Misplaced Pages

• Skip to open disputes
• skip to newest thread
• (purge cache)

• Administrators
  • Main
  • Incidents
• Bots
• Bureaucrats
• Centralized discussion
• Closure requests
• Education
• Interface admins
• Main Page errors
• Open proxies
• VRT
• Oversight
• User permissions

• Biographies of living persons
• Copyrights
  • Questions on media
  • Problems
• Dispute resolution
• External links
• Fringe theories
• Neutral point of view
• Original research
• Pending changes
• Reliable sources
• Resource requests
• Scalable vector graphics
• Spam
  • Blacklist
  • Whitelist
• Style
• Titleblacklist
• Translation

• History merges
• Mergers
• Splits
• Moves
• Protection
• Importation
• XfD
  • Articles
  • Redirects
  • Categories
  • Templates
  • Files
  • Miscellany
• Undeletion

• Conflict of interest
• Contributor copyright
• Edit warring and 3RR
• Sanctions
  • Personal restrictions
  • General sanctions
  • Contentious topics
• Sockpuppets
• Usernames (Requests for comment)
• Vandalism

• Arbitration
  • Committee noticeboard
  • Requests
  • Enforcement
• Edit filters
  • Requested
  • False positives
• Questions
  • Help desk
  • Teahouse
  • Reference desk
  • New articles
• Requests for comment
• Village pump
  • Policy
  • Technical
  • Proposals
  • Idea lab
  • WMF
  • Miscellaneous
• WikiProject proposals
• Discussions for discussion

If we can't help you, a volunteer will point you in the right direction. Discussions should be civil, calm, concise, neutral, objective and as nice as possible.

• This noticeboard is for content disputes only. Comment on the contributions, not the contributors. Off-topic or uncivil behavior may garner a warning, improper material may be struck-out, collapsed, or deleted, and a participant could be asked to step back from the discussion.
• We cannot accept disputes that are already under discussion at other content or conduct dispute resolution forums or in decision-making processes such as Requests for comments, Articles for deletion, or Requested moves.
• The dispute must have been recently discussed extensively on a talk page (not just through edit summaries) to be eligible for help at DRN. The discussion should have been on the article talk page. Discussion on a user talk page is useful but not sufficient, because the article talk page may be watched by other editors who may be able to comment. Discussion normally should have taken at least two days, with more than one post by each editor.
• Ensure that you deliver a notice to each person you add to the case filing by leaving a notice on their user talk page. DRN has a notice template you can post to their user talk page by using the code shown here: {{subst:drn-notice}}. Be sure to sign and date each notice with four tildes (~~~~). Giving notice on the article talk page in dispute or relying on linking their names here will not suffice.
• Do not add your own formatting in the conversation. Let the moderators (DRN Volunteers) handle the formatting of the discussion as they may not be ready for the next session.
• Follow moderator instructions There will be times when the moderator may issue an instruction. It is expected of you to follow their instruction and you can always ask the volunteer on their talk page for clarification, if not already provided. Examples are about civility, don't bite the newcomers, etc.

If you need a helping hand just ask a volunteer, who will assist you.

• This is not a court with judges or arbitrators that issue binding decisions: we focus on resolving disputes through consensus, compromise, and advice about policy.
• For general questions relating to the dispute resolution process, please see our FAQ page.

We are always looking for new volunteers and everyone is welcome. Click the volunteer button above to join us, and read over the volunteer guide to learn how to get started. Being a volunteer on this page is not formal in any respect, and it is not necessary to have any previous dispute resolution experience. However, having a calm and patient demeanor and a good knowledge of Misplaced Pages policies and guidelines is very important. It's not mandatory to list yourself as a volunteer to help here, anyone is welcome to provide input.

• Volunteers should gently and politely help the participant fix problems. Suggest alternative venues if needed. Try to be nice and engage the participants.
• Volunteers do not have any special powers, privileges, or authority in DRN or in Misplaced Pages, except as noted here. Volunteers who have had past dealings with the article, subject matter, or with the editors involved in a dispute which would bias their response must not act as a volunteer on that dispute. If any editor objects to a volunteer's participation in a dispute, the volunteer must either withdraw or take the objection to the DRN talk page to let the community comment upon whether or not the volunteer should continue in that dispute.
• Listed volunteers open a case by signing a comment in the new filing. When closing a dispute, please mark it as "closed" in the status template (see the volunteer guide for more information), remove the entire line about 'donotarchive' so that the bot will archive it after 48 hours with no other edits.

• To open, replace {{DR case status}} with {{DR case status|open}}
• To close, replace the "open" with "resolved", "failed", or "closed". Add {{DRN archive top|reason=(reason here) ~~~~}} beneath the case status template, and add {{DRN archive bottom}} at the bottom of the case. Remember to remove the DoNotArchive bit line (the entire line).

1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10
11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20
21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30
31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40
41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50
51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60
61, 62, 63, 64, 65, 66, 67, 68, 69, 70
71, 72, 73, 74, 75, 76, 77, 78, 79, 80
81, 82, 83, 84, 85, 86, 87, 88, 89, 90
91, 92, 93, 94, 95, 96, 97, 98, 99, 100
101, 102, 103, 104, 105, 106, 107, 108, 109, 110
111, 112, 113, 114, 115, 116, 117, 118, 119, 120
121, 122, 123, 124, 125, 126, 127, 128, 129, 130
131, 132, 133, 134, 135, 136, 137, 138, 139, 140
141, 142, 143, 144, 145, 146, 147, 148, 149, 150
151, 152, 153, 154, 155, 156, 157, 158, 159, 160
161, 162, 163, 164, 165, 166, 167, 168, 169, 170
171, 172, 173, 174, 175, 176, 177, 178, 179, 180
181, 182, 183, 184, 185, 186, 187, 188, 189, 190
191, 192, 193, 194, 195, 196, 197, 198, 199, 200
201, 202, 203, 204, 205, 206, 207, 208, 209, 210
211, 212, 213, 214, 215, 216, 217, 218, 219, 220
221, 222, 223, 224, 225, 226, 227, 228, 229, 230
231, 232, 233, 234, 235, 236, 237, 238, 239, 240
241, 242, 243, 244, 245, 246, 247, 248, 249, 250
251, 252

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the dispute resolution noticeboard's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

• Minorities in Greece (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs)

Dispute overview

• Can you give us a quick explanation of what is going on? What is the issue you are bringing here?

Disagreement in this article concerning some issues of Turkish and muslim minorities in Greece. More precisely, if the Turkish minority is a religious or an ethnic one, if information about discrimination and attacks against them should be present, if information about the problem of a mosque of muslims in Athens should be present in the article.

The dispute stated with this edit and continued first in my talk page then moved to talk page of the article.

Users involved

• Who is involved in the dispute?

• Filanca (talk · contribs)
• Athenean (talk · contribs)

The style of the other user (Athanean) was at times concentrated to me rather than the subject at hand. See this and this and the following in those pages.

• Have you informed all the editors mentioned above that you have posted this dispute? (If not, once you have informed them come back and replace the text "Not yet" with "Yes".)

Yes.

• N.B. To inform the other users you may place the text {{subst:DRN-notice|thread=Minorities in Greece}} --~~~~ on each user's talk page.

Resolving the dispute

• Have you tried to resolve this dispute already? If so, what steps have you taken?

Issue talked in my user and article's talk pages. We were unable to find a solution, mostly because (in my opinion) of the behavior of Athanean. Many of his points are centered on me rather than the encyclopedic content. He has added a reference by indicating a wrong page number (Alexandris, p. 120), as he acknowledges, but does not care to correct it. Some of his arguments are self-referenced or not referenced (see for example ) He deleted well referenced parts of the article repeatedly (, ), without giving sufficient explanation in the talk page. My impression is, there is no progress towards a solution.

I tried to find a compromise by summarizing the attacks to the minority upon his criticism of this list of attacks being too long. I also changed my use of word "atrocity" to "attack" (in the talk page, not in the article) upon his criticism. Neither helped.

There are minor issues, too, like his deleting of Turkish village names given in brackets next to Greek ones (). I see it only natural that Turkish village names be provided as well as the Greek one when speaking about the Turkish minority. I have not dwelled on these, because the main issue seemed to be more important.

• How do you think we can help?

I hope neutral outsiders' comments about not deleting properly referenced information from the article and not denying the obvious fact that "Turk" is not a religion but an ethnic group may work.

Filanca (talk) 16:13, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

Minorities in Greece discussion

Discussion about the issues listed above take place here. Remember to keep discussions calm, brief, and focused on the issues at hand.

Now, if you would humour me for a little while, I would like to hear your opinion. If it's not too much trouble, could you tell me how you would rate the significance of the material you have introduced, relative to the subject of the article as a whole? Please bear in mind that the subject in question here is the broad and general one of all minorities in Greece. This isn't a trick question or anything - I am genuinely interested in your opinion, and I would really appreciate you taking the time to answer. All the best — Mr. Stradivarius 05:00, 9 October 2011 (UTC)

Hi. Thanks for your reply. Here is my opinion on each issue in the dispute with respect to undue weight:

1) Organization of titles (ie, moving the Turkish minority section one level up to make it on the same level with other ethnic minorities): This may not be relevant in respect of undue weight.

2) Official denial of the Turkish minority: Both minority organizations ( p.1; p. 1 and 7) and independent sources indicate this is an important issue. Hence it would not be undue weight to mention. This information was present in the article before my edits.

3) Discrimination against the Turkish minority: This paragraph was present before my edits, Athanean deleted it after the dispute started. It mentiones important issues for the minority, in terms of property and Turkish identity.

4) Muslims in Athens needing an official mosque: Sources deleted by Athanean (including BBC news) indicate this is important, I do not think it has undue weight.

5) Attacks to Turkish minority: This one may arguably have undue weight in this article. After Athanean's criticism on the this line, I reduced the size of paragraph by summarizing it in one sentence. The attacks took form of arsoning (generally by molotof cocktails) and stoning of mosques, Turkish associations, consulates, private property and desecration of cemeteries. The remaining one sentence may not have undue weight, esp. considering the frequency of attacks.

Filanca (talk) 15:17, 9 October 2011 (UTC)

1) The reason the Turkish minority is included (together with the Pomaks) under the heading "Muslim minority" rather than among the other ethnic minorities is that because of the Treaty of Lausanne, these minorities enjoy special privileges and status not afforded to other minorities. Also, because as a result the same treaty and its stipulations, most of the literature treats them in similar fashion, i.e. as part of a "Muslim minority" rather than an ethnic Turkish minority. The exception is some Turkish sources, but that is not a reason to re-arrange the headings.

2) Regarding the claims of "Official denial of the Turkish minority", these are wildly distorted and exaggerated, as the Greek government does recognize the Turkish minority, just as part of a larger Muslim minority as stipulated by the Treaty of Lausanne rather than an "ethnic" Turkish minority. This is moreover a rather subtle point, and one I feel is being given undue weight. Regarding sources, www.abttf.org is a self-published advocacy source, with ties to and support from the Turkish government. The source www.usefoundation.org is also self-published and of dubious reliability. I do not think such sources meet the requirements for WP:RS.

3) The paragraph in question was a poorly sourced and implemented cut-and-paste job from another article. I looked into the sources, most are unverifiable, and the one that was verifiable was over 20 years old and contradicted by more recent sources (see , page 124). The situation of the minority has changed markedly for the better since 1990, but Filanca simply refuses to acknowledge this.

4) The Muslims of Athens are mostly recent immigrants, hence they are not a minority. Another instance of Filanca refusing to get the point.

5) This is the point on which I disagree completely. All the "attacks" mentioned are relatively minor (broken windows, amateurish arson attacks). Not a single member of the minority has been harmed, these are all minor attacks against property. Many times the claims are exaggerated and the sources misused in intellectually dishonest fashion, for example in the article talkpage Filanca uses the three different sources for the same attack then claims these are three separate attacks! The phrasing he wants to use is also highly inflammatory. Three minor attacks against property in 2011 is not "frequent attacks". Keeping in mind this is a very broad article about minorities in Greece in general, neither the relatively rare frequency of attacks or their nature warrants mention in the article.

On another note, I find it absolutely galling and hypocritical of Filanca to focus and highlight every broken window of Turkish mosques in Greece while glossing over the plight of minorities in Turkey. Compare this with this for crying out loud. While we must not focus on editors, scrutiny of a user's contributions are important for establishing credibility and assuming good faith. I regret to say that based on this user's contributions, I am having difficulty assuming good faith and intellectual honesty. Athenean (talk) 19:45, 9 October 2011 (UTC)

Filanca and Athenean, thank you both very much for your replies. They have given me a much better idea of what this dispute is about. I think we can settle this dispute if we can remember to stick to Misplaced Pages policy and not get distracted by our personal viewpoints and biases. (We all have biases, after all, and yes, that does include me.) In my opinion, the reason for this dispute is a subtle misunderstanding of policy that hopefully, we can clear up without too much trouble. Now Filanca, you said two or three times in your reply that the sources that back up your edits show that the issues are important. I agree that it shows they are important, to be sure. There is no question that these issues very important to Turkish minorities in Greece. The notion of undue weight in Misplaced Pages, however, is a slightly different way of judging what is important. To judge what is important in Misplaced Pages, we use the relative prominence of viewpoints in reliable sources. What this means is that we consider every single reliable source that has been written on the subject, giving special prominence to sources which are considered reliable and comprehensive by the academic community.

Before we go any further, I think we should come to an agreement on what the most reliable sources are. I would like you both to suggest what you think are the the top three most reliable sources on minorities in Greece, as judged by the academic community (not as judged by yourself). Remember, the more comprehensive and the more reliable, the better. Once we have agreed on these sources, I think it will be a lot easier to agree how much weight to give to each aspect of the subject. I've left a space below for you both to reply. If you can't think of three, that's ok - just fill in what you can. Thanks for taking the time to answer. — Mr. Stradivarius 16:03, 10 October 2011 (UTC)

Just to clarify - if you are not sure which sources are the most respected, it is perfectly fine to have a look at the article or use a Google Books search and make your best guess as to which sources are best. This is not a test of your subject knowledge - it's just a way to get a rough idea of how much weight we should assign to each subtopic in the article. Thanks — Mr. Stradivarius 16:43, 10 October 2011 (UTC)

Referring to Athenean's following comments "I find it absolutely galling and hypocritical of Filanca to focus and highlight every broken window of Turkish mosques in Greece while glossing over the plight of minorities in Turkey (...) scrutiny of a user's contributions are important for establishing credibility and assuming good faith". I think these opinions play an important role in this dispute from the beginning, ie, the perception of my bad intentions. I certainly have prejudices of my own. But I think writing a good encyclopedia is paramount here. I am not (or at least trying not to) "glossing over the plight of minorities" of anywhere since this would not be a correct way to develop Misplaced Pages. e.g. I do not refrain from completing missing sources about problems of Greek minority in Turkey . Filanca (talk) 07:09, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

Filanca

• The most reliable source: Human Rights Watch,
• The 2nd most reliable source: US Department of State, Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor reports, eg.
• The 3rd most reliable source: Minority Rights Group International

Please note that there are multiple issues in this dispute as mentioned above so I tried to find three resources that cover most.Filanca (talk) 21:11, 12 October 2011 (UTC)

Athenean

• The most reliable source: Crossing the Aegean: an appraisal of the 1923 compulsory population exchange between Greece and Turkey, Rene Hirschon, Bergahn Books, 2003 . An in-depth, scholarly appraisal of the 1923 Population exchange between Greece and Turkey. Each chapter is written by an expert in their field, and the publication focuses on the subject at hand.

• The 2nd most reliable source: Minroties in Greece, Richard Clogg, Hurst & Company, 2002 . Another in-depth scholarly publication focusing on minorities in Greece written by a well-known, neutral expert on modern Greek history.
• The 3rd most reliable source: Mediating the nation: news, audiences and the politics of identity, Mirca Madianou, Psychology Press, 2005 . Another in-depth treatment on the minority in Western Thrace, and also fairly recent.

I see that one of the sources Athanean kept deleting from the article during the dispute is his most reliable source, ie, Hirschon, 2003. Does that mean we now agree to keep that part of the article? Filanca (talk) 21:08, 12 October 2011 (UTC)

First of all, it's "Athenean", not Athanean. Second, I am open to conditionally keeping the sentence sourced to Hirschon, but that is just one sentence. Importantly, none of the six sources above speak of "frequent" attacks, and in fact most of them don't even mention them. Why? Because they are not frequent, and are minor. No one has been hurt or killed. No mosques have been burnt to the ground or destroyed. Broken windows and graffiti is minor vandalism. The other main point is that inflammatory, broad-brush statement "Discrimination of the Turks has been criticized by the US and the European Parliament." is also nowhere to be found. Third the sources Filanca produces are partisan advocacy sources (their job is to advocate on behlaf of minorities, it;s like me relying on Greek government sources, which I don't), and none are scholarly. In addition, he completely ignores that all of them mention positive steps taken by the Greek government, and only focuses on the negatives. Athenean (talk) 21:26, 12 October 2011 (UTC)

If we agree to keep the sentence sourced to Hirschon 2003, do we agree to remove the "Discrimination of the Turks" and "Frequent attacks" sentences? The first is too broad-brush and unsupported by any of the sources, the second is worded in POV-fashion, not supported by any of the sources listed here, given undue weight, and sourced to a highly partisan self-published advocacy group (www.abttf.org). Athenean (talk) 21:43, 12 October 2011 (UTC)

Filanca, It's not just the reliability of the source that's at issue here - there are a number of other factors involved as well. Just because a source is authoritative doesn't mean that everything it contains belongs in the article - there's obviously not enough space for that. At this stage we're just trying to find out what weight we should be assigning to different sections, and what things need to be merged together or removed. We can worry about the specific claims later. Thanks — Mr. Stradivarius 09:48, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

Hello both of you, and thank you for posting your sources! I'm really appreciative of the time you've taken to find them. Athenean, I agree with you that those sources look very good. I think your source number two will be especially useful to us here, as it covers the entire topic area and is still scholarly and detailed. The other two seem like very good sources, and although they appear to be slightly more specialized, we should certainly take them into account when deciding what weight to assign to different parts of the article.

Filanca, I'm afraid I have to take issue with the sources that you have listed. The article in question is "Minorities in Greece", but all three of the sources you have listed are about minority rights, not just minorities. If the article was called "Minority rights in Greece" then I agree that the sources you list would be excellent ones to use. We could, indeed, use your sources to decide how much relative weight to assign different things inside a "minority rights" section. However, as it stands, I'm afraid your sources are too specific to use to determine the weight to assign to different parts of the article as a whole. Sorry to assign more work to you, but would you mind going back and finding some more sources? The best ones will be about the general topic of "minorities in Greece", rather than anything more specific. (By the way, if you agree with Athenean's choices, it is perfectly fine to list the same books as they have.) Let me know if you have any problems. Thanks — Mr. Stradivarius 09:38, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

Stradivarius, sorry for my belated reply. Since the dispute was about minority rights (although the article is about minorities in general) I tried to pick up sources that best document the problematic points. As I see, you are looking for general sources about minorities to see how important these issues are. In that case, you would not like a source like Destroying ethnic identity: the Turks of Greece , could you fconfirm that? On the other hand, do you not agree that one of the most important points in this dispute is the organization of titles, and it is not related to weight but to the very nature of the minority? Filanca (talk) 08:58, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

Another source that I would like to hear you opinion: Old and new mosques in Greece: a new debate haunted by history by Athena Skoulariki in Mosques in Europe by Stefano Allievi (ed.) Filanca (talk) 21:07, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

Hi again, and let me also apologise for the delay. You are correct on both counts, that the sources you mention above are not the best ones for determining the overall weight to be assigned to different parts of the article. We could certainly use them to help judge what to include in the sections about Turks and Muslims, but not really the overall article, as there are lots of topic areas these sources don't cover.

I agree that the organisation of the section titles is a separate issue from what to cover inside those sections, but again the sources are relevant. In Misplaced Pages we should follow the sources where we can, so if there is a clear consensus among sources that Turks should be considered a Muslim minority, then that is how we should organise the sections. If there is no clear consensus among the sources that Turks in Greece are a Muslim minority, then we should respect that and list Turks under "ethnic minorities" instead.

I notice that Minorities in Greece lists Turks as a Muslim group, but that Human Rights Watch lists them as an ethnic group; this points to at least some disparity among the sources, but we won't know for sure until we can uncover more evidence. There is one thing which could clinch it quite easily though: are there a significant number of the Turkish minority in Greece who are not Muslim? If this is the case then it would obviously be wrong to list them all as Muslim. — Mr. Stradivarius 10:37, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

Nope, they are all Muslims as far as I know. Athenean (talk) 01:03, 21 October 2011 (UTC)

Would it be encyclopedic to make such a judgement, based on our estimation of how many of them are muslims? Or even, based on a poll? What would it change if they are 100% muslims, would they cease to be Turkish? Likewise, why don't we consider Jews in Greece as a religious rather than an ethnic minoritity? Why don't we make a search how many of them are religious? The same goes with other minorities (Aromanians, Albanians, Megleno-Romanians, etc.) in that country. I think this is the most important part of this dispute. Since many years (I think since the mid 20th century) the official Greek government policy is to deny the existance of a Turkish minority in Greece. As is documented in the sources in here and in the article (some may be deleted by Athenean), there are even Greek court judgements against using the name "Turkish" for self-identification of the minority there. The current Misplaced Pages article supports this point of view by the organization of its titles, which contradicts the neutrality principle.Filanca (talk) 13:43, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

You're still not getting it. The literature largely follows the arrangement of the Treaty of Lausanne. Misplaced Pages follows the literature. It's that simple, really. Athenean (talk) 16:55, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages follows literature that is reliable. International treaties are shaped with political concerns thus they do not make a reliable source for finding out if a certain minority exists or not. We should rather look at neutral scientific sources about minorities. However, there are even political documents related to the Lausanne treaty, the établi documents, which refer to Turks rather than Muslims in Western Thrace. That was what many Greek governments also used / accepted until relatively recently. Filanca (talk) 09:34, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Chzz

I intend to attempt to resolve this.

I ask all parties to please have patience; I need to read the background.

I remind all parties that we are all here to make this wiki amazing, and therefore suggest that they edit other articles in the meantime.

I will write more here ASAP. Thank you for your patience, consideration, and your work on this project.

No further input is required at this time, and I'd appreciate it if you would hold off for a few days on any edits relating to this matter, so that I can properly assess the issue. I will respond here within the next few days.  Chzz  ►  05:00, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

Hi Chzz, and thanks for taking this on. Your help here is really appreciated. This is completely up to you, Athenean and Filanca, but how would you feel about moving this dispute over to the Mediation Cabal? The discussion so far has been more mediation-like than most on this noticeboard, and it is already quite long compared to other threads here. I think if this discussion is going to continue in a similar fashion then the Mediation Cabal might be a better fit, just for practical reasons. We can just start where we left off, of course - there would be no need to discuss things again just because of a venue change. Let me know what you think. Regards — Mr. Stradivarius 07:02, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

I don't honestly care where we sort this out. Things move around pages, and that rarely helps; if it were in MedCab, I could similarly step in and try to help. So - it's here; for better or worse, and I can't see a good reason to move it - although I'm always open to ideas, if it'd help.

I'd like to avoid bureaucracy. That does not mean I will avoid anything; if this ultimately needs further fora to resolve it, then so be it. But... I would like to take a stab at fixing it here. If anyone wishes to escalate it, that is of course their prerogative. Otherwise, please hold on and I'll comment further below. Chzz  ► 

Comment: At this time, I am asking the users on their respective talk-pages if this issue could be subdivided into simpler, specific edit requests  Chzz  ►  05:02, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Hi Chzz many thanks for your help. I am responding to you in my talk page.

Stradivarius: I am aware that I was not able to produce the exact kind of sources you asked for, this is related to my recent time constraints, sorry. I am open to any suggestions to resolve this dispute either here or elsewhere. We may proceed with sources Athenean proposed. Meanwhile if I can find other sources of the kind you look for, I will inform you all. Filanca (talk) 11:22, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Hi again Filanca. Don't worry about not being able to find more sources - it is perfectly ok, and I think going ahead with the sources that Athenean proposed will be fine. As for the process we will use, I think it will be best to go through the proposal process that Chzz has started on your talk page. We will definitely be able to use the sources we have found in the discussion at some point, and dispute resolution usually works better when you concentrate on one thing at a time. So let's concentrate on the talk page proposal process for now, and after that has finished we can see whether any further steps are necessary. I will be keeping an eye on your talk page too, so we can continue the discussion there for now. Thanks — Mr. Stradivarius 12:21, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the dispute resolution noticeboard's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the dispute resolution noticeboard's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

• Operation Trident (1971) (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs)

Dispute overview

• Can you give us a quick explanation of what is going on? What is the issue you are bringing here?

Issue relates to the usage of the "casualties1" or "casualties2" field of "template:infobox military conflict". Specifically, Operation Trident was an Indian naval attack on Karachi harbour in Pakistan. After the operation, the Pakistan Air Force retaliated by bombing Okha harbour in India over a day later. While this was a reaction to the operation, the bombing of Okha was not a part of Operation Trident (which was planned and executed by the Indian Navy). user:DBigXray and I assert that "casualties1" and "casualties2" fields of the infobox should be limited to casualties incurred DURING the operation and that the retaliation should be covered in the section on "Aftermath" of the operation. The alternate claim is that casualties should include those that came about in follow-up operations that were separate but in reaction to the operation which is the subject of the article.

Users involved

• Who is involved in the dispute?

• Skcpublic (talk · contribs)
• Hassanhn5 (talk · contribs)
• DBigXray (talk · contribs)

• Have you informed all the editors mentioned above that you have posted this dispute? (If not, once you have informed them come back and replace the text "Not yet" with "Yes".)

Yes.

• N.B. To inform the other users you may place the text {{subst:DRN-notice|thread=Operation Trident (1971)}} --~~~~ in a new section on each user's talk page.

Resolving the dispute

• Have you tried to resolve this dispute already? If so, what steps have you taken?

Issue has been discussed on the talk page.

• How do you think we can help?

Please provide guidance on whether the proposal to limit the use of "casualties1" and "casualties2" to the casualties of the operation is acceptable. Also, please comment on whether describing the retaliation to the operation in the section on "Aftermath" is satisfactory.

Skcpublic (talk) 09:23, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

Operation Trident (1971) discussion

Discussion about the issues listed above take place here. Remember to keep discussions calm, brief, and focused on the issues at hand.

The citations Skcpublic has given don't say that the ship in question was irreparably damaged, he added that at his own accord. This POV is also disputed by the Pakistani sources which call it exaggeration. The infobox issue is a format issue and not a POV issue about saying weather the retaliation should be put in the casualties and losses section of infobox or just in the body. --lTopGunl (talk) 09:51, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

user:hassanh5: You are confusing two separate issues. This dispute resolution request is about whether the damage to fuel tanks on Okha harbour which occured in a PAF retaliation to Operation Trident should be included in the casualties of Operation Trident, which was an Indian Navy operation. If you want to dispute-resolution on the damage to PNS Shah Jahan, please open a new dispute resolution request. Also, please confine your edits to the discussion section. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Skcpublic (talk • contribs)

Ok. The infobox section isn't a POV issue and I think could have been easily solved on the talk page. I think enough discussion hasn't taken place on the talk. We should go with the format of other military operation articles if they include the losses from immediate retaliations in the infobox. --lTopGunl (talk) 10:40, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

There is no consensus on the talk page with just the folks party to the dispute commenting. You haven't provided any examples as requested of "other military operation articles" that "include the losses from immediate retaliations in the infobox". --Skcpublic (talk) 11:55, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

You should recheck the discussion, I was the one who requested the examples from dbigxray. Also check the same user's comment in citation section of talkpage where he asked me about the neutrality. --lTopGunl (talk) 12:09, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

Yes, but you haven't even provided a reference to show that PAF action against Okha was *during* Operation Trident. Nor that it was in *immediate* retaliation to it. You also haven't provided examples that justify inclusion of retaliatory follow-ups as part of the original operation's infobox. --Skcpublic (talk) 12:50, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

I think you missed my above comment, refer to it for the example part. As for the reference, I have provided a reference on the article right with the text in question which claims it as an immediate retaliation. Well as you said that was not the issue here, we're commenting on whether to include losses from immediate retaliations and consequences or not. --lTopGunl (talk) 13:27, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

Well from the comments of lTopGunl i was suspicious that User lTopGunl thinks that retaliations are a part of casualty/losses of Military Operations and hence it should be placed in Infobox though it has already been mentioned in the 'aftermath section' of the article.. I had sensed this and hence i had requested lTopGunl to have a look on other wiki battle pages (its me and not lTopGunl to do so first). Instead of doing that lTopGunl fired back a question and told me to supply the names of such pages. and thereby claiming that lTopGunl is the first person to do so. Well I can say to lTopGunl that the dispute is not about who the first person to ask about other articles is but the dispute is should the retaliations that are a part of the larger War can be included in a casualty and losses page of a battle. Its a fact that Okha was a part of the larger Indo-pak war of 1971 and not a casualty/loss of Operation Trident. It has wrongly been placed in the Infobox and should be removed --ÐℬigXЯaɣ 14:27, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

I do think immediate retaliations have some relation to the operations (even if they are not essentially a part of it). You asked me to compare it with other articles and I asked you an example. You gave the argument "i request user lTopGunl (talk) to see any Western battle page" and you can not expect other editors to provide references or articles for your arguments. I think we've made our points and its not a big issue, not even POV, just format.. so lets do whatever input we get, compare, and get over with it. --lTopGunl (talk) 15:17, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

if they have some relation that is why they have not been removed from the aftermath section. You still need to agree to remove the Reference statement about Okha as a Causality/losses of Operation Trident. This is the real dispute as pointed above. As soon as you agree to do so . the dispute is resolved, you can of course discuss if you disagree, but we cannot claim that the dispute is over till then --ÐℬigXЯaɣ 15:42, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

Remove the reference? Why would I or even you remove it? Its heavily backed up by other references that the harbour was bombed. If you're talking about comparing it with another article for format, please elaborate on your argument or give an example. Yes it certainly can not be removed from the after math section as it belongs there. But we're discussing about the infobox here. Lets see it like this; the fueling facilities were a part of the team that were in the operation... were they not? They provided fuel to the missile boats that attacked, so they were involved in the operation. That establishes them as a part of operation trident. Now if they are destroyed as a consequence, do they count in the losses due to the operation or not? --lTopGunl (talk) 16:29, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

Be Aware that this is a Historical article and kindly refrain from any wp:OR. yes i agree that there are valid citations for bombing the Okha harbour. but the matter of the dispute is

• was Okha a Casualty/loss of Operation Trident? NO its a part of Larger Indo Pak War Of 1971 and not a loss of Operation Trident. It is a known fact that during a LArger war ,every battle has multiple retaliations and that way every battle follows, and the WAR takes its course, but everything cannot and should not be placed in infobox. if the retaliations had occured during Operation Trident then it would have been worthy of placing in infobox. since it was not the case so it does not deserve the infobox.--ÐℬigXЯaɣ 16:46, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

I've not placed any wp:OR. Refer to my above comment. Okha was used in operation trident as a fueling facility so it was a part of it. And the retaliations were a consequence. Lets wait for a neutral comment before prolonging this discussion. --lTopGunl (talk) 16:55, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

That was dbigxrays argument on the talk page to which I requested an example to be reviewed for consensus which is pending. I have not come across another similar issue yet, so can't comment on wikipedia's trend. --lTopGunl (talk) 18:22, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

Operation Trident was the name of operation involving strike by Indian Forces on karachi. As mentioned on the talk page all the reliable citation state the incidents during the event. during the event Pakistan did not cause any damage to the indian Forces, hence the casualty on the indian side was right mentioned as NONE, before it was changed by above user. This fact of NIL indian casualty during Operation Trident has already been backed by various sources. The strikes by PAF at okha was the part of larger Indo Pak War of 1971 and not a part of Operation Trident. Moreover the wiki pages about short battle mention only the losses in that battle. The overall casualties are often added to the Page of the Larger war. Eg Battle of Đồng Hới, New Year's Day Battle of 1968,Operation Union II, Operation Focus during Six-Day War, Action of 1 March 1968,Battle of Haiphong Harbor,Battle of Pusan --ÐℬigXЯaɣ 03:05, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Hi everyone, I've just finished reading up on the dispute. I don't think we can really stretch Operation Trident to include the bombing of Okha harbour, although I think putting it in the aftermath section is entirely appropriate. Because of this, I don't think we should put the casualty figures from the bombing of Okha harbour in the infobox. However, I do have another solution for you. I had a look, and it appears that there is no separate article about the bombing of Okha harbour - how about creating one? The casualty figures from the bombing could of course go in the new article, and you could link to the article from Operation Trident, and also include the casualty numbers of the bombing in the aftermath section of the Operation Trident article. Let me know what you think of this solution. Regards — Mr. Stradivarius 12:13, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

• Support: That resolves the dispute. And a very good suggestion. --lTopGunl (talk) 12:20, 30 October 2011 (UTC)
• Support: The whole dispute was about the okha in infobox, which is now resolved as the user agreed. Thanks Mr. Stra for listening to arguments. agree with your suggestion. regards --ÐℬigXЯaɣ 23:09, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the dispute resolution noticeboard's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the dispute resolution noticeboard's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

• Britney Spears Live: The Femme Fatale Tour (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs)

Dispute overview

• Can you give us a quick explanation of what is going on? What is the issue you are bringing here?

The page was created separately for the EPIX special of the Femme Fatale Tour and the DVD/Blu-ray release. However, the article contained little information with only a few sources, so I redirected it to the Femme Fatale Tour page. User:Mirrored Love reverted my edit saying that the article was "about the DVD release." I reverted it again and explained on the edit summary and on his talk page that the article failed notability, and that he should open a discussion on the article's talk page. We engaged in a edit war then because he refused to discuss it; I did not come here earlier because I didn't really want to have a full-fledged discussion for a small page that's going to be recreated anyway when the DVD is released. I reported him in the Edit warring noticeboard for breaking the 3RR; he was not blocked, the page was protected and a user suggested I'd come here.

Users involved

• Who is involved in the dispute?

• Xwomanizerx (talk · contribs)
• Mirrored Love (talk · contribs)

• Have you informed all the editors mentioned above that you have posted this dispute? (If not, once you have informed them come back and replace the text "Not yet" with "Yes".)

Yes.

• N.B. To inform the other users you may place the text {{subst:DRN-notice|thread=Britney Spears Live: The Femme Fatale Tour}} --~~~~ in a new section on each user's talk page.

Resolving the dispute

• Have you tried to resolve this dispute already? If so, what steps have you taken?

I've explained the situation on his talk page and I've opened a discussion on the article's talk page.

• How do you think we can help?

I hope neutral users will see that this is a simple issue of notability and the page warranted a redirect for the time being.

Xwomanizerx (talk) 16:53, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Britney Spears Live: The Femme Fatale Tour discussion

Discussion about the issues listed above take place here. Remember to keep discussions calm, brief, and focused on the issues at hand.

Why?

What is wrong with having the page up? How does it fail notability? What's not notable about it? All aspects of the article are well sourced except for the tracklist which I was trying to source until it was locked. A lot of articles are made before the release of something. I don't care if you feel the need to put a 'future release' tag at the top of the page; that's fine. But just to say if fails notability is not enough. How is that measured? It's not, the article should stay! And when are you planning on opening it up? Are you waiting for a press release? Why? The information from that can be added when it comes. It should be kept. Mirrored Love (talk) 06:38, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

First, I suggest again that you read WP:NOTABILITY. It fails to meet the criteria for a stand-alone article, since it's only a small paragraph of information. The article is going to be expanded after the special premieres, when there's going to be reviews of the show, audience numbers and ratings, etc and then it will meet the criteria. Second, four unformatted references does not make the article "well sourced". Also, these references are copy-pasted from the Femme Fatale Tour page. You also say that "A lot of articles are made before the release of something"; that's WP:OTHERCRAP. This is not a personal thing because I do not know you, so stop making it that way. Xwomanizerx (talk) 07:15, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Okay, so we will expand the article after the premiere, then I'm happy. I'd be glad to help, if you would want me too? :) Thank you for replying, I understand where you are coming from. And I didn't want to make it a personal thing, I thought you were, but I see now you weren't :) By the way, because of the way you have made other Britney articles, then I have faith in you :) Mirrored Love (talk) 08:49, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

This looks resolved to me. Do you need our assistance here still? Steven Zhang 09:18, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

I agree that there is not much that needs to be done here. Misplaced Pages operates on a scale of months and years; the DVD is coming out in three weeks' time. I don't see any great harm in leaving the article up for three weeks until the DVD comes out and the reviews start coming in. If there are no further objections, I will go ahead and close this thread. Regards — Mr. Stradivarius 12:30, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

It's always nice to see a dispute resolved quickly, easily and without people getting angry - thanks to the both of you for doing that. I'll close this discussion now. I would suggest that next time, before an edit war ensues, the article is taken to WP:AfD, where the community can determine whether or not the article is notable. ItsZippy 16:59, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the dispute resolution noticeboard's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the dispute resolution noticeboard's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

• Monogamy (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs)

Dispute overview

• Can you give us a quick explanation of what is going on? What is the issue you are bringing here?

SypmatycznyFacet has removed a whole passage referring to published sources in Cambridge University Press and Ignatius Press, saying it was "Clearly Ideology-based fragments". You can view it here. Apparently he has his own criteria of discernement which sources are ideologically based. But the criteria are not clear to me and they do not match the Misplaced Pages standards of neutrality policy to show a subject from every possible points of view.

Users involved

• Who is involved in the dispute?

• Sympatycznyfacet (talk · contribs)
• Quodvultdeus (talk · contribs)

SypmatycznyFacet has had some periods of being blocked in Polish Misplaced Pages.

• Have you informed all the editors mentioned above that you have posted this dispute? (If not, once you have informed them come back and replace the text "Not yet" with "Yes".)

Yes.

• N.B. To inform the other users you may place the text {{subst:DRN-notice|thread=Monogamy}} --~~~~ in a new section on each user's talk page.

Resolving the dispute

• Have you tried to resolve this dispute already? If so, what steps have you taken?

I have had with SypmatycznyFacet nearly one month long editorial conflict in Monogamia article in Polish Misplaced Pages recently. The Polish administrators have asked him to stop editing the way he did and blocked the page for a moment, see here. The administrators have proposed a new schema of the article. For further details you may contact Loraine, she is fluent in English. SypmatycznyFacet, while he cannot freely act in Polish version, has started his dubious edits in the English one, (see link above).

• How do you think we can help?

Please check if his edit is an abuse to Misplaced Pages neutrality. If you think it is, remind him about the neutrality of Misplaced Pages and how it has to be understood.

Quodvultdeus (talk) 10:26, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Monogamy discussion

Discussion about the issues listed above take place here. Remember to keep discussions calm, brief, and focused on the issues at hand.

Hi there Quodvultdeus, and thanks for posting here. My first reaction is that this really needs to be discussed more on the talk page. I see you have asked a general question there about the passage in question, but there isn't any reply yet from Sympatycznyfacet. If you don't agree with their edits, then I suggest reverting them, then following through with more discussion on the talk page. A good model for this is outlined at bold, revert, discuss. It would also be a good idea to say precisely which parts of their edits that you do not agree with. Until there has been some substantial discussion of the issues on the talk page, it is really too early for dispute resolution. All the best — Mr. Stradivarius 10:42, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the dispute resolution noticeboard's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the dispute resolution noticeboard's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

This is a disscussion from AN. BeebleRox informed me to take the disscussion here. Olaf the Shakinglord: Mailbox, ??? 02:11, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

I believe Dr. Blofeld is mass creating pages without proper approvals/consensus/etc, and likely using his account via a bot to do so. I have attempted to discuss it with him on his talk page, but have gotten very terse and rude reponses. I also mentioned this on the notability notice board before I was able to discover the mass creation policy. Gaijin42 (talk) 20:20, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

There is a page in the archives I think which should dismiss these accusations and an explanation of what is happening is given on my user page as to their purpose and cleanup intended is mentioned to User talk:Fram. Nothing more I can say. ♦ Dr. Blofeld 20:25, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

I don't think there should be any problem here, we can create as many articles as we like if they are notable enough. Jaguar (talk) 20:34, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Out of curiousity, how exactly did you manage to create over 100 articles in about 20 minutes? I realize literally no work went into any of them, but still... Resolute 20:36, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Me? Don't want to be part of the discussion but I've done over 100 in six minutes on Serbia and Hebei, China. Jaguar (talk) 20:40, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

I don't think that is something to be proud of. Karanacs (talk) 20:42, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Sorry, maybe so but I'm just saying that Dr. B can't be using a bot script if I don't to create those articles. Jaguar (talk) 20:45, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Well, it seems to obviously be a semi-automated script, at least. I was just curious. that said, I agree with Karanacs. I realize that some do believe the creation of sub-stubs is a good thing. I don't myself, but if they are going to be created, think about the reader and have the article say something. Copy the infobox over from the foreign language projects at least so that a reader is actually given some useful information. Resolute 20:48, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

It's certainly doable - having a fast browser helps. I've managed a rate similar to this, though not recently. As to the why...I've been involved in that debate before, and I've always held that seeding the encyclopedia with stubs, while not ideal, does encourage some expansion via translation. --Ser Amantio di Nicolao_{Lo dicono a Signa.} 20:49, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Frankly, if it is manual, its pretty impressive! (Not that I approve (obviously)) but impressive none the less. Gaijin42 (talk) 20:50, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

As has been mentioned elsewhere, nobody really likes sub-stub mass creation. However there is also no rule prohibiting it that I am aware of and named rivers are generally condired to be automatically notable encyclopedic topics. Beeblebrox (talk) 22:38, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

I, for one, think that there should be a "rule prohibiting it". Has there ever been a centralized discussion of the matter? Deor (talk) 22:46, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Don't know, but its probably worth discussing. Beeblebrox (talk) 23:05, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

As a new pages patroller, I have noticed the amount of articles DR. Blofield creates and I have to say, I am suspicious on the number of them he can make. Olaf the Shakinglord: Mailbox, ??? 23:18, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

How about you start assuming good faith and trust me when I saw I do not run a script or bot. Hell if I did do you not think I'd be creating 10 times the amount of content at 10 times the rate?♦ Dr. Blofeld 13:27, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

• It's a fools game to guess whether another editor is using a bot or script. I deleted over forty pages in the span of a few minutes earlier today without the benefit of any such tools. I lined them all up in tabs, opened the deletion interface on each one, and went down the line deleting them in rapid succession. (they were all related, uncontroversial deletions of course). Besides, if the articles are ok, who cares how they are made? I believe that is what should be being discussed in a general manner as opposed to trying to catch a user using a script or whatever. Beeblebrox (talk) 00:44, 29 October 2011 (UTC)
  • See WP:MEATBOT and WP:MASSCREATION. ASCIIn2Bme (talk) 11:21, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

We should NOT be bothering Blofeld about this. Editors who are working on creating content should not be stopped or bothered with. It is your responsibility to show that he's being disruptive or generating bad content; speed is not in itself any evidence that he's doing anything wrong. That's the whole point of WP:AGF and WP:BOLD. If you have found something wrong with his creations, insofar as you think that the articles, ignoring how quickly they were created, should have been so obviously deleted, then we can discuss the problems Blofeld is creating. But quickly creating good content is no more disruptive than slowly creating good content. If you have nothing wrong with the articles themselves, then there is nothing to discuss here.--Jayron32 13:46, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

I wouldn't have an issue if he was actually creating content. All he is doing is turning a red link blue by putting barely enough info into the page to pass CSD A3. I get, and accept, why he is doing this, but I'd rather see him create 50 articles per 20 minute span, including a fleshed out infobox than 100 articles in a 20 minute span that tells the reader virtually nothing. Resolute 18:12, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

• I've been in disputes with Dr. Blofeld before about his enormous creation of articles of less than ideal quality. But I have to say that it is basically a valid choice to put quantity over quality - and he is one of the only editors who is undertaking real efforts to counter the systemic bias. If some of the articles are deleteable I say delete them, but let him do his thing.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 14:09, 29 October 2011 (UTC)
• I don't see any problem with it, really. I doubt he's using a script, probably all "magic words" - something like

{{Infobox blah
|param1 = {{subst:PAGENAME}}
|param2 = 
|param3 = {{subst:PAGENAME}}, Sweden
}}
'''{{subst:PAGENAME}}''' is a ] in Sweden.
{{Sweden-geo-stub}}

I'd probably think it's just a redlink elimination attempt, or just another mass creation. HurricaneFan25 14:12, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

It's a problem when we have articles of dubious notability or otherwise lacking a demonstration of why they should exist. Substubs about obviously-notable topics with interwikis and "translate" tags are vastly different and not at all a problem. Nyttend (talk) 18:36, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Though it would be common decency at point of creation to add {{unreferenced |date=October 2011}}. There may be editors who like to go around adding references to river articles. GraemeLeggett (talk) 19:01, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Its sort of a drive to try to do something towards systematic bias by trying to start to bridge the gap with other wikipedias. The translate templates are crucial in this aspect. Basically its a way of saying this content exists you can google translate link in the template and access it even not a perfect translation and hopefully they can add to it and transfer it and even expand it further using reliable sources. I agree its a tall order but I would never start a stub which I didn't believe couldn't be fully expanded. In my opinion ransacking categories on notable topics from other wikipedias and trying to get the same level of coverage in english is exactly what needs to be done on here if we are to build a truly comprehensive english wikipedia. I agree at face value initially they are rendered "useless" but we can't ignore 700 rivers in one state of Germany for instance. They are too important to the physical landscape of the real world.. And why wouldn't we want articles like this in english? While I would like to magically create every article at GA level I simply do not have the time to write everyone as fully as I'd like. And when there is a sheer amount missing quality tends to be at bare minimum. Any one though could be instantly expanded in minutes by anybody unhappy with the current lack of content and information given. An explanation on my views on this are given on my user page.♦ Dr. Blofeld 21:37, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

• This is the Misplaced Pages that most seem to want, so as long as people brag about how many articles we have as a selling point at fundraiser time, Dr. Blofeld's stub-a-palooza will be viewed as a valued contribution to the project. if you want to change that, then change the culture that alues quantity over quality. Otherwise, this is pointless griping. Tarc (talk) 21:44, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

When the stub count per category is reasonable rather than in the hundreds it is fine to add length and basin area and photo like Peršėkė... ♦ Dr. Blofeld 22:19, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Well, everything should be ok if it wouldn't be erorrs at these articles. User:Dr. Blofeld takes only one district ignoring that most rivers passes more than one district or even country. Also, I think it's very imporant to write at least with what bigger river it joins. If these things would be fixed I think such articles can be created. Hugo.arg (talk) 08:25, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

That's not so easily done by a script, so the answer is {{sofixit}}. ASCIIn2Bme (talk) 10:11, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

• Perhaps start with list-of-area articles: Although it is great to have stubs to capture every notable river, valley or town, those stubs alone will risk the danger of "Can't see the forest for the trees" as too many tiny articles which fail to describe the whole region. This is covered in new essay "WP:Aggregate data into lists rather than stubs".
  There are list-of-area articles which can be translated, first, such as from German WP. This is the concept of "List of tiny stuff" where not all items in a list have separate articles. For example, the valley in Germany, noted above (article "de:Zschonergrundbach"), is a small part of a list of 147(?) river valleys in Saxony (German: Sachsen), as one list for the 16 Bundesländer (federal states) in Germany:

• de:Liste der Landschaftsschutzgebiete in Sachsen - one of 16 lists of valleys

Before creating hundreds of stubs for valleys, start with the 16 list articles (for 16 states in Germany), with tables of valleys showing the location and area (in ha/acres) for each entry. Even in the German WP, a list of 147 valleys has red-links for dozens of valleys (no articles yet), and perhaps some valleys are so minor that there are no sources which focus on a tiny valley as separately notable in "continued coverage". Let's avoid stubs for every tiny thing listed in a book of geographic areas.
Remember that WP's current 2,000+ asteroid-list articles began at Harvard (Boston) as 37 large data-files, listing thousands of asteroid names in each of the 37 lists. A notable, yet obscure, asteroid number can redirect into a list of related "minor planets" where we figured 200 lists of numbered asteroids was "efficient" and 2,000 lists were perhaps too small.
Similarly, using lists of rivers in each county (parish), or district, is a much easier way to cross-check the length, flow, depth, etc. of many rivers in a list of 100 small rivers, rather than using 100 stubs needing to be edited to describe each river and set the river-size data. WP's unfortunate hatred of lists, in earlier years, thwarted the reality that lists are the way of the future. So, we can consider the initial genius concept behind Harvard's 37 lists of numbered asteroids, with similar lists of hundreds of smaller items (+data columns) and redirect titles into those lists, rather than start with 999,000 stubs to be updated with specific data in the next decade. Always consider WP:LISTSTUFF, rather than creating thousands of hollow stubs. -Wikid77 (talk) 10:24, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

I don't understand this user. I warned him not to create articles with errores but that was simply reverted . Hugo.arg (talk) 21:29, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

I would like to affirm this work as part of Misplaced Pages:WikiProject Countering systemic bias. To be useful, however, stubs need to have enough information to allow other editors to identify which topic the page is about and locate sources. I recently started a thread at Wikipedia_talk:Articles_for_deletion#AfD_templates_and_non-Latin_names about a related problem—where stubs are being nominated for deletion by non-native speakers because stubs are missing the topic name in some or all of the languages in which sources are likely to be found. Bearing this in mind, where-ever possible these kinds of stubs need to have the name of the topic in as many languages and scripts as possible. Stuartyeates (talk) 22:22, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Quality vs quantity is a false dichotomy.The creation of these articles has no negative effects on anyone who wants to write a few high quality articles, whether in that field or any other. It's like arguing whether we should concentrate on biographical or geographical articles; one does not exclude the other. DGG ( talk ) 22:55, 30 October 2011 (UTC) .

All encyclopedias have entries for distinct geographical entities such as rivers. I looked thru Dr. B.'s recent Lithuanian river creations - they do all have articles in the LT Misplaced Pages. I don't think incompleteness - such as missing the info that a river that flows mostly thru LT but probably rises in Latvia - is a sufficient reason to inhibit this process. (It's different from biographies of living people; no one is hurt by an omission or error or even passing vandalism.) On the LT WP, most of them are ref'd to extremely expensive books, so I can't personally verify most of them immediately. But I think it's safe to say at this point that they are very unlikely to be hoaxes, copyvios, promotional, or any other of the things that call for speedy deletion. I appreciate these articles' existence and I think future generations will too. Novickas (talk) 00:09, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Mass creation of articles is one thing, mass creation of unsourced articles is another. The only verification done before creating e.g. Vabala is the check that it exists in another unreliable source, Misplaced Pages. The article there has no sources at all. Can we at least put a stop to the creation of unsourced (or wiki-sourced) articles in such a manner? I have also asked Dr. Blofeld in the past to start articles on rivers with "The X is a river" instead of "X is a river", but I notice that this simple change isn't implemented.

The mass creation also contains errors, e.g. the article Weser (Ourthe) already existed as Vesdre for some years here. There also need to be checks on translations, e.g. do we want Église Saint-Jean-Baptiste de Bastia or Saint-Jean-Baptiste Church, Bastia (and there are quite a few of these church articles created already)? What with the names of rivers that run through different countries? Now, the first country Dr. Blofeld tackles gets priority, even though that may not be the best name for it? The Wisznia runs for 15 km in Poland, and for some 85 km in Ukraine. But our article uses the Polish name for it.

I think it would be better if these articles were created by a bot (run by Dr. Blofeld) with some control and some agreements, e.g. the need to have at least one reliable source, and the need for a better starting layout (it is a bit ridiculous that someone is going to correct all disambiguated articles like Bieke (Bigge) to remove the disambiguated part from the body of the article and the infobox). By having prior agreement before a run starts, things like the naming of French church articles can be handled before these are created. Fram (talk) 08:41, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

What difference would it make it a bot started creating hundreds of articles? I think I know; a human user would get in trouble for it at AN(I) and the bot wouldn't. Also the user could spot any errors in creating articles and fix them quickly, so having a user to do it might be better off. Jaguar (talk) 12:02, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Good point Fram and I had forgotten about the The thing, not that I ignored you. Although any article which says river of lithuania is still not erroneous as it is true but in a minority of cases may be cross border. Overall I'd say the benefits outweigh the negative. The Ukraineian name for the river you mentioned google translates as Cherry which is too literal. When I started the articles as Eglise I was using the current system used for many churches in Paris. We have tens of articles as Eglise in the same way we have them with Gare de for railway stations. Overall the positives outweigh the negatives I think especially if we view wikipedia as a project which will be around for future generations. What I want, and this was proposed at WP:INTERTRANSWIKI long ago, is to create an Interntranswiki bot which ransacks categories on other wikipedias and creates a missing directory where there are no en: links and attempts then to create them extracting some basic facts. I am clueless about coding though, if I was I'd have been running a bot for years and we'd probably have 10 million articles by now and most of the stubs of decent quality.♦ Dr. Blofeld 12:13, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

He's at it again! More geo articles have popped up from DR Blofield. Olaf the Shakinglord: Mailbox, ??? 18:31, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

I second the idea referenced above about making a list page "List of rivers in germany", that could be full of red links. If someone wants to flesh out one of those they can. Im not an admin, am I allowed to comment here?Gaijin42 (talk) 18:36, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

WTF are you on about? We have List of rivers of Hesse etc by state and a general List of rivers of Germany. Given that the vast majority could be written into full length articles how exactly would this be productive? @Shakinglord, and you're surprised? People just please stop moaning and let us get on with developing wikipedia s a website. ♦ Dr. Blofeld 18:53, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

It is my position that your stubs (as currently being created) are providing no value beyond what is in the list. If someone actually wants to make the full article then that is fine. Gaijin42 (talk) 18:56, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Most wikipedia articles, especially in the early days began as "providing little or no value". Do you think we have developed to what we are today in size by everyone article being generated fully as you see it today? You are missing what building an encyclopedia collaboratively actually means and what wiki technology entails and that as a resource we are still in our infancy. If you start to view wikipedia as a long term project which will be around for generations and we are to truly achieve wonders you will see the eventual purpose of what I'm doing. If we want a "complete" encyclopedia NOW then unless this site grossly changes its way of editing and purely focuses on quality then I am not willing to bow down on a whim to those who don't like it. As I say on my user page if we were a seriously scholarly encyclopedia we would build wikipedia GA quality article at a time and only permit that level of content.♦ Dr. Blofeld 19:09, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

For example, look at this almost useless article about a clearly notable subject that has since been converted into a GA. Or this two-line page with a speedy deletion tag that's currently Today's Featured Article. I'm not a fan of tiny stubs on notable topics either, but the way to get rid of them is expansion, not sanctions for the creators. Nyttend (talk) 19:28, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• It is disruptive to create thousands of completely unreferenced articles. If Dr. Blofeld wants to create an article, or 1,000,000 articles about rivers, hills, creeks, films made in Elbonia, or whatever possibly notable subjects ha has found in a database or a Big Book with directory listings, he should provide at least the database or book from which he learned that said subject exists. That eliminates the need for an "unreferenced" tag, and satisfies at least verifiability, if not Notability. It would not take the bot or the semi-automated script that much longer, since the pattern has been to find some list of hundreds of things and create a hundred cookie-cutter stubs which say something like "X is a Y in Z" all from the same source. As long as the "Xs" fall within the guidelines for notability, this is an activity which improves the encyclopedia and is meritorious. The bot or script could also add a reference section, rather than just an external link, to make it more convenient for follow-up editors to add more references, but that is less of a requirement. Edison (talk) 19:25, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

I either provide a reference or include a intertranswiki link for verification. If you disagree that a decent article on another wikipedia directly linked is not enough to verify it then that's your problem. There would be no point in referencing a one line stub just for the sake of it.♦ Dr. Blofeld 19:35, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages (in any language) is not a reliable source, and that is your problem if you're creating articles which only cite other Misplaced Pages articles as sources. If the articles you're citing are referenced, just take the references from there (after checking them of course) - Kingpin (talk) 19:46, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Nyttend - I think the human centipede article comparison is very constructive. Someone individually chose to write that article, even as a stub. That implies a level of interest in that particular article that will give a greater likelihood of future expansion. Blofelds articles do not have that level of editorial filtering going on. If he was walking by a river and said "gee id like to start a stub about this river", then that initial level of interest is there. Of course stubs can grow into full GA/FA. But those articles that are interesting enough to become FA/GA would get created even if the stub wasn't there. Whoever put the effort into the first "non-stub" article likely had that level of interest anyway. What % of these stubs will ever be edited again, or in many cases even looked at! Gaijin42 (talk) 19:36, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

It was all Magic 8-Ball when the project started. Many articles are still being created by translating from other wikis, there’s a presumption - not proof, but strong presumption - of existence and verifiability there. You can't know when any new stub will be edited again or how much. And Dr. B did choose which to create. To demonstrate the uncertainty, I'll add a sentence about drainage basins and a reference to all of Dr. B's new LT river articles over the next week, making them 2-sentence referenced stubs. There is a very comprehensive LT Ministry of Environment page for this . I imagine there are similar pages for other countries and maybe other country project editors will contribute similarly. (An announcement at country project pages would be nice, Dr. B, since probably not everyone reads Alex's New Article Bot entries.) Creating unreferenced stubs on encyclopedic topics using other language WPS, with context, like ‘x is a river in Lithuania’, is not explicitly deprecated AFAIK. If it is, let me know. I don’t see it in Misplaced Pages:Stub. Novickas (talk) 22:14, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

You can't know when any new stub will be edited again or how much - actually you CAN if you're willing to go out there and get some data. I got a small sample (via clicking Random Article and taking down info on stubs I come across) at this point of about 40 but on average, an article that is a stub TODAY, was created almost THREE AND A HALF YEARS AGO with none or only a single subsequent meaningful edit (i.e. not counting bots or automated (and apparently quite frequent) re-categorizations etc.) since. So yeah, for the most part, stubs stay stubs. And so will these. Volunteer Marek  22:29, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Just like this eh?. And please stop shouting in capital letters, we hear you...♦ Dr. Blofeld 22:50, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Are you familiar with the concept of an "average"? I think Misplaced Pages might have an article on it. Sure, you can find some stub (and almost all articles start as stubs) which winds up as an FA. But that is not the TYPICAL (I'm sorry, but the use of capital letters to emphasize something predates the internet, it is not shouting and it is perfectly valid) "history" of a stub. You can always find you a high school drop out who makes billions, but most high school dropouts are going to be in the lower end of the income distribution. I can find you a smoker who lived to be 100 years old, but most smoker's life expectancy is well below that of non-smokers. Same thing here. Volunteer Marek  22:55, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

nobody is contesting the fact that some stubs can become good pages. We are just saying that it is statistically unlikely, especially for mass created pages, and those stubs that are turned into good pages likely would have been created as good pages even had the stub not existed. Please stop making straw men arguments, and doing personal insults. (not this comment but one previous). Gaijin42 (talk) 22:57, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

I couldn't give two hoots what you or anybody else thinks Gaijin. This is my last post here. ♦ Dr. Blofeld 23:23, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Although your obvious stubborness and comtempt for other people may convince SOME people in this world to believe you are right. However, here we can obviously see you are simply blowing hot air, and your action both in mass creation and towards other users should be called into serious question. I cordially invite you to calm down and assume good faith. Olaf the Shakinglord: Mailbox, ??? 23:35, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Have you noticed that no admins have as yet seen fit to intervene in this situation? That's because this board is not part of the dispute resolution framework. There is no clear-cut policy violation in what Blofeld is doing, so there is not really anything for an admin to do about, whether they want to or not. Take it to DR or let it go. Beeblebrox (talk) 02:04, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

Merovingian mass creation

This is a disscussion from AN. BeebleRox informed me to take the disscussion here. Olaf the Shakinglord: Mailbox, ??? 02:11, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

User:Merovingian continues to make articles about astrology, sometimes a single minute apart, likely a an automated bot. This may be a violation similar to DR. Blofield's mass creation incident's. Olaf the Shakinglord: Mailbox, ??? 00:08, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

1. Astronomy, not astrology.
2. Please see previous discussions on my and other users' talk pages as to the developments regarding minor planet articles. Precedent has been to keep these articles.
3. I am not a bot. --Merovingian (T, C, L) 00:17, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Would it be possible to increase the information in the first sentence of the lede, to make it more intelligible? Something like: (37852) 1998 DG₃₂ is a main-belt minor planet, an asteroid not visible to the naked eye. Stuartyeates (talk) 01:08, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

I can mention the absolute magnitude... and anyway, as far as I can tell, minor planet is preferred over asteroid. --Merovingian (T, C, L) 06:33, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

I am not upfront against the articles you created -I am a 'space fan' so, I like them - but I note the existence of: wp:MASSCREATION - Nabla (talk) 11:40, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

I have no doubt that within astronomy circles minor planet is preferred over asteroid, but the proportion of readers who know what a minor planet is is very low. To quote WP:AUDIENCE Misplaced Pages is an international encyclopedia. People who read Misplaced Pages have different backgrounds, education and opinions. Make your article accessible and understandable for as many readers as possible. Assume readers are reading the article to learn. Stuartyeates (talk) 21:54, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

• I am of the same opinion here as above. If you have a problem with the content (rather than the method or speed) of what he is creating, we can make that a matter of dicussion. Making good content really fast is still making good content, and we should not, in any way, ever discourage people from creating good content at Misplaced Pages. If it is bad content, it should not be created at any speed, but I have not, as yet, seen any evidence that this content should not exist. Ergo, leave him the eff alone and let him create Misplaced Pages content. --Jayron32 18:05, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

I have a problem with the content. With very little effort the stubs being created could be made much more intelligible to non-astronomers, as per my comment above. While normally the fix it with editing rule of thumb applies, with the mass-creation of so many stubs it makes sense to put some effort into the text being put on every stub beforehand. Stuartyeates (talk) 09:01, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Had the articles been created as more than a stub, would they have been deleted? That is, is there anything about the subject of the article that makes it an inappropriate subject for an encyclopedia article? If not, there's no need to stop someone from creating them. If you think they need more content, then no one is going to stop you from adding it. --Jayron32 01:44, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• The mass creation of trivial minor planet stubs initiated a lengthy discussion at WikiProject Astronomy. The result of this long discussion was to create a notability criteria for astronomical objects. After much back and forth, language was agreed on and a draft article for notability criteria was produced. As the main co-author of the draft, I will be putting it up to a RfC this week. Astronomy editors at the project have already weighed in on this issue, and the vast majority of these stubs will not likely survive scrutiny under the proposed criteria. Merovingian, and others here, are welcome to make a comment about the notability draft here. Perhaps the mass creation of these stubs should be placed on hold until adoption of the notability draft. AstroCog (talk) 16:35, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

"This may be a violation similar to DR. Blofield's mass creation incident's.". "Violation". LMAO. Who is this guy? Why don't you actually do something for wikipedia Olaf instead of, well, hanging around here like an annoying little git.. ♦ Dr. Blofeld 21:56, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Do I sense some hostilities from Dr. Blofield? Surely an expirienced editor such as he is knows to avoid personal attack. Olaf the Shakinglord: Mailbox, ??? 23:04, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

(Copying from above as this is essentially the same issue) Have you noticed that no admins have as yet seen fit to intervene in this situation? That's because this board is not part of the dispute resolution framework. There is no clear-cut policy violation in what Merovingian is doing, so there is not really anything for an admin to do about, whether they want to or not. Take it to DR or let it go. Beeblebrox (talk) 02:04, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the dispute resolution noticeboard's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.