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This is the archive of un-resolved complaints from Wikipedia:General complaints. See Wikipedia:General complaints (resolved) for the archive of resolved issues.

Contents 1 List of archive sub-pages 2 Un-Resolved items not yet archived 2.1 Wikipedia:Cleanup 2.2 Main page status vs. level of "did you know" trivia 2.3 Wikipedia symbol/link invisible 2.4 Michael Jackson 2005 Trial 2.5 China's Second Artillery Corps 2.6 Listing in Categories and things like that 2.7 Soundfile Problem 2.8 Glitch in word wrapping on screen and at printer 2.9 What to Do When Someone Is Determined to Be Biased 2.10 User names 2.11 PDA Accessability 2.12 CategoryTOC template 2.13 Deletionists 2.14 Mindless Self Indulgence "what links here" - broken? 2.15 Too much reverts on Chen Yonglin 2.16 Turkmen interwiki links 2.17 Quagmire: Something fresh to complain about 2.18 Wikipédia française 2.19 Wiki Administrators: Systemic Left/Liberal Bias 2.20 Anchor's Away on Diff 2.21 The text in the Wikipedia logo graphic looks nasty in the Amethyst skin 2.22 Create Account/Log In Button 2.23 Certain images not displaying in Firefox

[edit] List of archive sub-pages

When there are 50 or more sections, the next 50 are moved into a newly creatred archive page.

• /group1 (first 50 sections moved to the "UnResolved" page)

[edit] Un-Resolved items not yet archived

[edit] Wikipedia:Cleanup

I always love it when project pages fight each other. Remember that time Wikipedia:Votes for Deletion tried to kill us? Yeah. Well, I really have to point out that Cleanup is, infact, itself in serious need of help.

1. . It's a mess. There really out to be some sort of organizing. over in Wikipedia:Requests they organize things by topic, not by date.
2. . Too big. My second complaint is the same reason I can't fix this. In my opinion, it ought to be archived by months (and by topic); the page is huge, I have dial-up, and I just can't find my way around.

Best of luck. -Litefantastic 01:36, 6 Sep 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Main page status vs. level of "did you know" trivia

The Wikipedia Main Page is read by gazillions of people every week. This in itself should create a need for a "lower cutoff" on the "did you know" trivia section. As in, if less than 0.1 person per thousand might bother reading the particular piece of trivia, then something else should be there. Right?

While reading the Main Page, I stumbled on the following, under the heading "Did You Know":

...that in the Ulster Cycle of Irish mythology, Ness' son Conchobar mac Nessa was brought up as the son of the druid Cathbad, although the true father may have been her lover, Fachtna Fáthach, the High King of Ireland?

No offense against the Irish, the druids, the Wikipedia, but I just can't help feeling that this bit of trivia might be, er, just a bit too trivial. (Pun intended.)

We all know that J.R.R. Tolkien derived part of his vocabulary and ideas for the mythology from the Finnish National Heritage Epic Kalevala. Now, as a Finn, I'd be severely flattered to find a bit of trivia on Joukahainen's travails on Wikipedia Main Page. But, believe it or not, I'd still complain about the level of triviality.

(Nobody's fault! Of course the existing Trivia Engine has been appropriate for ages. But as things grow, parts have to be adjusted. And I just happened to be the one noticing this one.) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.186.128.225 (talk • contribs) 16:43, 26 January 2005

[edit] Wikipedia symbol/link invisible

The wikipedia symbol in the upper left of all pages that links to the main page is invisible on several versions of ie in different OS versons (2k, xp, me...)

[edit] Michael Jackson 2005 Trial

The discussion page is broken, and needs fixing. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Kelisi (talk • contribs) 22:37, 5 April 2005

[edit] China's Second Artillery Corps

It appears that there is no article about China's strategic missle force. This seems extremely odd to me considering the effort that went into making the page on the People's Liberation Army. I can't remember if I have read this article before but I'm guessing that this was completely deleted by someone. --Hypo 19:32, 20 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Listing in Categories and things like that

I think that articles that start, for example, with an accent, such as Á or È or Õ (for example, Álvaro Cunhal, do you get it?) should be listed in categories, or other listings that take the first letter in account, under that same letter without the accent. For languages that use accents everywhere, such as mine, Portuguese, considering Á as another letter is a very strange thing to see.Afonso Silva 13:44, 21 May 2005 (UTC)

As a Swede my experience is the opposite. For me it is very strange to see the letters Å and Ä listed under A (and Ö under O). :-)

[edit] Soundfile Problem

hi, sorry for bothering, i'm not really sure how to use this, but could u guys please fix the "Edison speech, 1920s.ogg" if possible, it doesn't play for some reason, might be broken. I'd appreciate that very much, thanx.

~Raksha

[edit] Glitch in word wrapping on screen and at printer

From time to time Wiki does not wrap text around pictures properly, either on the screen or at the printer. The page meta:Election candidates 2005/En had this problem on the printer when Athere's picture was on the left hand side. I changed the image command from "left" to "right" and it worked OK.

Sometimes, the box containing the list of Categories is printed on the screen so that it obscures a line or two of text. Hard to say why or when, but it is a little annoying.

[edit] What to Do When Someone Is Determined to Be Biased

I hope I've got this in the right place. When recently on the wikipage for teenage pregnancy, I noticed the [Abstinence section] was extraordinarily biased and contained false information. I changed it to show both sides (you can see what I changed it from and to by visiting [my website page about the incident]; I show both the original version and my version.

The day after editing, it had been changed to a biased description again (this time perhaps worse than the first one). I changed it again to provide the unbiased and informative version that I had written. Today, it is changed a second time.

This is highly disturbing. People come here for information--unbiased information. I have my opinion about teenage pregnancy and abstinence, but I was more than willing to give both sides and make references to reports for and against it (again, as seen on my website). Instead, though, there repeatedly is the biased side that only "uptight Christians" are in support of such methods; be this true or not ultimately, it is completely subjective to target one group when there is no factual evidence to prove such a thing. It is also unfair to Christians who are not in support of abstinence, and it is unfair to non-Christians who do follow this method.

Please compare the following two versions for this page, and see which is more appropriate.

The Current Version To avoid unwanted pregnancy, there are many Christian religious groups in US that advacte for an abstaining approach, preferring and preaching a lifestyle of "sex only after marriage." These groups (and others) often push for the adoption of "adstinence programs". Studies vary in showing the effectiveness of abstinence programs and all such studies come under heavy critism from the opponents of the studies results.

My Version Some groups in the U.S. believe that sexual abstinence alone is the only safe way to reduce teenage pregnancies and the spread of life-altering and sometimes deadly diseases, such as AIDS and innumerable sexually transmitted diseases. Religious groups especially tend to lean more toward an abstaining approach, preferring and preaching a lifestyle of "sex only after marriage." In more secular groups, this priority tends to be of less importance; "safe sex" is often promoted more in these circles.

On the scientific front, studies vary in showing the effectiveness of abstinence programs. These programs and their tactics have varied through the decades, and so studies on them may have a wide range of results in a small amount of time; there are many variations of abstinence programs. It must also be taken into consideration that some studies only show statistical information for abstinence-only programs, while others focus on abstinence and comprehensive education programs, which teach abstinence as the preferred method but also teach the regular comprehensive sex health information. Oftentimes, studies will not make the differentiation between the programs, therefore leading one to believe that abstinence programs--as a whole, rather than specifically detailed--are either all effective or not effective at all. As with all scientific studies on controversial matters, it is easy for information to be tainted one way or another. Ultimately, decisions made about abstinence are personal ones.

Some positive studies: Abstinence Education Programs' Effectiveness, FAQ of the Title V Abstinence Education Program with statistics inside, Abstinence: Numbers Don't Lie, Condoms, Clinics, or Abstinence.

Some contrasting studies: Adolescence and Abstinence Fact Sheet, The Decline in Teen Pregnancy Rates: A Result of Abstinence and Contraception, Not Abstinence-Only Programs, Study: Abstinence pledges may trigger risky sexual behavior.

Perhaps also to be noted is that the president of the National Institute for Sexual Health, Joe S. McIlhaney, Jr., MD, supports abstinence and its educational programs in a recent testimony made to the United States House of Representatives.

Under the Bill Clinton administration, the Title V Abstinence Education Program was created. It is still in existence and still federally funded. As shown in some of the positive studies, Title V claims effective and positive results for their programs which promote abstinence.

The George W. Bush administration has largely supported and extensively funded abstinence programs, coming under some fire from the more liberal of American society who, on average, believe in comprehensive sex education, which focuses more on safe sex than any other approach. Typically, conservative individuals lean more toward promoting abstinence, and therefore support this newly aggressive funding approach with a more positive attitude.

I rest my case. But I can't make any difference considering someone keeps changing it back, be it an admin or not.

[edit] User names

I'm just curious why wikipedia doesn't have user names for editing pages. It seems like it would add ligitmacy to the page or edit if you knew who did it. People who messed around could be banned. I know this has been thought of, I just don't understand why things are they way they are. Anyone know?

• Wikipedia does have usernames, and edits are shown in the edit history for an article alongside the summary and the date of the edit. If people do mess around, then they are warned, and eventually banned. If you make an edit without a username, you are temporarily assigned a username that is your IP address, and this can be banned if people make malicious edits anonymously. Insomniacity 10:09, 20 July 2005 (UTC)
• See Wikipedia:Username. --Gabriel Beecham/Kwekubo 18:23, 23 July 2005 (UTC)

but the problem is that the wikipedia policy of allowing non-loggedin "users" to edit articles is just plain dumb. us legitimate editors are wasting more and more time reverting vandalism. this must be changed. r b-j 18:40, 20 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] PDA Accessability

I'm surprised Wikipedia isn't more PDA-friendly. Sure, the FAQ menations the table-free version and the text-only version, but that's not the issue; every recent PDA browser I've used can handle tables and images. The problem is the screens being 4 inches wide, and until clothing makers start making bigger pockets, PDAs will be getting no wider. In a PDA version of Wikipedia, that sidebar on the left should go to either the top or bottom of the page. Otherwise the page can only be viewed by scrolling side to side on every line. Fun. Even the table-free text-free version approximates a table-like sidebar, so in IE for Pocket PC I get articles with two or three words per line in "fit to screen" mode, and lines that run off the edge of the screen otherwise.

There is a downloadable PDA version of Wikipedia available, in the TomeRaider format (see Wikipedia:TomeRaider database). Note that these downloads were last synchronised with the Wikipedia in December 2004. Gabriel Beecham/Kwekubo 18:22, 23 July 2005 (UTC)

I think that a theme/style for wikipedia that is PDA accessible wouldn't be too hard to CSS up. Not that I could do it :(. Also, some pocket pcs [come with/can be downloaded onto] a program that gives you true VGA with a larger resolution, thus allowing web browsing of non PDA friendly pages. I'm not sure about the text size you'd get though. — Ilγαηερ (Tαlκ) 16:36, 5 August 2005 (UTC)

I too would like to see wikipedia PDA friendly, and not workarounds, especially, no downloads. If every website required some software or enhancement to be installed on my PDA to use their website, I wouln't get very far. This is not a desktop in my hand.

[edit] CategoryTOC template

The CategoryTOC template doesn't seem to work, based on two big categories i tried it on.Gzuckier 16:50, 29 July 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Deletionists

Th most famous people on Wiki is those who have no work other than cring "DELETE!" ...

They occupy pages on yahoo and google, while a single line about some poor guy is deleted.

They form the Wiki Mafia.

So what do you suggest we do about them? DES ^(talk) 22:58, 7 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Mindless Self Indulgence "what links here" - broken?

Special:Whatlinkshere/Mindless_Self_Indulgence shows Wikipedia:9/11 victims as linking to Mindless Self Indulgence. But it DOESN'T! :P What's with that? Hosterweis (talk) (contribs) 22:28, 17 August 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Too much reverts on Chen Yonglin

On this page, even minor edits regarding spelling and links get edited. The guy responsible said "If you do not want your writing to be edited mercilessly and redistributed at will, do not submit it." I'm not even frogging vandalising!

Wikipedia is not supposed to be a forum. It is an encyclopedia. Do you think Britannica or World Book would be at all successful if they had misspellings?Twilight Realm 21:26, 23 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Turkmen interwiki links

Interwiki links to articles in Turkmen appear in both Arabic and Cyrillic letters. Since the Turkmen-language wikipedia is written in the Latin alphabet, which is the official way to write Turkmen in Turkmenistan, I think it should also be applied in presenting the interwiki links.

[edit] Quagmire: Something fresh to complain about

First off, I founded this page. My very first comment, which is still available on the Talk page, reads:

Okay, I really didn't know where else to go with this, but I just have all these complaints (nothing REALLY serious, but important enough) that I decided to make this page.

My complaints are:

1. The search engine has worked properly for about ONE week since I joined in November of '03. What's wrong with it?
2. The site moves like a turtle at times. I'm using broadband and yet it still takes an almost unrealistic amount of time to save changes I've made to pages. Why is this, and can it be fixed?
3. The capital letters issue. If it isn't already a pain to try and correctly type out exact punctuation and spelling in the Search (O Brother, Where Art Thou? haunts me), we must also get the captialization exactly right. I'm in college and this gives me trouble, I feel real pity for grade-schoolers who have to try and find things.

This is a list of complaints. I'm not saying I'm mad at Wikipedia or anything, it's just that I think we might be able to improve some things and I think we ought to have an open forum (this page) for doing it. Don't hate me. -Litefantastic 00:39, 7 May 2004 (UTC)

And, if you've been paying attention, you'll know that, while my third complain appears to have been resolved, the other two comprise the bulk of the problemss on this page. I think, in retrospect, General Complaints was a bad idea. I was working under an imcomplete theory that if enough people complained, something would happen to fix the problem. Now 16 months out, I am beginning to have doubts. -Litefantastic 11:42, 16 September 2005 (UTC)

This is a suprisingly under-watched page - I only found it a couple of weeks back (I've been here since Decmeber 2004). The Wikipedia:Village pump pages are much mor ehighly trafficed and you can expect more people to spot your queries there. However, if you want to know about site speed then the page meta:server status or the technical mailing list Wikitech-l (see Wikipedia:Mailing lists) are better places to go.

If you want developers to fix something then your best bet is to post on the Wikitech-l mailing list or submit a bug or feature request at Bugzilla:. Thryduulf 13:11, 16 September 2005 (UTC)

Well if nobody who's anybody looks at this page then let's remove the link to it from the contacts page and point people somewhere else instead. If you follow the obvious trail for problem reporting from the main "Help" link then you end up here. I did anyway.

[edit] Wikipédia française

What's with the French Wikipedia lately? It won't let me edit articles or even look at an article's history. You click on the tab, and a truncated page appears. In the case of the modifier function, you don't get an editing frame, making editing impossible. Is it this way for everyone, or have I done something to annoy the administrators at Wikipédia française? All other versions of Wikipedia seem to work just fine for me. Kelisi 18:41, 24 September 2005 (UTC)

I have no idea what I'm talking about, but I'm guessing that the servers have a higher priority for the English Wikipedia or something. And even the English version has some problems lately. Though it's getting much better, so the French version may improve soon too.

[edit] Wiki Administrators: Systemic Left/Liberal Bias

I had a fine and mutually respectful discussion last night with a group of Wiki administrators. Having seen a disproportionate number of Wiki administrators act -- from my perception -- in a "squash non-liberal thinking" sort of way over time, I was moved to ask the group (respectfully) what their political inclinations were.

The result: only 3 of 24 administrators available at the time had voted or would consider voting Republican. (This was late on a Friday evening U.S. Central Time, and so there was no international presence to speak of; the point being that this demonstrates a hugely inappropriate skew towards the left, particularly given that most of the U.S. votes conservative).

Now, I'm sure that's music to the ears of those of the clearly left-leaning nature of Wiki world, but think about it: how is Wikipedia ever going to truly overcome its biases and reach balanced, NPOV conditions within its 750,000+ articles if it continues to be hounded administratively by one side of the political spectrum? If Wikipedia cannot achieve a balanced view, how will it ever contain unspun Truth?

I'll leave the solutions...if any...to the highest Wiki minds. But there is a profound problem within Wiki world, and not addressing it doesn't mean that it doesn't exist.

The Truth is Balanced.

Thank you.

--66.69.219.9 17:41, 1 October 2005 (UTC)

I'm willing to bet less than one Wikipedia in a hundred is communist. Does this mean that communists should get equal time? Wikipedia is not Fox News. Ideologues are never going to be satisfied with reports that are not spun to their personal biases. Wikipedia is a reality based encyclopedia, that makes it POV to some. That is their problem. --Gorgonzilla 00:59, 2 October 2005 (UTC)

Does this mean that communists should get equal time? Yes. NPOV is key, and the size of your support base should not matter. I think 66.69.219.9 has the beginnings of a valid point. However, the question to ask is not of the political inclinations of the admins, but whether or not this reflects on their actions. Personally, I think the answer to that last part is "no", most of the time.--inks 01:06, 2 October 2005 (UTC)

I would certainly like to think that the last part of what Inkypaws says is true, but again -- from my perspective -- POV admin bias is precisely what kicked off my inquiry in the first place. Let me be direct: I have seen Admins all but vandalize (some) balancing content that does not agree with left-leaning POV. Similarly, I have seen clearly left-POV edits survive, yet become deleted in their entirety when caught red-handed and have some balance added to them.

The stats I found (3 out of 24 as conservative) were just one measurement and so I do not want to overplay that...but at the same time it conveys a reality that is consistent with my own personal observations over time. There is an old saying that you can't argue with someone's experience, and mine has been the reinforced perception that there is an overall agenda within the collective body of Wiki work that comes across time and again.

This is a much bigger problem than Wiki realizes, though I sense that it is one of the serious problems that caused the original Wiki editor, Larry Sanger, to resign. With 750,000+ articles under development, just getting some real statistics on perceived admin POV-attacks would be a daunting task, much less fixing the problem. If NPOV and credibility are not truly objectives for Wiki, then, hey, fine...both sides have their blogs, and the Wiki world will just be one of the left ones. But if these are true objectives, there is some serious homework (serious data collection) and housecleaning (dealing with POV admins) to be done. I'm willing to help, but this is a huge issue and bears serious adult supervision within the world of Wiki. --66.69.219.9 05:23, 2 October 2005 (UTC)

P.S. This is an old problem in the world of journalism. Most journals/newspapers have well known biases. The best ones work to eliminate that by having a balanced staff. The worst ones try to disguise their true, hard-core biases by emulating an ostensible "NPOV", while spinning like mad all the while; I'm sure each side can name their own infamous offenders. In any case, it is absurd in the extreme to think that a counter-cultural ratio of 8-to-1 (24 to 3 in the measurement above) can somehow join hands and achieve NPOV just by claiming that they do. Truth doesn't happen that way...it gets assaulted that way. And it is just another form of anti-reality, falsifying spin to assert that it does.--66.69.219.9 19:06, 2 October 2005 (UTC)

You are basing this complaint based on a poll (presumably on IRC) of 24 wikipedia administrators, claiming that it doesn't represent US proportions because "most of the US votes conservative". There are so many things wrong with your line of thinking, it's frightening. (1) Your sample size is tiny. You are judging the 100,000+ registered users based on a very, very small convience sample. (2) Presumably you did your poll on IRC. Claiming that it was late night US central time and that therefore there is no international presense is just plain wrong. I can tell you firsthand that there are always non-Americans in the channel. (3) You might want to read hostile media effect - the republicans have been beating this to death for decades, claming that the media is hostile to them in order to make the media become more conservative. In sports, it's called "working the ref" - complaining that the ref is biased so he'll compensate in your favor. (4) The more someone understands about the world, the more hollow and incoherent conservative ideaology becomes (the voodoo supply side economics and tax cuts that pay for themselves, the mega-deficit spending, the holier-than-though bible thumping while taxing the poor to give to the rich, the play-the-races-against-each-other campaign strategies, the smash-mouth politics originated by Lee Atwater, the Orwellian destruction of our civil liberties, and the list goes on and on) That is why educators, doctors, journalists, 'etc all tend to be liberal (by american standards, at least). →Raul654 21:15, 2 October 2005 (UTC)

Sorry, but I beat you to the punch sample-size wise (only one sample re. 3 of 24 administrators as conservative). You are attempting to put words in my mouth or otherwise imply that I somehow said that it is statistically significant. It is not. It is, however, entirely consistent with my own perceptions...as stated time and again. The rest of your 'argument' I'll let speak for itself. Quite an emotional, illogical rant. Thanks for proving my point. But consider trying to keep the conversation more mutually respectful in the future. I think you'll find that both sides will benefit. --66.69.219.9 21:47, 2 October 2005 (UTC)

Uh, its flawed because you're sampling people on IRC - and people on IRC are always predominately liberal anyways. They are the eViL LibEral IRC cAbAl! Ryan Norton ^{T | @ | C} 21:51, 2 October 2005 (UTC)

I think that given Raul654's response, particularly given his position within the Wiki world (see [1]), that my "beginnings of a valid point" (as Inks collegially refers to my original post) is clearly of merit. The Wiki world can see some of the Truth for themselves in the above comments, but the real homework, statistics collection, cleanup, etc. remains to be done. I invoke Wiki management to pay attention. Whether it is realized or not, the true "NPOV" and credibility of Wiki are otherwise entirely at risk. --66.69.219.9 22:03, 2 October 2005 (UTC)

Well, it would not be hard to create a bot (or even conduct a manual survey) that places an invite on the talk page of each active admin (I know there is a list somewhere but can't find it), inviting them to indicate (anonymously or otherwise) their political leanings. Given the relatively small numbers of admins, we can attempt a complete sample, instead of having to randomise. Perhaps a scale of 0 to 10, with 0 being Ultra-Left, 5 centrist, and 10 Ultra-Right. Then we can run stats on those numbers. If nothing else, it would be an interesting bit of information to have. It will be at least 1.5 months before I'll have time to do something like that, but if you're still keen on doing it 66.69.219.9, leave me a note. We need also to ask what our findings can be used for. I think even if we do find that a majority of Admins are of X political orientation, we can only manage a general statement of bias...meaning that we can't single out individuals. It would however be a good basis for an article for submission to popular media maybe, or a press release? By the way, are you registered, but posting as an IP to avoid recognition? No judgement, just curious--inks^T 22:22, 2 October 2005 (UTC)

Inks: I'm not registered yet. Actually, I see an IP address as being much less anonymous than some of the totally anonymous/empty profiles out there. In all honesty, I'm still trying to gauge as to whether or not the Wiki work is worth my time. I live in the left-leaning world of Austin, Texas...so if it was political argument that was lacking in my day, the local Starbucks will do. The sheer numbers of left-POV admins is a force field, and, as in any organization, such an imbalance can only start at the top (are you listening, Raul654?). My passion is truth...pure and simple. Unlike Raul654, I see compassion in both the left and the right political worlds (one sees what one is), and in a Ken Wilber sort of way I think both sides need each other much more than they realize. I love the variety of inputs in the world of Wiki, but do not have time to keep re-editing what has already been said, and find the overabundance of left-POV admins quite annoying; it delays getting to the truth at a minimum, and sometimes avoids it altogether. I'll leave you a note re. suggestions for data collection, with the goal being...balance. Truth is content within context, and sniping at either component is falsehood. Thanks. --66.69.219.9 22:38, 2 October 2005 (UTC)

I gather from the last presidential election that only half the US electorate voted, and pretty much half of those who did voted Democrat. So that would give 6 out of 24 randomly selected Americans would have voted Republican in the last election. Did you bother to ask how many would vote Democrat? Average Earthman 22:14, 2 October 2005 (UTC)

My comments and graphics stand as stated above. I don't want to lose the baby of "the beginnings of a valid point" in the bathwater of political rhetoric. I trust that Wiki can do its own homework, which I would certainly hope will be much more rigorous than the finger in the air I've tested the Wiki winds with. --66.69.219.9 22:26, 2 October 2005 (UTC)

The graphic you cite is misleading. Almost all of the red areas have a population desnity of barely-more-than 0. If you were to weight the map by population, you get this, which debunks your claim that the US is mostly conservative. →Raul654 23:11, 2 October 2005 (UTC)

Raul, I'm not hardly so easily convinced, and neither should you be. Nor am I so easily distracted from the core issue above. But, if you insist on trying to discern the U.S. political mix, take an Occum's Razor approach and simply look at the total numbers of voters for President Bush vs. the distinguished Senator from Massachusetts. Game...set...match.

Back on topic, I am appalled at your above statements and clear hatred of 51% of the country. In my humble opinion, you should be sacked tomorrow vis-a-vis your position at Wikinews. It is ludicrous that someone of such a high degree of imbalance is making such judgements. --66.69.219.9 23:56, 2 October 2005 (UTC)

Your complaint is a mirror version of the same accusations that have been lobbed at the New York Times, CNN, 'etc for decades by conservates. And, much like those complaints, it is equally without merit. It's simply an attempt to "work the ref". Wikipedia is not going to change because conservatives complain it's not as friendly to them as Fox News. →Raul654 00:17, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

As a minor distraction from the core point above, but since you’ve brought it up, here are some examples of the alleged neutrality of:

New York Times: 4th correction of Krugman column [2]

CNN: “Bush pics labeled asshole, moron” [3]

Not to mention a fellow who used to work at CBS by the name of Dan Rather.--66.69.219.9 00:57, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

Again, Raul, it is your arguments that have no merit, so you find yourself once again regressing to the tactic of putting words in people's mouths. I am not arguing for Fox-like POV...I am arguing for true balance, and in your heart of hearts you know that's the right thing to do. With regard to my sense/single-measurement/contention that the Wiki world is not NPOV but is in fact left-leaning, I once again need only refer to your own words to reach a final conclusion:

Q.E.D. -- quod erat demonstrandum

--66.69.219.9 00:27, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

Wikipedia *does* have a neutral point of view. Conservates think it's left leaning because what they consider "neutral" isn't what anyone else would. ["Fair and balanced" anyone?] →Raul654 00:29, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

In the words of W. Edwards Deming "if you don't measure it, you can't manage it." By what specific measurement do you lay claim to NPOV, Raul? Go do your homework, without bias, and then back up that statement. If your admins are as hateful and grossly left-POV as you are, then forget it...it is absurd to baselessly claim that Wiki is NPOV. --66.69.219.9 00:41, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

I'll echo this complaint from my own experience. In fact, some of the very worst liberal point-of-view pushers on this site are administrators. Now, there are many good administrators here too so I don't mean to group them all into this category, but a handful of very liberal and very partisan administrators are among the most frequent participants in POV disputes on this entire site. In fact most revert warring I have observed, and virtually every revert war I've found myself in the middle of, has had at least one and often more than one administrator actively participating in it - almost always from the political left. An occassional revert war is probably unavoidable, but when all the major revert wars involve admins trying to push their POV's it's a big problem. It's also a dangerous situation to have our admins - who are supposed to be fostering a consensus-based environment - doing some of the worst damage to consensus by constantly getting themselves involved in politically motivated content disputes. This is another reason why I'm a proponent of requiring admins to practice absolute neutrality rather than letting them edit AND be the arbiters of non-admin editor disputes at the same time. Rangerdude 03:57, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

I salute Rangerdude's solution-oriented (rather than denial-oriented) approach. To avoid "tag teams" of highly left-POV admins continuing the content wars in a proxy fashion, I would suggest that some sort of admin 'boards' be formed and made up of those whose views balance. If it doesn't add excessive complexity, age should also be taken into account; youth and wisdom have not historically been found to be common characteristics. That's not personal...that's reality...and we all go through it in the human experience.

BTW, any who would take some sort of personal or quasi-professional offense at the notion that NPOV is not a reality within Wiki today should take a deep breath and look at what happened within the U.S. Supreme Court during the resolution of the 2000 presidential election -- it is clearly near-impossible, psychologically, to merely 'will' one's own personal POV away and somehow invoke an NPOV, especially when under emotional stress. Moreover, this isn't about you...or me...it's about achieving true NPOV. --66.69.219.9 13:23, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

As a fresh example of Left-POV Admins creating/participating in content wars, Tempshill engaged in such activity today in the Harriet Miers article. What had been installed early in the day as solidly NPOV/balanced discussion of the background of abortion law which included a direct lift from Ruth Bader Ginsburg's article wherein she found Roe vs. Wade lacking from a legislative standpoint was repeatedly attacked by Tempshill for "POV" (again...the content in question was largely already-consensus from Ginsburg's article, and in fact survived the vast majority of the day until said Left-POV Admin arrived). This is but one small example of this very, very broad problem.

Alternately, one might consider that User:Tempshill removed a claim (that there was a broad consensus on the left and right that Roe v. Wade has no legitimate legislative basis) from the Harriet Miers article, where that content wouldn't belong even if it were true. Tempshill 22:24, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

Herein emerges the previously seen pattern of putting words in one's mouth and, later, what Rangerdude describes as "Wiki-stalking" (via the Roe vs. Wade page). Tempshill is also making a knowingly false claim regarding my words on the Harriet Miers page, which I quote below:

The subject of Roe v. Wade is highly topical in this most recent nomination, due in large part to views from both the political left and right that this landmark Supreme Court decision lacks a strong legislative foundation.

Providing significant insight into this finding, Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, a liberal justice, has consistently supported abortion rights and joined in the Supreme Court's opinion striking down Nebraska's partial-birth abortion law in Stenberg v. Carhart (2000). However, Ginsburg has also criticized the court's ruling in Roe v. Wade as terminating a nascent, democratic movement to liberalize abortion laws which she contends might have built a more durable consensus in support of abortion rights. Regardless of political persuasion, Roe v. Wade has been judged as a form of judicial activism that pre-empted the democratic process.

The tone & temperament of the above Left-POV Admin's attack is but one example of this profound non-NPOV problem with the Wiki world. Wiki management ignores this at the peril of true NPOV and its own credibility.--66.69.219.9 23:02, 3 October 2005 (UTC)

Just by inserting that last quoted sentence in the Harriet Miers article and in the first paragraph of Roe v. Wade, you have made it pretty clear who here is pushing an agenda. Tempshill 15:55, 4 October 2005 (UTC)

Again with the deliberate untruths from Tempshill. Is this something that left-POV types find helpful to their arguments...? We're certainly seeing a trend here. To set the record straight -- as I frankly detest deliberate untruths -- I inserted the following into the Roe v. Wade article...nothing more, nothing less...and the majority was a quote from Ruth Bader Ginsburg's article. The portion in parentheses was pre-existing:

(It remains one of the most controversial decisions in Supreme Court history,) as it is widely viewed by both conservatives and liberals alike as being a judicial finding with questionable legislative support. In 2000, left-leaning Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg criticized the court's ruling in Roe v. Wade as terminating a nascent, democratic movement to liberalize abortion laws which she contends might have built a more durable consensus in support of abortion rights.--66.69.219.9 02:11, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

I think this argument is getting away from the point in contention. As I understand the argument is:

• 66.69.219.9's claim: There is a liberal Point of View in the documenting of current events in Wikipedia.
• 66.69.219.9's goal: Achieving NPOV on Wikipedia.
• 66.69.219.9's suggestion: That the Point of View of Wikipedia should be balanced to achieve NPOV.

I think his claim stands. Most of the people writing for Wikipedia are liberal. This is a trend not only in online communities, but in most open-source projects. As a result, most of the people who write for and administrate Wikipedia are going to be liberal and thus, intentionally or not, will emphasize those facts that most strongly resonate with their beliefs. I agree with his goal. An authoritative source of information needs to be as unbiased as possible. As for his suggestion, I do not agree. I don't think that anything would be solved by 'balancing' the Wikipedia. 66.69.219.9 contends that 'Truth is Balance'. This is untrue. The truth of a matter will not evenly divide itself amongst the two political parties of a a particular nation. The truth just is. I don't think any change in the political climate of the administration would fix the problem. Furthermore, screening the admins and constantly adjusting articles to include both sides are not good solutions. Inserting snippets of 'balance' into an article will just provoke an arms race of biasing (as you can see with the RoevWade article). Removing contributors based on their views defies the idea of an open-source encyclopedia. Other than removing false statements and groundless generalizations, the rest is a matter of consensual opinion. While the Wikipedia is an excellent source of information (especially in the area of science and computing), I would recommend that you read any current event articles with a grain of salt, as you should with all other forms of media. Ian Hill 3:34, 4 October 2005

I appreciate the respectful tone and honesty from Ian Hill. I also agree that the truth (content in context) largely exists on one side of an argument or the other. That's not to say that one side of the political spectrum has all the truth, and the other side does not. They share it...they each have some of the truth. The truth is in *being* balanced. This is notably shown by the Ginsburg snippet. She's already on the Supreme Court, and has nothing to gain but credibility by pointing out that Roe v. Wade overrreached legislatively. And there's nothing stunning about that blatant truth to anyone who can read -- at least, reasonably without bias -- the Constitution.

However, I would take strong issue with the conclusion that (paraphrasing): "Yes, Wiki has a strong liberal bias, but claims NPOV as this is seen as an expedient argument for achieving ostensible credibility. Hold your nose, as we don't know how to fix this problem." I would also disagree that the scope of the non-NPOV problem is limited to current events; this is a Wiki-wide problem, such as Rangerdude has commented above.

Frankly, I don't have any better idea -- nor should I have to, I'm a mere 'anon' -- than for Wiki management to acknowledge the problem, apply its own intellect/judgement and deliberately make the effort to clean up its act. I've proposed one idea. From Wiki management, I've seen (so far) nothing but defensiveness, outright denial that there is a problem, and the utterly arrogant attitude from Raul654 that (paraphrasing again...but not much) "sure we're liberal because conservative is evil."

Where is the real Wiki leadership? This can't be it. --66.69.219.9 02:33, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

I agree that the majority of editors here trend to the liberal side of things. I don't agree that in most cases the admins are liberal as it pertains to enforcing WP:NPOV. Perhaps the ones you have run into have a liberal agenda, but most of the ones I have met (I say most) do a decent job (unpaid) and enforce a NPOV stance on articles. It all depends on where you are editing...articles that are politically charged may experience some POV pushing and appear to be liberally dominated because they wish to distort things to fit an agenda, but that doesn't mean that ALL those watching that article and arguing with you are Admins. The best way to "fix" the problem with an article is to support your arguments with sources, and discredit those things you contend as being POV with proper rebuttal and citation.--MONGO 03:19, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

As a fundementally open society, I doubt there is much we could do beyond what we already have put in place. Certainly all administrators acknowledge that one of the foundations of the project to provide a neutral point of view, and their own participation should be tailored towards that goal. Most seem to try to embrace this goal, including a willingness to speak for "the other side" when they percieve that side as having something credible to say. In fact, I would go so far as to say that I can not recall any examples of an administrator knowingly trying to push a POV agenda into articles. However, the problem which you have already alluded to is that people, administrators included, can have broad disagreements about what NPOV means for any given situation. If I percieve that the other side's point of view is not credible then it is hard to offer them the equal time they may in fact disserve. This is the opposite of "the two talking heads" problem, wherein news reporters looking for balance find one person from each side and give them equal time, even if one of the views is nonsense that no one believes.

As I am suggesting that the problem is not being able to see where the balance of NPOV lies, the question is still what to do about it. Really there is little alternative to discussion, education and mutual understanding. Meaning that if someone is unconciously clinging to a biased point of view, the real solution is to show them through verifiable and credible sources and arguments that the other side has a meaningful point that also needs to be considered. The community as a whole has steadfastly resisted any attempt to introduce real editorial authorities in favor of our hap-hazard scheme of talking through every argument. For the most part it can and does work well, if one is patient and serious enough to allow it to work. And the community does have procedures for dealing with the patently disruptive. But in terms of doing any artificial or imposed balancing, I don't think there is a way to make it work. Such a scenarion would substitute the opinion of NPOV held by the balancer(s) for that of the community. Sometimes that would be an improvement, sometimes not, and as long as anyone is free to change it or argue a new opinion, I don't see how one could accomplish much. However, I do see value in your contributions 66.69.219.9, and hope you will stick around to help talk through NPOV issues with the rest of us. Dragons flight 04:18, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

I do wish these American political extremists would try not to be so parochial. Many Americans may have extreme right wing views, but this hardly goes for the rest of us. Skewing Wikipedia so that it would give equal representation to the extreme right of the Republican Party and to the not-so-extreme right of the Democratic Party would absolutely not produce a balanced encyclopedia. --Tony Sidaway^Talk 05:36, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

It is substantially unwise to refer to the Republican Party as "extreme right wing." In the U.S., American voters have put the Republicans in control of the White House, the U.S. Senate, the House of Representatives, and most state Governorships. You ignore reality, and do not appear to have even read the above line of mainly mutually respectful discussion. The promotion of parochial thinking is coming from you...similarly, for the moment, as is being maintained by the Wiki management that has shown up at this critical discussion. --66.69.219.9 13:30, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

Wikipedia is not an "American" encyclopedia. We have readers, editors and administratiors from all over the world, and when we say that Wikipedia is not POV, one of the most important parts of that is avoiding a nationalist or nationally limited viewpoint. If Wikipedia truly attempted to 'balance' its coverage in the way you suggest, the views of individual American political parties would come out to around 1% of the total world opinion. Those parties are still notable for their influence on world politics, of course, or when things relevent to them are the subject at hand; but even then, they are not the great philosophical axes that you make them out to be. The bias that you see as weighted towards your country's political left is, in fact, more balanced and comprehensive when taken in an international context. --Aquillion 16:37, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

Please don't take this as brusque, but this whole thread of the conversation is irrelevant. It is equally unacceptable for Wikipedia to be biased in favor of the political center as it is for it to be biased in favor of the left or right. Neutral Point of View is not some kind of Centrist Point of View. - Nat Krause 03:35, 9 October 2005 (UTC)

With an academically independent mind, please read the Barbara Boxer article in Wikipedia. Could her campaign staff have written a more flattering piece? --(unsigned)

Thank you for the (rare) honest input, unsigned. The answer to your question: "No." --66.69.219.9 17:08, 6 October 2005 (UTC)

Who ever said the truth is balanced? If you're talking about political balance, I'm willing to bet that most facts and issues are truthfully not balanced. If there's one issue that is unfavorable to one political party, should we try to "balance" it out by giving apologists and liars equal time, by packing in talking-point arguments that don't exactly hold up to scrutiny? I think this is taking place, to a greater or lesser extent, in those media outlets seeking not to be known as partisan. I think the effect is corrosive to public discourse and perpetuates the false and culturally divisive dichotomy of left vs. right.

As to the Wiki community and apparent bias, I think all this talk of "adult supervision" or keeping those admins in line is misplaced. Anyone can edit wikipedia, and anyone can become an admin. There are rules and guidelines that are, more often than not, followed and enforced. When you feel that they're not, you can make a fuss and get it resolved to some level of satisfaction. Perhaps 3 out of 24 admins (+/- a huge error) are Republican ... then wouldn't those three be sympathetic to instances of apparent anti-conservative bias? Moreover, I think the majority of Wikipedians value the enforcement of these structural safeguards above all opinions and particulars, especially admins. Perhaps the majority of admins are not Republican, but how many of those are idealogues intent on pushing their agenda to the detriment of wikipedia? The percentage shrinks considerably, in the least. TIMBO (T A L K) 15:37, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

• I don't understand how one could determine the political leanings of 500+ admins solely based on their edits (I encourage you to determine mine, so I know what to vote in the next election). Besides, the number of administrators is just a small sample of Wikipedia editors and even if admins were liberal (are you talking about liberalism or American liberalism?), there's about 100,000 possible right-wing wikipedians on the other side (a lot of whom can't even be divided in a simple left-right system). Anything center would be left to right-wingers anyway and viceversa. What if there was more left-wing people in the world anyway? It be hard not to have more on Wikipedia too. Regardless, you can't expect people to fully abandon their POV at the doorstep. It's just not humanly possible. Your opinion comes through in everything you write. Finally, politics is just a small part of our coverage. Reading something less controversial may be refreshing to you. - Mgm|^(talk) 22:58, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

OK, my arithmetic for the representational system of Wikipedia adminship as proposed by the admin: About 600 million people speak English effectively, half of them live in the US, half of them didn't vote. The votes are about evenly split dem/rep. So of our about 600 admins, 75 should be US/dem, 75 should be US/rep (or 73/77, please do the math). 150 should represent US non-voters and 300 should represent English speakers in the rest of the world. --Pjacobi

I'm new, so maybe I"m missing something, but it seems pretty simple to me...

1. Facts are facts, regardless of what you or I think of them

2. NPOV means "just the facts."

3. If it's not cited, it's not a fact - it's an opinion.

4. If the facts don't agree with you and you're a liberal, the facts are biased right. If the facts don't agree with you and you're conservative, the facts are biased left. (If the facts don't agree with you and you try to be neither liberal nor conservative, you're probably a scientist of some sort)

4a. Using US def's, 'liberals' tend to lean more toard science and empiricism, 'conservatives' tend to lean more toward religion and traditionalism. Note carefully that these are 'tendencies' and not 'absolute characteristics.' Anyone wishing to argue the point is welcoe to take it to my talk page and present evidence of any situation in which 'liberals' argued against scientific fact while 'conservatives' argued against religous dogma on the same issue.

5. NPOV on an issue that simply cannot be reduced to pure fact by reason of lack of empirical evidence must then present a genuinely balanced view of all sides of the issue at hand, striving to avoid semantically loaded words and phrases such as 'supposedly' or 'they say' or 'these people believe' or what have you - there is an exhaustive treatment of this very issue (semantics) in the new user section of WP.

5a. If you can't, for reasons of strong conviction, present a balanced view of a contentious issue, then you'd be best served to not attempt to edit WP.

5b. The very nature of WP, unfortunately, will tend toward ensuring that the exact opposite will happen - only people who have a sufficiently strong conviction to find it necessary to edit a given topic will do so, thus true NPOV is not likely achievable by everyday users. That is why there are administrators.

5c. These administrators are doomed to eternal universal hatred because no matter what they do it'll be too left for the righties and too right for the lefties, so maybe the lefties and the righties ought to (at the risk of cheesing off areligious/non-Christian lefties, which I happen to be one of) remove the beam from their own eye before they try removing the mote from Wiki's.

Okay, so what did I miss? It seems pretty simple to me.John Henry My Talk Page 05:18, 13 October 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Anchor's Away on Diff

I would like to suggest that on a "diff" page an link & anchor is placed from the "+" signs (indicating changes) on the diff summary to the actual location of the edit in the article. Kim Nevelsteen 09:01, 14 August 2005 (UTC)

[edit] The text in the Wikipedia logo graphic looks nasty in the Amethyst skin

Black-on-black text with antialiasing is not a happy thing. Seems like a buggish thing to me. - Technologeist

[edit] Create Account/Log In Button

I have visited Wikipedia frequently for the past two months, and up to now have never noticed the Create Account/Log In button in the top right corner of the screen.

I think that it should be placed in the navigation section on the left side of the screen, as it is about as important as the other buttons in that menu. This would encourage more users to sign in (especially for editing articles; unsigned edits are often annoying). Cdcon 20:29, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Certain images not displaying in Firefox

I've been using Firefox 1.0x and am currently using version 1.5, my OS is Windows 2000 Professional. For at least six months some pages such as MOS Technology 6502 won't display the thumbnail of an image such as Image:MOS 6502AD 4585 top.jpg. If I click on the image this image still won't display but otherwise the page loads as usual, only if I click the external link to upload.wikimedia.org will it display. I can provide more examples if needed. I have noticed the same problem on a different computer running windows XP. The image(s) display within Internet Explorer and Opera with no problems. - Diceman 14:10, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

Am I the only one to experience this problem? What is the likely culprit? - Diceman 15:56, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

Works OK for me (Win XP Pro, Firefox 1.0.7) Sbz5809 16:25, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

The problem must originate within my computer. - Diceman 16:51, 19 January 2006 (UTC)