User talk:Espoo

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[edit] Welcome

Welcome!

Hello, Espoo, and welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for your contributions. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are a few good links for newcomers:

I hope you enjoy editing here and being a Wikipedian! Please sign your name on talk pages using four tildes (~~~~); this will automatically produce your name and the date. If you have any questions, check out Wikipedia:Where to ask a question or ask me on my talk page. Again, welcome!  --ZeWrestler Talk 20:19, 15 January 2006 (UTC)

Hi ZeWrestler, and thanks for the welcome, but i've actually been contributing for more than two years and have had an account for almost 2 years. Is there a bug in the system that reports old accounts as new? Espoo 20:53, 15 January 2006 (UTC)

I think ZeWrestler noticed your recent edits, liked what he saw, but noticed you haven't received a proper welcoming yet (it's never too late to welcome a good contributor =)) — TheKMantalk 20:43, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Primrose oil

Your link to the quackwatch article made me smile David.Throop 23:58, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

Took 10 months for the anti-quackwatch guys to remove it. David.Throop 16:00, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Espoo

Do you live in Espoo, by any chance? -- comment by User:JIP, who forgot to sign this [ed. Espoo 07:41, 8 April 2006 (UTC)]

On the basis of your user page, the answer is kyllä :-) --Espoo 07:41, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Talk:Lagarostrobos franklinii

Hi Espoo - saw your comments at Talk:Lagarostrobos franklinii; I've added a note - MPF 23:56, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Tinea versicolor

I note from the edit-history that you previous contributed significantly to Tinea versicolor. I have grouped together the topical treatments as there is no distinction, in the UK, as to which agents may be obtained over-the counter or on prescription. I have previously summarised advice obtained from the UK Institue of Dermatology on treatment into a protocol factsheet, however wikipedia policy is not to add links to ones own website (but other editors may of course). - Please have a look at the Talk:Tinea versicolor page and comment as appropriate. Thank you :-) David Ruben Talk 01:18, 28 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] talk: terngarasu

please see the ratnapura discussion --Terrance 12:13, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Champs-Élysées

What do you mean? The article is at Champs-Élysées. Martin 19:32, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

Don't you get this when you click on the link?:

Wikipedia does not have an article with this exact name. Please search for Champs-Élysées in Wikipedia to check for alternative titles or spellings. --Espoo 19:36, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

No, it loads up the article properly. Martin 19:38, 17 September 2006 (UTC)
Looks like it was a Wikipedia:Purge problem. That page vaguely hints "(Logged-in users have a choice in their Special:preferences whether to see cached or live versions.)" I guess what is meant is "Disable page caching" on the Misc tab? In any case, i got the correct page after i clicked on the purge link on the error page. I thought i'd tried (in Firefox) F5, Ctrl+F5, and Ctrl+Shift+R (incorrectly notated as Ctrl-Shift-R on Special:Preferences BTW) but none worked. Those keyboard shortcuts should also be added to Wikipedia:Purge. --Espoo 19:52, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Adolf Hitler

Hello. You are almost certainly right about the user named Xanon. As far as I can tell he is a neo-Nazi revisionist; and in case he reads this the term is used in a strictly descriptive sense. I personally will not enter into any direct exchange with him. White Guard 23:44, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the heads up, but i felt i had to respond to him once more to leave a record on the discussion page (for possible new visitors) that his comments have not been accepted and are not acceptable in a civilised historical account (or discussion, for that matter). In the future, i can then simply refer to today's comment if necessary. --Espoo 20:00, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Veps

Thanks for moving Vepses to Veps. How can one fix the same word on the map? I have no experience with WP images. --Espoo 10:33, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

You just download the image and open up your favorite image editor and edit the image, and then re-upload it. No worries, though; I've fixed the image to say "Veps" instead of "Vepses" :-) — Mets501  (talk)  11:04, 6 October 2006 (UTC)
I guess you meant "will change"?. I didn't see any change on the history page, and it still says "Vepses" on the map. --Espoo 12:21, 6 October 2006 (UTC)
You have to purge your cache for the changes to show up. Also, for expert attention to a subject, place {{expert}} on the article page (not the talk page). And I fixed the sauteed reindeer problem :-) — Mets501  (talk)  18:28, 6 October 2006 (UTC)
Thanks! (You'd think i'd remember the cache problem since i talked about it myself a few lines up... :-)) --Espoo 19:54, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] layout problems

Could you please tell me where to find info about how to correct the layout errors on United_States_Capitol#Flags and Egyptomania#Race_and_national_identity? The latter is BTW only evident in Firefox, not IE. In FF, the first two lines don't stay to the left of the picture and the second line is truncated after "or Asia, or within the". Maybe the fastest way for me to start to learn about layout would be to see how someone corrects these errors. Thanks! --Espoo 06:51, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

Hi Espoo: I've fixed the formatting in those two places. The instructions on how to fix the first one is at Wikipedia:How to fix bunched up edit links, and the second one I just reversed the sides that the pictures were on because I couldn't think of any good way to fix that problem :-) —Mets501 (talk) 11:02, 12 October 2006 (UTC)
Thanks! --Espoo 14:57, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Vaccinium vitis-idaea

Hi again Espoo, in case you haven't spotted I've added a proposal to Talk:Vaccinium vitis-idaea to use the name Lingonberry throughout. I realise we have disagreed on this, but I respect the fact that you have stuck to Wikiquette and remained polite throughout. I've seen debates on simple changes spiral into mutual abuse on Wikipedia before, so I'd just like to say that I respect your opinion even if I differ from it, and I understand that both of our aims are simply to make the article as good and accessible as it could be. Kaid100 23:29, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for these kind words, but unfortunately your new proposal simply ignores all the evidence i presented and doesn't respect all the time i spent collecting it. I can understand your good intent to start a new discussion because the focus has changed, but it's not a good idea just ignoring large amounts of evidence and explanations that prove your ideas and claims were and still are incorrect, even if presented with a new goal in mind. Please try to understand that this is not a dispute between your personal opinion and my personal opinion. I am not presenting a personal opinion; i'm simply defending use of reliable, authoritative sources against your personal opinions and private research. You ignored my whole explanation of why you can't use Google frequencies to claim that dictionaries are wrong (unless they don't cover a certain field or a certain regional use). --Espoo 07:11, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Category:Finland-Swedish

Thanks for the page move for Finland Swedish; how does one fix the category's spelling? --Espoo 22:34, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

No problem on the page move. The category isn't much more complicated; you're just dealing with Categories for Discussion instead of Requested Moves. Check out the instructions at WP:CFD#How to use this page. Most requests have to sit on CFD for five days, and there's usually no opposition, and then they just get done. Someone might even speedy-close it, although it doesn't quite satisfy any of the criteria at WP:CFDS. I hope that helps. :) -GTBacchus(talk) 22:41, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

Thanks, finally figured this out. That page's directions are much more confusing than RM and the automated process produces at least two incorrect results.
  • There is a subheading called "If the category is a candidate for speedy renaming, use:" but no corresponding one called "If the category is not a candidate for speedy renaming, use:". As it stands, "If a single category:" is still part of the instructions for speedy deletion.
  • After adding the code for renaming on the category's page and clicking Preview, this adds a template with the erroneous "add entry {{subst:cfr2|Finland-Swedes|Swedish-speaking Finns|text='''Rename''', Your reason(s) for the proposed rename. ~~~~}} " which does not go away even after i did as that says (so all future users who see that template think they are being addressed and told to add a new entry)
  • Clicking on that link at "add entry" as well as on "Create the Cfd subsection. Click on THIS LINK" on Wikipedia:Categories_for_deletion#How_to_use_this_page produces a project page with the erroneous heading "Editing Wikipedia:Categories for deletion/Log/2006 November 1 (section)" instead of "for discussion" --Espoo 22:38, 1 November 2006 (UTC)
Should i put these complaints on Wikipedia talk:Categories for discussion??
Could you please take a look at the pretty unbelievable situation on Wikipedia:Categories_for_deletion/Log/2006_November_1#Category:Finland-Swedish, where someone is essentially implying that your admin decision on my suggested page move was wrong/sloppy and is demanding directly and in all seriousness (and/or perhaps to troll?) that "Finland Swedish" should be spelled with a hyphen although no other languages are and although it is spelled without a hyphen on many if not almost all edu pages written by experts who are native English speakers... --Espoo 07:17, 4 November 2006 (UTC)
Hi. Regarding your technical issues, I would say that Wikipedia talk:Categories for discussion is the best forum to let people know about those. Part of the confusion stems from the fact that "Categories for deletion" was recently (and perhaps incompletely) renamed to "Categories for discussion", for accuracy. As for Gene Nygaard, I think the best option is to solicit comments from others. Maybe a couple of notes on pages like Talk:Swedish language requesting more opinions? I've left a comment at the CfD; we'll see what happens. He did get a bit personal there - I think it's best to point out politely when he does that, reaffirm your good motives, and refocus the discussion on the matter at hand. I don't think he means to be offensive, but it can come across that way. -GTBacchus(talk) 11:23, 4 November 2006 (UTC)
Hey Espoo, thanks---unfortunately I'm pretty busy at the moment and I didn't find the time to chime in on the Finland Swedish issue, I'm sorry. I'll be back though, I got a couple points for you---hang in there! JackLumber. 14:01, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] 12-hour clock

I just saw your note on the irrationality of having 12:30 a.m. before 11:30 a.m. Did you know that the utility Wmatch by PC magazine to keep directories in synch actually got this wrong at one of their releases? When you edited and saved a file between midnight and 1 a.m., it thought it was older than a version created after 1 a.m. the preceding day. So your late night worked was erased. This info does not belong in an encyclopedia, but I thought you might like to know and laugh over it. −Woodstone 03:30, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

Hi. On the contrary, that info definitely belongs in an encyclopedia because it is a precise fact whereas my edit "most of these people are also confused" can actually be attacked by some fanatic defender of the 12-hour clock. Although the official WP policy/requirement to provide sources for everything in WP is of course a joke because most of us are not experts in the subject we're writing about, it works in practice the way it should be rephrased: (something like this, no exact wording, especially the word "true") Delete anything that sounds like it's not true and try to find or ask the person who added it to find a source supporting or contradicting the removed passage.
Your info in addition shows that the problem is a very real one even for experts so that proves the claim about "most people" is at least very probable even without a source to back it up. --Espoo 05:44, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] "ancient" and similar capitalisation nonsense

Hi

Please take a look at Wikipedia_talk:Manual_of_Style_(capital_letters)#historical_periods. Thanks! --Espoo 19:44, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

I'm not certain what I'm supposed to be looking for. - jc37 13:20, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
On Wikipedia:Categories_for_deletion/Log/2006_November_2#Category:Education_in_Ancient_Greece, you wrote Speedy Rename - Since it's a capitalisation issue of "ancient"., so it seems you have a strong and informed opinion and would like to maybe contribute to a more general discussion of unnecessary and incorrect capitalisation on WP. --Espoo 14:57, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
Oh, ok. Wasn't certain if there was something more specific, thanks for the clarification : ) - jc37 15:12, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Finlanswedes

Someone messed up the article Swedish-speaking Finns. Now the name of the article is Finlandswedes. I think that is crap English, so maybe you would like to change it back? Terveisin--217.112.249.156 22:42, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

Kiitos! The user who made that change and thereby tried to revert the admin's move is apparently serious in making the crazy or at least extremely eccentric statement "This user supports the return of the Finland Swedish areas to Sweden." Is he a Swedish citizen? How common is that point of view? --Espoo 19:57, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
Sorry for a very slow answer! Well, like every other country Sweden has its own share of ignorant chauvinists. But that view is, I am sure, rather marginal among the nation famous for its common sense...--217.112.249.156 16:07, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] re: aggressive admin

Hi, Espoo. I read the conversation at the link you gave me. I can see why you're frustrated. Personally, I make it a policy not to remove anybody's comments from my talk page, even obvious trolling, but I understand that plenty of people here delete material from their talk pages. I find that it's generally not worth the energy to fight with these people. He read your message; you can be sure of that. Beyond that, I don't think you come out of the discussion looking so bad. There's not really an accusation that you "threatened" him, just a statement that doing so would be useless. Reasonable people can see who's being polite to whom in that whole exchange.

Look, I know it's a pain in the neck, but the best thing to do, since there seems to be someone who's randomly opposed to a perfectly common sense move (or so it appears to me), and since the CfD was closed by an admin who's not interested in reviewing his decision beyond saying that the inclusion or exclusion of a hyphen doesn't have much effect on Wikipedia (which is true), then... it's basically down to the four choices Kbdank71 laid out. I suggest DRV first, and if that doesn't work — which may be for a variety of reasons, including that you might get de-listed because of someone's asinine idea of proper procedure — then I suggest trying a relist at CfD. In either case, if you can get some more informed opinions involved, that's the best. Let me know anywhere you list it, and I'll toss in a vote of confidence that I think your argument makes more sense than Nygaard's, based on the very little I know. DRV's a funny crowd - they may just do you right.

If none of that sounds worth the trouble, then I don't know what to tell you. Part of the downside of how Wikipedia works is that a lot of decisions are based on the reasonableness of the three or four people who happen to be standing around when shit goes down, and that doesn't always work out in the direction of common sense. I'm sorry I can't say more, but I can't go tell Kbdank what to do, and I don't know enough about the topic to swing more weight around; like Kbdank says, an admin is just a normal editor with a few more buttons. I wish you luck. -GTBacchus(talk) 10:45, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

Hi Espoo. I think it's completely wrong to remove part of a conversation and consider it closed, so I have restored your comments. If the user wants to remove the whole thing, fine, but removing part of it I think is wrong. —Mets501 (talk) 12:07, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
Thank you, both of you. I realise that the original object of the controversy, the hyphen, looks quite insignificant, but the fact that an admin openly gives personal preference and immature argumentation as much value as established practice in reputable sources and says so openly is very bad for WP. The admin violated several basic principles of WP and stood behind those decisions, which is why i didn't just ignore him and only renominate the CfD, as advised by the Mediation Cabal. On the basis of his reaction to my criticism, it's obvious these grave admin errors were not normal, human mistakes that we all make.
I haven't experienced many admins on WP, but most of them seem to be a fair and enlightened crowd. Nevertheless, even if there are/were only a few bad ones, they can and do turn off large numbers of users, especially the real experts, who so far have not contributed much to WP. When word gets around, and it already has, that WP decisions are made by a small arbitrary number of people who happen to be present when deciding and on the basis of their arbitrary level of competence and interest in the matter, most experts and in fact most "normal", fully employed people will not start to contribute to WP and waste their time arguing. And whether or not to include a hyphen is considered as significant as any other spelling decision by "normal" i.e. professional encyclopedia and dictionary editors. The whole point is that the most important job of admins should be to decide which side has more reputable sources, i.e. what's best for WP on the basis of WP policies, i.e. not vote counting and consensus among amateurs and wannabees; otherwise, WP is just a big blog because most editors are not real experts in what they write and because even the expertise they collect from elsewhere can otherwise be deleted or diluted by nonsense.
Therefore i feel that quality control of admin actions is one of the most important improvements necessary in WP. All the complaint channels i found were inappropriate, and they even contradict each other. Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard says ...on the subpage Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents (WP:AN/I). If you want to make an open informal complaint over the behaviour of an admin, you can do so there., but that page says This is not the Wikipedia complaints department. If you came here to complain about the actions of a user or administrator, or if your problem is a content issue and does not need the attention of people with administrator access, then please follow the steps in dispute resolution. These include: mediation, requests for comment, and as a last resort requests for arbitration. I tried mediation, but the case was quickly closed without asking what i thought about that, and the whole problem was turned into a technical issue despite my clear presentation of this as an admin violating WP policies.
WP needs an informal complaint box for bad admin decisions. We can't and shouldn't waste community and especially WP management resources and especially time by turning all disagreements into trials or even mediations or even discussions, but normal users, including experts, need at least the assurance that bad admins will be noticed due to large numbers of reasonable complaints in an informal feedback box. Even companies empower their customers that much. Most community dissatisfaction with bad admins is now a hidden, festering wound that is only a symptom of grave malfunctioning of WP in general. On the basis of large numbers of complaints, a board should implement training and/or disciplinary measures. In addition, admins need to be able to give each other feedback.
Power makes many people blind and arrogant and WP is missing an effective (i.e. light-weight!) method of simultaneously maintaining quality and democratic principles. Kbdank71 is so blind and deaf due to his lack of competence or his power trip that he either didn't read my message or didn't understand it or he repressed it because it pointed out that he should have his adminship revoked. This blindness or deafness is so bad that he doesn't even correct his technical errors. As i wrote:
It looks like you even have problems with the technical aspects of adminship. Despite your decision on Wikipedia:Categories_for_deletion/Log/2006_November_1#Category:Finland-Swedes, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Finland-Swedes still exists.
BTW, i just renominated the category rename Wikipedia:Categories_for_deletion/Log/2006_November_16#Category:Finland-Swedish --Espoo 16:28, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Pronounciation

Good to know that you're a bandwagon mentality editor. If the majority do it, it's right. That's jsut stupid reasoning for doing anything. Anywhere. Ever. I'm going to leave the edits alone, because I can tell you'll a 3rr lawyer. but I think your decision is a sign of poor ethics and even poorer judgement about the application of 'variant' pronounciations. It's NOT pronounced that way by anyone who can read, jsut by the illiterate. The Dictionary doesn't sell if the stupid and the stubborn think the dictionary is wrong, so the Dictionary edits to appease. Wikipedia is free, and has NO such obligations to shareholders. We should, and gneerally do, strive for accuracy, not popularity. ThuranX 17:02, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

1) You don't know how to spell or pronounce "pronunciation" or "mispronunciation".
2) You don't know how to spell "its" ("is not it's job"). (I'll assume all the other spelling and grammar mistakes you make are typos and not intentional.)
3) I normally am the first to defend the rights and dignity of people who don't know how to spell; it is rude and incorrect to claim or believe that people who haven't mastered the insane habits of English spelling (incorrectly called "rules") are less intelligent or less qualified to express an opinion. However, unless dyslexia is involved, lack of spelling skills is a sure sign that one is not an expert on spelling or linguistic issues and that one should not make a fool of oneself in pretending to be one. In fact, most people believe they're experts on their mother tongue just because they can speak and perhaps spell it, whereas in fact only linguists are scientifically trained and qualified to act as experts. (In that sense, almost all discussions on language use by normal people make fools of almost all participants, and they waste a very large part of editing efforts on WP. I'm getting so fed up with this nonsense that i will propose the formation of a copyedit portal or emergency squad to get some sanity and professionalism into this completely amateur aspect of WP.)
4) In your case, you have shown that you not only have problems spelling and are therefore not qualified to pretend to be an expert in this field. In addition, you don't know many basic things about language in general. All the spellings and all pronunciations you are now using were at some point changes of older forms and once considered incorrect "corruptions" by the older generation. Yes, when a large part of the population starts using a new spoken or written form or expression, it is no longer considered incorrect by the population and therefore also by modern dictionaries. The only reason you're so shocked by this pronunciation of "genealogy" is because it's rare where you live. WP is a global encyclopedia and does not cater to only one regional kind of English. If you want to understand at least the fundamentals of how new forms become accepted and how old forms are eventually considered obsolete and then incorrect in all languages, you should start by reading dictionary and Dictionary#Prescription_and_description and linguistic prescription and especially some basic things about the evolution of languages, i.e. linguistics. The days are long gone when dictionaries were used as a part of efforts to force people to use old-fashioned and outdated forms, which essentially produced different completely different languages for official and unofficial use.
5) You have absolutely no idea how dictionaries are made and your conspiracy theories about US dictionaries only show your complete ignorance; such nonsense does not belong in an encyclopedia. The OED is much less prescriptive than US dictionaries and the American Heritage is probably the most prescriptive US dictionary. Since AH lists the changed pronunciation first, it is more widespread in US usage than the traditional pronunciation. Your claim that dictionaries sell better if they are more descriptive (i.e. "permissive") and less prescriptive is the exact opposite of what happens in reality. Most people want dictionaries to be strict schoolmasters and condemn the English used by their children and minorities and other English-speaking countries. Most people are ignorant and learn nothing important in school; that's not surprising since most school education consists of learning to imitate and copy without any real understanding of any school subject. The reason most dictionaries still have some remnants of prescription is because they sell better that way. Most people have so little exposure to literature and other forms of English used by the upper class that they're afraid others will notice their lack of education if the dictionary isn't full of warnings about what not to use to not show they're just normal folks with a minimum of education. You can be very sure that AH wouldn't put the newer pronunciation first if its use would label the user as less educated. People wouldn't buy AH if they were afraid that they couldn't get ahead in the academic and business world by using the first form listed. Exactly because AH wants to not lose customers, your claim that only illiterate people pronounce it the new way is nonsense. All US dictionaries edit to please their readers, but in exactly the opposite direction of what you naively thought. Now that the OED (Oxford English Dictionary) is becoming more commercial, it will probably become at least a bit prescriptive too (so far, it's purely descriptive). I'll go to the library tomorrow to see if it already records the new US (educated) pronunciation and widespread (colloquial) spelling "geneology".
6) Now you can hopefully understand why it is in fact a sign of extreme conservatism and prescriptivism that AH doesn't even mention the very common spelling "geneology". English spelling is not phonetic and in fact more or less chaotic, but spellings like "geneology" do become acceptable when they correspond to a widespread change in pronunciation. US dictionaries are like UK dictionaries based on very detailed and scientific observation of mainly written texts, and exclusively well-edited texts in reputable sources. So the reason why they still don't have the spelling "geneology" despite it probably already being more common than the traditional "genealogy" (in texts written by normal people without spell checkers) is that AH and other US dictionaries ignore texts written by normal people. --Espoo 19:20, 23 November 2006 (UTC)
Well, it's clear you're not a native english speaker from your extreme bias against the language, and the speakers. As for my spelling, I teach, and my students got food into my laptop. Not all keys work all days, and since the meaning is clear, I don't worry on talk pages, saving it for the front page edits. Given your excessive hate of all things english, and apparently, American, I invite you to go edit on of the other language wikipedias, and leave this place of evil and horror behind. ThuranX 04:17, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
These comments of yours are so ridiculous that it's hard to know how to respond, but probably even you realise that gunk in your laptop does not force you to add extra letters and signs. Your regular misspellings "it's" and "pronounciation" and others are clearly not typos or caused by dysfunctional keys. You use extra, not fewer or wrong keys to regularly produce many of your misspellings. Your recurrent "substandard" spellings and the corresponding pronunciation are very widespread among normal users, but they are not yet widely used by educated speakers, which is why they are not yet recorded by any major dictionaries. But all languages are constantly changing, and it's pretty obvious that both the spelling and pronunciation "pronounciation" are becoming so common that they will be added to most dictionaries within the next 20 years or so and will probably be placed before "pronunciation" within the next 50 years or so (in both cases with a lag of about 50 years behind the real language situation, which a truly scientific, i.e. descriptive dictionary like the OED would record). So if someone claims that your spellings show you're uneducated or even illiterate (like you yourself did with "geneology"!), you can say with scientific self-assurance that they show you use modern English and have a good feel for the language. (I'm afraid it may take even more than 50 years before the "phonetic", i.e. phonemic spelling "its" will replace the unnecessary distinction between "it's" and "its" that gives you and most people such a hard time.)
And your ridiculous idea of my "bias against the language" is apparently caused by you confusing the language with its outdated and deficient spelling system, which is only a bad tool, nothing intrinsically English. By the way, it's quite widespread that the people who have the most trouble with this insane and increasingly analphabetic spelling system based on centuries-old pronunciation are also among its most adamant defenders, not unlike the relationship between victims and their torturers.
I have no idea where you got the ridiculous ideas of me not being a native speaker or hating especially American things when you were the one ranting against well-established US spellings and pronunciations and US dictionaries and i was defending them. Seems like very many basic things are completely muddled up and upside down in your head. --Espoo 07:50, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Re:Encyclopædia Britannica

Hi,

Did you ever report Bramlet Abercrombie for violation of WP:3RR as you wanted to? [1] What was the result?

Did you notice he slyly reverted again and without any explanation or even an edit summary? [[2]] He definitely wants to hide things and is not interested in an unbiased and objective article. --Espoo 10:17, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

When I said I was goingto report him, I meant I would if he did it one more time. The second diff is him removing it as per consensus on the talk page. He's not a bad guy, he just felt it was POV, which I suppose in a way it was. Anyhow, we decided that we should remove it, but added the inforamtion elsewhere in article (as you can in the diff). Thanks for trying to help, though. NauticaShades 10:22, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Re Talk:Académie française

Just took a look; that satisfied pretty much all my concerns. I'm going to stay neutral on this move for now, however. Thanks! — stickguy (:^›)— || talk || 16:50, 25 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] copyedit portal

I am not sure what to make of your essay to me, I just do simple copyedits. Thanks Hmains 03:38, 28 November 2006 (UTC)

Basically what i'm saying is that it would make sense to found something like Wikipedia:WikiProject League of Copyeditors, which i didn't know existed.
And if you don't understand what i wrote to you, then it seems you're very lucky and haven't wasted your time arguing with people who think their personal opinions are as valid as what dictionaries and other reference works and WP:MOS say about spelling, naming, and other copyedit issues. Unless copyeditors get together and enforce basic WP policies, all our work will drown in the onslaught of people who don't even know the most rudimentary things about writing an encyclopedia. --Espoo 05:28, 28 November 2006 (UTC)
Hi Espoo, that's a damn good idea. I wish I had some more time---I'd join your project stat. Just to help throw some anarchy out the window. I hope to be back soon. UNT, JackLumber. 21:34, 28 November 2006 (UTC)

Hi Espoo. Thank you for doing Balikpapan. I read through the debate on Talk:Académie française even though I was feeling unwell. I do not think my copyediting qualifies as professional, though I do think it is adequate for the articles I copyedit; so I cannot pronounce decisively on naming conventions. This is the extent of my judgement:

You are right that the most common name used in English should have precedence over the native name.

In support of your argument, you have cited various Google searches which put the number of hits of French Academy above Académie française; you also cite encyclopedias as using French Academy and not Académie française. Your opponents have put forth counterarguments that particular reputable sources — the Economist, a myriad of newspapers, certain university presses — use Académie française instead of French Academy. You dismiss these arguments, saying the most notable sources use Académie française as a kind of snobbery. They also cite their own web statistics, which you dismiss.

As far as I can tell, though not being an authoritative judge, the debate is moot. I do not have time to check the validity of the web statistics, and I do not have any predisposition to the premises of their arguments about authority or yours. If you were to show decisively, to those without prior opinions, French Academy is more accepted as the English use over Académie française, you would unambiguously win the debate. In the end, the issue is a judgement call which one makes.

I have personally seen Académie française more often in print — i.e., not often — and heard Académie française spoken more frequently than French Academy — i.e., rarely. I would support either position, whether it moves or not.

If you believe this issue is important and your reasons are certainly valid, I suggest you take the issue up with an administrator or to some kind of arbitration. The scope of my copyediting qualifications does not extend to naming conventions. A professional copyeditor might be able to help you more than I, but I am not a professional. Rintrah 13:52, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

Hi. You're right, I have been doing a lot of work, and it is rash to delist myself. I was feeling very ill yesterday and I realised I should scale back my activities on wikipedia — because there is so much else to do. By copyediting so many articles, I hoped to improve my own writing. I wanted to elevate myself from an amateur copyeditor to a professional one. I shall continue copyediting, and finish what I set out to do. I have thus put my name back on the list. Rintrah 05:25, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] French Academy

Hi Espoo. I got your link after the RM discussion had already been closed as a "no consensus". I can see why you find it frustrating. The guideline says that, if an English language name is in common use, then we should use it. I'm mildly surprised to see that "French Academy" is used as widely as your sources show it to be - personally, I've only ever heard it called The Academie Francaise (with or without diacritics), and I grew up in Texas! Nevertheless my personal anecdotal experience means nothing when it comes to making decisions for the encyclopedia.

It does seem to be the case that most people in that discussion were willing to discount Wikipedia:Naming conventions (use English) in this case. Why not bring it up there, on the guideline talk page? I'll bet that's a good place to find people who care about that guideline, as well as people who've dealt with similar controversial cases in the past. I've added the guideline to my watchlist; I'll keep an eye out for what kind of response you get there. If Académie française is to be an exception to the Use English guideline, then I think it should be explained why it is, and how to recognize such exceptions in the future. -GTBacchus(talk) 20:33, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for these wise and constructive comments and suggestions. I was beginning to wonder if it makes any sense to continue spending time researching and contributing if my research is just ignored. I'd realised that the WP conventions are not formulated clearly and forcefully enough and was considering suggesting improvements to them, but you're probably right in suggesting to first start a discussion on the talk page.
Basically, it seems the guidelines should state plainly that the English name should be used even if the foreign name is used more often, as long as the English name is used by at least some reputable sources, especially if these include other encyclopedias. More specifically, all the edit help files and the MoS need clear warnings to not use Google searches and frequencies except in rare cases and clear warnings on how to avoid searching in amateur ways. Most WP editors have no idea with how much effort and precision dictionaries and other reference works are produced and seriously believe they can use Google to come up with better or more precise terminology than in other reference works. This is of course related to the more fundamental problem that most people think they're experts on English if it's their mother tongue whereas only very few people like linguists and copyedit experts in fact know what they're talking about. MoS needs a warning to concentrate on being original in what WP is good at, content, and to defer to usage in other reference works in what most of us are amateurs in, terminology. --Espoo 20:33, 2 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Balikpapan

Various editing tags might be relevant to Balikpapan. If you find the content confusing, perhaps add {{confusing}}; if the content seems inaccurate, perhaps add {{verify}}. There is also a tag for insufficient context. The Cleanup page lists all the possible tags you can use. Rintrah 05:49, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Punctuation Questions

I hope I do not commit another grammatical faux pas. Oops. Rintrah 13:18, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

We all do those, so it's just a question of time. Since we're copyeditors, here's wishing you and me lots of time before the next one, which is sure to come though. After all, we're human. --Espoo 13:29, 5 December 2006 (UTC)
That brings in mind Pope's "to err is human". Because I know more than the general populace on some things, I sometimes forget I make mistakes. I could burn incense to propitiate mischevious gods who put erroneous thoughts in my mind. At least my knowledge of English grammar is better than of Latin grammar. Rintrah 14:46, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Finnish people

Greetings. While explaining the naming conventions in the different forms of the English language may seem an important aspect with regads to using the proper ethnic terminology, such information hardly belongs to the introduction of an article on an ethnic group? Also, I think a far too long discussion of this (off) topic follows in the article on "Finland-Swedes". Perhaps you could consider starting a whole new article on ethnic naming conventions rather than keep inserting such text in the separate articles? Clarifer 15:01, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

Hi, you're right that the discussion in the article on "Swedish-speaking Finns" is so long that it almost merits a new article, but none of the info is superfluous and it's definitely not off topic. Most people do not know what is explained there, and without that explanation, the article would continue to be the subject of attempts to change the name back to the old-fashioned and misleading name "Finland Swedes". You yourself didn't know what is explained there, as shown by your incorrect claims about US English and direct translations.

And your goal of a short intro is laudable, but you don't seem to understand several things already pointed out by my edits and their summaries or only implied by my edits of factually incorrect info.

1) It is simply factually incorrect to write "The terms Finns and Finnish people are usually used in English to refer to the ethnic group historically associated with Finland or Fennoscandia." Therefore we definitely need to say what was there originally, i.e. "The terms Finns and Finnish people are usually used in English to mean "a native or inhabitant of Finland", but they are also used to refer to the ethnic group historically associated with Finland or Fennoscandia and are only used in that sense here." My only contribution was to rewrite that in better English. It's not me who "keeps inserting"; it's you who keeps removing, and the result is factually incorrect.

2) The designation of any group of people is one of the most important aspects of a description of that group and often the most difficult thing too. According to WP's manual of style and general practice and in order to avoid edits by angry users who only read the intro, we definitely need to explain all the terms in use in the intro and, if they are ambiguous, explain their meaning in normal English. We also can't call things analogous or historical that aren't, as you did.

3) As explained in WP's manual of style and in Wikipedia:Lead_section, the intro can in fact be longer than it is now and should even include new things that are still missing:

The lead section should briefly summarize the most important points covered in an article in such a way that it could stand on its own as a concise version of the article. It is even more important here than for the rest of the article that the text be accessible, and consideration should be given to creating interest in reading the whole article (see news style and summary style). The first sentence in the lead section should be a concise definition of the topic unless that definition is implied by the title (such as 'History of …' and similar titles).

The lead should be capable of standing alone as a concise overview of the article, establishing context, explaining why the subject is interesting or notable, and describing its notable controversies, if there are any. It should be between one and four paragraphs long, should be carefully sourced as appropriate, and should be written in a clear and accessible style so that the reader is encouraged to read the rest of the article.

The appropriate length of the lead section depends on the total length of the article. As a general guideline, the lead should be no longer than three to four paragraphs. --Espoo 16:19, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

Your logic is of course impeccable. However, the down side of it is that you seem to produce very tedious text. How about some KISS? I stand corrected in my efforts of simplifying (e.g. "that have been living in...for centuries" into "historical immigrants") and for trying to avoid repetition (e.g. defining the scope of an article twice) and apologise if this has made an article "factually incorrect". Clarifer 19:43, 14 December 2006 (UTC)
Thank you for the compliment about the logic of my edits. If you don't agree with my style or can think of other ways to improve WP, please feel free to do so, but please remember that an encyclopedia is not literature in the strict sense, in other words it is not belles-lettres. More specifically, it is better to write what you call "tedious" text whose style others can improve than to write text that is incorrect or misleading.
Since i am a copyeditor, i could of course take your claim of tediousness as an insult, but i'll assume you didn't know that is my profession (despite its mention on my user page and on talk pages you've read) nor that that was your intent. On the other hand, you should be careful with such characterisations of other people's writing because less professional and more insecure users of English could very well be quite upset, and with reason, by such comments. It would be more constructive and less insulting to explain why you think a specific passage should be removed or shortened or expressed differently. This is especially true if the other person has explained the reasons for their edit, but not only then.
In my case, your claim is of course especially questionable because your native language is obviously not English and because you provide no support for your attempt to disparage the editing work of a native speaker who is a professional user of English. More specifically, you don't even explain what you mean with "tedious" and KISS. I spent a lot of time trying to enlighten you on the principles of writing a good lead section, and you apparently even agreed to the logic of both my application of those principles and to the content of my edits. If with "tedious" and lack of KISS you still mean that summarising an article in the lead section is an unnecessary repetition of the article's main points, then you simply have not understood what a lead section and its purpose are. Please reread the above guidelines and be more specific in your criticism, which also obviates the need to characterise my edits in a general way. --Espoo 12:05, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Kbdank71 mediation

It seems Wikipedia:Mediation Cabal/Cases/2006-11-09 Kbdank71 has become obsolete since Wikipedia:Categories_for_deletion/Log/2006_November_16#Category:Finland-Swedish has been closed as "Rename", as you requested. I'll close the case for now; if this was an error, please let User:-Bobby and me know and I'll reopen it. — Sebastian 07:41, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

Actually, as explained above and in my description in the mediation cabal, the original renaming controversy was and is quite insignificant and not what the mediation was about. The mediation was about the fact that an admin openly gave personal preference and immature argumentation as much value as established practice in reputable sources and said so openly, which is very bad for WP. The admin violated several basic principles of WP and stood behind those decisions, which is why i didn't just ignore him and only renominate the CfD, as advised by the Mediation Cabal. On the basis of his reaction to my criticism, it's obvious these grave admin errors were not normal, human mistakes that we all make.

However, i myself suggested to Bobby that we at least temporarily shelve this because Kbdank71 is dealing with a family emergency. In addition, it may indeed be best to completely forget about the whole thing because Kbdank71 would, if convinced by mediation to admit he did something wrong (or forced to do so by an authority figure), no doubt claim that he would not have reacted the way he did if the renaming issue had not been a seemingly trivial hyphen. --Espoo 09:17, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

If that's how you feel, you might as well keep it open. While yes, this happened to be about a hyphen, it didn't have to be. I don't believe I violated any basic principles of WP, and yes, I still stand by my decision (hyphen or not). --Kbdank71 17:15, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Saparmurat Niyazov

Thank you for experimenting with Wikipedia. Your test worked, and it has been reverted or removed. Please use the sandbox for any other tests you may want to do. Take a look at the welcome page to learn more about contributing to our encyclopedia. KazakhPol 22:33, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

It seems you don't know how to use the history log. These are my simple copyedit changes:
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Saparmurat_Niyazov&diff=95992685&oldid=95992598
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Saparmurat_Niyazov&diff=95993352&oldid=95993137 --Espoo 22:45, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
Do not remove valid warnings from your talkpage. KazakhPol 23:22, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
Now you owe me 2 more apologies. I did not "not remove vandal warnings", but you removed my comment which showed your warning was not valid and shows you don't know basic things about how to use WP and how to treat other editors. Who do you think you are trying to censor my comments on a talk page? Do you work for the KGB or the Turmenistan equivalent? --Espoo 23:29, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] League of Copyeditors participation drive!

Dear League member,

We've started a participation drive for the remainder of February. If you can, please help clear the backlog by adopting the following goals each week:

Thanks for your help! BuddingJournalist 08:42, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Sheerness‎ FAC

Hi. I'm sorry to bother you, but as a LoCE member, I just wondered if you would be willing to have a look through the Sheerness‎ article. It is currently a Featured Article Candidate and needs a copy-edit for grammar by someone who hasn't yet seen it. Any other ways to improve the article would also be welcome. Thank you very much, if you can. Epbr123 17:36, 8 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Merge/Coordination proposal

I will suggest you to find Alex because waste management is his expertise. OhanaUnitedTalk page 09:54, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] electronica

Hi - just wanted to apologize for reverting your copyedit at Electronica when I removed the reference. I was going too fast and didn't look carefully enough at your edit. Sorry about that... Your change does make the intro more clear, thanks. --Parsifal Hello 07:05, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Myanmar Shave

Thanks for the heads-up on the incorrect use of Myanmar — also for continuing the conversion of Myanmar to Burma in the article. I started it — manually — and tho't, "there's gotta be a better way". I now have wikiEd installed. Unfortunately, before I could start using it, I had to make a dash for the hospital. I generally don't like starting things and then leaving them; I'm more wont to revert my own changes rather than leave it a bad mishmash.

BTW, did you do the changes manually or did you use a bot? I could've continued manually, I think: I can hyperfocus, sometimes bordering on OCD, on a repetitive task for hours when the situation is right (strangely, I do this most when I'm tired as opposed to energetic and motivated). I wasn't tired enough today, so I looked for and installed my very first bot. Ooooh, look at all the pretty buttonses!

I'm a bit of a Luddite, or perhaps a throwback. On the information superhighway, I'm stuck at a tollbooth looking under the seatcushions for nickels. I did some CompSci back in university — a year before they retired the punch-card reader; my first and only TV video game was a RadioShack version of Pong; I long for the days of Hack and Rogue and line numbers in BASIC. Given this stunning level of technogeekery (-geezery?) can you recommend a bot or two that would be useful to an editor like me? Thanks, and cheers. --SigPig |SEND - OVER 19:04, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

Sorry, can't help you. I still haven't gotten around to learning about WP bots and editing tools. In any case, changing M to B would be very difficult with a bot because you need to keep M in quotes, titles of sources, and perhaps elsewhere. Where can i get wikiEd and read about it? I couldn't find anything on WP, and the Google results were confusing. --Espoo 19:25, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

Right here. --SigPig |SEND - OVER 09:11, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Burma/Myanmar

Thanks for the feedback. I didn't exactly "miss" the evidence you presented, but it simply would not have been feasible to cover every argument made in detail. --Michael Snow 16:02, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

I can understand that you didn't want to take sides by presenting details of the proof for preferred use in academic and expert use, but your article fails to present an or the essential element of the discussion:

Especially interested outsiders would be interested to know that the whole problem was much less political than it looked even to those participating in the discussion. Basically it was a fight between UK and US common usage (that ignored use in professional sources), which almost none of the participants were aware of until afterwards, and even then only some realised this.

Even more importantly, most discussions about language use on WP are just as chaotic because there are not enough professional linguists among WP editors and because even very intelligent discussion members believe in Google statistics without knowing enough about language to interpret them correctly and don't have enough sense and leisure to call a few experts in at least the 2 "most important" English-speaking countries. The insanely short 5-day period for discussions is a major cause of the lack of common sense and lack of input from experts and of the excess of emotions and feelings of panic in these discussions. Due to the 5-day limit, WP is reducing the input to mostly very active WP editors and ignoring the fact that real experts have real lives and jobs and do not spend enough time on WP to have even a small chance of noticing such discussions in time. --Espoo 17:09, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

Burma again Talk:Burma#Survey —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.241.189.89 (talk) 04:38, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Copyedit request

Hi, I was wondering whether you could copyedit the article Holden, which is currently a featured article candidate. The remaining concerns are to do with the prose, and If you could take a look, it would be greatly appreciated. OSX (talk • contributions) 09:26, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

League of Copyeditors roll call
Greetings from the League of Copyeditors. Your name is listed on our members page, but we are unsure how many of the people listed there are still active contributors to the League's activities. If you are still interested in participating in the work of the League, please follow the instructions at the members page to add your name to the active members list. Once you have done that, you might want to familiarise yourself with the new requests system, which has replaced the old /proofreading subpage. As the old system is now deprecated, the main efforts of the League should be to clear the substantial backlog which still exists there.
The League's services are in as high demand as ever, as evinced by the increasing backlog on our requests pages, both old and new. While FA and GA reviewers regularly praise the League's contributions to reviewed articles, we remain perennially understaffed. Fulfilling requests to polish the prose of Wikipedia's highest-profile articles is a way that editors can make a very noticeable difference to the appearance of the encyclopedia. On behalf of the League, if you do consider yourself to have left, I hope you will consider rejoining; if you consider yourself inactive, I hope you will consider returning to respond to just one request per week, or as many as you can manage. Merry Christmas and happy editing, The League of Copyeditors.

[edit] Spiritualism

Hi.

without spending too much time on the diffs, I have agreed with you on the talk page about the additional general use of spiritism/spiritualism. --Lucyintheskywithdada (talk) 02:24, 10 January 2008 (UTC)


Be bold ... thank you.
What are you feelings regarding redirecting Spiritualism to Mediumship, or do you think it requires a new topic of its own, something close to a general introduction or disambiguation page?
Do you think the Wikipedia could benefit from some kind of infobox on spiritualism (lower 's')? Personally, I think there is a good argument to place spiritualism somewhere in between and separate from the Wikiprojects on "Spirituality" and "Paranormal". I see there is a Category for but not spiritualism. Its all seems a little loose or duplicative. --Lucyintheskywithdada (talk) 05:31, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Hi. Sorry i didn't answer earlier, but i was and am very busy.

I'm no expert, but it seems that the religious movement called Spiritualism is more than mediumship and is in any case significant enough to merit an article of its own. Even if it's not significant enough to warrant an article as long as the current one, it would be very difficult to get consensus on how to reduce the content enough to make it fit as a subsection of the mediumship article.

What do you mean with an infobox? I think we should make a new article on spiritualism that can start out as a disambig page but that at least states what this word normally means in English:

1 a system of belief or religious practice based on supposed communication with the spirits of the dead, especially through mediums. 2 Philosophy: the doctrine that the spirit exists as distinct from matter, or that spirit is the only reality. --Espoo (talk) 10:27, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Espoo, no one does a move without opening the move up to discussion, and then giving interested parties a reasonable time to respond. What you have done seems like a sure way to make other editors angry--as if you know so much better than everyone else that you do not need to solicit feedback. I would have expected better from an experienced editor.--Anthon.Eff (talk) 15:48, 16 January 2008 (UTC)
Anthon, please see Talk:Spiritualism (religious movement) --Espoo (talk) 06:48, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
Hi. Anthon.Eff did make a fair point about all the broken links in the Wikipedia now.
See the new topic for infobox. I agreed with your rational and have developed a general, world view, "Spiritualism" topic page. I utterly agree with the general use of the word and the academic references are there to support it. Perhaps you can add details to other meanings of spiritualism or spiritual practises?
I would also appreciate some help fixing those links. I am going through the list of pages linking to Spiritualism. Most but not all refer to Spiritualism (religious movement) and some clearly to Spiritualism. It would be great if you help me 'walk the talk' here.
Thank you. --Lucyintheskywithdada (talk) 16:07, 20 January 2008 (UTC)
OK, I think I cover most of the links but it might be worth double checking
Can you have a look at this and see if you think it is fair? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:Spiritualism_small. I offered it up for discussion a few days ago.
It appears that I have raised Anthon.Eff's ire and he has nominated it for deletion, here; [3] in what it is hard for me to not interpret as a tit for tat in sticking a WP:3RR notice on his talk page and challenging him over the spiritualism issue. I entirely stand by your point of separating the historical religious movement from the general and specific uses of the word and do not understand what has set him off in this case?!? --Lucyintheskywithdada (talk) 19:25, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

I'm sorry i don't have time to help right now. I'll hopefully have time on the weekend. --Espoo (talk) 11:37, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

OK. Appreciate the answer. Take a look, I think things are developing nicely. --Lucyintheskywithdada (talk) 05:42, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
Boy, you really did open a can of worms with that split/move of this topic! Would be good if you came back and checked in to see how your baby is getting on sometime.--Lucyintheskywithdada (talk) 02:18, 13 February 2008 (UTC)


I have to agree that Spiritualism (beliefs) does not make sense either. I mean, surely that should be just what it says, focusing on the belief structure of spiritualism rather than, say, the history of spiritualism.
As you missed it, Espoo, I have to flag up that the page was moved to Spiritualism (beliefs) without ANY discussion or consensus and after a fudge over a move to Spiritualism (philosophy) which was even more erroneous. At that time Neal had not heard of such a use.
I also want to flag up that,
a) the move was being discuss formally on the correct page but that only two editors felt strongly enough to be bothered to engage, Anthon and I [4]
b) talk page surveys are not consider binding
c) both Anthon.eff and the new editor to the page, Nealparr, had had previous dealings with the admin that made the unilateral moves Dreadstar, and both were prepared to engage in a deeply obsessive mass disruption and edit wars over the spiritualism/spiritualistic infobox I made which the former failed to have RfD. Anthon has on more than one occasion continued to make prejudicial allegation to discredit me even though we have discussed and evidence the issue beforehand, including to this admin.
There is little to suggest that the moves were based on the academic literature. --Lucyintheskywithdada (talk) 10:59, 18 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Sibel Edmonds

thank you for your observation. I've replied here.  — Xiutwel ♫☺♥♪ (speech has the power to bind the absolute) 15:47, 26 February 2008 (UTC)

  • You have mentioned the need for including her testimony on the talk pages of several articles. Let me start at the beginning: are you satisfied with what is mentioned of "what she discovered" in her own article? How can we work together on this?  — Xiutwel ♫☺♥♪ (speech has the power to bind the absolute) 16:36, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Norman Mineta

Dear Espoo,

I would welcome any improvements you could make to my proposal at Talk:9/11#Norman Mineta testimony issue !  — Xiutwel ♫☺♥♪ (speech has the power to bind the absolute) 06:53, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] request your input in a consensus survey re 9/11

Dear Espoo,

At Talk:9/11#defining consensus I started a survey to get a better picture on how editor's opinions are varying with respect to the following statement:

"The current form of the 9/11 article is at odds with the WP:NPOV policy, and the proposed inclusion of the fact that Michael Meacher alleges the US government of willfully not preventing the attacks, would make the article better, in stead of worse.

I would appreciate it when you could take a look.  — Xiutwel ♫☺♥♪ (speech has the power to bind the absolute) 17:11, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] DirectX

Hi, I saw your addition to Talk:DirectX. Did you have an actual question about DX10 and WinXP? All you did was paste in a long list of operating systems -- please edit your comment to remove unnecessary text and add context so that we can understand what you are trying to say. Ham Pastrami (talk) 04:47, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Copyedit request

Hello, I am contacting you because you're a member of the League of Copyeditors. Would you be interested in taking a look at Highlander: The Series (season 1) which is currently a Featured List Candidate ? The quality of the prose is the only remaining objection to its promotion and I would really appreciate your help. Have a nice day, Rosenknospe (talk) 13:06, 17 May 2008 (UTC)