Wikipedia:Simple talk/Archive 39

Keeping track on the P(V)GA process

Hello, if I understood the Rambling Man correctly, one of the frustrations is that fundamental comments come at the last moment (when it is very hard to do time-consuming changes, with time running out). What would you think to have something like this page somewhere (I know I am not an expert on wikistyling or making it look good; but when discussion/voting starts, the page could be quickly updated (so that those interested see at a glance when the time is up for what article, and can schedule the please rewrite from scratch comment for early in the process; these are ofc just ideas....--Eptalon (talk) 12:04, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

I think one of the largest problems we face, and the one most evident in this specific case, is that very few people look at article when they are up for discussion. All the comments tend to usually show up once the article is put to a vote and even then much of it is only when someone points out the vote is happening and people need to look at it. In the Alba case, only two vote came in before the Simple talk notice asking for people to take a look at it. Most people tend to be busy doing whatever it is they are doing and not taking part in GAs and VGAs unless they are prodded or have a vested interest in it. By the time we get to voting, there should be nothing left to fix on the article. Actually, edits after the voting starts for VGAs is likely to cause the article to no longer apply as it fails the criteria that the last few changes should be minor. Much of the repairs of issues are hardly minor changes such as a typo/spelling error or a link fix.

Just because no one opposed an article being moved to the vote does not mean they support it, it seems to mean they just never got around to even looking at it to decide either way. This is a problem, but it is one I really do not know if it can be fixed. People cannot be forced to check every (V)GA, we are all volunteers after all. Each person will spend whatever amount of time they spend here as they see best. With our current user base, it just does appear that there is strong enough interest and dedication by most users to prevent things like this from happening. We don't have 1 million+ users where .001% of them is more than is needed to handle this. We have 22K and getting .001% activity would not be enough to get 6 votes. Out of En:'s 2.3m accounts, looking at the nomination page most currently active candidates are being discussed by 10 or less people, that's about 5 people per million accounts. With only 1% of their accounts, each person here would need to be 100 times more active to get the same results. Our users are more active (45 edits average per registered account vs 32 edits on En:) but we are not that much more active. -- Creol(talk) 13:16, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

Looking at it from a numbers points of view, getting 5 or 6 votes (with a given support percentage: usually up to 7-8 votes you have the article pass with one oppose, two will kill it) is a lot (given we are perhaps between 10 and 20 high-volume contributors). It is true that each of these 20 people has their favourite subjects, an article which touches your favourite subject is more likely to get your review that one that does not. The problem is: with 20 people, 5 votes means 25% of the active people who actually vote. We could now go and say that this is a problem which is specific to VGA with the stricter criteria - but the problem of getting people to look at an article, and comment on it is actually independent of any criteria. If on the other hand, we drop all requirements for a number of vote, we will step back to where we were half a year ago - that those articles that get promoted meet the criteria, but the community does not really see them as very good articles. We also need some kind of timeout,else we will see articles that are not ready sit there and collect dust. Making an article meet the criteria (either GA or VGA) is a lot of work, even for a decently-written article; I therefore understand that people get frustrated over a voting, where major things come in at the last moment. The argument This article failed VGA, let's try GA is not good either, because it makes those people who try to get GAs through feel second-class (bad). we cannot do anything like a given percentage of active editors must vote either, because then we have the problem of what an active editor is. Another problem: Some people say that World History is probably a good article; last I checked the article was like 25 printed pages long. - You seriously want to review that in a week with a stock of 15 freelance editors, who'd rather do other things?- The big question therefore is: What can we do to resolve this deadlock? --Eptalon (talk) 13:57, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

This may be a misinformed comment, because I've not looked heavily into the processes here, but as someone who has played a huge part in molding en's GA project into what it is today, and someone who has participated in the FA process a few times, maybe I can offer some assistance to improve things here.

First, the issue with making changes to the article may disqualify it unless they are all minor: Why is that a criteria? En has a similar one, but it only involves edit warring and content disputes. Any improvements are welcome. Such a criteria is discouraging for article improvement and seems counter-productive.

It's my understanding that there are two phases to this process. A nomination stage, where the article is critiqued and then a voting stage where it is decided if the current version should be promoted. Please correct me if I'm wrong. I've been told there's an issue with people dropping lengthy opposes on the last day and tanking nominations. I would recommend one of two things. Either 1/ allow extensions on voting so that the necessary changes can be made and those opposes hopefully changed to supports (that would be possible only if the aforementioned criteria is removed) or 2/ only those who participate in phase one are allowed to participate in phase two. Personally, I think option 1/ is ideal.

As far as the strictness of the criteria, am I reading correctly that the community rejects nominations that meet the criteria solely because they believe they are not of a good enough quality regardless? If that's the case, the criteria needs to be strengthened to match what the community feels is appropriate. Otherwise, as we found in the GA project on en before we strengthened the criteria, it just causes a lot of frustration and disappointment for the nominators and authors, which causes a lot of drama for everyone else, in turn.

Last, to increase participation, perhaps create a newsletter that goes out to those who care to subscribe to alert them to the current nominations and voting and such. Alternatively, such a page as Eptalon has proposed above. Hopefully I'm at least close to the mark, otherwise I've just wasted everyone's time, and thus I must apologize. LaraLove|Talk 22:52, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

What a promotion process should look like ideally:

1. Article is identified; shortcomings are listed (and are fixed with help from the community with a two week delay)
2. Article is moved to voting; during a week the editors (which were ideally involved in phase 1 as well) either support or oppose it;If it has enough support/votes at the end of the week, it will get promoted.

Seeing this, the bulk of the changes (with help of the community) should be in phase 1, not phase 2. The changes in phase 2 should really be limited to spellchecking/link-fixing and similar activities. At the moment, the bulk of the work is in phase 2 (where it should not be). We could fiddle with the timeouts; and say for example: 2 Weeks identifying issues; 1 week finishing fixing issues (vote possible); 1 week voting/fixing minor issues. Last week only if it did not reach the necessary votes in the first week, and has like 4/6 (3/5) required votes?--Eptalon (talk) 23:53, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Has there been any consideration in doing it like FAC is done on en? Where the article is nominated, shortcomings are listed, changes are made, people support or oppose as they feel necessary, and as long as the article is actively being improved it remains listed until it has enough support? Obviously, if an article is far from the standards, it would not remain listed. Likewise, if improvements are not made and active editing ceases, it is removed. It's my perception that there is a need for more promoted articles. Perhaps it is necessary to make some such changes. LaraLove|Talk 01:51, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

There are two fundamental problems (one was listed about) here:

1. The fact that for many articles, no one is looking at the articles in the first stage. A person identifies an article (most likely the article they have been working of for the last few days/weeks) and nominates it. That person sits there and watches as no one comments on the nomination (some get a comments, but most get nothing). The person eventually moves the article to the vote and informs the community of the vote and then people finally get around to looking at it and (hopefully, see #2) pointing out problems. By stage 2, voting, all of these problems should have been looked at and addressed but because no one had the time/took the time to deal with it at this point, all the problems finally get pointed out.
2. As with the old system, many articles are not being fully looked at before being voted on. Obvious mistakes are existing after 2-3 voters say the article is good. If the article was read and voted as good, there should not be a lot of problems left - especially simple one like a word missing in a sentence because it is in the interwiki links. In the recent Jessica Alba (hate to harp on this one again, but it serves as a good example of the problem), the top interwiki link was (and actually, still is) to en:wikt:apology. The sentence where half this problem is created reads "However, she later dropped the lawsuit she got a personal from Playboy owner Hugh Hefner." That sentence was supposedly looked at by three editors and never noticed that the word apology isn't in there. 5 editors (the line was edited and changed after the original editor and the first voter) didn't notices that this is actually two sentences (separate between Lawsuit and she or at least put an "and" in there and make a run on sentence out of it.) Everyone misses something, but 5 different people read that line in some form and thought it was correct.

The "last edit should be minor" was mainly created to prevent this last problem - someone voted, someone else edited the article to fix a problem they saw and created another problem (a bigger one). At this point the first person's vote is still counted even though with the change they may not agree with their own vote. You suggested extending the voting when problems like this occur, I would take it one step further and restart the process - move it back to nomination as if no vote was started, deal with the issues, and restart the vote when all problems have been fixed. Ideally it would be best to have someone involved with the process, but not especially involved in the particular vote who could make the decision if a vote needs to be negated and restarted (a ga/vga manager/administrator/coordinator). -- Creol(talk) 05:27, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Project director?

Added break for easier editing.

So, basically, you think there should be a director? Something like Raul654 and SandyGeorgia for FAs on en. I don't know if you have edited there and know about them. They run the FA program, SG specifically on FAC (Featured Article Candidates). She determines whether articles should pass or fail. In such cases as you mention above, I believe she contacts voters and asks them to update their vote if there has been significant changes, but I could be incorrect. If that's a viable option here, I'm sure she could be consulted. LaraLove|Talk 07:58, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

I think if we did put someone in charge we should probably keep it in-house. The main reason I feel this is because the primary criteria - That it is Simple English - is easier to judge if the person is very familiar with SE. Any native or fluent English speaker can understand SE, but writing it and more importantly reading it and trimming out non-SE is a totally different thing. I've worked with it extensively for close to two years and I wouldn't claim to be more than a high {{User simple-3}} to low {{User simple-4}}. To have someone who has little to no working knowledge of the language be in charge of deciding if the language is used correctly would not be a good idea. -- Creol(talk) 18:03, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Well, you're not placing someone to be the sole decider. Simply someone to run the program and keep track of what articles are being improved and which ones need to be removed. They go by what the reviewers are voting, not simply their own impression of the article. For that reason, I don't see a necessity to have someone who is simple-4 or -5, but rather someone with the desire to take on such a task. That would be the difficulty. Finding someone who the community trusts that is willing to take on so much work. Speaking specifically on the "in-house" comment, I did not mean that someone from en should run it. If that's the impression you got, I apologize. I meant only that Sandy could be consulted to give the details of how she runs FAC so that it could be discussed here and possibly a similar process established for simple. LaraLove|Talk 06:30, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

If we create the job of Article improvement director, their duties would be:

• Inform the community of Proposed article promotions (this could be done in page like the one I designed above)
• Decide when it is time to move from 'Phase 1' (discussion) to 'Phase 2' (voting), within the three weeks total time.
• Decide when it is time to restart the voting because of bigger changes, and tell all those that have voted until then to re-vote.
• Close the request as either successful or unsuccessful according to the criteria, after either the time is up, or vote is done. Remove/replace tags on the article, archive discussion/vote.

I think we need 2-3 people for each category (those doing PGA can also do PVGA, so there is no need for distinct people). I would however request that whoever is chosen is a named user from the local community, and is familiar with the criteria and with editing here (probably meaning:500-1000 edits minimum). Ideally they should be elected much like an admin. If we can agree on this, we need to update the criteria; voting is the same for both categories, only needed votes/support are different.--Eptalon (talk) 11:55, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Project administrator - yes, project director - no. FA is run as a private fiefdom over at en. and that's another mistake we don't want to replicate here. --Allemandtando (talk) 12:10, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Agree with the last point. The title, I think, is trivial. I don't think it should necessarily be an election, however. That's much too formal, and along the same lines with not wanting it to be private as it is on en, I don't think it should be as formal or official as it is on en. It shouldn't a position of power, rather one of organizer. However, much as a crat does, it is a position of determining consensus. So I guess it's all a matter of working out details. I also agree that it should not be just one person. LaraLove|Talk 19:44, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

I don't think it's a case of having someone determining consensus, more moving the process along at the right time, like an election judge / returning officer / scrutineer. Hippopotamus (talk) 22:33, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

(unindenting) Do we basically agree on the four points I gave above? - If so, we need at least 2 people (who are ideally already osmewhat involved with the process, so they understand the criteria. Do we also want such directors for the proposed demotions? --Eptalon (talk) 11:39, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

I think (considering the project's size) the same two people could handle demotions too. —Giggy 11:55, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Yea, I agree. As the project grows, and the workload grows, it can be split between more editors. LaraLove|Talk 16:48, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Stubs

Can we start a discussion (perhaps for the nth time) about stubs? Recently an admin added Category:Stubs to the {{stub}} template which had previously been removed and, has since been removed by another admin. Secondly I've now discovered a {{sports-stub}} template. There may be more, I don't know. Can we try to form an agreement on what we're doing here without slow-time wheel-warring? The Rambling Man (talk) 18:00, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

See here for templates that exist. - tholly ^--Turnip-- 18:02, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

That's redlink, and secondly, are those universally agreed before being rolled out or just tests? The Rambling Man (talk) 18:05, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Synergy mixed up the piping, I've fixed it now. Cassandra 18:06, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

I'm not Synergy, but yes I mixed it up. - tholly ^--Turnip-- 18:11, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

O...K... so I'll ask again, is rolling out a new stub type generally agreed or part of a test? This needs to be established before editors create stubs however they like. The Rambling Man (talk) 18:14, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Part of a test at the moment I think, but the {{sport-stub}} is already being used in several places. See here. - tholly ^--Turnip-- 18:17, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

You mean that you've been using it for 45 minutes? This needs to be discussed before being rolled out otherwise we'll have dozens of users copying and pasting stubs from en-wiki..... The Rambling Man (talk) 18:19, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

I agree, and TRM, check your Email Chat. SwirlBoy39 18:21, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Hey, I didn't apply the {{sport-stub}} to any of those pages! - tholly ^--Turnip-- 18:31, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Not saying that. It wasn't visible until an hour ago. Has it been agreed within the community? The Rambling Man (talk) 18:32, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

What do you mean, wasn't visible till an hour ago? And I don't think so , that's why the 'Project' is still in a userspace. - tholly ^--Turnip-- 18:36, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Well I'm guessing this edit was something to do with it, and the fact that the project is in userspace is irrelevant because the stubs are in the mainspace. We need to talk about this before we roll it out. What other stubs are being used like this? The Rambling Man (talk) 19:23, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Greetings TRM. We have never formally communicated (on any wiki) till now. I've made a proposal and I'd like the communities consensus before anyone proceeds in making more stubs. I didn't migrate from en to start a problem. All stubs created before this are subject to review, of course, in retrospect of their individual importance and significant usage. The basis for my proposal is to determine your very concerns and I'd appreciate any further conversation happen over there to document that consensus. So far, I have yet to see a clear rationale that main, top level, or general stub types should not be created to facilitate a comprehensive and structured maintenance scheme. I've also taken the liberty of creating two very important articles for this project (they being Silence and Consensus; both of which need simplification before moving to project space), and help with these would be appreciated. Regards. Synergy 00:35, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Hi Synergy. I looked at your pages on Silence and Consensus. I think that we do need a policy page on Consensus and that Silence could be a less official policy. However, they look like they were taken straight the English Wikipedia because of the high reading level. Mind if I simplify them up on your userpage or should I copy them to mine? Staeiou (talk) 03:11, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Hello. I agree with you. The consensus article should be a policy, as it is an important part of the goal of the project. The silence article should only be an essay and only work to supplement the policy (or rather, to elaborate and expand thereof). I have no problem with anyone working on these articles at all. I openly request that you do. Synergy 05:59, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Something like "agreement" would be a far better page name than "consensus" since the title really should be Simple English. Hippopotamus (talk) 04:00, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but I will have to disagree with you on this. Consensus is a word that all editors on every wikimedia wiki should know. We can and should, better define it or simply what it means in the article/policy/guideline (whichever it becomes) so that others may properly understand its meaning. Synergy 06:13, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Noooo, editors should not have to learn a new language ("consensus" is an English word, not a Simple English word) to participate. "Agreement" is better. —Giggy 09:48, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

This is a common mistake people make. The "Simple English" is for the articles, not necessarily for anywhere else. Consensus is as much a "complex" word as agreement anyhow. Majorly ^talk 12:39, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Hmmm. You may both have a point here. I or we, can change the title to best suit this wiki's need when its moved into project space. I'd like to hear suggestions on a name change, on that articles talk page if we are to consider changing it. Synergy 13:15, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

If Simple English is for articles only, how can people fully participate in the wikipedia? They shouldn't be limited to just reading articles because they can't understand guidelines. That's defies the point of a wiki. "Agreement" at least has its roots in the Simple English word "agree". There's no easy way to work out what "consensus" means without knowing the whole word. Hippopotamus (talk) 14:10, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

I'm pretty new here, but I also think that Simple English should be simple for people to read and edit. Now, I do think that consensus is a difficult idea. I say we treat it like we would treat any difficult word that we have to use. Just because Prophylaxis is a difficult word does not mean we cannot have an article about it or use it in other articles. Same with Consensus - we just need to be very careful. Also, learning a new word might be good for new people because consensus (as we do it) is a new concept for most people. Staeiou (talk) 14:28, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Well put. I just created the Nomenclature disambig. It will strike some editors as a complex word, yet when you go to the article, it will explain what it means and show its usage. We can do this for any article or project page (essays, guidelines, policies, etc). Synergy 14:34, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

I would agree if there weren't a suitable simple alternative, but this in case there is, so it doesn't seem to make sense to make things any more complex than they need to be. Webster's Dictionary' gives the definition of consensus as "general agreement", so "agreement" is a pretty good match. Also I think we should write any agreement/consensus page from scratch instead of simplifying something from enwiki. As an aside, I do like the Nomenclature page. Hippopotamus (talk) 01:06, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

I hope the community doesn't mind but I was bold and went ahead and created {{PW-stub}} as professional wrestling isn't exactly a sport but it isn't exactly not a sport either...I felt something more specific was called for in this case.--  † ChristianMan16  21:39, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

Isn't that a little more specific than what we were proposing. I'd put professional wrestling articles to something like an "entertainment" stub class. Hippopotamus (talk) 17:17, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Well, entertainment is the overall category, and PW is a specific type and is not limited to just entertainment. Also, there are many examples of non-entertainment article possibilities that would be improperly tagged as an entertainment stub (such as notable props, costumes, title belts, the wrestlers themselves i.e. biographical, accidental deaths, etc etc). Synergy 17:28, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

To Do list

Hi, Another request for someone to fix something. This time My To-Do list. For some reason it jumps number 2. The code seems fine, and I have tried many times, but I can't seem to fix it... Any ideas? ← κεηηε∂γ ^(talk) 08:22, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

This is what I see:

  1. Get SPL to Good Article status.
  2. Update Scottish Football League - very out of date.
  3. Start Scottish First Division.
  4. Start Scottish Second Division.
  5. Start Scottish Third Division.

What do you mean? - tholly ^--Turnip-- 08:29, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Interesting, I see:

  1. Get SPL to Good Article status.
   
  3. Update Scottish Football League - very out of date.
  4. Start Scottish First Division.
  5. Start Scottish Second Division.
  6. Start Scottish Third Division.

Must be a problem with me then. Thanks ← κεηηε∂γ ^(talk) 08:50, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

American vs. United States

So I was trying to clean up the Matrix articles and I copied the cat structure from en, which goes under en:Category:American films. I changed that to Category:American movies. When I was creating that cat, though, I ran into Category:United States movies...so what. Do we follow en and go with American, or use United States instead? Either way it's going to be a substantial amount of cleanup. Cassandra 19:27, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Does en-wiki use Category:American movies? Couldn't see that... It uses the non-US-English version, film, so the category, if we're arguing the toss, ought to be Category:American films. The Rambling Man (talk) 19:31, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

FYI, w:Category:Films by country should be good guidance. The Rambling Man (talk) 19:33, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

On semantics alone I'd say American (which is also what en.wiki uses). United States gives a false impression that it represents the entire country. American is idealistically a brand name and represents the people and subsequently the people who made it, and the language its in. Synergy 19:36, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

And on general usage I'd say "films" because this isn't Simple United States English Wikipedia. The Rambling Man (talk) 19:38, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, definitely film. I don't know how I missed that. Synergy 19:46, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

So we're going to mave all pages in Category:American movies and Category:United States movies into Category:American films? I'm not going to do anything now in case I've got the wrong idea and mess everything up... - tholly ^--Turnip-- 21:36, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

The film vs. movie debate has reached epic proportions. Let's wait on more voices before we act again. Cassandra 22:35, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

I think moving everything to "American films" seems fine. Hippopotamus (talk) 01:30, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Yet another topic that pops up each time we get new editors in from en:wp.. (last brought up here) Film mean 1. A thin layer of a substance, 2. A medium used to capture images in a camera. 3. A motion picture (or movie). Movie = movie. Why use the term with three meanings when the third meaning is a term which can be used? Then of course there is the American ambiguity issue (United States vs The Americas), but that one we tend to just ignore and stick with "American = from the United States". Category:American movies would be the correct name based on our naming conventions here. -- Creol(talk) 04:52, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Then that should settle the matter then. We should keep to the MoS (or at least until the MoS is changed). Synergy 04:58, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Well not really. Movie is very US-centric indeed. If the "naming conventions here" means "go with Creol" and stick US-centric then sure, it's movies. Otherwise, for the rest of the world, it's films. Is this Simple US English Wikipedia or are we interested in an international audience, of which the US constitutes around 5%? The Rambling Man (talk) 06:15, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

I see your implications, and I don't agree (I'm not bowing to anyone other than the collective, yet I support film over movie). Change the MoS first, then change the name of the category (you should know this is standard, a top down approach). Synergy 06:22, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

"For the rest of the world, it's film".. CNet.au, AOL.au, Yahoo.au, and EBay.au all use the term movies instead of film. The Australian (www.theaustralian.news.com.au) shows 5K hits for movies and 7k hits for film (including filmed and filming). That is fairly close for a term they do not use. FILMINK magazine is "Australia's best movie magazine". Movie World is a theme park in Queensland. And of course several other sites use the term commonly. Similar instances also come up for Canada as well as India, Nigeria and the Philippines (#2, 3 and 5 in terms of English speaking population). It would appear to be more of a UK issue than a US one. Heck even BBC who normally does use the term film uses movie in several places. This is not uncommon as most terms even on en:wp use the US English name (elevator/lift, truck/lorry, Wrench/spanner) and (according to en:wp) 57% of all native English speakers are American (215 million out of 375 million). Compare Britain's colonistic expansionism (source of UK English worldwide) vs Hollywood's social and cultural pervasiveness (US English) and I would hazard a guess that US English is spreading deeper than British English in all places not Britain. -- Creol(talk) 11:01, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Point me to the relevant MOS which states movie over film and I'll change it. And do try to be a little less patronising - "you should know this is standard" tsk. The Rambling Man (talk) 06:55, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

And while we're at it - if Movie is correct, why does it redirect here to Film? We should at least be consistent within the wiki. The Rambling Man (talk) 06:59, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

I didn't particularly like how you responded to me, so I responded in kind. We both come from en and this is in fact a standard approach, whether it be for MoS, policy, guideline, etc. The MoS for simple is here. And Netoholic redirected it. Synergy 07:04, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

I don't care who redirected it, the fact of the matter is the actual article is at Film and we should be consistent. And FYI I've corrected the MOS which itself was inconsistent - "If the name of a movie is the same as something else, add (film) " - where's the logic in that? Surely we should be adding "(movie)"? The Rambling Man (talk) 07:08, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Then why ask why it was redirected? How is anyone other than Netoholic able to comment on the motivations for his own editorial actions? I can see you are just getting angry and misjudging the situation, so this conversation is over. Synergy 07:12, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Angry? You don't want see me when I'm angry... Well all I've said is the Wikipedia needs to (a) cater to an international audience and (b) be consistent within itself. Currently neither of these criteria are met. The Rambling Man (talk) 07:21, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

OK, so It's American movies, or American films, and which ever we chose should then be made consistent over the whole wiki. I think it should be films, but how can are we going to decide without just having an argument with no resolution? - tholly ^--Turnip-- 08:50, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Pesonally I think we should use United States movies/films cause while yes "American" is typically sensed as the United States some smart allecks sense it as North/Central/South America.--  † ChristianMan16  18:09, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

(unindenting) I would think that we should go with Category:American movies because I believe movie to be simpler than film. Also, people from the United States are Americans, so if someone from the United States was to make a movie, wouldn't it be called an American film? Cheers, Razorflame 01:58, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

You didn't even read my post did you? I do agree that it should say "movies" but "American" still seems to broad for me.--  † ChristianMan16  07:13, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

I think most people know that 'American' generally means someone from the United States. And as Razorflame said, people from the US, are called 'Americans'. I'm OK to go with movies if it means not so many things need to be changed, as when we decide we will need to change all films to movies on articles to make things less confusing. - tholly ^--Turnip-- 07:36, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

We may also want to move Film back to Movie and create and article at Film to actually cover the topic. Right now, Film only covers motion pictures and not the entire art form that is Film. Differentiating between the art and the product may be a good idea at this point. It seems that it was moved originally because Netoholic had a thing about making us as similar to En:wp as possible. Looking at en:wp reasoning for the name choice, it appears one of the strong reasons was that film is the more academic than the other terms. As we are certainly not as academic (they are university and business, we are ESL and sixth graders for the most part), our take on the topic(s) is from a different veiwpoint and would need to be handled differently. -- Creol(talk) 12:19, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

Okay, so if we assume movie to be more universally "correct" then film, can someone ensure the inconsistencies throughout this Wikipedia are resolved? A bot seems like a good choice for this task. The Rambling Man (talk) 15:55, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

I'll start it, but I'm on holiday tomorrow :) - tholly ^--Turnip-- 18:24, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

Wait a minute, what about Film, are we moving back? And are we moving all "NAME (film)" to "NAME (movie)"? - tholly ^--Turnip-- 18:39, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

Yes, we absolutely have to. If the consensus is such that movie is preferred, then all film references must be changed to movie. The Rambling Man (talk) 18:47, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

OK, one last thing, Film noir. It seems to be a special term. - tholly ^--Turnip-- 18:48, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

Heh, funny. Still, Movie noir doesn't quite cut it does it?! I think since it's a French term, we'll stick with the French, i.e. Film noir. But good spot. The Rambling Man (talk) 18:56, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

I can't move Film Director until someone deletes movie director (redirect) - tholly ^--Turnip-- 19:09, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

(<-) This is certainly bringing up some issues. This change over is certainly not "bot work" for the most part as there are a lot of things to consider in the changes. Film noir is an obvious one as are things like AFI (American Film Institute). The other ones I am seeing while working through the list (AWB- google "film" got 990 pages) are terms which specifically deal with the art form (film) and not the product (motion pictures). Things like "Film festival" where the proper term is indeed film (the festival is for the art form; they just happen to show and judge movies there), film critics review movies, film directors make movies (and TV shows and music videos, video games even..) and "art films" is the proper title for that type of movie. Then there are the quotes and references with titles.. A lot of this is requiring a lot of decisions (and some personal opinion) on what is the art and what is the dealing with finished product. I think this is part of the reason this has been put off for so long - it is one hell of a headache to clean up. -- Creol(talk) 09:11, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

Hmm, I guess I meant a bot (or AWB) for the sort of changes you've just done (i.e. X (film) to X (movie)), not for anything like you've mentioned above. It's interesting that you believe "art film" is preferred over "art movie" - do US contributors consider this to be correct (I'm asking because I don't know, not because I'm being difficult)...? The Rambling Man (talk)

In every page, there are several others linked to that need to be renamed too, it's very slow work. I accidentaly renamed photographic film earlier, before realising. - tholly ^--Turnip-- 11:08, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

Region %

Am I right in assuming that a reasonable % of viewership is from non-English countries? Since English is a popular language in Spain and the like, but not quite popular enough that people would speak an advanced level of English. - A Link to the Past (talk) 02:36, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

I do not know if Wikipedia keeps those statistics. However, I just looked at our ten most active anonymous (IP) contributors. I got the list from the Simple English statistics page. I then ran them through an IP address lookup website. Here is where they are:

1. 24.17.48.241 – USA
2. 71.10.52.224 – USA
3. 88.134.192.92 – Germany
4. 83.13.213.19 – Poland
5. 217.95.243.42 – Germany
6. 218.190.30.243 – China, Hong Kong
7. 85.31.137.11 – United Kingdom
8. 24.247.84.197 – USA
9. 193.65.112.51 – Finland
10. 84.120.17.126 - Spain

Sure, it is not readers, but it shows that many of our most active anonymous members are not from English speaking countries. If people from these countries are editing, there must be more who are reading. Staeiou (talk) 17:21, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

I dunno about that - I would think that the top two are from the USA because contributors are for the most part English, since they're the best at writing in English. - A Link to the Past (talk) 17:28, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

Complex problem I need to discuss with an admin

Hi - I need an admin to email about a problem that is likely to become complex and for reasons that will become clear are best discussed off the board as a starting point. --Allemandtando (talk) 03:16, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Thanks - this has been replied to and is in hand. --Allemandtando (talk) 10:45, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Proposed VGA - Jessica Alba up for voting

After a very constructive set of comments from a number of editors, I've now moved Jessica Alba's WP:PVGA to the voting phase. Of course comments are still more than welcome and I'll do my best to address them as quickly and accurately as possible. Also welcome are votes, particularly supports! Cheers! The Rambling Man (talk) 07:35, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Dates of birth for people

Hello all! This is Razorflame, and I would like to bring this up for everyone to discuss. While browsing through many of our pages on people, I have noticed that we don't have a reference for when each person was born and died. I believe that we need references that say this because the dates of birth and death have been known to be incorrect. I think that it would help us increase our comprehensiveness if we were to add all of the references for all of the dates of birth and death for every person that we have an article on.

However, I think that that might be too much for us to handle, so I think that we should do this for every major person (e.g. Albert Einstein, Saddam Hussein, George W. Bush, etc.) that we have an article for. What do you guys think? Cheers, Razorflame 02:10, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

I think it should be necessary to have refs for the article to be a GA or VGA, but not necessary for the dates to be there. - A Link to the Past (talk) 02:17, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

I'm not saying that the dates of birth and death should be in the article, because for some people, that just is not possible. I am saying that for most of the major people that have the dates of birth/death already stated in the article, we should dig up references for them because that will help our comprehensiveness and our credibility :) Cheers, Razorflame 02:21, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

This is a good suggestion. In fact, references should have been inserted for birth and death dates when the articles were created. Providing such references will ensure that the correct dates can be ascertained if the existing dates in the articles are maliciously altered. — Cheers, Truth's Out There ^–talk– 10:59, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

I don't see the need for this to be discussed. I can't see any negatives in adding references, so go ahead and do it. —Giggy 12:01, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

I agree. However, I do think it is a good idea to require it for Good or Very Good articles. Staeiou (talk) 15:33, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

Vandal Warner

Hey, I just noticed the 'Vandal Warner' on the margin when you edit a talk page. Currently, it says:

   * Test edit ({{test}}
   * Test page ({{testarticle}}
   * Nonsense ({{test2}})
   * Don't remove ({{test2a}})
   * Please stop ({{test3}})
   * Last chance ({{test4}})
   * Only warning ({{test4im}})
   * Don't spam ({{spam}})
   * Blocked 1 ({{block}})
   * Blocked 2 ({{block2}})

Whilst being very useful, I think that it would be more logical to have:

    * Test edit 1 ({{tl|test}}
    * Test edit 2 ({{tl|test2}})
    * Test edit 3 ({{tl|test3}})
    * Test edit 4 ({{tl|test4}})
    * Only warning ({{tl|test4im}})

    * Test article 1 ({{tl|testarticle}}
    * Test article 2 ({{tl|test2article}}

    * Removing content 1 ({{tl|test2a}})
    * Removing content 2 ({{tl|test3a}})

    * Don't spam ({{tl|spam}})
    * Blocked 1 ({{tl|block}})
    * Blocked 2 ({{tl|block2}})

The spacing is purely decorative, and doesn't have to be discussed. But I think it makes more sense to have all TEST templates one after the other and to add in the few TEST templates that aren't already there. What do you lot think? --Gwib ^-(talk)- 17:53, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

We get a plethora of crap pages being created so I'd like one or two of the creation warnings added. The Rambling Man (talk) 18:01, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

The vandal warner can be customized to use whatever warnings you want to put into it. You just need to set the WarnVandalCustomItems listings for it on your monobook.js page. Take a look at Tygrrr's for an example. -- Creol(talk) 18:26, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for that! Didn't know you could customize the tool bar. --Gwib ^-(talk)- 18:40, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

Movie/film changes

For those that missed/ignored the discussion above, a recap of the outcome and status:

1. Film was moved to Movie. The article for Film needs to be rewritten to cover the industry and art form that is Film.
2. Pages linking to film or using the term film to mean Movie (motion picture) needs to be cleaned up with links and terms changed over. (close to 1K pages) This is confused by the fact that some of the terms still should remain using the term "film" as they apply to the industry and not the product or are proper names.
3. The MoS has been changed to reflect a change in naming ambiguous movies. (movie) is now used in place of (film). All movies will need to be moved to the new names and links could use updating on all those pages that link to movies..
4. Category:United States movies has been replaced with Category:American movies

That's the bad new, lots of work... The good news?

700 edits later, all pages in the year categories, English language movies and US/American movies categories have been renamed to "X (movie)" where needed. All pages in the English language and US/American movies as well as all linking to either Film or using {{Infobox Film}} have been edited to replace the film link and usage of the term film with movie. (as well as some wikifying and cat work on a lot of them). The bulk of the work is done. There are going to be some things that got missed and some articles that still need work (did I mention the 700 edits??) but most of the heavy lifting should be over with for now. We just need to keep an eye out as best we can for the stragglers and try to ensure that new articles that get created use movie instead of film.

There are still a handfull of articles that link to film. These should all be referenes to the actual act of making movies, the art form itself, or scholastic degrees in the field. No articles still use {{Infobox Film}}, all have been changed over to {{Infobox Movie}} although the redirct is still in place. One area that does need to still be dealt with is redirects for the "Year in movies" links (the old "year in film" - i.e. 2004 in film)( Done) and I think I may have a few "Year in movie" links by mistake in there..( Done) I'll look into those later as I need to pass out now. -- Creol(talk) 19:16, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

I'd like to suggest that a new guideline (perhaps "Wikipedia:List of simpler English terms") be created to record decisions like the preference for movie over film, and linked to "Wikipedia:How to write Simple English articles" and "Wikipedia:Examples of simpler English". Otherwise, once the discussion that has taken place on this page is archived, new editors will not be aware of the consensus reached and experienced editors will have to constantly make changes to articles. The proposed guideline can consist of a table like this:

Difficult English	Simpler English	Comments
film	movie	Movie has only one meaning, while film can mean "the art and industry of making motion pictures", "movie", "photographic film", "a thin skin or membrane, or any covering or coating" or "a thin layer of liquid on water or solid stuff": see the discussion at "Wikipedia:Simple talk#American vs. United States".

— Cheers, Truth's Out There ^–talk– 19:54, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

Usability

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Animal_Crossing_Fink_Heavy.png Is this image usable on this Wiki? - A Link to the Past (talk) 02:41, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

Yep; PD-textlogo (see the templates on there). —Giggy 04:14, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

PVGA for Jessica Alba

This may sound like a broken record but I'm here to ask for more consideration of Jessica Alba for WP:VGA status! She's got four days left to run and still needs more support! Of course I'll happily deal with any concerns raised. The Rambling Man (talk) 06:05, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

Britannica

I've recently created many articles on the Encyclopaedia Britannica, I'm trying to get it to become a GA, slowly. I have two questions I need to raise. Firstly, the names of the parts of the Encyclopedia always have the merged "ae" in them, for example "Propaedia", "Micropaedia", so on and so forth. Which is the easiest and fastest way to create this merged "ae"? Secondly, I need to ask whether I can create a category for the encyclopedia. Thanks! Minor Contributer (talk) 08:34, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

1. You could turn on the edit tools to display the special symbols on the edit screen. See here for how to do it.
2. With the main article, the 1911 article, macro, micro and p.. something.. the need for at least 3 articles to create a category is met. There is reason not to create a subcategory under Category:Encyclopedias. -- Creol(talk) 09:05, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

So I can create a category? Also, where is a place where I can work on it bit by bit? For example, I can't just write one part of the history than just leave it there. I need to do it all in one, but I don't have the time. Where can I work on it slowly? Minor Contributer (talk) 08:10, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

I went ahead and created Category:Encyclopædia Britannica and recategorized the 5 book articles and the company article to be included in it. As to where to work on the history of the article, you could do it in your userspace. Just create a personal sandbox (for example, User:Minor Contributer/Encyclopaedia Britannica), copy the article and do it there and then transfer the changes back to the main article (or better, ask an admin to merge the two so the histories are preserved.) -- Creol(talk) 08:28, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

Hey, you had the same idea as me! I did that before you replied, thanks! Minor Contributer (talk) 08:30, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

References

I need help on references. How do I make the references? I need to translate the text from the English Wikipedia to the Simple English, but with all the references, I find it hard to touch the references, so I've been deleting them so far. Can someone help, please? Minor Contributer (talk) 08:48, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

Can you be more specific? Are you having difficulties using <ref> tags, {{cite}} templates, or something else? Generally, you shouldn't be deleting the references as articles need to be properly referenced and verifiable. — Cheers, Truth's Out There ^–talk– 15:14, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

Well, I'm not sure myself. All I know is that I'm dealing with some severe problem with my references here. Minor Contributer (talk) 09:53, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

GA and VGA

Do I need to create a new article for a particular red link everytime I come across one? That would be a lot of work! Is there another alternative? Minor Contributer (talk) 08:52, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

There are three ways to get rid of a red link:

1. Formulate it differently, so that it no longer uses the phrase of the red-link
2. Create a stub for the red link
3. Create a redirect for the red-link (or link the red-link ot a different article. --Eptalon (talk) 08:57, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

Okay, thanks! Minor Contributer (talk) 09:00, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

I think it would also be fine just to delete the link. If an article is created later on, that editor can link that article to other articles. — Cheers, Truth's Out There ^–talk– 15:16, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

No, please don't do this. I'm the kind of editor that thrives on red links. If you have it red, I'll be more inspired to create an article than if it doesn't exist. It's just more work too to add, delete, and readd a link. I consider removing red links for the sake of GA and VGA [1] to run counter to our goal of creating a comprehensive encyclopedia. Cassandra 17:34, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, I'm with Cass. Keep the redlinks and if you're not confident to create stubs (or better still, better articles!) for them then ask other editors to give you hand. It's all about expanding the Wikipedia! The Rambling Man (talk) 17:37, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

Okay, thanks! Minor Contributer (talk) 09:52, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

Kashmir: Naming the beast..

Hello all, for those of you that do not know yet, Kashmir is a large region in the North of the Indian subcontinent; Since at least 1947 (when the modern-day states of India and Pakistan were created) it is split between India, Pakistan, and China. The Indian part is called Jammu and Kashmir, the Pakistani parts are called Azad Kashmir and Northern Areas and the Chinese part is called Aksai Chin. There are UN patrols on the line of control (between India and Pakistan), there is rather heavy fighting about the Siachen Glacier between India and Pakistan. Personally, I do not know the details of this bloody conflict, the reason I am writing this post for is a different one:

• The UN seems to call the whole of Kashmir (controlled by Pakistan and India) Jammu and Kashmir
• The Pakistanis refer to the Indian part as Occupied Kashmir, this is probably a translation from Urdu.
• The Indian people refer to the Pakistan-controlled areas as Pakistan-occupied Kashmir.

My question is now: how do we best talk about these areas, if possible without implying that a certain area should belong to a specific country? --Eptalon (talk) 08:54, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

Well, I feel that since all of the different names are not Kashmir, you can use Kashmir, and just state the different names. Minor Contributer (talk) 08:59, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

After reading way too much about the area over on en:wp, It seems the area prior to the British giving it freedom (and starting all this trouble) was Jammu and Kashmir. When all the states were being separated into either Pakistan or India, this one decided to vote neither. Internal strife over taxation led to part of it rebelling to Pakistan (Azad Kashmir). Pakistan rebels moved into the main state to try and "free" it from its Dogra ruler. The ruler could not defend himself so he asked India for help and eventually signed a treaty with India to join. The UN pops in and says the people should vote on who they belong too (apparently ignoring the decision of the ruler at the time). India does not support voting as it already has a signed treaty, Pakistan seems to support voting but only for the part in India as it feels the parts under its control already voted when they rebelled and became part of Pakistan. China.. no clue how they got involved but they control part and are arguing over several small areas with India. Way too much drama here. As such, for naming: The name of the independent state prior to this current drama, the Indian name, and the UN name are all the same. I would go with its independent name - Jammu and Kashmir. -- Creol(talk) 10:12, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

Hey, I didn't know you guys were Led Zeppelin fans! ;) Oh, perhaps I should read more than the section header... -  EchoBravo  contribs  13:30, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

Add more classes and importance levels.

I know Simple.Wiki does not do this at this time, but it's simply a good idea. If we sort by class, people can go to GA or, an example of a class, Start, and try to promote it another level up. And with importance, it helps people look at what to make based on what's top, or high, or mid, etc. - A Link to the Past (talk) 02:56, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

I just don't think it works very well on enwiki as it's so subjective. Personally, I'd stick with what we've got and concentrate on writing articles instead of matching criteria. It's nice to showcase the very best articles with GA/VGA, but in genrral people can judge an article themselves when they read it. Hippopotamus (talk) 03:56, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

That doesn't address the fact that assessment helps people find articles to improve. - A Link to the Past (talk) 04:31, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

Virtually all our articles need improvement (the majority are stubs), so a ranking system would not be as useful as it would on EN.--TBC 04:59, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

We already have a nearly foolproof method of finding articles to improve. A user just has to click here and 99% of the time they are taken to an article that needs improvement. Two thirds of the time, it will give them an article that is already marked as a stub. There is also this and this which also points them in the correct direction. -- Creol(talk) 05:33, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

(unindenting) We already have 4 classes of article: stub, regular article, GA, VGA. In my opinion, defining more classes does not make sense at this point in time; the about 20 regular editors we currently have are mostly happy working to get articles to GA or VGA. Even if you look at GAs and VGAs there are noticeble differences in quality, even within the class. --Eptalon (talk) 07:36, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

Yes, I like the simplicity of our classes. I cannot even understands EN's system very much, it is so out of proportion. I say keep our system for now. — American Eagle (talk) 16:44, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

Random comment

Hey, a (wiki) friend of mine on en.wiki is working on making a tool to aid in "translating" articles to Simple English from normal English. His tool is nearly ready for it's first beta release. I just wondered, would introducing a flood of copied-and-simplified articles from en.wiki to this project be considered a bad idea? J.delanoy ^talk_changes 05:49, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

Given they are from a beta and an unnamed user whose understanding of what defines Simple English is not known, I would suggest dumping them into the userspace first and have people take a look at the product and comment before dumping into the main space. If there are problems, we don't have hundreds of articles to hunt down and correct sitting out there this way. Automatic translation tools rarely work well without further editing and it would be best to see tests before facing the flood. -- Creol(talk) 05:54, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

(side point) It would also be best that the transfer includes the {{enwp based}} template or something similar on the talk page for the article to deal with potential copyright complaints as well as for comparing the two articles to see how well it functions as a translator. -- Creol(talk) 05:57, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

The user is en:User:Thingg, he's fine. The tool is not automatic, right now, it merely highlights words that are in the BE 850, BE 1500, and the Voice of America wordlist in different colors, the user then has to "translate" the text, all the tool does is makes it easier to see how "simple" the basic text is. I was just wondering if I would get yelled at for creating a lot of pages that based on pages on en.wiki. J.delanoy ^talk_changes 06:04, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

If you want a dummy I'd be happy to trial the tool in my userspace and see how it works (and in cases where it works fine, move the article to mainspace). —Giggy 08:14, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

(unindenting) As far as I know, automated translation tools are not fully reliable, in the sense that they need at least a human editor to proofread the translated article; That said, I would suggest that the translation is doner into userspace; a reviewer can then move the article into main space.--Eptalon (talk) 07:32, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

I don't think you guys understand what I am saying. This tool is very simple right now. All it does is highlight words in the Basic English 850 as one color, words in the Basic English 1500 in another color, and words in the Voice of America wordlist in a third color. The person using the tool still has to go through and change words that are not in any of the lists and they have to simplify the grammar. The only thing I want to know here in this post is, is copying article from en.wiki and simplifying them considered a bad idea? J.delanoy ^talk_changes 12:18, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

No, copying over an article from EnWP and simplifying it here is not a bad idea - no matter what tools you use. Be aware though that articles that are simply copied over (and where there are no traces of simpilfication) are prone ot being deleted, after a certain time. As outlined above, the enwp based template should also be added. --Eptalon (talk) 14:39, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

As far as I know, if such automatic translators exist, then there won't be any use for this wiki, and you can have an automatic robot at the EN Wikipedia that can help you translate the articles at the click of the button. Minor or Prime 09:14, 15 August 2008 (UTC)

PVGA votes needed! - Jessica Alba

Yet another request for some interest over at PVGA. Two days to go now and she's stuck on five supports which isn't enough. Either way, I'd love to hear more comments, supports/opposes, just something to keep this on-track. Cheers! The Rambling Man (talk) 07:45, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

Template:Video-game-stub

Could someone fix this template up? I can't get it to put articles in the Video game stub category, even though the category is on the article. - A Link to the Past (talk) 17:53, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

Fixed it! You had a <includeonly> tag around some of the text where it should not have been. Staeiou (talk) 21:06, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

Ah, thanks. That added some of them, but a lot are still not on the list - Phoenix Wright 2 for instance. - A Link to the Past (talk) 21:11, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

This may simply be because the server has not refreshed itself. — Cheers, Truth's Out There ^–talk– 21:41, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

Template:Romania-stub

Based upon the high volume of Romania-related stubs that I have been creating, I have taken it upon myself to add {{Romania-stub}} and Category:Romania-related stubs to our ranks of breaking down stubs into new categories and such. I just wanted to let everyone know about this change. Cheers, Razorflame 00:28, 7 August 2008 (UTC)

Why on Earth is there a subcategory when Category:Stubs doesn't exist? —Giggy 01:07, 7 August 2008 (UTC)

Obviously, I don't know the correct stub category :). See the Wikiproject based on stubs. Cheers, Razorflame 01:09, 7 August 2008 (UTC)

I profess confusion, so I've removed the category ([2]) until you clarify why some stub templates have categories but the main one doesn't. —Giggy 08:58, 7 August 2008 (UTC)

Sarah Siddons

Hello all, Sarah Siddons is the current translation of the Week. I copied the article from EnWP, and started to simplify it, but I'd appreciate any help. Thanks. --Eptalon (talk) 11:12, 7 August 2008 (UTC)

American football

Just a quick word - this article is simply terrible and while I'm no expert in the sport, I think I could knock something up in ten minutes which is better than the current article. Anything which leads with something like "American Football, known in Australia, New Zealand and parts of Great Britain as gridiron, is a sport played by two teams of people with 11 players on each side. It is played with a brown ball that is pointy at two ends and is about the size of a loaf of bread." is in trouble. In GB it's definitely not referred to as "gridiron" - is the ball always brown? Is it the size of a loaf of bread?!! Warped thinking. I think this article devolves further than Simple English -this is simply awful English Wikipedia. This article needs a lot of work from people who know about the sport. And quickly. The Rambling Man (talk) 20:36, 7 August 2008 (UTC)

For the record, in Australia we call it gridiron (or crap; it's not the best sport! ;-)). —Giggy 23:26, 7 August 2008 (UTC)

English Translation

Hi, I need help translating this text to Simple English. Firstly, I don't even understand it.

"It was conceived as a conservative reaction to the provocative French Encyclopédie"

Thanks! Minor Contributer (talk) 09:51, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

As to the understanding part: The Brits created the EB because they felt the French Encyclopédie was too racy/risque/suggestive/indecent. They wanted an encylcopedia which was written in a manner which was similar to their own style of thinking and living.

(and except for the racy/risque/suggestive/indecent part that needs a more simple phrase I can't think of, that pretty much simplifies it also.) -- Creol(talk) 10:02, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

Okay, I'll try to use that, thanks. Can I link the word to Wiktionary? Minor Contributer (talk) 10:06, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

It's better to use a simpler form of the word than to link it to Wiktionary.--TBC 22:31, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

I think the original reference for the sentence needs to be checked to find out what was intended. The Encyclopédie may not have been provocative in the sense that it was "racy/risque/suggestive/indecent". Perhaps it simply contained too many radical or revolutionary ideas which the editors of the Britannica were uncomfortable with. — Cheers, Truth's Out There ^–talk– 07:06, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

Main Page Font

On the Main Page there are some links like "Useful Pages" and "How to write in Simple English". The font used is really strange and a little distracting. LIAM / LIAM ^mailbox 16:54, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

There are currently proposals to re-design the Main Page. See the discussion here. - tholly ^--Turnip-- 17:26, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

Cross-linking with the main Wikipedia

English Wiktionary

The English Wiktionary has a dictionary definition (meanings of a word) for: wikis

I imagine this suggestions has already been discussed and debated, but I am not sure how to find such a discussion or contribute to it. It's a simple idea really: wouldn't it be wonderful if all the Wikipedia pages having a corresponding article in the SE Wikipedia could reference it in a straight forward and consistent way? (And vice-versa). There have been so many times that I have been struggling through a complex Wikipedia article, when all I really wanted was a simpler introduction, such as would be found here. Is the relationship between these two projects conducive for such an arrangement? What I am envisioning is a link (perhaps like the one to Wiktionary, at the right) that would inform the readers of the main Wikipedia article that a simpler version is available here. (Although something even less prominent would be great too.) Kmote (talk) 22:20, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

They are already cross-linked - take at look at, for example, Winston Churchill. Scroll down and you'll see on the left the links to not only en.Wiki, but many others in many languages. Thanks MindTheGap (talk) 22:33, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

Yes, I think a Simple English link together with the other language links on the left side is sufficient. I'm not really in favour of a special box for Simple English. It could easily be argued that other languages also deserve a box, and that would soon make articles unwieldy. — Cheers, Truth's Out There ^–talk– 06:59, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

I see now. I hadn't noticed that before. That's going to be very helpful in the future -- thanks! However, it prompts an additional question: Are those links added automatically, or do they need to be manually inserted (in both wikis) in new articles? For example, I notice that Factorization has a link to the English wiki, but not vice-versa -- how could I add a link back to the SE wiki from the English version? --or from here to there if I found an article without such a link?) Kmote (talk) 22:20, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

There are certain robots that will add these links (more or less on their own); it is generally a good idea to provide at lease one of those links (they are called interwiki links) when creating a new article. --Eptalon (talk) 22:25, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

Free use images needed to depict some games' gameplay.

Could someone make me a couple drawn images? Namely, I'd like an image depicting the screen in Guitar Hero, and one where the player is holding the DS on its side (like in Brain Age). Could someone do that please? - A Link to the Past (talk) 01:56, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

Screen is impossible (it would be a derivative work), but an iamge of the Guitar Hero controller could easily be done. But I'm not spending $50 on it as I don't like rhythum games, much less a portable one (if coerced, I'll play DDR). Cassandra (talk) 02:53, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

I don't mean a screen - I mean a drawn image depicting gameplay in games like Rock Band, Rock Revolution, Guitar Freaks, and Guitar Hero. I think that because this depiction of rhythm games covers so many games, if it's just the "frets coming down the board to the marker point", I could argue it's a gameplay concept, and that no one holds a copyright to gameplay concepts. Imagine it kind of like this: [3] - A Link to the Past (talk) 03:00, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

That's really the maximum you could go in terms of detail (which isn't much) before it would become a derivative work. It's walking a fine line, especially if you specifically state that it's based on a specific game. —Giggy 04:24, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

It's not based on any one specific game. It could be used for any number of games - all GH games, all Rock Band games, all Guitar Freak/Rock Revolution games, that one Disney band game or whatever, or even the rhythm genre itself to be an example of timing in rhythm games. It's a commonly used gameplay mechanic that no one actually has the rights to. It's not really derivative of any one thing, just like no one could argue that the artillery drawing is a rip-off of that one sidescrolling tank fighting game. - A Link to the Past (talk) 05:31, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

Well, to make my point a bit different, it is a derivative work, but of something that no one person or company owns, a gameplay concept. All you have to do is to, let's say, have the "field" facing up like in Guitar Freaks, do differently shaped frets, and don't include anything else that isn't considered universal (like, say, a Star Power meter). Essentially, if I am legally able to make a game with that gameplay and not have to worry about copyright issues over the most basic aspects of this engine, it should be okay to make a diagram of that engine.

But on the DS image, I'm almost positive that it's okay to make a diagram of it being held on its side - I mean, you can take pictures of it being held on its side, so I can't see why you couldn't draw it. - A Link to the Past (talk) 05:36, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

So would you have it somewhat similar (but not too similar) to the concepts within [4]? —Giggy 05:53, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

No, it'll be completely vertical, with it pointing straight up. - A Link to the Past (talk) 16:08, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

I've just looked on meta:Non-free content, which stipulates we could start non-free uploads, but that will require reenabling of image uploads, and a number of pages/templates be created. Still, if we want to get, like Windows Vista up to like ENWP (it has 10 Fair Use images), it may be nessacary. Effectivaly we would need to simplify This, and use it as a EDP. Even if we even futher limit the EDP to software, logos and the like, that may solve some issues. I'll start work on simplifing it. --  Da Punk '08  talk  20:58, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

There is now a draft at here. --  Da Punk '08  talk  21:04, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

Please see new discussion below about Fair Use --  Da Punk '08  talk  21:30, 16 August 2008 (UTC)

Template categorization

I've recategorized some date-related templates in "Category:Time, date and calendar templates". However, while {{Birth date and age}}, {{Death date and age}} and other templates appear in the category along with their documentation pages (e.g., {{Birth date and age/doc}}), why is it that only the documentation pages of {{Birth year and age}} and {{Death year and age}} and not the template pages themselves appear in the category? It's been a few days, so it doesn't seem like a caching issue. — Cheers, Truth's Out There ^–talk– 07:29, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

It seems it was a cache issue. As the templates are not accessed a lot, changes to pages included in them are not noticed very often. Both are currently included in the category after null saves updated their links. -- Creol(talk) 07:44, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. I didn't realize that how often articles, categories, templates, etc., got refreshed depended on how heavily they were used. — Cheers, Truth's Out There ^–talk– 08:15, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

Manual for new and small Wikipedias

Hello, at Meta there is the project of a Manual to help new and small Wikipedias, and a set of Wikipedia pages and help pages every Wikipedia should have. You gained experience in these questions when building up your language edition, and I would like you to have a look and comment. Kind regards --Ziko (talk) 13:52, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

I'm Back!

O.K. I have decided to return. I am Da Punk '95, as a new username (my old password's gone). Just showld tell everyone, and what has happened (and since when was Ionas unblocked!) — This unsigned comment was added by Da Punk '08 (talk • changes).

Heh, welcome back :). For the decision to unblock Ionas, please refer to WP:AN. Chenzw  Talk  07:50, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

Hey Punk, nice to see you back.--TBC 02:13, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

Javascript question

Is there a simple way to make my en.wiki javascript work on simple wikipedia easily or does it all have to be imported and copied here first? So far I've tried simply copying my page and changing the links to have w: in front of them, with limited success. --Philosopher ^{Let us reason together.} 12:52, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

For some scripts from other places, instead of using:

importScript('w:User:Lupin/popups.js');

Use:

document.write('<script type="text/javascript" src="' 
            + 'http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User:Lupin/popups.js' 
            + '&action=raw&ctype=text/javascript&dontcountme=s"></script>');

But some scripts won't won't here anyway. - tholly ^--Turnip-- 17:06, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the help! --Philosopher ^{Let us reason together.} 23:19, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

Retired

Hello friends, I decided to retire. Please read why on my user page. Thanks — American Eagle (talk) 20:43, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

See you around, American Eagle. Cassandra ^talk 22:21, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

It's tough to see you go. You'll be missed.--TBC 02:14, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

That's so sad... one leaves when someone else decides to come back... best of luck in your future endeavours. Chenzw  Talk  05:49, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

Bye, American Eagle. I hope you come back though, it happens often, doesn't it? Minor Contributer (talk) 12:58, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

God bless you too, Eagle. Hope to see you around every once in a while :) TheWolf 21:15, 13 August 2008 (UTC)

You were the first person to welcome me to Simple English, and I also know you've meant a lot to everyone here. Good luck and Godspeed. Staeiou (talk) 21:16, 14 August 2008 (UTC)

User

I want to bring up a user by the name of Winterkind. I have once tried posting a message to him/her on his/her talk page, but I received no response. I can see that none of the other editors got a response either. Can I request that Winterkind tell us whether you can read our messages? Minor Contributer (talk) 13:16, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

Why don't you post on his talk page? - Aside form that, I have only seen valid contributions from them; should there really be a problem, please tell me, I have the same mother tongue, which might make things easier. --Eptalon (talk) 13:39, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

He has already posted. Apparently there is always no reply. Chenzw  Talk  13:43, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

Top Article Views

I really laughed when I saw this. According to these stats, our top visited article is List of Greek gods and goddesses (at 7724 views).

However, after scrolling down through the list, I saw an unbelievable amount of articles relating to SEX being viewed. Excluding the "Wikipedia:" pages, we have:

• Penis - 6865 views
• Vagina - 4768 views
• Clitoris - 4667 views
• Masturbation - 3582 views
• Sexual intercourse - 3427 views
• Sex - 3115 views
• Testicle - 3052 views

It seems that young kids (or others) get a kick out of the Sexuality articles on SEWP. I propose that we make our most viewed articles longer, more informative and overall; better.

When pages such as Clitoris get almost 1,000 more views than WWII, I think it's time to start a Wikiproject Sexuality. --Gwib ^-(talk)- 22:59, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

Heh, that is a lot of views... I'm all in favor of it. Our most viewed articles should be pretty quality articles also, IMO. -- RyanCross (talk) 06:49, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

Should these be candidates for GA/VGA? - Personally I have no problem with this, there is nothing raunchy about a VGA for Penis or Vagina; An ecyclopedia is there to provide information; given that speaking about sexuality is a taboo, it is clear that some of the youngsters need to get their info from somewhere (other than their parents) - I also think getting Masturbation to VGA or GA might be a fun thing to do. --Eptalon (talk) 08:11, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

Although I cannot argue that an encyclopedia should be as comprehensive as possible, putting such articles on the front page will give people the impression that you're building up another Uncyclopedia. Parents might be uncomfortable with this, and there goes our chance of building a popular place where children can learn easily. Minor Contributer (talk) 08:18, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

(unindenting) Wikipedia is not censored; the need for information comes before the need to hide facts because they are seen as inappropriate for some audiences. Or otherwise put: Most teenagers find out about masturbation, sometime - If we can provide founded information on this, it should be no different than any other article. We currently have about 30 higher quality articles (GA and VGA), If we had 50, and the articles above were among them I would not worry. Put differently: Evolution is a very good article, yet it says that probably plants and animals on earth developed from other plants and animals. Some religious groups hold that the bible (or other holy book) should be read literally; this can cause problems (see for example Noah's Ark) - hence having Evolution on the front page is at least as controversial as having Masturbation there. So, yes, a Wikiperoject Sexuality (that also includes topics of abortion and contraception) that gets the related articles to a decent state is definitely a worthwhile task. And don'tt forget: Masturbating frequently makes you blind. ;) --Eptalon (talk) 08:53, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

Well, the effects could be a disaster, like having a hundred vandalism edits to these articles per day. Minor Contributer (talk) 08:59, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

Vandalism is something we can deal with; besides to have 100 vandalism edits a day would mean we had many more editors, and a generally much higher level of activity... :) --Eptalon (talk) 09:03, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

I have nothing else to say; just note that I am opposing this. I think you are right on the part that we will have to try to make our articles as big as possible, thoiugh! Minor Contributer (talk) 10:00, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

I'll create a Wikiproject Sexuality in my userspace then. I'm going on holiday to Bristol for 4 days, so when I get back, consider it done! I'd love it to be in my userspace though, it seems there are so many Wikiprojects out there and I need to follow the trend :P. --Gwib ^-(talk)- 10:47, 12 August 2008 (UTC)