with most of the other sistes you want to delete links to, leave aside the idea that the site is small and devoid of informational content: at 480+ pages, covering every comune in the Umbria, many of the churches, etc. that wont apply either.

So the question is whether the pages actually consist of information useful to someone coming to Wikipedia seeking to learn something about the subject of the Wikipedia page, or whether it's just loose travel reports, photos of summer vacations, etc. For example, look at the site on Bevagna; not the largest subsite, although — hey, I'm not going to shoot myself in the foot — not by any means the smallest, either. The 18 pages on Bevagna include a number of pages on the Roman monuments of the town (with no better coverage of them anywhere online), a few pages on some of the comune's churches, with history and art criticism; and the (complete) Bevagna section of one of the most important books written on the place, Giulio Urbini's work. The site is informative and reasonably comprehensive; and the individual comune pages have often enough served as the ground for Wikipedia's own respective articles.

While many of the other comune pages are just that — single pages, with no dozens of sub-pages yet on major monuments, etc. — they do provide the basic information on each comune, a good photo, and, in the footer bar at the bottom of the page, links to the best external sites; you'll notice also that vanity is not my forte: often enough, I point out that those external sites are, for now, better than my little page; and of course, I do link to them (which vanity sites, and come to think most of the other sites on Umbria out there, don't do.)

And then, a number of the comune subsites are similar to Bevagna's in their approach: Trevi, Spello, Orvieto, Umbertide, Spoleto, Cannara, etc. In sum, I have a feeling you didn't look very carefully at my site at least.

The same applies, with natural differences, to the other sites listed (and now reverted). How, for example, you deleted Italy's National Geographical Institute as "linkspam" beats me altogether. Similarly, although there is of course some money somewhere behind a number of these, they are comprehensive, in that they offer detailed information about the 92 comuni of Umbria.

There are hundreds of vanity blogs out there, and sites whose sole purpose is to rent vacation apartments, and "galleries" of a dozen tourist pictures — often uncaptioned — and I've been among those carefully watching to make sure that Wickedpedia is not submerged in them: see for example my edits to Tuscany and Lazio and Rome.

In sum, you've made a mistake because you've run thru the sites very fast. I notice from your "Contributions" list, that you could not have spent more than 7 minutes going thru all of them, since you came from a fertilie morning editing various Gallego pages, FC Barcelona, etc. at 11:41 and at 11:48 the axe to the links to all those good, and carefully selected, Umbrian sites. You could not possibly have had visited the thousands of pages they represent in that time, to make any kind of good decision!

Saludos, Bill 11:56, 3 August 2006 (UTC)


Dear Bill,

Thanks for the message. Firstly, let me say that it is a pleasure to have a conversaton with someone who makes clear points, in a collaborative and open manner, and who avoids any kind of "I'm right, you're wrong, any one who disagrees with me is an idiot" dialogue.

So, to the matter in hand. I assure that I have visited every site before deleting it, which has been a laborious and time-consuming process. Yes, I know, I really should get a life. I cannot exclude the possiblity that in this I have accidentally deleted an occasional site that probably is correctly included, and one that you mention certainly sounds like it might be among them. However, I am sure (and have just revisted the Umbria page to confirm) that this is not the case generally. Most of the links that you have put back do indeed fall into the category of commercial and/or vanity publishing. I would encourage you to visit them and see for yourself.

I will not revert the changes pending further conversations which, given your earlier contribution to the debate, I am sure will lead to a consensus.

Right, that's enough amiability and reasonableness; I'm right, you're wrong, yah boo.

--Bcnviajero 13:08, 4 August 2006 (UTC)


Please let me give a word to honour signor Thayer's: its site is by no means a vanity blog, for me. It gives precise, detailed, and critical commments over a huge number of monuments, historical sites, small towns (even an handful of houses) that are not covered in any way on the Internet, neither on their respective Comune website. Thus, I think that the links to its site should be kept: I would recommend it. --Cantalamessa 17:50, 10 August 2006 (UTC)


Hi there. I think there is come misunderstanding...there was one site of Mr Thayer's that I deleted, which he agreed was corrently deleted. It was not a vanity blog by any means, but he agreed that it did not have enough information for inclusion. However, I have seen others of his which are excellent, and I have not deleted any of them.

--Bcnviajero 18:00, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Re: External links and linkspam

Thanks for your message, Bcnviajero. I agree with you about the spam problem and it seems to be getting worse. Every day people are spamming articles on my watchlist. Sarah Ewart (Talk) 02:14, 5 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Spelling

Thanks for your message. Please note that spellings with -ize and -ization (like organize) are correct in both British and American English. See [1]. The Spain article is written in British spelling, but I noticed that the suffix -ize was used more often than -ise. Therefore, to achieve consistency, I changed several -ise to -ize, but also favor to favour. The article uses consistent Oxford spelling now. SpNeo 17:29, 9 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Sardinia

Thank you for your comments regarding my message on the Sardinia external links. Sorry that it has taken me so long to retort. I have noticed with a wry smile that in the time that has past there has been some activity concerning these links with other users. Firstly I would like to say that you placed a message on the talk page of Sardinia with an open question as to any other opinions from other users of the page and then promptly removed the links anyway. Wikipedia is based upon an open licence that sets out guidlines and no rules allowing the free distribution and editing of the software by all users and therfor if you have no real interest in the content of the page your open question to users of the page I would have thought would have been suffucient. I have taken another look at the websites in Question and again See nothing wrong with them unless you consider Adsense to be Spam advertising ( I think google may have something to say about that) and any Online booking services are non existent with only external links to another website with what seem to be direct contact details for peoples travel needs (Even this though seems to be another website altogether.) Both of these sites though have extensive further reading on the subject matter of Sardinia. I have not replaced the websites as I do not have either the time or inclination to go too and fro with this matter. kirk11 10 August 2006

[edit] Keith Parkins and http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2006/08/346947.html

Oh my god - how sad!!! At least we know why these "users" are so obsessed with this link.  :) Gsd2000 15:37, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Check this out too: 'www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2005/11/327726.html'. Gsd2000 15:48, 12 August 2006 (UTC)
He's certainly been busy linking to his site: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Search&search=www.heureka.clara.net&fulltext=Search&offset=0&limit=2000 Gsd2000 21:37, 13 August 2006 (UTC)
I'm not sure how one takes things further than the spam warnings found here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Spam#Warning_spammers Gsd2000 12:07, 14 August 2006 (UTC)
Thought you might be interested to see the checkuser result - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requests_for_checkuser/Case/Brightonkid. I still do not believe they are unrelated though. The rant-style and language is far too similar. Gsd2000 01:51, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Removal of link from Alton, Hampshire page

At (09:40, 14 August 2006) you removed a link from the Alton, Hampshire page which had been on that page since July 2005. I didn't put it there, but I and several other people have done a lot of work to the article since then, and I considered that the site that was linked was unusually informative and a worthwhile resource; hence when reviewing the external links from the page I did not remove it. I'm interested to know the criteria you applied that led you to delete it. Regards, Euchiasmus 20:44, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Thank you for the message on my talk page. I deleted the link as it has transpired that the owner of the website in question has been placing links to his own site through a variety of sockpuppets and anonymous IPs on a large number of Wikipedia articles, presumably in order to increase his Google Page Rank, as he offers consulting services. When his links are removed, he becomes quite astonishingly aggressive and abusive (most notably on the Brighton page, but also on others). He refuses to debate and simply leaves endless, rambling, self-important messages on talk pages.
I hope this clarifies the situation, please do leave me another message if you would like any additional information.
--Bcnviajero 10:24, 16 August 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for your reply. I've done a bit of browsing and discovered the truth of what you say. Such aggression on his part is regrettable and it is unfortunate that he does not realise how counterproductive it can be.

I have found several websites (eg the Alton Chamber of Commerce site) that contain much of the information on his page, so am citing those on the Alton, Hampshire page instead. -- Euchiasmus 17:22, 16 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Link spam

I think that you should look up the meaning of linkspam on both Wikipedia and elsewhere because I think you are very misinformed as to the meaning of the term. Linkspam donates a form of deception and a reference to content or subject matter that is other than that referred to. Have a think about it! —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 84.223.28.93 (talk • contribs) .

Dear Anonynous user. I assume you are referring to the two links on the Sardinia page as you have put them back twice. I could not diagree with you more about their suitability. Linkspam refers to links which are incorrectly added to a Wikipedia article, for example for being commerical or vanity links. Both of these links are commercial sites with advertising. The Going to Sardinia one even links directly to a travel agency. In any case, the inforation there is purely touristic, and tourism information should be on Wikitravel. This is supposed to be an encyclopedia. External links should only be placed if they provide a unique, definitive resource going far further than the article ever could. Some tourist information does not meet this requirement. Also, please learn to sign your messages. --Bcnviajero 14:46, 16 August 2006 (UTC)
Eavesdropping here, hope you don't mind if I butt in, B. Mr/Ms 84.223.28.93, I concur with B and I would have removed those two links myself because they look very spamish and really don't add anything much to the article. In particular, I would have removed goingtosardinia.com, because, as B points out, it links to numerous commercial interests including property sales, flights, accommodation etc. I highly recommend you review our external links guidelines because this is what guides our decisions on what links should and should not be included. Thanks, Sarah Ewart (Talk) 15:07, 16 August 2006 (UTC)

Once again I disagree with your opinion and interpretation of the Wikipedia guidlines. The guidlines say nothing about the non inclusion of websites that are in any way travel related. It is absolutely absurd to think that travel information is not a useful resource for readers of an article related to a tourist destination. To include external links that are only official within a page surely does not give other points of view. Why did Wikipedia incude the possibility of adding external links when the project was developed, as they surely knew that people would add links to relevant websites. External links are surely for further reading and as long as they are relevant to the content from which they are being linked form are useful to the reader.No? As far as the question of linkspam is concerned you have the concept completeley wrong! A spammer is someone who blatently tries to fool either users or search engines to visit a website under false pretences by using either cloaking devices, false anchor texts or meta phrases. If you look at both of the websites in question they are both about what they say they are about, Sardinia. The both have a google page rank of 5 and if you check the back links are reffered to by other sources such as the BBC! If Wikipedia were so concerned with links gaining google page rank form being listed within the encyclopedia then they could quite easily place do not follow tags on all of the external links that would make search engines ignore them but allow users to follow them. Wikipedia does not do this!Why? I hope that you respect my right to remain anonymos although you will probably see it as being some kind of subterfuge. It is not. I do not wish to offend or be rude this is not my intention. My intention is mereley to express my equal right to edit as a common user of Wikipedia. I will check back here for your comments Thank you. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 84.223.29.243 (talk • contribs) 05:17, August 17, 2006 (UTC)

84, I agree fully, the guidelines do not say that travel sites cannot be linked and I never said they did, so I'm not sure why you would think that I did. And unless I missed something, I don't think B said anything like that, either. I also agree with your view that some travel information is extremely useful.
First of all, what is your connection to these sites? I see that you are in Sardinia, are you the owner of the sites? You seem quite committed to getting the links included, so I can only assume that you have a particular interest in the sites?
If a link does not provide a unique resource, they shouldn't be listed. In addition, we do not list sites which are geared for advertising or that exist to sell goods and/or services. In particular, goingtosardinia.com appeared, to me, at least, to fall under that category. Are you claiming this is not the case? If so, I am willing to look at the sites further and reconsider. But either way, neither of these sites appear to me to be unique in comparison to the sites already listed.
With regards to your question, why did Wikipedia include the option of providing external links? Generally editors add links to sites they have used as references in the article or because they believe the site provides exceptional additional resources. There is no problem with being anonymous, though generally a person with a username has far more anonymity that a person signing under and IP. I've no idea what you mean by "express (your) power," but it kind of concerns. I have this page watchlisted, so feel free to continue replying here, Cheers, Sarah Ewart (Talk) 20:56, 16 August 2006 (UTC)
Also, please do not use edit summaries to make comments such as: "Are you an administrator or owner or even a GOD of Wikipedia?" This could be taken as a personal attack. Wikipedia maintains a very strict policy against personal attacks and people are frequently blocked for making them. Thanks, Sarah Ewart (Talk) 20:56, 16 August 2006 (UTC)
Thank you for your swift response.

My remark concerning the seemed non inclusion of travel related websites was related to the edit comments that these were travel sites and therefore had no place in Wikipedia. You are correct I am in Sardinia but I have no direct involvement with either of these websites but I do play an active roll in the Tourism industry on the island. The project on which I work is related to official tourist information in the province of Sassari in the north of the island. My interest in the inclusion of these links is stemmed from my personal and professional interest in promoting Sardinia as a travel destination.Both of the websites mentioned are free resources at internet/information points at Alghero airport that aid travelers arriving on the island with relative information concerning places to visit, festivals e.t.c. The project is non profit based and if you examine further you will see that the links to accommodation e.t.c are direct website services, and that there are no online booking services whatsoever. I must make clear that I have no direct involvement in this service but it does fall under a number of incentives that the region are promoting to present more awareness in the island of which I take part on a voluntary basis. I feel that the inclusion of the official regional website that is only in Italian and presents little in the way of further reading for visitors, as the only external link seems a little limiting. I apologies profusely if any of my comments were taken as personal attacks. This was not my intention at all. Thank you. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 84.223.28.93 (talk • contribs) .

84, thankyou for clarifying those points. I appreciate your honesty and frankness in answering my questions. Firstly, just to clear this up straight away, I did not believe the edit summary was intended as a personal attack. I just wanted to let you know that it might misunderstood and to be careful in future. There is no need to apologise.
I don't have time to do this right now, but if you give me a day, I will go through both sites more closely. Would this be satisfactory to you? Just to be clear, I do not believe that travel sites as such are inappropriate for listing, we just need to be careful which ones we do list because many of them are not appropriate. Also, many travel related sites that get added to the external links section are spam, so we sometimes might err on the side of removal. I don't know if this is the case in this instance, but if it is, I will reconsider my opinion and support inclusion of the links. I hope that is satisfactory for you. Thank you also for clarifying the power/common user thing. I understand exactly what you mean now. Cheers, Sarah Ewart (Talk) 22:27, 16 August 2006 (UTC)


Hi all,

I go away for a couple of days and find my talk page has become the location of debate! Thanks for joining the conversation to both of you.

To clarify a couple of points... Yes, absolutely correct, there is no obligation to create an account (although, as Sarah says, doing so in fact provides more anonymity, not less). However, I was referring to the non-signing of messages. Signing messages is in any case advisable as non-signed messages often get deleted or do not receive responses as they are not considered "valid".

On the subject of the two links, I have looked once again, and the Going To Sardinia site still seems to me to be very clearly a commercial site, in particular given the fact that it is covered top and bottom with Google AdSense. The sarnow link is a bit closer, but for me still falls short of being the unique and definitive resource that it needs to be.

It is certainly true that an external link should not be counted out simply for being travel-related; that would be absurd. If a truly authoritative site happens to have been written for travel purposes, then that is of course no barrier. However, it does need to be unique and definitive, and sites which are interesting simply for tourism reasons, rather than encyclopaedic reasons, have a totally suitable place on Wikitravel.

Thoughts?

--Bcnviajero 20:16, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

Hello and thank you for joining the discussion once again. The two websites in question I do believe have a degree of information concerning the whole island of Sardinia that cannot and is not contained within the one page on the subject matter within Wikipedia. The Sarnow website has a number of very long and in depth essays on various subject matters from travel to archaeology and the cultural arts and crafts of the island. The website has been running for many years and is considered in many circles to be a very in depth resource on Sardinia. We chose to include this website within the tourist information points at the airport as it is a source that although a little long winded (some of the articles are 10 pages long)makes very interesting reading for someone who is interested in the island of Sardinia and is a resource that is recommended by many reputable sources such as the BBC. The second website goingtosardinia was produced by Someone in Alghero to be used as an information source for the information terminals at the airport. The website has a number of destination guides for travel purposes but also a number of small articles on festivals and archaeological places of interest, so therefore I believe offers a little more than just tourism information. This site as I mentioned in my earlier post is linked to another website that again was created for the project at Alghero airport in Sardinia and does contain a number of Travel resources such as hotels, agriturismos and restaurants. This website is not a travel agency or booking website but instead a detailed list of direct contact travel resources. The subject of Adsense is I believe a delicate one. Websites that use Adsense are divided into probably three groups. 1. Spam! Get as many people to the site as possible, usually under false pretences and then use as many sneaky ways possible to make people click on adverts. This is Fraud! 2. Very popular websites with extremely high numbers of visitors that add Adsense to the website to increment any other revenue that they generate (usual large companies, some Blogs)3. Creators of free content websites that need to find some way to cover their hosting and other production costs. I can assure you that the latter is the case as far as the goingtosardinia website is concerned. Bearing this in mind is it correct to exclude a website if it uses a program such as Adsense? All websites have over heads and need to find a way to cover their costs. You just need to take a look under donations on the Wikipedia menu to see the overheads that are generated. Wikipedia it seems have generated over half a million dollars in donations this year and it still does not seem to be enough. Of course smaller websites do not need anywhere near this kind of budget but it is also true to be said that a donations button on their websites probably wouldn't go very far towards them covering any of their costs. I just think that when we see Adsense on a website we need to look a little further and see under which Adsense section they sit. Wikitravel is in my opinion a project that is unfortunately doomed for failure. The templates are far to standardized and the amount of space available for information to limiting. This kind of project is already covered enormously by either blogs or giants of the industry such as trip advisor, lonely planet and the travel library. In my opinion a poor extension of Wikipedia. Thank you for your time and I look forward to hearing your comments.--84.223.14.139 21:57, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

I just don't see the need for those two links with the article. Many articles on popular tourist destinations are constantly bombarded with similar links, thinly veiled commercial sites. Unless there is a compelling reason to include them, they should be eliminated. 84, you appear to be the only person here strongly in favor of them, are you willing to adhere to the consensus? Honestly, I feel your last revert was done in bad faith. Seaphoto 23:09, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
I do agree with Seaphoto. For the reasons I have already given, and for those given by Seaphoto, there is no compelling reason for them to be there. --Bcnviajero 18:53, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
Firstly I would like to ask you what you think a travel related link should cover? Pages of information on the destination? This is what the pages that you deleted cover and as mentioned on the talk page are information about Sardinia that is non profit based and runs adwords as many websites to cover costs. There are no online booking features or online costs of any kind, infact all content and information is completely free to the user. I am very confused as to what you believe should and should not be included as an external link.

You continue to delete these links with no direct response to any of my earlier comments your over Zealous behavor is more than a little concerning. On one hand you say that these links should not be included although thay contain nothing but information about Sardinia yet you leave the inclusion of a non English language website (that of the region) that in itself is contrary to Wikipedia guidlines. I also noticed that you are a keen Barcelona fan and contributer to the article on Barcelona football club an article that includes numerous fansites that are also blatenetly commercial and not in the English language a combination that would surely discount them for inclusion form Wikipedia yet you have not felt the need to remove them. I would much appreciate your remarks and clarification on this matter, thank you--84.223.29.119 23:18, 5 September 2006 (UTC)


Thank you for your message. I agree with your comments on those links on the FC Barcelona page...in fact they have been deleted many times by myself and others. The situation there is that there is an individual who has constantly messed up that article, while being abusive and agressive to all other editors, and the only to stop what was a truly tedious edit war was to give ground on some areas. Regrettable, but that seems to have been the compromise. Feel free to delete them when the protection is removed. The page is currently protected, due to that individual's consistent actions.
On what should be included, I return to what has been said previously and is stated in the policies, that generally external sites are not suitable, unless they provide a definitive, unique, and unmissable resource. Incidentally, I do also agree with you on the link in Italian. As it is not in English it also seems unsuitable. I guess I just missed it...
--Bcnviajero 20:00, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] FC Barcelona

Cheers for your support. It is nice to know I have an ally out there. Djln--Djln 20:29, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

  • Yes unfortunately, I think we spoke too soon and I think he has returned Djln--Djln 21:01, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] 1902 Copa del Rey

There is a debate going on at Talk:Athletic Bilbao and Talk:Copa del Rey about the 1902 Copa. Basicly should these articles include the 1902 Copa in Athletics honours. I am of the opinion that they should. However our old friend is of the opposite view. I would be interested in your view. Djln--Djln 11:45, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Query for Barcelona

Hi Barcelona

I had posted this query a day or two ago, then realised that I should have posted it at the bottom of the page rather than the top (I had assumed that most recent at top but reading the posts it appears most recent at the botttom). This is why I've deleted the original post and reposted at the bottom of the page.

I've just noticed that on the 5th August, in the 18:37 edit of "France", the resource "Maps of France Collection" was removed from the external links (the link was to http://www.france-property-and-information.com/map_of_france.htm).

Reading through the discussion below, I see that along with a number of the agreed deletions, there were some inadvertent deletions. I'm hoping this is the case for the above, which has been present on the "France" page for some months.

I'll note up-front that I'm the owner of this page. That being said, I believe that this link provides useful content. To begin with, it brings together interesting maps from many different sites (all with the written permission of the originating sites). It also includes maps which I've developed. Finally, it includes maps that previously were available only in paper form. In addition to the maps, it also includes statistical information and other information of interest.

I would also note that this page contains no advertising (not even Adsense) and is not promotional. Likewise, none of the maps on this site have any promotions or advertising. For those maps which have been provided by other sites or organisations, I do credit the originator. However, surely this is only fair and just.

After developing this page, I had it professionally translated into 5 other languages, along with all the maps on my site which it references. I do have some advertising on the top page for each language but nothing that would be unsuitable for family viewing. I then added the top-level page for each language to the Wikipedia corresponding language view of France. I think this is particularily useful, as some of these lanaguages are less well represented for maps in their language. Therefore, it seems to me particularly unfortunate that these other-language versions have been deleted.

Given the above, what would be your position on re-adding this resource?

Best regards, Doug Stewart


Dear Doug,

Thanks for the message. As an inital point, I appreciate you being up fron about being the owner of the site. There is an issue with people putting links to their own sites on Wikipedia, ([2]).

On the site itself, while it is clear that there is no advertising on the pages in question, the site is clearly a commercial one, selling property. This makes it entirely unsuitable for inclusion here. However, were it to be hosted on another URL (and placed by someone else....) it might well be accepted as suitable.

Please let me know if you would like to discuss this further.

--Bcnviajero 18:48, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Dear Barcelona

I understand that listing with Wikipedia is a privledge, and if Wikipedia does not accept commercial sites, OK.

However, I would note that this doesn't actually appear to me to be the policy for Wikipedia in general or this specific article "France" in particular. A few quick examples to illustrate my point:

- The article currently retains an external link to www.parks.it. This site is not only very commercial, but also sells property (the reason given for excluding my site).

- The article includes Encyclopaedia Britannica, which is not only commercial, but much of the content is available only to paid subscribers. This is contrary to the rules in the reference you note in your response.

- The article also includes CountryReports, which is not only commercial, but almost all of its content is available only to paid subscribers.

- And so on for most of the links in the existing article, which contain either direct advertising and/or Adsense.


It would seem to me that my site is less commercial than the retained external links, in that:

- There is no advertising on the page references, nor on any of the sub-pages

- All my content is free to view

- I provide a certain amount of unique content, available only on my site.

I have no complaint about being excluded. After all, this is the privledge of Wikipedia's owners/editors. However, the basis of this exclusion does not appear to me to be fairly applied. Also, given the large amount of content (including unique content) I provide, the exclusion of my site does not seem to me to be a decision that adds to the overall value of the article.

Best regards,

Doug (6th Sept., 2006)


Dear Doug,

Many thanks for your reply. In fact, I agree with just about everything that you say. The links you mention are also blatantly commercial and should not be there....unfortunately it is not possible to stop all commercial links alone, I am just doing what I can!

I do agree that there is a much useful information on your site, and if you can simply host it on a non-commercial URL I doubt anyone will have a problem with it. The issue is that having a link from such a popular page as the France article on Wikipedia gives a significant benefit in terms of Google Page Rank, and therefore boosts the commercial website.

--Bcnviajero 19:54, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

Dear Barcelona

The type of people who visit my site are people interested in France, either as a visitor or in terms of moving there. To help them, I've added hundreds of pages of unique content to my site (taking me about a year to research and write), of which the maps are just one area. A large portion of my 120 000 visitors a month benefit from the maps (I keep stats on visits to these pages).

To purchase another URL and copy them over wouldn't make any sense to me. To begin with, it wouldn't have any search engine traffic, so very few people would find or benefit from them. Secondly, it would be a waste of time and money, to set up a non-commercial and non-visited site. So, while I appreciate your suggestion, I will be leaving them where they are.

I am disappointed that you've used the term "also blatently commercial". I really feel that I'm in a completely different position from the sites I've quoted. I offer a large amount of information, completely free, without advertising. It merely happens to be on a site which does have commercial aspects. The sites that have been retained offer a small amount of information as a hook, then say for the really interesting information one has to be a subscriber.

Consequently, it appears to me that the most commercial sites have been retained, whereas my site providing useful and unique content free of advertising or fees is removed. As I noted earlier, I don't object to being removed on the basis that I'm a commercial site. However, to remove a slight offender and leave the worst offenders is difficult to understand.

That being said, if your mind is set on this, I suppose there is no point in debating further.

Best regards, Doug


Doug,

To clarify, I did not mean that the information under discussion was blatantly commercial, sorry if my choice of words caused it to appear that I did. However, the property site is clearly commercial. On the change of domain, a URL costs just a few dollars, and with the amount of content a new one would very quickly be included by the search engines. That is completely up to you, though, of course.

If there are sites that are inappropriately linked from any article, do feel free to remove them.

Thanks for the reasoned conversation, by the way, there are far too many people here who resort to insults and name-calling...

--Bcnviajero 12:15, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Problem Website

Hey, you may be as overjoyed as I was to read this: User_talk:David_D.#problem_web_site. Wikipedia is finally rid of his spam! Gsd2000 22:12, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] RfA thanks

Hey B., thank you so much for supporting my recent RfA. It finished with an amazing final tally of 160/4/1. I really appreciated your support as a fellow anti-spam warrior. :) If there's ever anything I can do to help you out, please don't hesitate to give me a yell. Cheers mate, Sarah Ewart (Talk) 22:04, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] why did you remove this?

why did you remove my section of Brazil at the 2006 FIFA World Cup on the final reactions? i do not appreciate this at all, your actions were very unacceptable and i demand to know why it was removed. thank you

You have not signed your message, and it appears that you are not registered, so it is not clear if you will see any message that I leave on your IP talk page, and I will consequently reply to you here. I removed that paragraph as it was poorly written, added nothing, and was purely personal opinion, with no facts. As regards you "demanding" an explanation, and considering edits to be "unacceptable", it seems to me that you may be unaware of how Wikipedia works. Indeed, many of your edits are simply vandalism; to provide simply three examples, your edits to Martin Jol, Carles Puyol and Spuds. There are many more.--Bcnviajero 10:49, 18 December 2006 (UTC)

Ha. you make me laugh. And youre wrong, Brazil did very poorly at the World Cup, you must know nothing about football if you couldnt see this. And it was very well written, i used correct grammar and a good use of vocabulary.

Hmmm, in fact I would agree totally that Brazil did poorly. But that is taken care of with the results, and is not remotely the point. Your paragraph added nothing other than personal opinion, and was not by any stretch of the imagination well-written. Better written than your "Martin Jol is so fat many people think he is an American", "Carles Puyol is one of the ugliest footballers in the world", or "Spuds is a nickname for Tottenham Hotspurs", but badly written all the same. And please do learn to sign your comments. --Bcnviajero 13:15, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

But spuds is a nickname for tottenham 71.254.211.239

[edit] FC Barcelona and Catalonia autonomous football team‎

Neeutral point of view is needed in these articles. Stop vandalism. Thanks.--Codorado 12:59, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

An odd response. As I mentioned in the comments, you might want to have a look at what vandalism is in the context of Wikipedia. There has been a consensual solution in these articles, reached over a period of time, which you are removing consistently. You have a particular, politically-motivated, viewpoint, as is your right, but this viewpoint should not be forced on the article, and as far as possible neutrality should be sought. If you are not happy with the consensual solutions previously reached, please take your concerns to the relevant discussion pages, and reopen the debate, rather than engaging in edit warring. --Bcnviajero 13:49, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

The only politically-motivated here, is you. The OFFICIAL NACIONALITIES can not been vandalism.--Codorado 13:55, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

I did not say that you were committing vandalism, simply that you were using the word against others indiscriminently and incorrectly. That said, persistent edit warring in pursuit of a narrow political objective without debate amd discussion comes close to vandalism. Nobody has removed the Spanish flags that are so important to you, but there are additional flags to provide additional information. How you can object to these, especially on a page about the Catalan football team, is difficult to fathom. Likewise, the fact that you keep replacing the FC Barcelona weblink with www.fcbarcelona.es (instead of .cat or .com, as it is officially listed and promoted) gives an indication of your intentions. --Bcnviajero 14:02, 13 November 2007 (UTC)
If the .cat is so important for you, you can use it. But why do you want to use the flags of the spanish regions, and not the flags of the russian regions? That is politically incorrent in the english wikipedia. Neutral point of view. --Codorado 14:09, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] El Clásico

I posted a note on the FC Barca talk page about your latest edit and I was hoping to get your input on it (or at least give you the opportunity to respond). Thanks, Isaiah (talk) 13:37, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] City links

In removing external links, as at Deruta, please check that you aren't removing sources for text, as you did there. Wise Wikipedians are even more careful with what they delete than they are with what they add: a foolish addition is quickly detected. --Wetman (talk) 12:23, 31 January 2008 (UTC)


Thank you for your message. I have, I believe, been very careful in what I have deleted. Italin Visits is a clearly commercial site which exists in order to sell tours and make money in other ways. It is scandalous, in my opinion, that this organisation has plastered its links all over Wikipedia. This kind of activity has to be challenged in order to save any kind of credibility for Wikipedia.
Would you not agree as to the commercial nature of the site?
--Bcnviajero (talk) 13:52, 31 January 2008 (UTC)


Hmm, another look at the two links you deleted, http://www.deruta.net/ Brief history and pictures of Deruta (in English) and [http://www.italianvisits.com/umbria/deruta/ ItalianVisits.com ItalianVisits.com. does remind me that in fact neither of them is brilliant. I was the one who cobbled together the bit of Deruta's history: it does need some in-text references. Let me restore yoiur links-deleted version, for a start. --Wetman (talk) 15:52, 31 January 2008 (UTC)--Wetman (talk) 15:52, 31 January 2008 (UTC)


Thanks for the quick response. I am glad we agree! The Italian Visits people have been particularly aggressive in their spamming of Wikipedia. --Bcnviajero (talk) 15:57, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] External map service links

Hello. You have been identified as having added or removed direct external map service links in articles[3]. There is a discussion at Wikipedia talk:External links#Issues with inclusion or exclusion of map service links about which should be done, and some more opinions would be good to find community consensus. --Para (talk) 22:58, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] George W. Bush

I've reverted your edit to the Bush article. GWB was not "controversially adjudged to have won the" 2000 election; he simply won the election per the presidential election system in the US. Additionally, "April of 2008" is the correct wording, not "the April of 2008". - auburnpilot talk 16:20, 5 May 2008 (UTC)