Wikipedia:Village pump (miscellaneous)/Archive 14

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Village pumps: Policy • Technical • Proposals (persistent) • Assistance • Miscellaneous
Village pump (miscellaneous) archive  
This page contains discussions that have been archived from Village pump (miscellaneous). Please do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to revive any of these discussions, either start a new thread or use the talk page associated with that topic.

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Contents

[edit] "Unencyclopedic" is now a word

It's official; rather subtle Wikipedia jargon is now entering the mainstream press. I think it's significant that this jargon is referring to an idea, not a technology, and that its source is not attributed. I'll note that the weirdness of seeing "unencyclopedic" in The New York Times was quite striking to me, even before I noticed that Wikipedia is mentioned in the next paragraph (confirming IMO the source of the writer's train of thought). [1]--Pharos (talk) 05:12, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

There is a website called "Unencyclopedia." It looks just like Wikipedia. The only thing that is different is that "Unencyclopedia" has an open chat. --~I LOVE TOAST~ (talk) 01:33, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

I love the sound of "the age of Wikipedia". So, imperial. So, 21-century. Wikipedia to rule the world! -- Taku (talk) 04:37, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Not even slightly porn (sorry)

Does anyone know what to do when I feel a discussion was inaccurately closed? The discussion is Wikipedia:Featured list removal candidates/List of vegetable oils, which was closed as Keep, but as no-one moved to keep it, the result should actually be No-consensus. At the time I was on a geography-enforced Wikibreak, and was unable to complete the discussion. I would change it myself, as I think the error is clear, but I've never seen it done so I'm wary. And to clarify, yes, I am being anal-retentive. At the time, I even created the section Wikipedia:Lists#Organization as a reference point. ~ JohnnyMrNinja 07:04, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

I'd go up to the closer whom appears to be User:Circeus, but it was from a long time ago, perhaps WP:CCC. x42bn6 Talk Mess 15:42, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Wiki

If someone started a boycott against the Wikimedia foundation, I would start a counter-boycott. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.255.150.26 (talk) 00:33, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Good for you! CWii(Talk|Contribs) 02:48, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Right of way

does any one know the answer to my accident? if i was driving, and have the right of way but i hit a car at an uncontrolled intersection in a parking lot, when i say hit i mean t bone, who is at fault? is it me because i hit them on the front door? or is it them for not yeilding to the right of way —Preceding unsigned comment added by Briana01010 (talk • contribs) 04:04, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] IP address

Is it possible for someone to have the same IP address as mine? I mean, when I looked at my contributions it said that I made contributions to the Top gear article. I never have. Also, how do I see all my contributions? I know I've made more than three (of which, two aren't even mine).

P.S I am the only one who uses my computer. 203.206.9.192 (talk) 10:31, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

This will depend on how your ISP assigns IP addresses. Some give you one more-or-less permanently, some (like mine) give a new address whenever you reconnect to the internet, while some (like AOL) have a system which means every edit comes from a different IP address. There's no good way to access all edits from your computer, though they are (probably) all from the IP range 203.206.0.0-203.206.255.255. If you want to do this, you should create an account. Algebraist 10:50, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Thanks! 203.206.9.192 (talk) 10:55, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] What's going on with the birds??

Is it just me or has anyone else noticed that birds do not move out of the way when you are driving along until the last minute? They almost seem oblivious until you are right next to them, almost running them over!

I have a theory that it's something to do with mobile phones affecting their radar, but one of my colleagues thinks that it's bird gang culture, daring each other!!! What do you think???

--Whitesheba (talk) 11:01, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

This is nothing to do with Wikipedia. You might want to try the miscellaneous reference desk. Algebraist 11:09, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Admins...they walk among us!

You want to know what I love about Wikipedia?
The fact that administrators work side-by-side with non-admins, taking the same responsibilities and more that other Wikipedians have. It goes to show how very kind and good Wikipedia, Wikipedian policy and Wikipedians in general are! Thank you for not having overinflated egos, admins! It really makes me feel good! BobAmnertiopsisChitChat Me! 21:44, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Discussion Page

is it true that User:TimShell once proposed discussion pages for articles? Did he do this in nupedia already? Is there a source for this information (e.g. list-archive) -- 78.53.183.47 (talk) 00:05, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

"perhaps there should be a standard discussion page" (Shell), "I think people should feel free to edit main articles, such as the controversial GeorgeWBush article, but also add to corresponding discussion pages--linked from the bottom of the page. That's what I did for GeorgeWBush; I made BushTalk and moved the discussion there." (Sanger) [2] -- 78.53.183.47 (talk) 08:54, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
In the early software, we used to add at the bottom of the page a link to, for example, GeorgeWBush/Talk to create a subpage for discussion. Worked ok but sometimes people trying to avoid an argument would go in and add a second link to say GeorgeWBush/Discussion and start a second discussion page. Later the Talk namespace was added which automatically created one (and only one) talk page. Rmhermen (talk) 00:49, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Wikipeda Icon

If you have tabs, or look in the left hand side of your address bar, you will see an icon similer to that of Continental Airlines. Continental may sue, but if they don't, the icon is still confusing to many people, and should be changed. TravelCRAZED (talk) 03:34, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

That is nothing like Continental's logo. Our logo is just a little "W". Are you sure you have the right tab open? Soxred93 (u t) 04:18, 20 May 2008 (UTC)
It's nothing like Continental's logo. Our image that resides there is a W in a Times font. Continental's image is a sphere covered with a white grid on a blue background. They're not even remotely the same. Celarnor Talk to me 04:28, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, I think there was an error with my computer. TravelCRAZED (talk) 00:06, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Get Well Soon template?

There are A HUGE amount of templates for various things...is there anyone that knows of a "Get Well Soon" template? Thanks! Letter 7 (talk) 15:42, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Some mentoring on the extent of editor responsibilities would be helpful

Here, JohnnyMrNinja writes that "it is not an editor's duty to clean up and add references to things that the original contributers could not be bothered to do." This is the exact opposite of my idea - and, I believe - the general idea - of how we work. What matters is the outcome and facts are judged by their merits instead of the presentation of those merits. Neither are people required to conform to the walls of text that are our conventions and referencing practices right away - in fact, it is (was?) a principle that you're allowed to screw up, other editors can give you a hand. Otherwise, any significant change in standards would require us to nuke a third of the encyclopedia.

He hasn't actually done anything wrong, so a polite conversation with him by someone who, unlike myself, can do that, ought to be a good thing. --Kizor 17:00, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

It's not about presentation, its about proving that you aren't making stuff up. To quote myself from the referenced AfD, "If an editor feels a piece of information is valid and useful, then it is their responsibility to defend it by properly sourcing it, and asserting it's notability, at the time it is added. If it is not OR, that means the original contributor had a source. Not bothering to list the source creates double-work for someone else, who then has to find a source, and then list it. If it is OR (or just made-up), the other person is looking for a source that doesn't exist. I've had things deleted for this reason, and it sucks, but it wasn't anybody's fault but mine."
But, yes, I will have a talk with me... a hard talk across the face! ~ JohnnyMrNinja 21:33, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Question

Can someone hep me with my article http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banya:_The_Explosive_Delivery_Man? Is this the right place to ask this question? X27 (talk) 17:26, 20 May 2008 (UTC)X27

[edit] Template:POV-check

I suggest changing the orange color of the stripe on the left side of the POV-check template to yellow, to reflect the idea that a {{POV-check}} is less severe than a {{NPOV}} dispute. As I understand it, you nominate an article for {{POV-check}} if you think that it may have a non-neutral point of view. An article gets tagged with {{NPOV}} if it is the subject of a serious dispute, possibly involving multiple editors, as reflected on its talk page. 69.140.152.55 (talk) 11:53, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

The colour isn't intended to indicate severity. According to WP:Ambox, the orange strip is used for all article content-related boxes. Algebraist 13:11, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
If you wanted to seperate out articles by severity; you might want to start by working with teh categories. Right now both templates go into "NPOV disputes" even though the "POV -check" isn't neccesarily a dispute. Really the NPOV categories need systematic review overall.--BirgitteSB 15:43, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Why...

Okay, not that I really want to ask burning questions about Avril Lavigne, but how come you aren't answering questions about her in the Reference Desk. My friend told me you guys weren't anymore and I just thought it was weird and oddly specific... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.160.222.253 (talk) 22:18, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

I'm not a Reference Desker, but I'm pretty sure that isn't true. Most likely, some questions about her just aren't being answered for lack of relevant expertise among the people who staff the Reference Desk. Dcoetzee 22:39, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
When a whole slew of one-liner questions on the same topic are asked in quick succession by the same poster, then Ref Desk people tend not to put to much thought or effort into the answers of any one of the individual questions. It's a pretty normal reaction, when you consider that the ref desk is staffed entirely by volunteers. APL (talk) 01:51, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] What is % of English only vs. non Eglish articles

A quick question about Wikipedia's multilingual content...

Is there a way to determine:

  • What percentage of the English (EN) of the 2,375,000+ have no other translations?
  • How many of articles in the non-English Wikipedias have no English (EN) version?
  • What percentage of all Wikipedia articles are written in English (EN) first, then translated to other languages?
  • And conversely, what percentage of all articles are written in non-English languages first, then translated to other languages?

Are stats like these kept? And if so, where?

Thanks

-R —Preceding unsigned comment added by Ricks99 (talk • contribs) 19:29, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

There are some statistics on the number of articles in the various different language Wikipedias at m:List of Wikipedias, but I don't think that's what you're after. Working this sort of stuff out would probably involve downloading a database dump or every single Wikipedia language edition and then processing them all, which would be difficult. Hut 8.5 20:24, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

This data, while potentially very interesting, is not readily available here. It would require lots..and lots...of work, and with very trusty translation programs. I'd love to see such a report, but am in doubt of it's attainability. -Violask81976 22:01, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

we should be able to do a count by simply the presence of interwiki links, without concerning ourselves about the ones that do have equivalent articles but not links, and other gaps and errors. That should be much simpler? DGG (talk) 00:24, 25 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Secure tunneling in deletion log?

I am pretty positive that "Secure tunneling" used to be an article. I cannot locate it in the deletion log. Why is this/might this be? Changed to redirect then deleted? If you would reply on my talk page, I would be quite grateful. --Emesee (talk) 06:02, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

(copied to user talk) If it was changed to a redirect and then deleted, it would still be in the deletion log. The obvious explanation is that you haven't got the page name exactly right. Unfortunately it's difficult to find deleted articles without the exact name. Did you ever edit the article? If so, an admin could look at your deleted contributions. Algebraist 11:39, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
You can see a list of all pages that start with "secure" here - were you thinking of Secure Socket Tunneling Protocol? I wrote a program a while ago to search the titles of deleted pages but its raw data is a few months out of date. You haven't got any deleted edits to any pages with remotely similar titles. Hut 8.5 19:14, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Attention native speakers of English!

Hi. I've recently come across a number of uses of the phrase "Topics on X" (where X is a region, place, etc) such as "Topics on the United Kingdom" and "Topics on the European Union". Any other native English speakers find that an odd turn of phrase? Sardanaphalus (talk) 17:47, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

  • Yes. You could have "books on the European Union", certainly, but for this usage it would be "European Union topics".--Pharos (talk) 17:56, 21 May 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for your response. Anyone else? Or is there a better place to guage any consensus about this? Sardanaphalus (talk) 04:39, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
My grammar is a little rusty, but I think the phrasing is awkward because topic is fairly synonymous with subject, meaning the EU is the topic. "Topics related to the European Union" is fine, but "Topics on a topic" doesn't work". JohnnyMrNinja 04:56, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
I'd go for "European Union topics" myself. DuncanHill (talk) 12:16, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
"On" is a preposition; a word that relates its object (a noun or pronoun) to another word in the sentence. Hence, you cannot have a topic "on" something unless it is literally physically sitting on top of it. The only place you'll see it is in bad English (which is everywhere, I know). Fleetflame 03:41, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

How about this: "The committee already discussed the topic on May 3." -- Taku (talk) 04:33, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

  • I think the "on" is referring to the discussion, not the topic. At least, that's how it reads to me. Sardanaphalus (talk) 06:14, 25 May 2008 (UTC)
Initially I found the construct stilted, and I felt that Topics about Place is better English. However the discussion above seems to be based on feeling rather than fact. A standard English Grammar is Thompson and Martinet OUP 1960, ISBN 0 19 431323 9. To this I will refer. On can be a preposition or adverb.(para 90) Other words in this group are: in, up, down, off, near, through, along, across, over, under, round.
Examples. They carried on(adverb)He rang on the bell.(adverb) He dined on mince and slices of quince... (adverb)(Lear) He fell on the floor (Preposition of travel) It lived on the floor (Preposition of place). We went on Thursday(Preposition of time). The question is whether in modern current English, the word Topics can govern on- and though I don't use that form, I can't find any prescription against doing so. And taking a parallel, we would use Articles on Place with no hesitation. ClemRutter (talk) 15:18, 25 May 2008 (UTC)
  • There may be no prescription against using "topics on" or "topics in" -- meanwhile, however, the responses thus far suggest it's a phrasing not commonly used. I guess the structure of language may be based on discernable rules, but not necessarily its use. Sardanaphalus (talk) 16:05, 25 May 2008 (UTC)
In the phrase that Sardanaphalus used originally, the word "on" is used as a preposition, not an adverb. Therefore, it is only correct if the topic is literally sitting on something. Perhaps you could use "the topic of X" correctly. That preposition works, because it's not a prep. of place. Fleetflame 01:12, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Using A Wikipedia Font Elsewhere

Is there a way I can download wikipedia's Greek font so that I don't have to cut and paste each individual letter? I have other Greek fonts for MS Word, but I would prefer wikipedia's because it works with just about any program. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.85.177.46 (talk) 20:50, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

The Greek fonts you have are probably like the old "Symbol" font - when you type "a", you get an alpha; but you only see an alpha, actually it's just an "a" in a fancy font. Wikipedia uses Greek characters from Unicode, so an alpha is an alpha, whatever font you use to display it. I believe what you're looking for is installing a Greek keyboard layout, which would allow you to type Greek characters like Greek do on their computers. As this isn't really Wikipedia specific, you should ask how to do that at Wikipedia:Reference desk/Computing. --Dapete会話 09:57, 25 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] A "Gallery Viewer"?

I was just viewing the article Maryland, and liked most of the pictures in the Gallery in the middle of the page. I thought that it'd be a lot more convenient to have a Gallery Viewer- where you could click one gallery image and then have arrows that would lead you through the others- instead of clicking on an image and then reloading the article and clicking a new one. It doesn't seem like it'd be too hard to create either, but I'm not sure. Anybody agree/disagree? --Alegoo92 (talk) 16:21, 25 May 2008 (UTC)

It would be posible yes but would require changes to how mediawiki handles images (most people get the effect you want by opening the images in new tabs). At the present time I don't think we have anyone interested in writeing the relivant code.Geni 16:36, 25 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] an obviously plagiarized article

The entry on Southdale Mall has been plagiarized (like so many other Wikipedia entries) from an article published by Malcolm Gladwell. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Timtherhetor (talk • contribs) 21:21, 25 May 2008 (UTC)

Can you provide us links to the articles you claim are plagiarized, as well as to the sources of the alleged copyright? Tony Fox (arf!) 21:39, 25 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Request help from Internet Explorer user

Could someone who uses IE7 please check out Template:Ribbon devices/testcases#Examples and tell me if the "live" and "sandbox" versions are the same or different? The result I am looking for in the "sandbox" version is five rows of ribbons with, from top to bottom, 2-1-3-3-3 ribbons. Please comment on User talk:Flamurai or Template talk:Ribbon devices. Thanks. – flamurai (t) 00:30, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

The 'live' versions are different in FF and IE (7.0.5730.11), but the 'sandbox' version (different from both 'live' versions) is the same in each, 2-1-3-3-3. Algebraist 01:10, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Wikimedia Blog

The Wikimedia foundation blog, is located at the blog site.

Information about this blog can be located at Meta.


The blog is currently encouraging suggested post drafts from the contributers on here at Wikimedia. Please check out the drafting instructions at m:Wikimedia_Blog#Drafting_a_post

Send in your material!

An example of a post that could be drafted is the new SUL / Unified login system. Perhaps a contributer knowledgeable in that area could write something up.  :)

Very Best! NonvocalScream (talk) 02:11, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Questionnaire on translating for Wikimania 2008

Hello, everyone. :)

You don't know me (I'm most active on fr:wp), so I apologize for intruding a bit on your wiki. But I do need your help!

I will be giving a talk at Wikimania 2008 in Alexandria on translation in Wikimedia projects (along with User:Aphaia), and to that end I need some statistics upon which to base my work. I have prepared a questionnaire in several languages, including English, and am looking for some kind souls who would take 5 minutes of their time to answer it. ;) It is very short and the questions aren't hard to answer. I aim to get at least 100 answers, and have gotten around 35 so far. Please help if you can.

Please reply in whichever language you feel most comfortable with. I'm not looking for just the most active translators, either, so if you translate very little I'd still be grateful for your participation. Please don't hesitate to share these links with anyone you think would be interested!

Thank you,
Arria Belli | parlami 15:06, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Wikimedia Commons announces launch of new Valued images project

The official VI seal
The official VI seal

[edit] The project goes live for nominations on 1 June, 2008 at 0:00 UTC

This Commons Valued images project sets out to identify and encourage users' efforts in providing valuable images of high diversity and usability, and to build up a resource for editors from other Wikimedia projects seeking such images for use online. The project also provides recognition to contributors who have made an effort to contribute images of difficult subjects which are very hard or impossible to obtain in featured picture or quality image technical quality. The project will run alongside the existing Commons Featured pictures and Quality images projects.

Please visit Valued images candidates to nominate an image, or to help review the nominations. Anyone with an account on Commons is welcome to nominate images, and also to take part in the open review process. --MichaelMaggs (talk) 22:02, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] "Gonna Fly Now" has false info

This article lists Gonna Fly Now as the theme song for Rocky. This is not true. Each movie has a different song played during the title sequence, which I think should be considered the "theme song". The song played is not Gonna Fly Now, it is a similar song called "Fanfare for Rocky" on the Rocky soundtrack. I could be wrong, just wanted to get this out here. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.29.65.87 (talk) 00:14, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

Note that the one reference on that article is to a page called "Gonna Fly Now (Theme from Rocky)", so I think you have a hard argument to make. You are welcome to find a reference proving your point and either introduce it to Talk:Gonna Fly Now or simply edit the article yourself. - BanyanTree 04:32, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Wikipedia background image(the book thing)

What is the licensing information? thanks. Rahk E✘[[ my disscussions | Who Is ]] 21:55, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

You mean the background behind the logo and all of the frames? That's not part of Wikipedia, that's part of MediaWiki, which is released under the GPL. Celarnor Talk to me 23:46, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Comparative politics articles

This morning a group of new users posted a series of new comparative politics articles. My guess is that they are part of a school project. For the most part they are fairly good, though they unquestionably need some style and formatting revisions. They are pretty bulky articles, and it would be could if some users could give them some care and attention. The ones I've found are:

- SimonP (talk) 18:08, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

Are this kind of things really encyclopedic? They would also appear to have NPOV issues.Geni 01:25, 30 May 2008 (UTC)
The American British one blithely assumes that there is only one legal system throughout the UK too. In actuality there are three: a common law system for England and Wales; a second common law system for Northern Ireland; and a hybrid civil/common law system for Scotland. That error alone would suggest that these articles need checking. -- Derek Ross | Talk 04:19, 30 May 2008 (UTC)
For one thing, an encyclopedic article shouldn't have the conclusion section; that's just not the style. They might be better put in Wikibooks, I would say. I can easily imagine a textbook comparing various governments in the world. -- Taku (talk) 08:27, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] straw poll

When you think of Washington State (with a capital S), do you mean:

Washington State University, or
the State of Washington, or
either one?
  • Disambiguate. 69.140.152.55 (talk) 05:10, 31 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Neither. Anytime it is possible for the title to have more than one meaning it must be a disambiguation page. To be redirected to the university article would particularly irritate users who are unfamiliar with the US practice of using this format as a "shorthand" form of university names. Roger (talk) 09:37, 31 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Disambiguate. Not everyone is familiar with the US-centric practice of shorthanding university names. Celarnor Talk to me 03:19, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

(Please sign *~~~~ in the appropriate section, and add any comments you deem useful.)

69.140.152.55 (talk) 05:10, 31 May 2008 (UTC)

Note that this is an inappropriate forum for this discussion. There is an ongoing discussion at Talk:Washington State. There is already a note pointing people to that discussion at Talk:Washington State University, though another at Talk:Washington is probably merited. In any case, please have this discussion somewhere localized to the users who frequent the relevant pages. - BanyanTree 04:26, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Can't vote for Wikimedia Board of Trustees election

I've got no idea where to put this but I'll post it here.

You are not qualified to vote in this election. You need to have made at least 600 contributions before 00:00, 1 March 2008, and have made at least 50 contributions between 00:00, 1 January 2008 and 00:00, 29 May 2008.

Why can't I vote? I've made over 5000 edits since being here. So I don't count? Bidgee (talk) 17:09, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

I don't know... According to the quote, you should be fine, as you made well over 50 edits since January and a lot more than 600 edits before March. Perhaps it only likes edits in a certain namespace? Rahk E✘[[ my disscussions | Who Is ]] 23:39, 1 June 2008 (UTC)
You didn't go to the vote page from some other wikimedia project using unified login, did you? I just did that (from simple.wikipedia) and it only counts edits in the project you come from. Algebraist 13:50, 2 June 2008 (UTC)
As far as I can tell, Bidgee does meet the criteria. Try again, making sure that you come from en.wikipedia, not from another project, and that you are logged in. If that fails, it might be a bug. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 15:39, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Earnest question

Does anyone know what the political biases are of the Trustees Board members at Wikimedia. For that matter, is there any real power granted to the Wikimedia user who wins the board election? Can they shape policy at all?

I just want to be clear on how important that office really is, and if it can effect things like, whose views are accepted as "consensus". Tcaudilllg (talk) 02:52, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

In the context of acting as a point of contact with external agencies such as the tax authorities, the courts, the media, etc., the Board of Trustees are important. In the context of the internal operation of the encyclopedia, they choose not to be. Hence things like whose views are accepted as "consensus" have been decided by anyone who has been interested in discussing that sort of thing. Check the Wikipedia mailing list archives and meta.wikipedia.org for past essays and discussions on this and many other matter of Wikipedia governance (including the creation of the Board). While the Board probably has the legal authority to decide such a matter as who is eligible to form consensus, its past behaviour suggests (to me at any rate) that it would only do such a thing under duress from external agencies. The only things that the Board mandates (as a result of agreement among those editors who were involved in the early days prior to the Board's formation) are core policies such as that "Wikipedia is an Encyclopedia and not various other things", the Neutral Point Of View, etc. -- the Five Pillars basically. Since the Board raises funds, pays for the servers, etc. it seems not unreasonable that it should set Wikipedia's high-level goals. If anything it seems quite surprising that it should leave so much of the detail to be defined by the General Public (or that segment of it which wants to volunteer for Wikipedia anyway).
So to specifically answer your questions. Some people may know the political biases but I don't. I would hope that they belong to the Encyclopedia Party though. They have as much power as any other Board member and rather more than the average editor. They can attempt to shape policy via discussion with other editors (as we all can) or impose it via a Board fiat (which they have only done to maintain Wikipedia's core values or to protect the encyclopedia from legal issues). -- Derek Ross | Talk 15:41, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] So and so is a fictional character

Why do so many articles on televsion characters begin with the line, "so and so is a fictional character in so and so series"? Why fictional? Shouldn't that be obvious from context? An encyclopedia would never refer to a real person as a "character". Indeed, "so and so is a fictional character" is actively misleading in many cases. It makes it sound like a character is fictional within that show's universe, like Itchy and Scratchy in The Simpsons.

I see similar patterns in articles on comic book characters. Look at the first line at Captain Marvel (DC Comics): "Captain Marvel is a fictional comic book superhero..." As opposed to a real comic book superhero?

I've started a discussion about this here. It would be great if people could stop by. Awbizkomeydownstar (talk) 08:13, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

This was discussed and agreed on some time ago. It may be obvious to you that David Copperfield is a fictional character (or that he is not a fictional character) but that does not mean that it is obvious to someone who has never heard of him. Particularly when it comes to minor characters from minor novels, experience proved that it was necessary to establish context for fictional characters to prevent confusion. Hence the standard wording that WP now uses for them. -- Derek Ross | Talk 19:56, 28 May 2008 (UTC)
Is there a link to a past discussion? Awbizkomeydownstar (talk) 23:26, 28 May 2008 (UTC)
You want a link to a discussion that took place five or six years ago ? That could be tricky. -- Derek Ross | Talk 03:11, 29 May 2008 (UTC)
Take a look at Wikipedia:Manual of Style (writing about fiction). I'm sure plenty of discussion has happened on the talk page and its archives. --—— Gadget850 (Ed) talk - 18:35, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
The lead for Doctor Doom is probably better written: "Doctor Doom is a fictional character that appears in the comic books published by Marvel Comics." --—— Gadget850 (Ed) talk - 20:59, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] New MOS for TV

The television community currently has an MOS guideline under proposal, and would appreciate all comments at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Television/Style guidelines#MOS proposal in order to have the best possible guide for television related articles.  BIGNOLE  (Contact me) 12:04, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] How much info on embarassing associates should be in a presidential candidate's biography?

Some editors here think that when a U.S. presidential candidate is embarassed by someone associated with that candidate, no information about it should be mentioned in the WP biography article, even if the campaign (and therefore the person who is the subject of the article) was affected. Others think WP should only mention that this person was controversial and leave a link in the article to the WP article on that controversial associate. Still others (including me), think we should briefly explain just why that person was controversial in the candidate's life, which can be done in a phrase or at most a sentence or two. Examples:

Whatever we do, we should have equal treatment, so anyone interested in NPOV-, WP:BLP-compliant articles should look at and participate in the discussion at Talk:Barack Obama#Attempt to build consensus on the details. We've started the discussion on how much to say about former Weather Underground leader Bill Ayers in the Barack Obama article, but this will likely affect many other articles. Noroton (talk) 15:26, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

Please don't respond here! Please respond at the Talk:Barack Obama#Attempt to build consensus on the details where your comments will actually affect the consensus!!! Noroton (talk) 17:53, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
I agree that edits should be evenhanded and come from a NPOV, but to me the most important issues should be notability (within the context of that article) and verifiablity of the information in question. No doubt the people listed above should be included in the respective articles, but they shouldn't take up a majority of the article (and some of them are more notable than others within the context of each person - i.e. Wright > Rezko within the Obama artice). My $0.02. - Masonpatriot (talk) 15:56, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Date parameter for split templates

It has been suggested that I get a consensus on my proposal to add a date parameter to the split templates. I feel that the change is minor and therefore consensus does not need to be sought. There is a discussion at Wikipedia:Requested templates#Date parameter for split templates. -- Alan Liefting (talk) - 22:40, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Cleanup listings for WikiProjects

About 16% of all Wikipedia articles are flagged for cleanup of some sort, although this number varies largely by subject area. Any help in cleaning these massive backlogs is appreciated.

In order to help editors in finding articles of interest that need cleanup, I started to offer per-WikiProject and per-workgroup listings of flagged articles across all maintenance categories. See User:B. Wolterding/Cleanup listings for more information. The system has stabilized somewhat, and user feedback was quite positive, so I would invite more WikiProjects to join (i.e. to request listings).

By the way, the Urgent Maintenance Award of the Month is shared by the articles Legality of cannabis and Meme, each of which had 16 (sixteen) cleanup categories assigned as of May 24. --B. Wolterding (talk) 12:11, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Problems with wiktionary transwiki

CopyToWiktionaryBot has not been functioning for some time. The category includes articles tagged for transfer from at least as far back as May 10, here. (There may be older; I only looked at a couple.) I wrote to the bot's operator, User:Connel MacKenzie, about it on May 24th and got a prompt reply, but it wasn't really encouraging that the bot would be up and running again any time soon as there is evidently an issue with "false positives" in Special:Import. (Note: I am technologically pretty clueless. I am reporting it, but I don't know what he meant by it. :)) He suggested that an admin may be found on Wiktionary in the event of an emergency transfer; I don't know that there are any emergencies in this list, but am concerned that they are stacking up; currently there are 52 pages in the category. I asked two days ago at AN to see if there were any administrators here who might also be admins there, who could help clear this up, but got no takers. Anybody here have any idea how we can handle this "in house"? If not, I may wander over to find some AN noticeboard on Wiktionary and ask for ideas there. --Moonriddengirl (talk) 16:48, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Six Degrees of Wikipedia?

Do you reckon it's possible to get from any Wikipedia article to any other Wikipedia article just by clicking the hyperlinks in the text in less than six moves? Savager (talk) 18:28, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

It is not. You can't get to a page with no incoming links, for example, such as Al 'Uyaynah up till a minute ago. But see Wikipedia:Six degrees of Wikipedia. Algebraist 18:52, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
I tried a dozen or more combinations of two articles in Wikipedia:Six degrees of Wikipedia, getting as obscure as I could, and every single one took exactly four "jumps" between articles - no more, no less. Is this reflective of some deep truth about reality?!?! - DavidWBrooks (talk) 18:59, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
Yes. You have taken the first step towards complete omniscience. Celarnor Talk to me 19:53, 3 June 2008 (UTC)
here is the answer GameKeeper (talk) 07:39, 4 June 2008 (UTC)
From that website: "If you follow the best route in all cases, it takes an average of 4.573 clicks to get from any Wikipedia article to any other." (most likely referring to articles in the "big component") Dcoetzee 22:22, 5 June 2008 (UTC)
Except our Kevin Bacon is Billie Jean King. Phlegm Rooster (talk) 22:36, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Alexa traffic rankings for Wikipedia

Any reason for Wikipedia jumping in traffic in the last 2 weeks: [3]? Samw (talk) 22:05, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

According to a Signpost article from May 2nd, it's a result of Alexa expanding their dataset in mid-April. - BanyanTree 07:06, 4 June 2008 (UTC)
Thanks! So the growth is only showing up now? The Alexa stats are even better than the Signpost article! Samw (talk) 03:07, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] How do I delete a disambiguation page?

I want to delete this page -> Wacol and link it straight to the Wacol, Queensland page 203.206.10.229 (talk) 15:39, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

If you're sure that that meets the requirements for disambiguation pages (here) i.e., that this particular Wacol is going to be the one wanted by most readers, then you should move (using the "move" tab) the content of Wacol to Wacol (disambiguation), and then edit the redirect that should be made on Wacol to point to Wacol, Queensland. You should finally add {{otherusesof|Wacol}} to the top of the Wacol, Queensland page so that the disambiguation page doesn't get lost. --tiny plastic Grey Knight ⊖ 16:19, 5 June 2008 (UTC)