Misplaced Pages

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wiki reveals magic effects

As an avid magician, I have to protest the revelation of these effects. Such effects as King Rising, Balducci, and elevator are revealed here. It is very unhelpful to the magic community. Please help us and protest the exposure of these effects. ThanksBirdy2011

Spell check abuse

This section may contain material not related to the topic of the article and should be moved to The Google conspiracy to take over the world by making us spell "cheese" wrong, hyperintelligent zebras, and their possible involvement in said conspiracy. instead. Please help improve this section or discuss this issue on the talk page. (Learn how and when to remove this message)

Is it possible that a company, like Google (with "did you mean ___?"), changes the spelling of words in Misplaced Pages articles to find out what people most likely think a word should be spelled like, because it seems like a good idea and they have so many computers, each with a different IP address, it would seem hard to catch them at it. Jeffrey.Kleykamp 11:26, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

What? --Golbez 22:25, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

I'm saying that a company (like Google) can go through words that are entered frequently but don't have many search results (I'm calling that word "x"), then they go through all possible other spellings that have more search results and find them on a Misplaced Pages article, then they use one IP address to vandalize the article and then with a different IP address they change it back without the undo button (to make it look like an unprofessional undo), however, when changing it back they misspell the target word (which is a more common variation of "x", e.g. "cheese" has 71,600,000 search results however "chese"("x") has only 217,000 search results) to see if people will consider that variation of "x" to be the correct spelling of "x".

And the reason that I say this is because Google almost always guesses right with the "did you mean ___?" and I know that they might just have good programming (companies with worse programming could be doing this) but I heard that spam people offer "rewards" after typing in the words in a picture box that is originally from an e-mail service to create e-mail addresses to send spam from and this would be the same thing just without any rewards but a lot more people. Do you understand now? Jeffrey.Kleykamp 00:26, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

I'm still not sure I understand. Is it possible? Possibly. It's also possible that I'm a hyperintelligent zebra, but I'm not sure where such baseless accusations get us. So far as I know, not one single article has been vandalized in this fashion. --Golbez 00:32, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

I'm saying that they are careful to make it look like innocent spelling errors, and I'm not accusing Google, I'm simply saying that a company with enough computer power could do this as long as they have a motive like optimizing search spell checking. Jeffrey.Kleykamp 00:45, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

You kind of are - you didn't say "they could be careful", you said "they are careful". And as Emmaneul said, there's far, far cheaper and faster ways to do this. And again, there is zero evidence of this happening, so it still has the same footing as me being a genius hippotigris. --Golbez 02:20, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

Impossible, there are far more effective and intelligent ways to find out "alternate" spellings than this. Emmaneul 11:19, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

WTF? --tjstrf talk 01:40, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

XKCD references Misplaced Pages

I thought this was pretty hilarious. —Dark•Shikari 15:54, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

Ooh, vandalism, please protect. x42bn6 Talk Mess 20:26, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

Yes! That was a hilarious Misplaced Pages in-joke. Someone should approach him to upload the image to the Misplaced Pages Commons. ;) His comic has also done spot-on parodies of other web phenomena, such as inane YouTube comments. --IanOsgood 16:37, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

xkcd has mentioned Misplaced Pages before, like in this comic. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 19:34, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Vandals that delete warnings

24.82.98.151 and, possibly, others delete their warnings after they get a warning for vandalizing, will that make it look (without going through the talk page's history) like they never vandalized, and make it that they never get caught? And, if so, what can we do about it? Jeffrey.Kleykamp 22:44, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

Please note however that I was talking to 24.82.98.151 and found out that he deleted it because he thought it wasn't justified, and I must agree with him (he deleted "mmmm,mmmm" from a description on an image which caused the page to be blank, which RandomHumanoid saw to be vandalism).

Regarding the general question, it's been discussed a thousand times and there still is no real consensus. My own opinion is to leave it alone - if this person is intent on vandalizing willy nilly, they'll get blocked anyway sooner or later. Others feel that talk page warnings leave an important record of past user behavior; at most, they can be archived or crossed out. Use your judgment. YechielMan 05:07, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

Wouldn't it be good to have a log of warnings that can't be deleted only added to (I'm not sure that it's possible to only add and not delete), like a warnings page? Or, maybe, a feature that searches through the talk page's history to find all warnings, and then it creates a summary (e.g. Average .1 warnings per day, 10 warnings total, highest level: 3), or, even better, a bot that searches through known vandals' history and creates a list of people based on the same principle. Jeffrey.Kleykamp 19:42, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

The best way to avoid a user masking their vandalism history is to use good edit summaries when warning them. This has been brought up repeatedly in the last year (at least), and the general consensus was that while vandalism warnings were not meant to be a scarlet letter (and thus are able to be removed/archived), some sort of tracking system is advisable, and the history of their talk page serves pretty well for this purpose. You may also want to look at Misplaced Pages talk:Centralized discussion/Removing warnings which has more information than you could possibly want to read on this subject. --nae'blis 18:05, 14 June 2007 (UTC) (not signed in at present)

Maybe we should set up some FAQs? --Kim Bruning 21:28, 14 June 2007 (UTC)

Uploading Newer Versions of Images that are Protected

Now, I know that this is WP:BEANS, but I have to ask:

What happens if you "upload a new version of the file" of the picture that is picture of the day. Besides getting banned and blocked. What I mean is will the server let you? It is blocked, right? I'm not going to do it or anything, but if you can, maybe we should report it to the WP:VPT guys so they can stop potential vandalism. I'll post this there too, but I don't know if it really fits there. If this is too WP:BEANSish for you, just delete this section. Thanks!! - Hairchrm 01:44, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

No, it is not possible. The Main Page is under full cascading protection, which also protects all the transcluded images and templates appearing on the Main Page. Fully protected images cannot be overwritten by new uploads. See Misplaced Pages:Protection policy for more details. Thanks for the concern though, BanyanTree 04:27, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

Signature Shop

I have created a proposal for a task force here. --Tλε Rαnδom Eδιτor (ταlκ) 02:41, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

Where's Hagerman?

I've noticed that Hagerman (talk · contribs) hasn't posted an edit since 16:47, 29 April 2007. His bot, HagermanBot (talk · contribs) last edited about a month later at 02:42, 25 May 2007. I don't see any kind of Wikibreak notice on his user page. Does anyone know if he's okay? —Elipongo (Talk contribs) 20:36, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

• Try contacting him on e-mail, if he has it activated, that is.--Kylohk 16:55, 14 June 2007 (UTC)

last.fm radio player widget for Mozilla Firefox

Hi I created a last.fm radio player widget for Misplaced Pages. It runs with Firefox.

Further info, see here: User:Csörföly D/last.fm widget

File:JerusalemEmblem.jpg The Lion of Judah "You send your big neck police friends fe come cool I up - But it no work" 2007. június 14., 00:43 (CEST)

Please make your signature shorter, and don't include an image in it. Corvus cornix 23:26, 14 June 2007 (UTC)

HELICOPTERS

Nearly everything can be explained and figured out through math and physics. However, on paper Helicopters should not be able to fly. In theory they really don't work, they are a man-made phenomenon.— Preceding unsigned comment added by 12.148.248.180 (talk • contribs)

Especially the black ones.--Isotope23 16:07, 14 June 2007 (UTC)

Two words immediately sprang to mind... "drivel" and "tilde".--Rambutan (talk) 07:14, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

Weasel words

Some people say we all love weasel words, but a user is really surprised to see that there haven't been any templates, or any good templates at least. I dusted off {{WW}} today and added categories, documentation, etc. to bring it up to the {{fact}} standard. Only two articles so far use it. How can some of us promote use of this template. hbdragon88 00:59, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

They all use Template:Weasel, but there may be situations were the small size of {{WW}} makes it the better choice. I added a link to it at Misplaced Pages:Avoid weasel words:See also to make others more aware of it. -- Jreferee 21:19, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

It turns out that there's {{weasel-inline}}, though it's quite dreadfully long – I could never type that in. It's even longer than {{weasel}}! But thanks; I had created Category:Articles with weasel word statements, and now I see Category:Articles with weasel words. Repointed and tagged accordingly. hbdragon88 05:13, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

English Misplaced Pages visible in China again

like it says... m.e. 03:20, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

Any bets on how long that will last? hbdragon88 03:39, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

Well, at least those Wikipedians in China can legally edit Misplaced Pages without violating WP:NOP for a while. Why is Misplaced Pages censored in China anyway? It doesn't seem to do much harm, does it?--Kylohk 19:49, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

It includes information censored in China. Atropos 00:18, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

Blocking of Misplaced Pages in mainland China. I didn't know we had an article on it. hbdragon88 01:39, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

Looks like a Chinese search engine company, Baidu has launched its own wiki Baidu Baike. As of now, its got over 700,000 articles, cover 6 times that of Chinese Misplaced Pages! This censorship really is bad for Chinese Misplaced Pages, since its quality definitely will lag behind a lot now without 20% of the world's population contributing.--Kylohk 09:11, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

Oh, and now, the WP:NOP is inconsistent with WM:NOP, the one on Meta being less strict, and showing that they don't want to punish users who used open proxies but have not caused any trouble.--Kylohk 14:08, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

What is the proper response to something like this?

I have a mental disability. I also have been involved in a long running dispute with a user. In a recent comment he made a snide reference to my disability. What do people recommend I do about this? --Ideogram 13:04, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Leave a message for the user in question, asking them not to do this again, or if you feel unable to do this, ask someone you respect and trust to have a word with that user. Carcharoth 13:12, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

This user has requested that I stay away from their talk page. He has a number of friends on Misplaced Pages who always rush to his defense in any dispute; I have been trying to talk to one of them but his only response was to try to smear my name. There is an admin who is trying to intervene, but these people are giving him hell. Can people really get away with this kind of thing on Misplaced Pages? --Ideogram 13:33, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Keeping off each other's talk pages is fine, but you will encounter each other in other places in Misplaced Pages. If conversations between you two end up like this, it might be best to avoid each other in other places as well. Sorry if this isn't very helpful. Hope something gets sorted out. Carcharoth 13:44, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

These users, all of whom have problems with me, are very active in many policy discussions. If I were to follow your advice, I would be unable to participate in any of those policy discussions. I suppose that would be no great loss to Misplaced Pages, but it seems quite unfair. --Ideogram 13:49, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Ideogram, I'm sorry to hear that you have a mental disability. I think you very accurately describe it as a long-running dispute. And it seems to include more than just yourself and one other user. I would like to gently point out that your two diff's, related to Geogre, are not in the same conversation, and I don't believe Geogre was responding to you in the 2nd diff.

I'd also respectfully note that your own remarks seem to be a bit snide on occasion. I don't know you but I'm sure you're a very good editor.

Personal remarks, especially referencing handicaps, are completely uncalled for. And, in my experience, those types of remarks are generally the result of a deeper frustration. Treating only the symptom will not make the problem go away. And, leaving, isn't the right answer either. My suggestion is to identify what the frustration is, and see if you can do anything to help eliminate it from your end. And, at the same time, pursue the advice (above) and make it clear that you are offended by the pointed remarks about your disability. Peace in God. Lsi john 14:09, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Thank you for your kind words. I admit to having a short temper and accept some of the blame. To be honest, I grew up in a family where anything could be said in anger but would be forgiven once the fight was over. I thought I could address the problem by making another attempt to AGF, but I have concluded that the problem cannot be solved. Thanks again for your support. --Ideogram 14:30, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

If you grew up in a family where anything could be said, and then be forgiven, then why not simply forgive him and move forward? note: I am not condoning poor conduct. I am addressing what you said about forgiveness. It seems contradictory to say you grew up with a pattern of forgiving after fights and then to imply (in your post above) that his snide remarks are offensive.

Again, I am not condoning poor conduct, and at the same time, his remarks seem to be rather subtle, because it requires an inside knowledge of your situation to know that is what he meant. Knowing the details now, I'd agree it was in poor taste, and I think you would agree that he could have been much more pointed about it.

I don't agree with your conclusion that the problem can't be solved (unless you are intent on making sure it can't be - and I assume that is not the case). My questions to you are: What resolution would you like? What do you want to happen? What outcome would make you happy?

Lsi john 15:55, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

And, if you can answer it: what do you think your contribution is (if any) to the source of his obvious frustration? Lsi john 15:57, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps its also important to add here, that saying snide things to our families, and being forgiven, is quite a bit different than saying snide things here. Our families love us and, in fairness, are stuck with us. Our fellow editors don't really even know us, let alone love us, and they certainly don't feel stuck with us. So, if we say snide things to them, it is only reasonable to expect snide things to be said in return. And, once we jump into that game, we no longer get to complain about who was more snide.

And I'd like to be clear that I'm not addressing your remarks specifically. I'll let you do that for yourself. I'm addressing your question about "what can you do?". And, my answer is, you can only control your own actions and remarks. You are responsible for yourself. So, refer back up to my previous questions, in the context of your contribution to the situation, and you will have an answer about what you can do. Lsi john 16:06, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

I'm afraid Ideogram stalks me wherever I go, inspite of my nest attempts to ignore him. In the latest encounter with him, he popped up with this edit in a matter with which he was completely uninvolved. One can only ignore so much. Giano 16:13, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Giano, your information, while relevant and seemingly on-point, is very poorly delivered, which only obfuscates the message and diverts the negative attention back to you. In fact, showing up here, and claiming stalking, is a bit of an oxy-moron. Lsi john 16:51, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

• Before accusing me of stalking ideogram, check your facts, it was linked from this thread in which I was involved. . Believe me, by choice, I give Ideogram as much space as possible. Giano 19:01, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

"If you grew up in a family where anything could be said, and then be forgiven, then why not simply forgive him and move forward? "Lsi john

I can easily forgive him, but there are two prerequisites: he must be able to admit there is something that needs to be forgiven (i.e. that it is not entirely my fault) and he must be able to forgive me. --Ideogram 17:04, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

I disagree with your reply. True forgiveness does not require anything from the other party. Forgiveness is completely unilateral and does not even require communication with the other party. Lsi john 18:28, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

I suspect you meant your family all apologized and accepted each other's apologies. From that context I understand. However, true forgiveness, does not require an apology.

All right, I forgive him. --Ideogram 19:16, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

"note: I am not condoning poor conduct. I am addressing what you said about forgiveness. It seems contradictory to say you grew up with a pattern of forgiving after fights and then to imply (in your post above) that his snide remarks are offensive. "Lsi john

Actually, I was asking a question about Misplaced Pages policy, since it seems I get blocked every time I try to say something snide. --Ideogram 17:04, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

There is a very simple solution to that problem. Don't say anything snide. That is something you have 100% control over. Lsi john 18:28, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Don't expect me to be perfect. --Ideogram 18:51, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

"I don't agree with your conclusion that the problem can't be solved (unless you are intent on making sure it can't be - and I assume that is not the case). My questions to you are: What resolution would you like? What do you want to happen? What outcome would make you happy? "Lsi john

I don't know what he wants. He engages in behavior that seems counterproductive. Not just towards me, either. I would like him to stop the counterproductive behavior. The best way to accomplish that would be to understand what he wants and suggest more productive ways to get what he wants. But I can't do that as long as he thinks attacking me is productive. --Ideogram 17:04, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

I didn't ask what he wanted. I didn't mention him at all here. I asked what you want. This is about you, about what you want, and about what you can do to get what you want.

As for him, thinking attacking you is productive, I'd submit that posting here helped support that conclusion (as does your giving up at the bottom). I'm not suggesting that you don't post here, but I am suggesting that you consider your reactions. (perhaps refer back to forgiveness and simply ignore him?) If he gets absolutely flagrant, someone will block him even if you don't respond. Lsi john 18:28, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

"And, if you can answer it: what do you think your contribution is (if any) to the source of his obvious frustration? "Lsi john 15:57, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

I think he and his friends display a pattern of viewing anyone who doesn't agree with them as an enemy. I want to understand them, but that doesn't mean I will agree with them. If they require that I agree with them, I cannot comply. --Ideogram 17:04, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Again here, you are making it about them and what they want and what they require. You can't control them. You have no power over them. You only have power and control over yourself. Step into it and own that power. Stop worrying about them and what they want. What they want is irrelevant. It is the position of helplessness and victim. Own your power and decide what you can do to change the situation. What do you want? How can you react differently? How can you change your edit summaries? How can you stop showing that something bothers you? What can you do to achieve what you want?

Are you seeing my pattern here? Stop worrying about them. There are other admins and editors who will worry about them for you. Start looking about yourself, and your choices and your actions and your contributions to the situation. Lsi john 18:28, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

In the larger context, this is a fight about who gets to do what they want on Misplaced Pages. If they get what they want, I cannot get what I want. So we fight. Forever. --Ideogram 18:51, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

He can't get what he wants, so he gets frustrated. That frustration boils over into unproductive behavior. I cannot give him what he wants, and I can't make him stop wanting it. Now I have what I want. --Ideogram 19:16, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

"Perhaps its also important to add here, that saying snide things to our families, and being forgiven, is quite a bit different than saying snide things here. Our families love us and, in fairness, are stuck with us. Our fellow editors don't really even know us, let alone love us, and they certainly don't feel stuck with us. So, if we say snide things to them, it is only reasonable to expect snide things to be said in return. And, once we jump into that game, we no longer get to complain about who was more snide. "Lsi john

Believe me, in my family snide words were often said in return. Again, I was mainly asking a question about policy. I have trouble adapting to an environment where saying snide things gets me sanctioned. --Ideogram 17:04, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

I didn't see where you ask a question about policy. What policy are you asking about? I'm unaware of any policy that dictates a response from you. Are you asking where you can officially report it? Do you want him reprimanded? Do you want him blocked? Do you want him gelded? If so, you should say that. If not, then I'm not sure I understand what your original question has to do with policy. Lsi john 18:28, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

It seems to me that I get blocked for violating policy while he does not. Are you asking me not to be bothered by that? --Ideogram 18:51, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

"And I'd like to be clear that I'm not addressing your remarks specifically. I'll let you do that for yourself. I'm addressing your question about "what can you do?". And, my answer is, you can only control your own actions and remarks. You are responsible for yourself. So, refer back up to my previous questions, in the context of your contribution to the situation, and you will have an answer about what you can do. "Lsi john 16:06, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

What I can do is wash my hands of the situation. I am sorry to say it. --Ideogram 17:04, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Ok. Then you have peacefully surrendered to the situation? You will no longer be affected by his snide comments? You are willing to allow them to continue and you accept them as okay? Is this really a peaceful surrender to something you cannot control, or did you simply decide to be a martyr and give up? Either way, understand that 'giving up' only works once. So choose carefully before you claim to quit. I'm sorry if this seems harsh, but from my perspective, it appears that I care more about this than you do. Peace in God. Lsi john 18:28, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

I cannot surrender. --Ideogram 18:41, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

You're the one who said you were washing your hands, I just asked what that meant to you. Lsi john 19:37, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

I cannot promise to avoid every page he posts on. Let's take this one step at a time, OK? --Ideogram 19:16, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

You're the one who is suggesting avoiding pages. I'm certainly not. And, as you have pretty much ignored every one of my questions, I'm not going to respond any more. When you are ready to discuss what you can do to help yourself, and what your contribution to the current situation is, I'll be around. Lsi john 19:37, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Complaint

Why is the Vince McMahon article is protected??? Shkarter1985 21:34, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

My guess is that his recent kayfabe "death" keeps getting put into the article. I can therefore imagine that people are saying he is dead, when he obviously isn't - but his wrestling persona is "dead" (but knowing professional wrestling, he's bound to be reincarnated somehow). But unfortunately, people keep doing so and it is quite difficult to keep reverting, so protection is easiest to stop the edit war. x42bn6 Talk Mess 00:04, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

I disagree with your comment, this is suppose to be the 💕 not the Unfree.Shkarter1985 20:45, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

I know, and protection is unfortunate. However, there are times when vandals and people introducing BLP problems overwhelm users trying to keep that off the page. Which is where protection comes in. See the protection policy for more information. If you would like to request something to be changed, then the talk page allows for discussion of potential changes. x42bn6 Talk Mess 23:37, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

WP:CHU backlog

What does one do about the huge backlog at Misplaced Pages:Changing username? Only interested, I'm not awaiting a change.--Rambutan (talk) 21:01, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Run for Bureaucrat and pass.

...Wait, you wanted options that were actually possible? --tjstrf talk 22:11, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Haha, you can ask at WP:BN. That'll usually work within a few hours. But I've decided to wait just to see how long it takes. :) YechielMan 07:00, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

Advertising

It seems to me that people with little experience and with strange formats to their edits are creating large edits to Misplaced Pages, what I really want to say is that I think that advertisers are editing Misplaced Pages because of the increase in use from institutions, e.g. has a summary section but no beginning section, and it's linked to Advertising#Optimisation which used to have the {{advert}} tag (that is before I edited it). I don't really know what to do about this, other than creating a anti-ad force that systematically goes through all articles linked to the {{advert}} tag, finds the user that created the bad edits, then warns them, and fixes the article, and finally fixes any articles that got edited by him/her but that's hard work (and Misplaced Pages is so big that it wouldn't wonder me if that already exists). I thought I might mention it either way. Jeffrey.Kleykamp 00:31, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

I would also like to note that copy testing also mentions Young all the time, just like Advertising#Optimisation used to, and, to me at least, the way that the person uses it as a reference is bad formatting and proof of what I'm saying above (that inexperienced advertisers are editing certain things to make institutions end up thinking that they need their form of advertising, it could even be a scheme to make Misplaced Pages surfers end up on a particular article). Jeffrey.Kleykamp 00:40, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

Freckles.10.6.2005 is the one that made all the edits, he admitted to working for one of the companies that he wrote about , not that that's a problem, but if too many people do that then it will probably become one. Jeffrey.Kleykamp 00:50, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

Please report that kind of problem (and chip in with the volunteers who address it) at Misplaced Pages:Conflict of interest/noticeboard. Durova 17:09, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

I moved the conversation to Misplaced Pages:Conflict of interest/Noticeboard#Advertising. Jeffrey.Kleykamp 19:09, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

Just a question

Why are you Americans so box-minded? You should write articles about people independently of where they were born or raised. For example I saw a list of Russian Americans. Why don´t you also make a list of Chinese Americans, Japanese Americans, French Americans, French Brazilians, Black Jews, Mexican English and Swiss tennis players? Those kind of lists are totally arbitrary and don´t make much sense. No wonder there´s so much segregation in the US. You could start by getting rid of some of these lists.

The lists are only a collection of links to articles, the articles are already written at the time of creation of the list, i.e. the people aren't written about because of their nationality but they're added to the list because of it, therefore it isn't a real problem. I would also like to say that the lists are useful for example if you wanted to write about a Russian American then you can look at that list to find someone to write about. Jeffrey.Kleykamp 13:26, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

You can think of these multi-criteria categories as Misplaced Pages's Venn diagrams. Such as German artists or Canadian racecar drivers, to name just two. Adrian M. H. 18:11, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

Bear in mind that few individuals who live in the United States can trace a significant portion of their ancestry to any of the land's native peoples. Pride and interest in one's own background doesn't necessarily mean denigration of other heritages. In some professions a given heritage has a significant impact on the individual's work. For example, students of literature may use this type of list to narrow down their seletion for a "compare and contrast" term paper assignment to Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man and Walter Mosley's Devil in a Blue Dress. In other situations, where prejudices traditionally limited or closed a career field to persons of a particular background, these lists can be a starting point for a different type of research. Durova 18:34, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

Ok thank you for sharing your opinion.

Portal:Roman Empire

Hello there. I recently created a portal, The Roman Empire Portal. It is still under construction, and I could use volunteers to help build it. Thanks. --Tλε Rαnδom Eδιτor (ταlκ) 20:56, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

  Rome was not built in a day.  (sorry, couldn't help myself) Fristenskyk 22:54, 22 June 2007 (UTC)

Observation

I am Elaine, and I will be observing this community of "wiki writers" as part of the requirements for an online-based writing course for the Center for Talented Youth, or CTY. I will not disturb this community significantly, but I do want to ensure that this can happen. (I have to have permission, by the way.) So just drop a note here so I can link my teacher to this page to check permission. Thank you, Elaine--03:38, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

Please feel free. We all watch each other all the time, so one more watcher won't cause us any trouble. I suggest that you register an account though. That way we can tell that it's really you and not some troublemaker pretending to be you. -- Derek Ross | Talk 04:29, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, I don't think anyone's ever asked us that before, but you have to do some pretty nasty stuff to get on our nerves. :) YechielMan 06:58, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

Okay. Elainew246 21:37, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

Less Vandalisim?

It may be just me, but over the last few months it seems there is getting to be less and less vandalism. Whenever I filter, there's almost nothing. Is this really a trend or is it something else? Dfrg.msc 05:56, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

• Not sure. I don't keep a careful eye on the infamous Wdefcon template, but there are a number of factors to consider. First, the bots are getting better at catching the obvious vandalism, so there's less for us to do. Second, it's possble for the quantity of vandalism to stay about the same even as the overall number of edits increases with the increasing number of edits; that may be what's happening. Third, the vandals may be learning how to contaminate the wiki with conflict-of-interest crap that isn't actually vandalism. That's a problem that just won't go away by itself. YechielMan 06:57, 21 June 2007 (UTC)
  • COI and NPOV entries in articles often get detected and reverted by people watching it anyway. However, I don't have problems reverting vandalism before the bot does it.--Kylohk 13:53, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

Open Call for Editors to Participate in Research Project

Hi

My name is Jim Sutton and I'm undertaking research in the School of Library, Archive, and Information Studies, UCL.

My research involves studying wiki usage, the reasons why individuals use wikis and the benefits/disadvantages of using wikis to manage knowledge.

I was wondering if you would agree to my analysing your contributions to Misplaced Pages. This will basically involve calculating how many times you've contributed to Misplaced Pages within the time period of a week.

I was also wondering what your reasons are for using/contributing to Misplaced Pages. I'd be extremely grateful for any feedback you can provide.

If you agree to my analysing your contributions then please email me with your Misplaced Pages username and any feedback you have. My email address is james.sutton (at) ucl.ac.uk

I also have a survey online which I'm using as part of my research at:

http://myweb.tiscali.co.uk/stqa7937/survey/

My Misplaced Pages username is Sutton4019 and my research is being carried out jointly with Melissa Terras at UCL. Her email address is m.terras (at) ucl.ac.uk .

If you have any questions please let me know and thank you for your time. Thanks! --Sutton4019 12:39, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

Will discuss on talk. --h2g2bob (talk) 18:26, 22 June 2007 (UTC)

Forte, a music encyclopedia

I dunno if I can do this, and if not then just delete this. Like... I just want some help. I dunno.

Well, I've started a music wiki encyclopedia. It's called Forte. I have me and another friend to help me, and we've got things set up. We have about 50 albums and 10 artists, and we NEED to expand.

And that's where Misplaced Pages comes into play, hopefully people in WP:ALBUM and WP:BAND I'm trying to get friends to help, but I also need people who already know how to edit on a wiki. I can understand if you guys don't want to help, I wouldn't blame you - it is a big job. But I'm begging you guys, to please help me. Most things are set up - the wikifarm it's currently on uses an outdated version on MediaWiki so you can't do everything, but you can do most things - I've just been running into trouble with different template stuff. But other than that, all you really need to do it just add articles. It has an album, song, and band infobox, and i'm going to make the genre infobox and instrument infoboxes soon.

I posted this in the WP:ALBUM talk, but an admin said it was just vandalism that had nothing that Wiki doesn't have except for ads. I'm sorry I can't buy my own servers or understand the code. I kinda find it pretty crappy that wikipedia has a list of places you can host wikis on, but then when somebody goes to one in a goal to start an encyclopedia, they get turned on by the people who run it.

Thanks for any type of help you can give. If not, though, it's ok... -sk8₁₉₇₆ 21:30, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

As your wiki is GFDL licensed, you can use Special:Export and download music-related pages from Misplaced Pages, and Special:Import on your own Wiki to import these pages. This way, you can make a progressive fork of Misplaced Pages. (If you intend to do this for over 300 pages, please use the database dumps).

Your wiki stands the best chance of success if you make it distinct from Misplaced Pages in style and content - for example you could allow a non-neutral point of view (ie, make it a form of blog), provide recommendations (like Amazon), or discard the notability guidelines (like MySpace). If it's the same as Misplaced Pages, people will just post here and join our music wikiprojects instead. --h2g2bob (talk) 18:22, 22 June 2007 (UTC)

The no notability guidelines sounds the best. It's like Wiki merged with encyclopedia mettalum.-sk8₁₉₇₆ 16:35, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

BAG Joining

Hey, I have been asked to post a notification of my request to join the Bot Approvals Group on here. It can be found at Misplaced Pages talk:Bots/Approvals group#Joining. Thanks! Matt/TheFearow (Talk) (Contribs) (Bot) 02:08, 22 June 2007 (UTC)

Apice.Italy-info

I am in the process of finding relatives of my grandparents who came o this country from Italy. From what I have found, they are both from the area of Campania and sailed from Naples in 1905-arriving in New York possibiy on the Citta di New York.(Ship) I would like to go there and meet any one who is left. Their name was Racioppi-they were not married when they came. Her last name was Pastore. Any info at all would be appreciated.

Garbardeen

Um, we're writing an encyclopedia here, not running a detective agency. Misplaced Pages doesn't have every bit of information that exists in the world! Sorry, The Raven's Apprentice 05:42, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

Jimmy Wales

Jimmy Wales only made 3,119 edits and 628 in the mainspace and if you look at the bottom, the most edits (18) in the mainspace were made to the article on Jimmy Wales (COI) compared to the second best of 13 edits to Marc Lemire, see , and yet we treat him as a god. Think about it, 'cause I don't have an opinion, Jeffrey.Kleykamp 15:05, 22 June 2007 (UTC)

Hey, you're right... we should ban him immediately!--Isotope23 15:20, 22 June 2007 (UTC)

Heh. The word is, I think, editcountitis :). ck lostsword • T • C 15:24, 22 June 2007 (UTC)

Isotope how about we start a discussion on WP:CSN then! Then we can watch as it is put WP:BJAODN! FunPika 17:00, 22 June 2007 (UTC)

I don't think it's possible to accurately measure his contribution to the project as a number of edits. ---J.S (T/C/WRE) 19:44, 22 June 2007 (UTC)

Wow, he'd never pass RfA. Which is more a deficiency of RfA than Jimbo. Dcoetzee 20:10, 22 June 2007 (UTC)

Well if he wasn't Jimbo and was just another user, I would probably oppose because of the large lack of activity in many months. Also, I am not joking when I say this. Captain panda 23:21, 22 June 2007 (UTC)

Repent, heretic, before the god-king brings forth his unearthly wrath upon you!

Seriously though, Jimbo's authority doesn't derive from his ability to write stubs or revert vandalism. The philosophical framework of the site, as written in core policies, is his doing. So we collectively agree to give his word extra weight since he was nice enough to start Nupedia/Wikipedia out of his pocket and then give it away for free so we have a neat encyclopedia to play with. He almost never actually uses his authority, which is partially why we give it to him, though people use his name in vain a lot. There's also the commonsense argument that we really do need an appeal of final resort to stop arguments on the policy level that deadlock and would go on interminably, and he's a better choice than all other options I've heard. A lot of his interaction with the community is done off wiki, e.g. via the mailing list, so edit counts aren't really a good measure of how involved he is. - BanyanTree 00:05, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

On another serious note -- since he doesn't regularly participate in the gruntwork of building the encyclopedia I often wonder how much he knows what really goes on around here. As opposed to the party line about a "harmonious editing club." 71.214.249.249 15:25, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

That's the problem with upper management these days - instead of spending time in the trenches, answering phones and waiting on customers, and micro-managing every new initiative to make sure it goes correctly, they "delegate" day-to-day stuff, and only step in when they absolutely have to. Lazy bums. If someone like Jimmy won't take the time to learn to do everything at Misplaced Pages better than any other editor, including having a higher edit count than anyone else, why should we give his opinion any weight? -- John Broughton (♫♫) 15:58, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

Editcountitis problems here. And, unlike other Upper Management guys, he doesn't murder people for stealing his userpage design. :) Jimbo's someone we trust, not 'coz of his gargantuan edit count, or the position he's attained on Misplaced Pages... We trust him 'coz he's the one who gave us the Wiki to play around, 'coz his will always be the voice of reason even if irrationality becomes the Wikipedian consensus, 'coz he'll always embody our principles even if we forget them. That's why he's deified-- coz he represents our ideals, whatever we're working for, even if they're unattainable ideals, even for him. Think of what you're saying-- What kind of argument against Jesus is it to say "Hey, I've never seen him attend Mass!" ? --The Raven's Apprentice 16:37, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

We're getting goofy after 6 years on the web. I think Jesus would get blocked on sight for a violation of our overzealous username policy. Cool Blue 23:09, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

In all seriousness the deification of Jimbo is creepy as hell to me. --P4k 23:11, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

"Make us a king to judge us." --tjstrf talk 01:15, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

In all seriousness the deification of Jimbo is creepy and sacreligious. But he's a good guy who's good at ignoring the rules, so he would probably get supported if he wasn't a founder. bibliomaniac15 02:11, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

People who think I am not active in Misplaced Pages simply don't know what I do. Ask the ArbCom, and the Oversight group, and they will tell you how deeply involved I am in day to day matters. People who think that edit counts are a good measure of activity really don't understand Misplaced Pages very well. --Jimbo Wales 02:41, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

The problem

User:Badlydrawnjeff and User:Rama's Arrow have left wikipedia this week. Both featured article contributors. Why? well no one knows for certain why great contributors are leaving wikipedia, apprently on a weekly or atleast monthly basis but few can take a guess.

It is of my personal opinion that the utopia ideology of wikipedia is destroying it. Everything needs to be discussed, no one can curse or show any sign of a negative emotion, long processes to fix simple problems like blocking vandals, extremely long process to get rid of or at least stop opinion pushers, no one/group has the authority to make general decisions based on a "no consensus" discussion, everything can be interpreted if enough people stand by the interpretation and ofcourse "anybody" can edit as if "only a few" can register. Why? In 2001 Misplaced Pages needed contributors and readership. Today it has plenty of both. Most policies are pretty straigh forward and correct. No policy is pushing personal opinion or bullshit information to be placed here, none of which has any place on wikipedia. You can't really write an encyclopedia in "creative" ways. So why does everything need to discussed and everyone gets leeway as to not hurt their feelings or someone else's. Misplaced Pages needs to finally stand to its policies and enforce them strongly, so everyone who follows the rules knows that the project is behind them while people who don't agree with something can get the hell out. The policies wikipedia was built on are fine, its time to stop interpretation and finally put your foot down and enforce them. Why is that so hard? Can someone tell me. 99.244.236.210 18:17, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

I can definitely tell you that another editor I know well left for harassment issues, and I stopped using my original ID for the same reason. The polices do need to be enforced in full, and personally I agree we should stop this BS about hurting peoples feelings. If they're not following policy, then that is it... it's not a personal attack, it's fact. The problem of off-wiki harassment for volunteering one's time and being proud to be associated with the project (i.e. making one's true ID known), is not only getting out of hand, but frankly, dangerous. Why would anyone volunteer their time anymore to a project where if they piss the wrong person off by upholding policy, they get harassed, threatened, and stalked? There are a lot of things that need to be worked out, and it's not just the concept of discussing every thing. Rider of the Storm|_Thunder 18:24, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

Also I want to note how this rant relates to "Village pump (proposals)". I'm tired of adminstrators who are usually great contributors who are given extra tools bombarded with complaints about blocking and so forth. If somone doesn't get the picture after being warned about breaking policy/guideline he needs to be blocked. Why do adminstrators need to justify all their actions with one exception of "vandalism blocking"? No action is "too quick" if someone is a clear disruption. Not every dumbass need to be given the privalage of talking to arbcom. Mediation is not full from 2 rational contributors disagreeing but a normal user and a swarm of idiots who want to push their opinion or how things should be done, ofcourse with few exceptions. Everyone is afraid to block people who aren't clear vandals. We need a policy or change in policy to stop some of the adminstrators having to justify all of their actions to the "mob" (people who do minor contributions but are very vocal). Sure some admin actions are questionable but majority aren't. I'll go as far as to say if 1 or few people question every administrator action without gaining any interest from the wider community, this is blockable disruption. Adminstrators do not need to respond to every "puzzled" user who doesn't understand why something was done and wants to go into a big discussion into why "User:Death to China" was blocked for adding information sourced to "evilchina.com"-example. Opinions? 99.244.236.210 18:48, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

I tend to agree with you, but there are plenty of Wikipedians who do not. For example, Misplaced Pages:Requests for adminship/Armedblowfish and Misplaced Pages:Requests for adminship/CharlotteWebb are both cases in which the candidate violated Misplaced Pages:No open proxies. Though they failed, there was a great outrage at those who opposed them. I will try not to start an arguement involving those RfAs, but in both cases, the rules of Misplaced Pages were violated by those candidates. There are plenty of those out there who are not so rule-enjoying as us. Captain panda 00:15, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

Didn't User:ScienceApologist leave in the last few days as well? --tjstrf talk 00:44, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

I agree. Misplaced Pages has serious problems. Those who write articles are not appreciated, so they leave. You can start a discussion at Misplaced Pages:Reform. --Kaypoh 00:53, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

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