Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)/Archive 11

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[edit] Standardizing author attribution (for merges, etc)

Just an idea I've been thinking about - not really fleshed out yet. When pages are merged, we've been pretty sloppy about maintaining attribution (both for the GFDL and for the purposes of just trying to keep track of where stuff came from). At least one page on merging (Help:Merging and moving pages) documents the common practice of just linking to where the stuff came from. Sometimes Template:R from merge will be used to prevent stuff from being mistakenly deleted. The most careful of us will sometimes even add a list of author names or article names in a section on the talk page.

My proposal is to standardize the method of attribution. My specific idea is to create a subpage of talk pages (when necessary) to document any additional attribution. It would be located at Talk:PAGENAME/Attribution. It would be linked from the talk page using some standardized template and could maybe even be linked from the article's edit history. --- RockMFR 02:52, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

I would be neat if the history tab was partly editable, to be able to annote thing like this. —Ruud 09:26, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Why not just move the old article page (and thus its edit history) to be a subpage of the surviving article's talk page? Then change the redirect to point to the surviving article; the history of the redirect page now tells you where the article history went to. -- John Broughton (♫♫) 14:57, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

This is a valuable idea, and I agree that author attribution of merged pages has been somewhat neglected. In most cases we might not need a subpage and a special template on the talk page might suffice, but I can see a subpage being needed in some of the more complex cases.--Pharos (talk) 20:17, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] {{ArticleHistory}} deprecates other templates?

Editors may be interested in the discussion that is starting here. Happy‑melon 12:41, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] WP:LRR - long range TFA requests

Since Wikipedia:Today's featured article/requests is almost always filled to its five-request capacity, I and some other editors decided this first-come, first-served system wasn't adequate anymore, and therefore created Wikipedia:Today's featured article/Long range requests. Our proposal is simply to allow FA contributors to specify a pertinent anniversary, holiday or other date that they would like their article to be TFAed on, if possible. Someone had pointed out that The Raven, for instance, could have been TFAed on Edgar Allen Poe's birthday. Sarsaparilla (talk) 04:03, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Fair use image for upload

I had recently been looking at the article Fear Her Initially the article had a fair use image, Image:Fearher.jpg, this was deleted as failing to meet the guidelines for fair use

The image was then reuploaded, deleted

Then reuploaded, and deleted again

It was replaced by another Image:DW Fear Her.jpg that failed to meet FU requirments

Having listed this at ifd, a protracted complaint was made against me for disruptive behaviour (later withdrawn), and the ifd "speedy closed"

The image then went to deletion review, where the closer was found to have acted improperly

The image was then relisted at ifd, and eventually deleted

Members of the wikiproject have threatened to continue to reupload copyrighted images for use in this article

This was a long and protracted process, WP is littered with thousands of copyrighted images with flawed rationales, which on the whole are cut and pastes added by users who neither understand the goal of the project or the concept of "fair use", the ammount of work taken to get rid of one copyright violation was excessive, and is not sustainable, and this abuse is moving the project away from it's goal!

It is my opinion that WP has this process round the wrong way To upload an image with an invalid fair use rationale, takes seconds, yet to get it removed takes weeks, and even then there is no guarantee it won't be back in another form.

I would propose that all non-free images with the exception of "Team and corporate logos" should go through an Image for upload process where the merits of the FU rationale are discussed beforehand, and if approved, they then become eligiable for use in article space Fasach Nua (talk) 16:44, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

I would think a more appropriate course of action after this incident is to arrive at a definitive policy statement about whether it is acceptable or not to use single non-free screenshot images for TV episode articles. This sort of thing should not need to be debated (or justified) every time. It would seem to me that either they all can stay or they all should go. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 18:39, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

I couldn't diasagree more the use of a copyrighted image on WP should always have to be "justified", and the extent of abuse of copyright images on this project extends far beyond that of television programmes. Fasach Nua (talk) 10:21, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

The abuse of copyright images is certainly widespread for corporate and team logos too, so I am puzzled why you propose they be exempt from your proposal. — Andrwsc (talk · contribs) 18:40, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

The WP:FU policy seems to be more straight forward for these than other fair use images, I have no strong feelings in favour of exempting them, and not exempting them would greatly simplify the proposed system. Fasach Nua (talk) 18:59, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

Too much bureaucracy. Also, drop the pointless vendetta. The image has been deleted. Will ^(talk) 19:38, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

Too much bureaucracy in the ~200 edits to remove a single copyrighted image, or too much bureaucracy with this proposal? Fasach Nua (talk) 22:49, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

Proposal. Taking 300 per day as a conservative estimate, that's still more than all of the deletion processes combined. Will ^(talk) 22:51, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

The reason there are so few deletions are they are too beuracratic, I have no interest in tackling another one for a good few months after my last experience. I would imagine that if it was more difficut to upload it would stem the influx of more spurios images, just as the deletions of copyright violations are stemmed now. There isnt an easy answer and you are going to get bureaucracy either way. I think it should be easier to dispose of a non-compliant copyrighted image than to upload them, and there has to be a better system than there currently is (im not saying the one Im proposing is the best alternative) Fasach Nua (talk) 22:59, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

The deletion process is damaging enough as it is, especially with BetacommandBot mindlessly tagging images for deletion. A much better solution would be to change the guidelines to clearly state the policy on screenshots for lists of episodes. Personally, I think it's fine to have a screenshots to show an episode in a list of episodes as long there is no more specific article about that episode. —Remember the dot ^(talk) 23:29, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Wikipedia is not iTunes

When I was scrolling through the Slipknot article, I noticed that there were not one, not two, but three audio samples. Compare that to one image of the band itself. There should be some type of policy against this. --Gp75motorsports ^{REV LIMITER} 16:18, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

The fair use policy limits articles to one sample per song, but looking at the total number of samples in an article, Wikipedia:Music samples states: "There's no limit of how many samples you could use in one article, but you have to put in mind that music samples serve as tools for a better understanding of the article, so insert only relevant samples.". Tra (Talk) 16:34, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

As long as each sample illustrates a fact stated in the article, there should be no problem with it. I don't know about Slipknot, but there's a long discussion over at Radiohead about which and how many samples to include. –Pomte 22:39, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Go/Search

Is there any way to change the behavior of Wikipedia searches, such as the direct search available for Firefox, so that users are taken directly to articles rather than a list of search results (if an article exists with the name searched for), the same way the "go" button works in the Wikipedia search box?

I presume you must have been using the search tool available through the Mozilla add-ons page. Wikipedia doesn't have any control over that, but there is a search tool available that does act like the 'Go' button. To get this:

1. Make sure you are looking at a Wikipedia page
2. Click the drop down arrow to the left of the search bar. You should see that Wikipedia (EN) is on the menu.
3. Click Add "Wikipedia (English)"
4. Click the drop down arrow again
5. Click Manage Search Engines...
6. Select Wikipedia (EN) and click Remove
7. Click OK

The search box should now work properly. Tra (Talk) 00:48, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

Awesome, worked just as you described, thanks so much! Sorry to trouble the proposal page with this.

Equazcion •✗/C • 00:56, 12/24/2007

[edit] New proposal

I've posted two suggestions here in Jimbo Wales talk page about trim down vandalism & making Wiki more user friendly. Please check it. Thanks. --Avinesh Jose (talk) 04:26, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

You can open external links in a new window/tab by going here, clicking on the "Gadgets" tab, selecting the "Open external links in a new tab/window" option, and clicking "Save". Gracenotes^T § 04:53, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

ok I done. But what about my first suggestion? (pl check above Jimbo Wales page) can anyone give some comments about that?. --Avinesh Jose (talk) 06:23, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

And please, in the future, post suggestions on one of the Village pump pages, not on the Jimbo Wales talk page, unless you're specifically asking him about something that only he can respond to. -- John Broughton (♫♫) 22:13, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

As far as userpage vandalism goes, that is usually by people who have been warned or temporarily blocked for vandalism and then vandalize the userpage of the person who warned or blocked them. It is rarely from random drive-by vandals. Also, if the vandalism is going to occur anyway, it would be better for it to be in usersace than in articles. Mr.Z-man 06:27, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

Pardon the tangent but I didn't know about that gadgets tab until now. I think that's a great idea, letting people install scripts automatically just by checking a box. Are there plans to expand it? I think "six tabs" and "watchlist since" should go in there too.

Yes, after placing that yet-to-create-script in a user page by self, no new user/anonymous IP’s can edit (except administrators/established editors) on that user page, if it works. --Avinesh Jose (talk) 07:30, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

I'm sorry but I have no idea what you're trying to say. I was just suggesting more scripts to add to the "Gadgets" tab in the Wikipedia user preferences.

Equazcion •✗/C • 13:55, 12/24/2007

I hope you already read the proposals I've mentioned above in Jimbo’s pg (the pg is archived now). per that, the second one (open in different window issue solved). I was talking about the first one. i.e. cut down user page vandalism. I suggest that make some scripts '{{}}' which can be placed in user pg by user, so that nobody can vandalise user pg except admins/established users (if any copy vio occurs). Because, user pg is one of the main places where often getting vandalized. --Avinesh Jose (talk) 17:06, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Modifying images: "use the previous version's license"

Most of my image uploads are actually just modifications (maybe I correct a mistake or improve brightness/contrast) of images that already existed on one of the Wikis, so I find it irritating to have to try to match the previous license with one available in that license list. Sometimes, the image was released under, I don't know, NiftyLicense 1.2, but times have changed and all the cool kids are now using NiftyLicense 1.3, so 1.2 isn't listed - what am I supposed to do in that situation? Technically, the original author said 1.2, and I don't think I legally have the right to change the license to 1.3 after modifying it. I propose that an option is added to the list to "use the previous version's license" which would only be available of course, when a user has clicked on the "Upload a new version of this file" link on the original image's page. --Seans Potato Business 14:12, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] WikiProject Classroom

I was outside, stripping kick wax off of my cross country skis, thinking, just thinking, and then I thought, 'Hey, Wikipedia has plenty of projects, like WikiProject Maine and such, and then it crosses my mind, how many times have I heard teachers say Wikipedia is so unreliable, you can't trust anything they say and such? TOO MANY. Then I came up with the idea for a WikiProject Classroom.

First of all, lets identify why people find Wikipedia unreliable.

1. Anyone can change it.
2. People can change anything they wish to.
3. Information is not always correct.

So, what do I propose to change this? I propose that we make a template that only administrators can use that states that an article is within the scope of WkiProject Classroom. Also, how do we know if something is used in the classroom? I KNOW we have some users here that are teachers. Create a template for teachers, and then the teacher can look at their curriculum and then look at any page that may contribute to their and deem it to be a WikiProject Classroom focus point (with a template).

What are the greatest benefits?

1. EVERYONE benefits- the encyclopedia, the teachers, and the students.
2. It is not time consuming- It should take less than a week for a teacher to decide what pages may be within the scope for WikiProject Classroom.
3. It will create a reference to pages that one might be able to use reliably.
4. It will provide unmotivated Wikipedians with, possibly, a greater motivation.
5. Wikipedia would be better advertised as a reliable source.

Good peoples, I am not trying to criticize the website by saying it is not reliable, I am simply telling you what is actually said in the real world- teachers fail students because they got all their info from Wikipedia, even if no other sites offer any.

Thank you for your time, please do not ridicule this and throw it in the trash, I believe that this could actually turn into a wonderful new project for Wikipedia. Independent147 (talk) 19:02, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

I don't understand how labeling articles as "used in the classroom" prevents them from being any less unreliable? Everyone can still change/vandalise them and they'll still be full of errors? If you wanted, you could start your own Wikiproject with like-minded people and put banner templates on the talk-pages that you think are within the scope of "the classroom" (up to highschool though, that's a heck of a lot of articles). --Seans Potato Business 19:23, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia:WikiProject Classroom coordination. Durova^Charge! 19:32, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Proposal for change to the Upload File interface

I propose that when a fair use licensing statement is selected on the image upload Wikipedia:Upload, that the standard summary entry box be replaced with Template:Non-free_use_rationale.

That would at least educate new users as to what makes up a free-use rational and would increase the standardization of what FURs are used on image pages. Further, it would increase compliance with copyright laws, as now users would be aware that they are breaking fair use law by not filling in a template. This would presumably lead ot more users filling in all required fields

The summary box could either be filled with a blank template or there could be separate entry boxes for each line of the template, depending on waht would work best from a technical standpoint. Mbisanz (talk) 04:01, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

I've make a protected edit request at Wikipedia talk:Upload#Preload description and use rationale templates. Please comment there. —Remember the dot ^(talk) 05:00, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Template Proposal

Well I thought I'd propose a new template. Now this isn't necessarily about voting, but I'm proposing a new user friendly template for placing a choice in deletion discussions ect. It would save having to put in the markup and also feature icons to help differentiate the different choices/decisions.

The template would be something simple along the lines of {{vote|choice}}. So if you put in {{vote|keep}}, it would turn out like:
Keep

Sometimes people are for for two things so you could have {{vote|choice|secondary choice}} which would turn out like this:
Keep/Merge

I have put in an example below of what it would look like in a deletion discussion:

Bearcat Heavy Fighter

Bearcat Heavy Fighter (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs) – (View log)

Non-notable fictional spacecraft. The article has no reliable secondary sources to establish notability in the real world and fails Wikipedia:Notability. It consists mostly of a list of specifications, as one would find in a game guide, which Wikipedia is not. Pagrashtak 18:21, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Note This debate has been added to the list of video game deletions. Pagrashtak 18:22, 21 December 2007 (UTC)
Merge whatever valuable content there is into Wing Commander IV: The Price of Freedom. Otherwise delete. --NickPenguin_(contribs) 18:38, 21 December 2007 (UTC)
Delete/Redirect to Wing Commander IV: The Price of Freedom. Addhoc (talk) 19:37, 21 December 2007 (UTC)
Delete Non-notable and fails WP:Plot. Ridernyc (talk) 02:02, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

Of course this is also applicable to other discussions as well, not just deletion ones. Well maybe the idea could use a bit of work. I'd like to know what you all think, maybe we can make a system that works. .:Alex:. 22:48, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

It'll never pass, it's a perennial proposal. Will ^(talk) 22:55, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

I like it. Saying it's a perennial proposal doesn't say much. What exactly makes this a bad idea? Seems like this would make it easier to get an idea of which way a discussion is leaning. It's also more aesthetically pleasing, and makes it easier to find specific !votes when you're looking for a particular one in the midst of a large discussion.

Equazcion •✗/C • 23:22, 12/23/2007

I like it too. It could also be more easily processed by a bot if one wanted to automate vote counting. Sarsaparilla (talk) 00:18, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

Vote counting for what? The only thing we have that is officially a straight vote is ArbCom elections, held once a year and we already have bots that count that and RFA (a pseudo-vote). The place where this would get the most use, AFD, is not a vote and most closings require reading and analyzing the comments, so a bot would be useless. Mr.Z-man 08:15, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

I find it distracting rather than pleasing. The bolded words are enough; entirely unnecessary to have 2 distinct ways to express the same thing. See TfD June 2005, TfD Nov 2005, TfD May 2007, DRV May 2007, etc. –Pomte 07:52, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

I just found this monobook.js script that automatically shows those symbols when you're viewing a !vote discussion, based on the text of people's votes. Seems to work pretty well so far.

Equazcion •✗/C • 11:53, 12/24/2007

Hm. I tried it out. It's kinda quite good, but it has flaws in that it adds a symbol to unrelated text in certain articles and talk pages. I also just found out that the commons uses something similar to this, but lets not bring that into it. .:Alex:. 12:32, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

I have seen some instances where it adds the symbols to non-vote text, but that doesn't seem to happen too often -- certainly not enough to be a problem.

Equazcion •✗/C • 12:41, 12/24/2007

I strongly oppose this, partly on the basis of the previous TFDs. However, the larger reason is that the symbols add no context to the opinion (be it keep, delete, support, oppose, etc.) whatsoever. The only way they would be helpful is in a multilingual project, like Wikispecies, Commons, and Meta. 哦，是吗？(O-person) 23:33, 26 December 2007 (GMT)

[edit] Proposal to add a list of contact information for major companies

I don't know if this would be against wikipedia's policies, but it seems to me that there is a problem with finding contact details for companies, and especially with finding contact details that allow direct contact with a human as opposed to an automated system.

There are lists out on the web at the moment (gethuman.com) but they do not allow easy contributions from the public. This is where I think wikipedia could really improve the list. Any visitors could immediately add contact details, or change them if they become obsolete.

This wouldn't really make an encyclopedia entry though. If it's not suitable for wikipedia perhaps there are other wiki projects that would be more appropriate? Milliondead (talk) 22:43, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

As you say I don't think this really falls under the scope of an encyclopedia. You could contact Wikia about setting up a project like that. It seems like the kind of thing they'd be interested in.

Equazcion •✗/C • 23:50, 12/24/2007

Your initial suspicions were right: Wikipedia is not the white/yellow pages. MER-C 12:35, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Featured User

How about we start a new featured section for usres? There would be criteria such as edit count, contribution, and other. Juliancolton (talk) 17:00, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

We're here to build an encyclopedia, not glorify individual editors. That and any selection process would be a popularity contest, and ultimately not based on any type of objective criteria. Sephiroth BCR ^(Converse) 18:07, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, it would be like RfA, only more to-the-point. Who the hell wants that? Equazcion •✗/C • 10:17, 12/26/2007

Sounds like Uncyclopedia's "Noob of the month." bibliomaniac15 23:15, 26 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] What links here: pages linked to within templates

I propose that links originating within transcluded templates have a special note beside them in the "What links here" page to reflect the fact that they're not mentioned in the body of the article. I'd like to change it to be able to identify them at a glance. This is especially an issue with large navigation templates. SharkD (talk) 23:53, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

I agree. I've found several times that whenever I've moved a page, changing the links to the article is often a torturous process, as 90% of the links are to a template, and finding the links that are not template-related is often exhausting. Having a notice would go a long way to making this process more streamlined. Sephiroth BCR ^(Converse) 07:38, 26 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Aesthetic implications of article series boxes

I first brought this up in the technical section of the Village Pump (here, to be specific), in order to get a first consultation on the technical implications of this matter. Seeing that there are practically none (for reasons stated in the aforementioned location), I have decided to re-submit the issue, this time here.

Ahem. I like article series boxes, and I like succession boxes—they are very useful and their appearance has greatly improved since the old days. However, I find that the transition from the article's text to the templates is usually both ugly and confusing. That is, more often than not the templates begin right after the last reference, external link, of line of text of the article, leaving no space at all and making the very last part of these articles look crowded, creating a tiring and confusing image for the reader, and practically obscuring the fact that there is not going to be any text after that point.

This, this, and this are examples of the situation I am referring to: bad template layout, bad page end construction. I have encountered worse cases, but only these examples I have been able to retrieve promptly enough.

Articles need to be able to breathe. All we need is a small gap.

The remedy is a simple one: instead of leaving only one empty line between the templates in question and their preceding text (or references list), or even no lines at all, I propose that we leave two empty lines. It is nothing complicated; I have been consistently applying this simple solution to articles (and I am active in WikiProject Succession Box Standardization so I edit quite a lot of articles purely for their templates), and I am very pleased with the result. I believe that a very simple thing like this can actually cause an improvement in the appearance of the bottom of many articles (especially larger ones, which are also more often visited); this is the last readers see of articles, and is thus quite important.

I wonder whether this small directive can be accepted by the community, how this can be done, and, if it can, in what form might it be incorporated into our editing practices. I hope that even a small matter like this one can generate fruitful discussion and eventually lead to some kind of improvement. Waltham, The Duke of 21:45, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

I assume you're referring to something like this:

Using two spaces instead of one is simply a bad idea. The example above uses margin:5px auto; instead of margin:auto;. Modifying a couple of key templates would fix the issue almost universally. --MZMcBride (talk) 22:46, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

The Duke of Waltham isn't referring to spacing between the boxes, but spacing between the last line of the article and the first box. –Pomte 23:04, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Bingo. Instead of this...

• The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King at Box Office Mojo
• The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King at Metacritic
• The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King at Yahoo! Movies

I suggest that we try to achieve this:

• The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King at Box Office Mojo
• The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King at Metacritic
• The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King at Yahoo! Movies

Doesn't it just look better? The same goes for succession boxes, which in any case always precede article series boxes and are close to them both in purpose and in function. Waltham, The Duke of 23:41, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

I think while there's not enough spacing in the first case, there's too much spacing in the second case to make it look inconsistent, since that sort of spacing doesn't appear anywhere else in the article, like it shouldn't be intended. A compromise would be roughly half that space, using an empty div or something, but then this would have the disadvantage of being complicated and requiring another template (this is just a personal preference though, which can be ignored). I agree overall that the second is better than the first. –Pomte 00:06, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

If not looking inconsistent is a consideration, spacing (or anything else) specified in terms of pixels looks inconsistent depending on what browser resolution and text size an individual user happens to have his machine and his browser set up for. -- Boracay Bill (talk) 01:04, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

I should not think that the fact that spacing of this size does not normally appear in the rest of the article is that much of a consideration, as we are talking about what is essentially the end of the article. It is one thing discussing the spaces between different paragraphs or sections, and an entirely different analysing the connection between the article's text and a few foreign elements, whose purpose is to ease navigation between the article in question and different articles. That said, I persist in the two-line scheme, which has the added benefit of introducing neither complex syntax nor any inconsistently appearing pixel-defining code.

In fact, large gaps in this very place are usual in Wikipedia, a result of small boxes on the right linking to portals and/or one or more of the sister projects. In the article for London, for example, this is most evident. I should say that adding larger spacing in the rest of the articles actually increases standardisation across Wikipedia, as the large gaps of my example are more or less unavoidable, while the reverse (adding spacing) is perfectly feasible. Waltham, The Duke of 08:20, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Wtmitchell: I wasn't thinking in terms of pixels, but em. There's more space in Firefox 2 than IE6 anyway, for instance, but this is beside the point. –Pomte 08:49, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

I thought this discussion was actually interesting... Or is it just the Christmas effect? Waltham, The Duke of 17:27, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Taking note of the primary contributor(s) to Featured Articles

I have made a proposal for taking note of the primary contributor(s) to articles at FAC, for purposes of transparency (especially to non-Wikipedians) and good book-keeping. Please see the discussion at Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates#Taking note of the primary contributor(s). Thanks.--Pharos (talk) 07:03, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] School IPs

Has anybody ever looked into the percentage of anonymous edits from schools that are vandalism? It sure seems like school IPs are a large portion of the vandalism. I wonder if the current policy of generally blocking schools from editing for a few hours (as opposed to the longer periods for other anonymous users) might be a bad policy? Obviously, creating a policy similar to the Open Proxy policy wouldn't make sense, but would Wikipedia benefit by requiring editors from school computers to register accounts at home before they can edit at school? Life, Liberty, Property (talk) 07:16, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

I think you are mistaken - it's the other way round. Most anonymous users are blocked for a few days , whereas unregistered editing from school IPs with a history of vandalism is routinely disabled for months at a time (up to a year). See Template:SharedIPEDU. Hut 8.5 20:00, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

I, as a vandal fighter, am quite content with the current policy
To begin with, while it is true that some school IPs are blocked for a few hours, 24 or 31 seems to be a more common duration for first time offenders. Persistent vandalism can get months. Also, blocking them only for a couple of hours is logical, it can be long enough for the vandal to move on to the next class where they might not have access to computers.
I haven't seen any percentages, but I can imagine that many edits coming from school IPs are constructive contributions. Imagine this-you're a high school student reading up on the French revolution during your free period. You notice a typo. So you click the "edit" link. You are told you can't edit it, which is in direct contradiction of what it says on the main page (Welcome to Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit) and one of the founding principles ("You can edit this page right now" is a core guiding check on everything that we do). Are you going to go home, and register an account to change that one letter? Hardly. Also, keep in mind that not everyone has internet access at home (preventing those who don't have internet access at home from editing is likely to contribute to systemic bias). I can imagine that there are a lot of valid contributors from school IPs. Puchiko (Talk-email) 20:06, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

Some great points. The more I think about it, vandalism from school IPs should eventually decline as soon as the teachers understand more about Wikipedia and step in to stop vandals. I guess I got this bad idea because of all the bias against Wikipedia in schools and because school articles seem to attract alot of vandalism. Life, Liberty, Property (talk) 21:31, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Proposal to create the Commission for Public Complaints Against the Arbitration Committee

Please see here for a discussion regarding the Proposal of Commission for Public Complaints Against the Arbitration Committee (CPC-ArbCom). I have already gotten a few requests to investigate some interesting cases. --CyclePat (talk) 19:15, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Hide "user page" link for anonymous users

Anonymous users don't use user pages, yet whenever you visit the talk page of an anonymous user you see an ugly red "user page" link. I've made a user script that automatically hides this link. I'm wondering if there's any interest in deploying this script for all users.

To try it out, add the following to your monobook.js (or the script file for any other skin you may be using):

/* Automatically hide "user page" link for anonymous users */

function hideAnonUserPageLink()
{
    document.getElementById("ca-nstab-user").style.visibility = "hidden"
}
 
if (wgPageName.search(/^(User_talk:(?:(?:25[0-5]|2[0-4][0-9]|[01]?[0-9][0-9]?)\.){3}(?:25[0-5]|2[0-4][0-9]|[01]?[0-9][0-9]?))$/) == 0)
{
    window.addOnloadHook(hideAnonUserPageLink)
}

—Remember the dot ^(talk) 03:28, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

Sometimes a message is put on the user page of an IP, see e.g. User:216.83.121.194.--Patrick (talk) 10:23, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

Yes, but since people rarely visit IP user pages, the information is generally given at the top of the talk page instead. I see your point though, and I've tweaked the script to only hide the user page if it does not exist:

/* Automatically hide "user page" link for anonymous users that do not have user pages */
 
function hideAnonUserPageLink()
{
    var userPageLink = document.getElementById("ca-nstab-user")
    if (!window.hideAnonUserPageLinkDisabled && userPageLink.className == "new")
    {
        document.getElementById("ca-nstab-user").style.visibility = "hidden"
    }
}
 
if (wgPageName.search(/^(User_talk:(?:(?:25[0-5]|2[0-4][0-9]|[01]?[0-9][0-9]?)\.){3}(?:25[0-5]|2[0-4][0-9]|[01]?[0-9][0-9]?))$/) == 0)
{
    window.addOnloadHook(hideAnonUserPageLink)
}

—Remember the dot ^(talk) 18:17, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

The ugly red user page link can be fixed with an edit to your monobook.css. Gracenotes^T § 18:31, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

Can you be more specific? —Remember the dot ^(talk) 19:28, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

How about:

#ca-nstab-user.new {
    color: #hexcode;
}

Note that it colors all nonexistent userpages, not just IPs'. Tuvok[^T@lk/_{Improve me}] 04:36, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the suggestion! However, I'm really interested in applying this to IP editors only, because otherwise it would make it difficult for ordinary users to create user pages. Generally, IP editors should not have user pages, so it doesn't make sense to display the "user page" tab for them. In fact, if you request from the search box the user page of an IP user that does not have a user page ("User:24.115.70.15", for example), the search function will take you to the contributions page instead of the user page. —Remember the dot ^(talk) 04:45, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

Hmm... The body of each page in MediaWiki is assigned a class named page-[namespace]_[escaped_title_here], but I don't know about the feasibility of regex in CSS rules. I'm not sure it's possible to do that. JavaScript would have to be used. There's just no class- or ID-based way of telling IP #ca-nstab-user tabs from registered user tabs. Perhaps you could put in a request at Bugzilla for an "anon" class to be added to IP user and user talk pages; then you could use the selector #ca-nstab-user.anon.new... Tuvok[^T@lk/_{Improve me}] 14:20, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

I don't know if this is something that might be added to the new gadgets tab of "my preferences", but in any case, would you mind setting it up on a separate page? Village pump pages are only pseudo-archived, so archives aren't searchable via Google and a permanent page is thus much better for things of ongoing value. -- John Broughton (♫♫) 13:51, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

Just to let you know, the newer archives are now indexed by Google although most of the older ones are not searchable. Tra (Talk) 18:21, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

I'm interested in having this enabled by default, perhaps with a gadget to disable it if desired. It would improve the user experience for all. —Remember the dot ^(talk) 19:26, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Create a new ref tag called <note>

Sometimes you use the <ref> tag for notes (ie a bit more information) instead of for a reference, and i have seen articles which use the old {{note}} template to create a separate list of notes as well as of references. It should be very easy for the mw:Extension:Cite/Cite.php extensions to add <note> and <notes /> as two new hooks which work in exactly the same way as <ref> and <references /> do.

This would enable an article to maintain two lists (one of notes and one of references) as now it is either lumped together in one list, or needs to use old templating systems. For example: International Whaling Commission uses just the ref tags but some of the tags are for notes (eg number 6), so could have two lists instead.

Also, would it not be possible (maybe with a bit more work) to be able to have multiple lists of each. Ie you could have <ref1>, <ref2>, <ref3> which corresponds to <references1 />, <references2 />, <references3> which would be handy for articles such as List of Governors of Alabama which has a list below a table, and then one at the end of the article; or United Kingdom (and like many of country articles) has some notes in the infobox as well as a References section at the end of the article.

(I also raised this question at the technical village pump.) Chris_huh^talk 15:01, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

This is often discussed at WT:FOOT. Incidentally, if there is a Bugzilla request for this feature perhaps it should be listed in the Related section of WP:FOOT. -- SEWilco (talk) 15:25, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

I think those are both excellent ideas, the notes and the separated lists of refs (and maybe even separated lists of notes, like <notes1><notes2>). I hope it gets implemented. Equazcion •✗/C • 23:58, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

Having a section attribute would be a good way to implement this. Example usage:

<nowiki><ref section="notes">hello i am a note</ref> and <ref>i'm just a regular (default) ref</ref>