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Revision as of 02:05, 5 August 2008 editBrewhaha@edmc.net (talk | contribs)1,265 edits Template:Weasel, fully protected.: Everyone is Australian.← Previous edit Revision as of 02:24, 13 September 2008 edit undoBrewhaha@edmc.net (talk | contribs)1,265 edits Deleted archived sections. I'll try to figure out how to list my archive TWO properly.Next edit →
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== Vote. ==
== Please feel compelled to enumerate yourself in this vote. ==
<br>

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{{weasel}} {{weasel}}
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<pre> <pre>
Chillum Cailil MoonRiddenGirl Voter1 Voter2 Voter3 BrewJay Levy
Concrete Terms: U U U Concrete Terms: U U U Y N
Notability: U U U Notability: U U U Y N
Neutrality: U U U Neutrality: U U U N Y
Contains Equivocation: U U U Contains Equivocation: U U U N Y
Audio: U U U Audio: U U U Y N
Suck or Draw: U U U Suck or Draw: U U U D U
Terse: U U U Terse: U U U Y N
</pre> </pre>


Your attitude towards participants is irrelevant. Your decision should come from analyzing the effect of those examples. If you are not named, then please feel free to add yourself. Please ignore conversation about those issues. Your decision should come entirely from analyzing the effect of those examples. If you are not named, then please feel free to add yourself. Three votes should become a decision.

== Needs talk link ==
This template needs a talk link: what's "weasel words" is not always obvious. Problem is referred to above. Now it is marked by ], which implies it will probably be fixed soon. <span style="color: #800000; background-color: #FFFFA0; padding: 1px 2px 3px 2px">''Said: ] ] ]''</span> 09:48, 4 July 2007 (UTC)

:Found this: ]. I'll insert it if nobody objects. <span style="color: #800000; background-color: #FFFFA0; padding: 1px 2px 3px 2px">''Said: ] ] ]''</span> 18:10, 4 July 2007 (UTC)

::Oh, darn stupid of me! Pardon! <span style="color: #800000; background-color: #FFFFA0; padding: 1px 2px 3px 2px">''Said: ] ] ]''</span> 18:11, 4 July 2007 (UTC)

== Iceweasel ==

Am I the only one wondering why is a browser logo being used in a template? ''']'''<sup>]</sup> 13:57, 12 August 2007 (UTC)
:I think it should be reverted back, as I don't think it is appropriate. ] 18:40, 12 August 2007 (UTC)
:::Ok, I've reverted it, since the change was done by a annon user and there reason for changing it was to match the style of ], which I don't think is a good enough reason. ] 18:49, 12 August 2007 (UTC)
::::Thank you, it's much better now. ''']'''<sup>]</sup> 21:18, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

==Weasel==
I'm not sure how many times has been posted, but it is at least once. -- <font face="Kristen ITC">''']''' <sup>''(])''</sup></font> 04:35, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

==Weasel image: Stays or goes?==
The weasel image was re-added a while ago; I'd really prefer this template to be as small and non-intrusive as possible (I'd vote for L1AM's suggestion, below). I'd revert to L1AM's design, but there's a lot of intermediate changes, and I don't want to undo things indiscriminately. Does anybody else think L1AM's suggestion is better than what we have right now? If not, I'll just leave it as is ... ] 19:32, 14 April 2006 (UTC)
Is this something with I.M. Weasel? ] (]) 14:05, 20 November 2007 (UTC)Kinz

:I'm thinking that an egg full of meaning being sucked out to nothing but a shell by a weasel is anti-]. Weasel words suck meaning out of facts. I don't see an easy way to illustrate that. Goes. ] (]) 06:58, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

== This template uses weasel words ==

"''May'' be compromised by weasel words"? The template, at least, should be straight with the facts. --] 04:48, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

:This is an interesting point. Could "may" be removed - as the template would carry more weight and have more resonance with users - might receive higher responses. ] (]) 10:35, 9 February 2008 (UTC)

::I think that would be ill-advised, as the implementation of the template often comes up in disputes. Consider the neutrality dispute template. The purpose of the templates is to alert readers and editors to potential problems that need fixing, not to label articles. --] ] 22:12, 4 April 2008 (UTC)

:::You can't hav weasel words in the template. That's hypocrisy. ] (]) 05:36, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

== Weasel image obstructs text in safari ==

When looking at ] in Safari 3.1.1 (latest version), the Weasel image is a bit too much to the right, obstructing the first 3 characters of each line. Could somebody fix that? Thanks! ] (]) 11:29, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
:I did a quick fix, maybe somebody can clean it up and make the code correct etc. ] (]) 11:31, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
::Bring back the Weasel!! --] (]) 21:52, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

==Weasel words <strike>suck</strike> draw meaning out of wikipedia. ==

{{ambox
|type= content
|image=]
|text= '''] makes this {{{1|article or section}}} ] or ].''' <small>Please clarify such statements or remove them.{{#if:{{{date|}}}|''({{{date}}})''}}</small>
}}
] (]) 23:32, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

I think David Levy missed the mark on what weasel words are. They are ''typically'' vague attributions. More jenerally, they are vagueness, period. Let's see: vagueness, fuzziness, indetermination, equivocation. "Fuzzy" could be barbaric. ''Please remove terms from this article or section that make it fuzzy''. A problem with that is that I don't see anywhere to link ''notability'' and verifiability policies in, and it doesn't offer the alternative of snipping the whole sentence. ] (]) 06:37, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

I'm not changing the text. I'm just putting up a 57k VBR ogg that breaks George Orwell's sixth rule in "Politics and the English Language" in place of the exclamation mark. It needs '''two''' links, though. Hopefully I can see where wp:notability goes.] (]) 05:40, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Barbaric it might be, and if you call it nonsense, then I'm raising the production value with my synth and adding a beat to put less emphasis on "suck". Nothing was wrong with the template; If the icon for audio is too big, then make it smaller for an ambox, please. ] (]) 11:38, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

:This is a serious template that appears in articles. Please stop inserting your "joke" that breaks it. Thank you. —] 12:15, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Broken is exajeration for a graphic image that is too big. I would fix it, and ] is locked. I'm glad you still find humour in it, because I adapted (found a beat for) an instrumental refrain in ]. So, you can see that the tune is aimed at something other than humour. And isn't it also a refrain of Jim Wales to hav the objective of making the internet not suck? ] (]) 12:31, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

:No, "broken" refers to the fact that you've repeatedly '''broken''' the template (by making it difficult or impossible to read). Don't do that. —] 16:33, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

::We hav here a tendency to egzajerate. Sticking text into the rightward third of the screen was and is not my decision, nor does it change how readable the text is. You'll find less than ten words in a newspaper column. Five is good enough, especially when there's about thirty words of it when ten will do. ] (]) 22:19, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

:::I don't know how the template was affected in your browser, but in mine (Firefox 3), the audio player '''covered''' much of the text. The template was '''broken''', and you did this a second time (''after'' I informed you of the problem), all for the sake of an admitted "joke." Please refrain from vandalising the template. —] 23:33, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

::::That wasn't my choice, nor did I hav any details about browser distinctions. In I.E., at 800by600, all it did was make the play button take up two thirds of the width. The easy choice to make was to use features in the ambox template, rather than setting width:10% and height:10%, like I would if I were writing the style.

:::::When someone tells you that your edit broke a page, don't bloody restore it without checking other browsers (not that the IE result was remotely acceptable). And don't add jokes to the article namespace, period. —] 05:10, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

:Additionally, your joke sucks. Please refrain from making the template suck.

::It must be funnier than the exclamation point. I didn't expect anybody would listen to the way I posted it the first time more than once. I don't remember anyone telling me the same joke twice in a day.] (]) 22:19, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

:::The template isn't supposed to be funny; this is a serious encyclopedia. Do you have it confused with ]? —] 23:33, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

::::Why is it so hard to explain that truth is in jokes? The funny part is in our understanding of them. Typically, a comedian will feign total ignorance of something to show you an angle on truth that's hard to see. For example I know this comedian who tried to tell David Suzuki that Whales we saved explain the rise in sea levels. Sometimes a perspective in nonsense is informative. In that case, it's showing what is likely (that we're still the cause) by taking an unlikely alternative. Every joke is like a riddle. Where is truth in it, and how much? The full explanation for why "Weasel words suck meaning out of wikipedia." is in piles and piles of essays (and gigabytes of phrase that didn't even make it to wikipedia) about ].
::::Jokes are a sketch and reminder of what you already know from a perspective that's obviously false. Someone experienced at writing and reading won't need to hear anything more to know foggy prose or what causes it. What to do about it will always be tricky.

:::::Kindly keep your jokes out of the article namespace. —] 05:10, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Your wording, Mister Levy, still fails to link to ]. That's really what weasel words are best at: interfering with significance. ] (]) 13:02, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

:That page deals primarily with determining the notability (or lack thereof) of articles' subjects. It has very little to do with this template. —] 16:33, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

::Weasel words weaken the meaning of a sentence, making what might otherwise be a notable fact into something that looks like fiction. That interferes with notability. Perhaps it tends to be the product of bias, and I think it's more important to attend to results, which are weakened facts; weakened notability. ] (]) 22:19, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

:::The page in question is about determining whether subjects are sufficiently notable to have articles in our encyclopedia. —] 23:33, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

::::It follows to apply those rules to facts within those articles. For example, the subject of Gravity in Physics is notable. Statistics about opinions of whether the Sun goes around the Earth or vice-versa are not, because the remaining fact is that they both go around a mutual center of gravity that is very close to the center of the Sun.] (]) 02:10, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

:::::Quoth ]: "These notability guidelines only pertain to the encyclopedic suitability of topics for articles but do not directly limit the content of articles." Please stop linking to an irrelevant page. —] 05:10, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

== Vandalism (as posted on ]) ==

Please do not add nonsense to Misplaced Pages{{#if:Template:Weasel|, as you did {{#if:|with }} to the ] page|{{#if:|, as you did with }}}}. It is considered ]. If you would like to experiment, use the ]. Thank you. <!-- Template:Test2 (second level warning) --> —] 12:12, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

:I could accuse you of the same thing for using wording that ''does not'' link to ]. This discussion doesn't belong on my talk page. I think my wording is all too clear, and you will need to think about your objection to it more carefully.] (]) 13:12, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

::No, using wording with which another editor disagrees isn't vandalism. Repeatedly breaking a serious template by inserting an admitted "joke" is. Don't do that.
::My objection is that you're using vague wording (in a template designed to discourage the use of vague wording, no less). As noted above, the added link isn't helpful (because the page lacks relevance to this tag). —] 16:33, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

:::To repeat myself, "breaking a serious template" is an egzaJeration, when all it does is display a graphic that's too big, and that's beyond my power to fix. ] (]) 21:41, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

::::Obscuring the text = '''breaking the template'''. Doing so for the sake of a "joke" = vandalism. —] 23:33, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

:::Explain why ] isn't in your "fix"!? ] (]) 21:41, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

::::I did; it lacks relevance. —] 23:33, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

::::Biased has a bigger problem. You can't read motivation behind obscurant text; you can only guess that it actually and only represents an author's opinion, rather than a faithfully represented line from credible authors. If it is ONLY an opinion or unreliable hearsay, then it's not significant, and I won't be able to tell if it was biased without a very careful interview of the author.] (]) 02:24, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

:::'''Joke''' is not an admission. It's something to be proud of. If people want to hear it more than once, then maybe they'll come to understand what degree of truth is in it. To be sure, jokes are always lies of some kind. In this case, I think it's all in the strength of that one word "suck", that we demand of good vacuums and bad girls. ] (]) 21:41, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

::::Your pride in inserting jokes into the encyclopedia (a form of vandalism) is quite troubling, and your remark about "bad girls" was uncalled-for. —] 23:33, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Please stop making the template equivocal. ] (]) 06:08, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

== Significance ==

Dear Mister Levy:

I must take issue with your supposition that ] does not make decisions on the notability of content within an article. In direct terms, it doesn't make decisions. It off-loads them. That's from a long-standing tradition of different standards for different subjects. The document leaves it for projects. In pure mathematics, the Probability of Significance must be one (applicability to anything real is incidental). In applied mathematics, it's arbitrary. In Physics, a lot of discussion is involved in arriving at an appropriate level of significance. It's usually .97 or greater. In Psychology, there is one number that I hear quoted more often than any other, and that's ''nineteen times out of twenty'': 0.95. So, there are standards for significance. If ] doesn't list them all or link to them, that's a fault in the policy document, not an opposition to the idea that significance is relevant to whether information should be in an article.

So, do statements become more important if they become definite? The Earth very probably revolves around The Sun, or it does. (Both statements are not quite right). You must see that having a definite answer is more valuable.

On another topic, I don't understand why you are putting bias into this template. It's relevant, and I don't see any way to be sure that weasel words are bias. They indicate that the information might be fabricated or original research, but those don't make it false. Since you can't clearly detect bias from weasel words, I favour removing the mention of bias from this template.

It is not safe to assume bias within an estimated or approximate fact. I can be definite with the way I want to word this template. It is not appropriate for this template to analyze tendencies or equivocate. Either too many statements in the document are foggy, or not.

In sum, even if we don't hav a single document, here, describing standards for notability or significance, all of which are arbitrary, those standards exist. Deleting weasel words or the statements attributed to anonymous authorities has its own pitfalls in bias. It is still the only path for primer documents to take.

Impeding significance is what weasel words do best; it is a problem; it is relevant to policy.
] (]) 11:01, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

:1. My "suposition"?! I quoted the bloody page itself:
::''These notability guidelines only pertain to the encyclopedic suitability of topics for articles but do not directly limit the content of articles.''
:2. The template merely states that weasel words often accompany biased information (which is a true statement). —] 13:35, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

==Protection==
I have fully protected the template for now in respect to long-term ongoing dispute about the language that has been carried out primarily, it seems, in the template. As ] notes:
{{cquote|Being bold in updating or creating '']'' and '']'' can have far reaching consequences. This is because category changes &ndash; and even more so template changes &ndash; can affect a large number of pages with a single edit. Templates, moreover, may have complex source code that can easily be broken by untested changes (which can fortunately be corrected with a single revert).

Because of these concerns, many ] are ] from editing. Before editing templates or categories, consider proposing any changes on the associated talk pages and announcing the proposed change on pages of appropriate ].}}
Please take this opportunity to establish consensus for language or other changes to this template. When the protection expires, please be sure that changes to the template accurately reflect the consensus established here. Efforts to force through changes without consensus by directly and repeatedly editing the template may constitute ], even if not technically in violation of ]. Please consider following ] if consensus cannot be reached here. --] <sup>]</sup> 14:22, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

:After discussing the matter at ], I've extended the protection to infinite in accordance with ]. If consensus is reached for a change, please follow the steps listed at the top of the page for having those implemented. Thanks. --] <sup>]</sup> 16:23, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

::Old habits are hard to break. This is not USENET. ] (]) 17:50, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

Revision as of 02:24, 13 September 2008

This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Weasel template.
Archives: 1
Templates for deletion This template was considered for deletion in December 2005. The result of the discussion was "Not deleted".
Archiving icon
Archives

Archive 1


Archive Two

Vote.





This article contains weasel words: vague phrasing that often accompanies biased or unverifiable information. Such statements should be clarified or removed.


Foggy wording makes this article or section unverifiable or insignificant. Please clarify such statements or remove them.
                     Voter1  Voter2    Voter3  BrewJay  Levy
Concrete Terms:         U      U          U       Y       N
Notability:             U      U          U       Y       N
Neutrality:             U      U          U       N       Y
Contains Equivocation:  U      U          U       N       Y
Audio:                  U      U          U       Y       N
Suck or Draw:           U      U          U       D       U
Terse:                  U      U          U       Y       N

Your decision should come entirely from analyzing the effect of those examples. If you are not named, then please feel free to add yourself. Three votes should become a decision.