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Hi. I've made a bit of a cockup of the move request. I had a tiring day, got home, saw that Michaelsanders had put in the move request, was concerned that he might think I was being unhelpful, and went ahead and moved it without checking because I didn't realise it was controversial. Do you want me to undo what I did, or shall we just carry on with the discussion and move it back later if that's what people want? Deb (talk) 18:35, 30 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I think you'll find my response amusing at best, juvenile at worst, and hopefully just satisfactory and clarifying as to my stance on Augustus.--Pericles of AthensTalk 08:50, 3 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The Military history WikiProject Newsletter : Issue XXII (December 2007)[edit]
The December 2007 issue of the Military history WikiProject newsletter has been published. You may read the newsletter, change the format in which future issues will be delivered to you, or unsubscribe from this notification by following the link. Thank you. This has been an automated delivery by BrownBot (talk) 23:30, 3 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hey, I don't begrudge you your sentiments, but would you consider rephrasing your last comments on the FJS talk page? We can afford to be gracious, don't you think? Cheers. Unschool (talk) 07:45, 5 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Just wanted to say good job on opposing the rather daft attempt to rename god knows how many articles to Gaelic names in one fell swoop. I must admit to being a leyman in the matters of scottish history (ONly having studied them in relation to my Anglo-Saxon history) which just makes this seem more bizzare as, well, we didn't use much anglo saxon in studying it (except for loan words like whitten and fyrd and such). Narson (talk) 19:22, 5 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for spotting that his response was incivil. I was wondering whether I was mad in thinking he was being abrasive. I must admit, I don't venture into eastern european article alot, despite my family's roots, and only strayed onto the subjects as I watch RM and comment on some. I can't say that I have much desire to venture into the articles if this is the general attitude of the involved editors. Kudos to you for putting up with the toxic atmosphere. Narson (talk) 10:06, 8 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
24 hours for a violation of the 3RR rule. Try getting consensus before you make controversial changes. SpartazHumbug! 19:09, 8 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
This blocked user (block log | autoblocks | unblock | contribs | deleted contribs) has asked to be unblocked, but an administrator has reviewed and declined this request. Other administrators may also review this block, but should not override the decision without good reason (see the blocking policy). Do not remove this unblock request while you are blocked. You may request another review up to a maximum of two per year per block by adding another unblock request.
Request reason: "Compromise almost obtained at Talk:Romania; if this discussion can continue, the substantive issue will go away. Blocks are preventative, not punitive, and the infringement was at best marginal. SeptentrionalisPMAnderson 19:11, 8 January 2008 (UTC)"[reply]
Decline reason: "It has been quite a while since the last time you were blocked (by yours truly, incidentally) for a 3RR breach, so I don't take issue with the length being only 24 hours. That said, you really need to be more mindful of exceeding three reverts per 24 hours. Yes, blocks are preventative not punitive, but 3RR is designed to be preventative (a 3RR block would be punitive if the violation was committed, say, a week ago). Which is to say, some line in the sand needs to be drawn and the 3RR is one such line. So, please, be more cmindful in the future about it and let this be a (not too harsh, by any stretch, I don't think) reminder. Regards, El_C 21:36, 8 January 2008 (UTC)"[reply]
Thank you for replying. No, I don't think it too harsh, if the four edits consistute a 3RR breach; and I'm not sure how I would see that it weren't me. SeptentrionalisPMAnderson 23:00, 8 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
As the editor break the 3RR 3 times before (the last block for 3RR being 52 hours), I propose to extend his block to at least 64 hours. --Eurocopter tigre (talk) 19:43, 8 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I request that note be taken of the vindictiveness displayed here; especially since there is a reasonable argument that the poll Eurocopter wants should not take place until I am unblocked. If he had nothing to discuss but the issues, we might actually get somewhere. The 52 hour block was nine months ago. SeptentrionalisPMAnderson 19:46, 8 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Seems we already have editors which support the idea of an poll, so it will start in few moments. I also mention that a pool will be the most civilized way to stop this disruptive conflict. --Eurocopter tigre (talk) 19:55, 8 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I'm sure that more will come. However, I will assume good faith (a thing which you didn't) and wait one more hour to see other opinions. --Eurocopter tigre (talk) 20:05, 8 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- [1] first and only warning to Eurocopter tigre. SpartazHumbug! 20:39, 8 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hi PMAnderson - at the risk of jumping into a contentious situation, would you consider having Rumania given in the intro but just not in the first sentence? --Reuben (talk) 23:02, 8 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The only qualm I would have is: Will editors dumped there by the redirect from Rumania see it, and realize they are at the right article? This is the principal reason to include it at all, besides documentation of the obvious stating a mildly important fact, not now included. If (as we probably should) we have an approval poll, please add the wording you suggest to the list of alternatives, and I will probably support it. SeptentrionalisPMAnderson 23:07, 8 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think the (recently elided) text I put in can fairly be considered equal billing. It certainly wasn't intended to be. SeptentrionalisPMAnderson 23:13, 8 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
That's true enough. I hadn't studied the edit history. --Reuben (talk) 23:16, 8 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I fixed a link for you. Sorry if this was stepping on your toes or anything. I just didn't want the new user to click it and be like "what the heck is this?" --Cheeser1 (talk) 00:30, 10 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Signpost updated for January 2nd and 7th, 2008.[edit]
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It seems it is happening again. Two or so users are pushing a non-English name; one is citing a single source as "evidence". I have posted on the talk page under "princes of the duchy". Charles 16:56, 13 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Nobody is changing the name of the article into Duchy of Pszczyna. The voting was in regards to the name of the Duchy, now Charles wants to rename the city of Pszczyna into Pless, this was not under the vote, and such proposal should be made at city's page.--Molobo (talk) 17:29, 13 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
What a bold lie. Maybe you should read the article's talk page regarding my views before you foolishly make such assumptions. Charles 20:36, 13 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Please try leaving them a message on their talkpages, about it; if needed I will comment there. Oh, and please archive your talk page, it's a bit on the 'way too long' side :) --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk 23:29, 13 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I will endorse any just action because I have experienced a fair share of related difficulties. Tell me where and I'll view it and follow up in whatever matter is appropriate and fitting. Charles 19:08, 14 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
LOL, I wasn't aware there was a Piotrus Principle... thanks for pointing it out :) Yes, occasionally good stuff will be added to non-article pages and needs to be moved to talk. Perhaps an even more fitting name would be 'Reference Desk principle' - I have seen this done often, with impressive explanations on RDH (often by Clio) being turned into articles.
As for DoP issue, I lost track a little - I am not sure which argument of mine do you refer to. But yes, Dukes of Pless should have a separate article from Duchy of Pless at some point; even if most of such articles start as as little but lists of office holders, they have a potential to develop into something more.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk 05:57, 16 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
but the Dukes, and later Princes, of Pless would remain owners of its soil, and lords of its inhabitants. The Dukes of Anhalt-Cöthen-Pless inherited in 1765, being descended from the earlier dukes in the female line; the last of them died in 1847, and was succeeded by Count Hans Heinrich X of Hochberg, his son-in-law. The Hochbergs <:ref>Hans Heinrich X, XI, and XIV; the dynastic numbering was, like other princely families, given to all males of the House</ref> were among the wealthiest families of Germany, and lived in great state; they maintained a herd of wisent, given to them by Alexander II of Russia in 1864, but it was reduced to three survivors during the First World War.
The Duke of Ratiborwas defeated in the first election to the Imperial German Reichstag, in 1871 by Eduard Müller, one of the founders of the Centre Party, although Hans Heinrich XI von Hochberg not only endorsed him, but had so much control over the local government that he used the constables as election workers, parading the streets with drums to get out the vote; he also threatened, for example, to end wood-gathering rights for those who displeased him.
This has been edited so as to claim that the Duke of Ratibor in question was defeated by the Polish Nationalists in 1903. This is certainly not the case; the Centre Party held the seat in the intervening thirty years; I am not sure he was still alive.
Hans Heinrich XIV succeeded in 1907; he had married Daisy, Princess of Pless, the diarist, whose memoirs are cited by Barbara Tuchman and other social historians.
Since these are the materials for which the sources are cited, they are now valueless. What form of Mediation would you be interested in? SeptentrionalisPMAnderson 01:42, 14 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
You pasted the same text in two different places, here and here, making it look a lot less like a message to me, nevertheless, since you want to be taken seriously, I would expect that you do the same first... and respect my sources. I'm not totally against whatever relevant information there is in your paragraphs, but the cheap editorializing and runaway digressions ought to be edited out. Here are some of the worst examples:
"Princes of Pless would remain owners of its soil, and lords of its inhabitants." Gimme a break, is this a blatant WP:COPYVIO or what?
"Hans Heinrich XI von Hochberg not only endorsed Eduard Müller (and, what is this guy doing here?), but had so much control over the local government that he used the constables as election workers, parading the streets with drums [blah, blah, blah… more WP:COPYVIO] to get out the vote..." I'm asking you, what does this have to do with the Duchy? Here's a simple answer: nothing! --Poeticbenttalk 06:37, 14 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I warn you from indulging in edit wars. If you cannot provide the details asked and cannot provide information, then you have no right to remove any content from the article. You will be reported to the Administrator if you continue with these kind of behavior.Chanakyathegreat (talk) 13:14, 17 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
"There are those who disagree with my principles, and would indeed like to wipe Poland out of Wikipedia."
I am not a fan of conspiracy theories. I even don't exactly understand what you mean by that. Frankly it disturbs me, as it seems you are guided by some strange theories in regards to edits.
As to the name of the article, nobody is changing it, so I see no reasons of your concern. Nobody is changing the voted on Duchy of Pless into Duchy of Pszczyna.--Molobo (talk) 17:41, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
I don't agree with the vote, but as nobody does change the name of the article and I don't see anybody entering the name Duchy of Pszczyna, then there seems to be no problem.--Molobo (talk) 17:48, 17 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I noticed your comment here [2]
If anybody moves the article to name not agreed by the vote, feel free to aske me to change it back. --Molobo (talk) 18:59, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
Btw my original question was regarding improving the flow of the article, Pless is repeated in every sentence almost, it would be nice if you would come up with more ideas to improve the text and make it less akward by reducing the mention of Pless to reasnoble number rather then having it in every sentence, sometimes numerous times even in one. Which of course reads terrible. --Molobo (talk) 18:59, 17 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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Do you have any opinion on this discussion? Note the very lame, age-old "move the other article" argument. This is about one user replacing all English instances of the name with the Polish name, Charles 17:33, 19 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Your input would be appreciated here... A user is arguing that surnames can be literally translated and is claiming that I made the claim that only royal names can be translated (I never said that). I made the distinction between surnames, house names and territorial designations but was ignored. The user is asking me to prove a convention which exists only because translation of surnames is rarely exercised in the English language (essentially, I "have to" prove that not translating names is right instead of pointing out that it's never done as it rarely appears anywhere). The user also has compromised sources. Charles 22:28, 19 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Incorrect: I am asking Charles to prove with a reference only his POV that commoners' surnames cannot be translated into English. For the rest of my stance on this issue, see my replies here and here. Thank you! Lil' mouse 2 (talk) 22:43, 19 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
If the info is so "well known," you should have no problem finding a source. I would encourage you to use said source to rewrite that paragraph so that it's more substantive and informative than "there was a method..." (what method? where were the rules written? etc.) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.174.180.145 (talk) 16:46, 22 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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I'd really love if we could agree on a naming convention for Polish kings; I have proposed one at guideline talk - I am sure you have noticed it (or would shortly). I'd like to seem them standarized; nicknames are popular in many cases and I see no reason why not to use them wherever possible (for standardization). They are useful; people find it easier to associate people with nicknames than with numbers. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk 16:20, 25 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I don't know what you're trying to achieve with these messages. They're really irritating, esp. using WP:Point like that. Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 18:52, 26 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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Considering your involvement at Talk:Levon V of Armenia#Requested move, can I get you to look at User:Srnec/Kings of Cilicia and tell me what you think of these proposed moves before I do them? It is designed to remove all inconsistency and ambiguity and favours English forms for non-Armenian names and whatever Armenian anglicisation is most popular in English texts for Armenian names. I am very open to changing "Thoros" to "Toros" or "Hetoum" to "Hethum", for example, based on evidence of superior usage. Srnec (talk) 21:19, 1 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The Military history WikiProject Newsletter : Issue XXIII (January 2008)[edit]
The January 2008 issue of the Military history WikiProject newsletter has been published. You may read the newsletter, change the format in which future issues will be delivered to you, or unsubscribe from this notification by following the link. Thank you. This has been an automated delivery by BrownBot (talk) 01:35, 4 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for the support for the move on the Brunei Dollar. Just an aside, searching for "Brunei ringgit" gives me 2,060 hits on Google, searching for "Brunei dollar" gives 4,530,000 hits. I should go post that somewhere... --Novelty (talk) 05:30, 4 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I have made a request for move on behalf of the editors who's been persistently edit warring to add "Northeast China" to the title of the template. Please join the discussion[3] to help reach a consensus. Cydevil38 (talk) 01:01, 5 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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Hello Pmanderson, I'm a numeralist when it comes to 'regal names'. However, should any articles be moved to nicknames? I won't revert them (not my style), PS- the article name Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden still gives me heartburn. GoodDay (talk) 16:42, 7 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I'm curious of something though, about the Swedish monarchs. Doesn't Gustav actually go with Adolph and Gustaf go with Adolf? If so? all those articles are incorrect. GoodDay (talk) 22:09, 10 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Just a quick question - why did you put the tag on Samuil of Bulgaria? I need to know so to improve it and have it removed. I'm only asking cause you didn't point the reasons in the edit-summary or the talkpage. Cheers. --LaveolT 13:33, 12 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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Hellow! Do you now Ostrogorsky was YugoslavandYugoslavia was the only country in the world which did not recognise the Bulgarian character of Samuil's state. Great Soviet Encyclopaedia was # 1 in the Slavic world and Eastern Europe! Did you ever read the Bitola inscription for example? Now even the modern scolars in Serbia as Privratich have recognised it's Bulgariannes. Will you invent the "warm watter"? 88.203.200.74 (talk) 13:45, 14 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, of course I do; I described him as a "White Russian-Yugoslav scholar". As for the Great Soviet Encyclopedia: it does help to have the entire Red Army as salesmen. SeptentrionalisPMAnderson 14:54, 14 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
PMAnderson, are we now seeing eye-to-eye on Talk:MOSNUM. My read of what you wrote is that you like spaces to the right of the decimal point (as do I). Are we in synch now? Here is a nutshell overview of my proposal. Greg L (my talk) 21:36, 14 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hey PMAnderson. Do you have an opinion on this Ukrainian thing I raised of the titles guideline page? You're normally interested in this kind of thing, so I'm desirous of your feedback. Regards, Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 17:51, 16 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The Samuil one doesn't bother me ... I don't think it's the same problem here. If you could convince me this was modern semi-spurious Bulgarianization rather than nativization I would for sure change it. Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 18:20, 16 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah, I know where the Halych is coming from ... and they're free to use it to refer to the modern place. But historians writing in English do not use it very often. And ... wow ... Danylo of Halych is just a parody of itself. You could do a year of Rus' history and never encounter that in English! Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 18:30, 16 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I noticed you were the last to make edits to this policy/guideline. Can it now be considered stable? I appreciate the beliefs about Wikipedia you hold, but everything in the known Universe has structure, and Wikipedia despite its inherent attempts to be different also has to have some, even if Amoebic, structure. It does become extremely frustrating to edit when one doesn't even know which language the editing conforms to.--mrg3105 (comms) If you're not taking any flak, you're not over the target. 01:32, 17 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hi. Is there a problem with e-mail use, or is there another reason that you will not reply to my e-mails? Cheers--mrg3105 (comms) If you're not taking any flak, you're not over the target. 00:32, 22 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Because I haven't received any. It is possible that they are swept up as junk mail, but I don't think that has happened before. SeptentrionalisPMAnderson 00:36, 22 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hmm, that is what I thought at first. I will try again now in case there were technical issues on the previous occasion. I have sent e-mails to others in the last two days and have not received reply which makes me think the issue is with my ISP.--mrg3105 (comms) If you're not taking any flak, you're not over the target. 00:48, 22 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
As I am sure you have seen, I've started a thread on a proposed new WikiProject to coordinate Manual of Style pages. I think this might provide a mechanism to address the problem without raising concerns about centralization of authority on the main MoS page. I noticed that you believe such a project might do more good than harm, and your comments on how it might work most effectively would be very valuable. See WT:MoS#WikiProject Manual of Style. Geometry guy 19:43, 17 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I've now initiated a draft at WP:WPMoS. Sorry for the delay. I hope you will want to add your name to the list of participants. Thanks, Geometry guy 21:30, 26 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
As far as the Elizabeth Hamilton article goes, I don't see any evidence presented that she was called that at the time, but I'll take your word for it and let it go. As far as the Alexander Hamilton article goes however, by stating that "several Republican politicians advanced their careers" by writing biographies about him, it seems that you're implying that they did something unethical or crooked by doing so. Is there any reason that simply acknowledging that those politicians wrote biographies on him isn't sufficient? Thanks. Equinox137 (talk) 01:22, 18 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I'm tired of rebutting Dove1950 when he doesn't even choose to respond to my statements and questions. Instead, as you said, he just regurgitates the same argument ad nauseum without trying to respond to anything else or trying to persuade anyone over to his POV. I find it interesting that even User:Chochopk is agreeing with me, despite the initial disagreement (on the Brunei dollar vs the Brunei ringgit) that started this whole discussion. Oh well. Sometimes it's fun watching a trainwreck. --Novelty (talk) 00:34, 20 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I've drafted a set of naming guidelines for Kosovo, loosely along the lines of the earlier WP:MOSMAC, which I created ages ago. Could you possibly take a look and see what you think? It's been a pain drafting them, and I'm sure I've not got everything right first time around, but I would very much appreciate your views in the light of your experience with ethnic conflicts. Please see User:ChrisO/Wikipedia:Manual of Style (Kosovo-related articles). -- ChrisO (talk) 01:40, 25 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Signpost updated for February 18th and 25th, 2008.[edit]
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Hi Pmanderson, thanks for the comments at the Princess Helena FAC. I've made a change so it now reads: " In the latter, Prussia and Austria defeated Denmark, and retained the duchies de facto, but following the Austro-Prussian War, they became Prussian. The annexed Duchies of Schleswig and Holstein, formerly the personal property of Danish kings, were then given to Prince Christian's family." Is this correct? Unfortunately none of my sources talk about the Austro-Prussian war, which seems strange now that the facts have been clarified. Best, PeterSymonds | talk 16:12, 29 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Right, after over an hour of puzzled thought, I've found out what happened and put a reference with it. Every book I have seems to have a different train of events, which made it pretty confusing, but the version as it stands is backed up by a reliable reference and the articles here. Best, PeterSymonds | talk 17:20, 29 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry, I don't have time to wade in. If you have any specific questions or need comment on some specific matter, I might be able to help, but I definitely can't drive it. I'm already to the point where interruptions have been interrupted. I'd been trying to work on several topics in Seattle history; that was interrupted by the FAR on Blackface (which I'm still trying to sort through), which in turn has been somewhat interrupted by the FAR on Che Guevara (where I'm trying to suggest approaches and to do what I can do quickly as a "pure editor": I don't plan to hit the books on that one). So one more level of interruption is probably more than I can handle competently. (Unlike last year, I'm working a full time job, which is my plan for the next several years.) If you think you can drive it, great. In any event, it's a little after the period where I'd call myself really knowledgeable, anyway. (I've focused on the period from the mid-1780s to the September Massacres; after that, I am still clueful, but probably no more so than 100 other Wikipedians.) - Jmabel | Talk 18:03, 29 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I'd like to request that you please don't add your own comments under mine at FACs unless they are needed. For example, you added More important, what were its numbers in proportion to the followers of other flags? Septentrionalis PMAnderson 20:10, 29 February 2008 (UTC) in the midst of my issues list. This should go in your own section, not mine, so that I (and Sandy) can better track who is asking for what. I'm also very curious as to which of the FA criteria you think we ought to follow, as so far I've seen you dismiss pretty much all MOS-related issues and now citations. A well-written article that looks ugly and can't be verified (which means it is also hard to know for sure that it is comprehensive) isn't that useful in the long run. Please stop being dismissive of others' good-faith efforts to follow the rules as currently written. Karanacs (talk) 20:39, 29 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I don't have a problem with responses that are addressing my comments, but at least one of your comments appeared to be an additional issue with the article, and that needs to go in another section. Karanacs (talk) 21:12, 29 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
You mentioned taking "FA from the trenches" -- two things. First, if you're talking about writing the Dispatches article, you'll want to take a look at WP:FCDW, where it's being developed. Second, I'm not sure what you mean by "a parody", but if you do write an article, please ensure it's written in standard news article style. Ral315 (talk) 09:33, 1 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for your input. I'm gonna get around to it soon, promise! BTW, thought you should know, you are being discussed at Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Biruitorul 2 ... partially my fault ... but thought I should tell you anyways. Regards, Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 21:48, 8 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
IT really baffles me that you keep putting up the same opposing answer, that Granicus is just Granicus, then how do you explain the Battle of the Hydaspes River! YOU would not complain that after hydaspes comes river, but for some reason its okay for Granicus not to have the word river after it, ive checked in history books, and most called it Battle of the Granicus River! So do some research and then make the same old answer, and please comment on the discussion page of voting i set up, and dont put the same old answer, and both Hydaspes and Granicus Alexander the Great fought in! Even the article of Granicus river its called Bigi Cayli check it out for yourself the ancients called it Granicus river as do people today, and no city is near where Alexander fought the battle. So it should be identified with the rivers name which is the Granicus River, all other ancient battles that took place at a river have river at the end except Granicus thats why i want to change it in the first place mr smarty pants! Thanks for reading.--Ariobarza (talk) 01:16, 4 March 2008 (UTC)Ariobarza talk[reply]
ON granicus im willing to call a truce, but for Siege of Tyre im concerned because as you know it was besieged by the babylonians and assryians and others, so if it was besieged the first time by Alexander i would not give it a date, but Alexander besieged it probably the 5 time in history it was not the first time, and just because he's Alexander i dont want to give him a special privilage that all his battles should be without dates, to match a consistensy of not dating his battles, so explain to me why Tyre should not have a date, and i think one of the battles of the neo assryian empire feature Tyre maybe, but i know that they besieged it at least 400 years before the Siege of Tyre, so there you go.--Ariobarza (talk) 03:28, 5 March 2008 (UTC)Ariobarza talk[reply]
The Military history WikiProject Newsletter : Issue XXIV (February 2008)[edit]
The February 2008 issue of the Military history WikiProject newsletter has been published. You may read the newsletter, change the format in which future issues will be delivered to you, or unsubscribe from this notification by following the link. Thank you. This has been an automated delivery by BrownBot (talk) 07:55, 5 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
You are receiving this message because you have signed up for the Signpost spamlist. If you wish to stop receiving these messages, simply remove your name from the list. Ralbot (talk) 08:19, 5 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you muchly for your support in my recent request for adminship, which was successfully closed on 76%, finishing at 73 supports, 23 opposes and 1 neutral. The supports were wonderful, and I will keep in mind the points made in the useful opposes and try to suppress the Larry David in me! Now I'm off to issue some cool down blocks, just to get my money's worth!
Hi, since you took part in the discussion about renaming this article, you may be interested in participating in a most evil poll to determine the public opinion on the naming issue. --Illythr (talk) 20:07, 5 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Treaty of Jassy was written in three languages, Russian, Arabic (Turkish) and German since a copy was forwarded to Russia's ally, Austria. Catherine IInd also was much more conversant in German then Russian.--mrg3105 (comms) ♠♥♦♣ 01:00, 6 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I HAVE REQUESTED MOVES FOR TYRE ALREADY, check on march 1 or 2 on the wrpm or requested moves page of wikipedia, and youll see that nothing has happened. SO i do that first then put up a requested move in the comments area after.--Ariobarza (talk) 11:46, 6 March 2008 (UTC)Ariobarza talk[reply]
I just wanted to let you know about the formation of WikiProject Parliamentary Procedure. We hope to cover all the major motions and parliamentary procedure terms. You are welcome to join. Thanks, Obuibo Mbstpo (talk) 19:42, 8 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I'm also writing this essay analyzing the similarities and differences between principles of parliamentary procedure and Wikipedia. Obuibo Mbstpo (talk) 20:35, 11 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hi Septentrionalis,
I have no problem with you reverting my edit, but I would appreciate that you revert to the real previous version (which had "Latin alphabet"), and not change the text to "English alphabet" with the comment "no consensus". I found the comment quite misleading, and it took me some time to find out in the history where the "English" crept in. I have reverted to your version which immediately precedes my edit you find problematic Jasy jatere (talk) 18:08, 12 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Glory to Augustus? No, let's criticize the bastard![edit]
Hello once again. I've been sulking over what you've mentioned on the talk page recently about Augustus receiving too much praise in his article, so I've decided to knock him down a peg with a new "Criticism of Augustus" section at the end. It's not finished or anything, but it's a start. I hope this better displays my NPOV, if my NPOV came into question previously.--Pericles of AthensTalk 18:21, 12 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Looks interesting; but you will get the reaction: "work it into the article", as you should.
Well, maybe I can "have my cake and eat it too" in this regard; I think I can mention criticisms of Augustus within other sections of the article without having to scrap a valid section devoted to criticism. Thanks for the swift reply, though, as I intend to check out Syme as you suggest.--Pericles of AthensTalk 18:37, 12 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Just so you don't think I am advocating this from sheer stubbornness, my position is that good article research should discriminate between good and bad original research, even when it is the source for the article. I don't think reference work editors should compromise on article quality in any way as a proof of our integrity expected by users--mrg3105 (comms) ♠♥♦♣ 01:09, 13 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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I notice you have previously participated in discussions about the article titles for Qing empresses. I am interested in getting opinion on the correct location of the articles on Qing empresses which are almost all currently located at hideous violations of pinyin rules. I don't have opinions on the format or even the names themselves so I would like to get some consensus before proposing moves. (But please, no hyphens and no CamelCase.) The articles in question are every CamelCase or hyphenated name plus Empress Xiao Xian and Abahai at Category:Qing Dynasty empresses and Category:Qing Dynasty empress dowagers. If you are interested please discuss it here. Thanks. — AjaxSmack 03:09, 21 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks - I had thought that discouraging use of on-line EB was stronger than that. If we can all cite EB, WP will simply become "EB Lite" as editors will be less likely to do the hard work of finding and citing primary and secondary sources! NorCalHistory (talk) 21:58, 21 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hey Rich, things swimming around in my head this morning:
Thank you kindly for all the work you're doing in many forums where I participate, and a lot where I don't. As I was telling another guy this morning, all that's important to me is how much time people spend doing useful things on Wikipedia, and you do a ton. You regularly speak up quickly and intelligently on a number of pages, such as WP:CITE, especially when it's needed, and you make a lot of solid article contributions.
You said on WT:STYLE1.0 that Jimbo said something on the front page ... I missed it, what did he say? It's not in the history.
You made a comment on your userpage, sometime before this month, about the "effort to format Wikipedia identically in every article". I just want to make it clear that when I'm talking about standardization at WT:STYLE1.0, I am probably not talking about anything that you would object to (or at any rate, should object to, given my understanding of your feelings). I don't mean "standardization" in the sense of "one rule to cover everybody", I mean a reasonable number of rules reflecting actual practice, with an eye to erasing the things from Version 1.0 that would seem sub-standard to, say, a very well-read and broad-minded academic.
I think there was more, but my brain isn't working, I'll have to reboot. - Dan Dank55 (talk) 17:50, 23 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Oh right, what do I call you? I think I've used Rich, Anderson, and Sept, because Septentrionalis doesn't come very easily to my fingers. - Dan Dank55 (talk) 18:12, 23 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Anderson—Can we try to nut out a wording here, since the more verbiage at MOS talk, the harder people will find it to engage with a proposal, I suspect. First, I'd like to know whether inserting Greek/Hebrew originals in parentheses is useful to anyone in this "Naming and etymology" section (at least we're not hit with it in the lead, as in the Chinese example I provided at MOS talk).
The lion's name, similar in many Romance languages, derives from the Latin leo,[3] and before that the Ancient Greek leōn/λεων.[4] The Hebrew word lavi (לָבִיא) may also be related,[5] as well as the Ancient Egyptian rw.[6] It was one of the many species originally described, as Felis leo, by Linnaeus in his eighteenth century work, Systema Naturae.[7] The generic component of its scientific designation, Panthera leo, is often presumed to derive from Greek pan- ("all") and ther ("beast"), but this may be a folk etymology. Although it came into English through the classical languages, panthera is probably of East Asian origin, meaning "the yellowish animal," or "whitish-yellow".[8]
Why is the Egyptian item not rendered in the original script? And why not pan and ther, for consistency?
Another issue: where there are several transliteration systems for a particular script/language, does the chosen system need to be specified? Is it necessary to place a diacritic over the o in leon?
Noetica and I have come up with a short, simple draft:
Except when giving etymologies, place original, non-Roman script in a footnote to avoid clutter in the main text.
Can you reply on my talk page? Tony(talk) 12:13, 25 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I'm afraid I have no idea what you mean. Who is Narson. Why is a paucity of syllables relevant to relocating clutter into footnotes?
"I do not see your agreement with Narson; your proposed mandate would be most unfortunate. Do you realize that Chinese, in any dialect, has only a few hundred syllables, or less? Distinct words can only be distinguished by the characters." Tony(talk) 01:13, 26 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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Thank you for all of your input at my first FAC, which was recently closed with the promotion of Flag of Germany to FA. Your comments and insight were instrumental in helping me get the article up to standard to pass FAC, and have also given me a lot to think about for when I attempt a second FAC in the future. Thanks again. - 52 Pickup(deal) 09:50, 26 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Please tell me where it was broken and I will fix it. I thought I caught everything and I just fixed Template:WikiProject Judaism. Epson291 (talk) 23:09, 29 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I agree it shouldn't have been closed, and would think that even if it weren't my article. But you know what would happen if I nominated immediately, don't you? People being people I'd get opposes just to punish for being so pushy. It's a fait accompli now, so I'll have to wait a dignified period of time before renominating. It's good though that you and other users continue to improve it! Kinda feel the topic doesn't really deserve the attention though ... Thanks again for your continued help! All the best, Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 15:42, 1 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I'll be here for another week, that's not a problem, though I'm going to bed rather shortly for this particular day. Worry that renominating it would piss people off. That said, I'm not averse to you renominating it, but maybe you could run that by SandyGeorgia first? Might come across as a slight to him/her if you didn't. All the best, Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 16:04, 1 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for your comments on my FA nom of Richard Mentor Johnson. Some of your comments were identical to ones I was about to make. Every time I make an FA nom, I get the same response: "There are too many errors that need fixing; I'll cite a few and leave you to find (or guess at) the rest. A thorough copyedit is needed." It's extremely frustrating, to the point that I rarely even try to get articles promoted to FA anymore. There are no doubt some areas for improvement in this article, but I don't think I'm that bad of a writer.
Complaining aside, if you can provide any help in terms of improving the copy, I'd really appreciate it. I think I must be too close to the prose to see its faults. And BTW, I haven't missed your comment regarding the chronology of 1850. I hope to take a look at that later today or tomorrow. Thanks again. Acdixon(talk • contribs • count) 19:13, 2 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for your continued work on this article. Your explanation of RMJ's education is quite good; certainly better than I could have come up with. It's taking a while to get through the Meyer work, but I'll keep adding/clarifying as I find things. Acdixon(talk • contribs • count) 20:34, 9 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Top of the afternoon to you. I read on your user page that you oppose any efforts to create conformity among Wikipedia articles, and took that statement into consideration before leaving you this message.
Is there any chance of my convincing you that a clear, concise, simple-to-reference style guide would be advantageous here? I know a thing or two about why style guides are created and how they grow into the monsters they sometimes are. I might be able to persuade you that some style guidelines are desirable.
If you're closed to the possibility, I won't waste your time or mine. I assure you that our audience is my primary concern. Not confounding our editors is my secondary concern. Let me know. --Laser brain(talk) 20:03, 2 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
All right. So what precisely is it that bothers you? That there is an unwieldy MoS, or that it gets cited on FAC pages? We could fix the former, but I'm not sure the latter is reasonable to try to control. Some reviewers are grammarians, some are subject matter experts, and some look for MoS breaches, or a mixture of the above. I don't think that will ever change. Do you think that the MoS should not be part of the "professional" standard of writing that's part of the FA criteria? I'm interested in understanding your position.
I write for a living. We have a style guide that, among other things, helps readers understand what to expect through visual cues. For example, we italicize the names of other documents; the result is that when our readers see italics, they know they are seeing the name of a document. Would my editor return a document to me with the comment, "NEEDS ITALICS"? You bet. Would you consider that a similar niggle to commenting on em dashes or commas? Or more to the point, would you consider it out of line? --Laser brain(talk) 02:40, 3 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Honestly, it sounds like people's behavior bothers you more than anything. I'm not sure any amount of MoS editing would reduce edit warring over the things you mention. --Laser brain(talk) 03:51, 3 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Sir, now we're getting somewhere. I like to connect that idea with "audience" because I think it is what you are implying. You may want to avoid spaced em dashes because they're annoying as hell for the reader to jump over while they're reading, right? You may want to keep the British English if the article is about a British topic and 80% of the readership will be British, even though your spell checker doesn't like "colour". *Shrug* I think it may be possible to hammer out something if we get everyone on the same page, which is that only the audience matters. --Laser brain(talk) 04:26, 3 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
So you agree that we should be writing to the 80%, not the 20%? You also bring up an interesting point. If you flat ask someone (who isn't a professional writer or editor) about their opinion on most style issues, they will likely respond, "I don't know." or "I don't care." Em dashes are a perfect example. However, I don't think that necessarily translates into "No style needed." The reason is that, like I said earlier, styles become visual cues for readers. If someone reads two articles that have unspaced em dashes, they will have no idea they are seeing unspaced em dashes but their mind will associated that visual with a pause in speech. If they see a spaced em dash somewhere after that, their mind will recognize something "off" which creates a disruption in their reading and an impression of an error. The result is a worse reading experience and less credibility for Wikipedia. I know this is getting sort of deep into rhetorical topics but... maybe you see my point. --Laser brain(talk) 14:09, 3 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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The Military history WikiProject Newsletter : Issue XXV (March 2008)[edit]
The March 2008 issue of the Military history WikiProject newsletter has been published. You may read the newsletter, change the format in which future issues will be delivered to you, or unsubscribe from this notification by following the link. Thank you. This has been an automated delivery by BrownBot (talk) 03:15, 3 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The article on Bangalore has yet again been moved to "Bengaluru". That move was done hastily and in disregard of the long-running controversy about it and past lack of consensus for it. (It has also been made irreversible by ordinary editors.) If your opinion is still that the article belongs at "Bangalore", please say so on the article's talkpage. -- Lonewolf BC (talk) 16:54, 3 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks .. I think ... frigg ... I didn't sort out the David thing. I was waiting for Karanacs to respond, but he never did. I'll need to get on it quick!. All the best, Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 16:11, 5 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
copied from my talk page (and there's another comment before it):
Oops ... I misspoke, I didn't mean "most of the things you say", I meant "most of the things I was talking about that you said"; there's a big difference. Your contributions are helpful, in general, as everyone knows. - Dan Dank55 (talk) 03:58, 7 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Please note that the reliance on this source has already been greatly reduced. I now have no more problems with it for precisely the reasons you stated. Awadewit (talk) 03:22, 12 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
On user:Aradic-en demand I have started request for arbitration [5] . You are involved party in this request.--Rjecina (talk) 07:42, 16 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Signpost updated for April 7th and 14th, 2008.[edit]
Sorry, it seems that the bot quit before completing its run last week. Here is the last two weeks' worth of Signpost. Ralbot (talk) 08:55, 17 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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You've inserted "for US-related articles, and where idiom requires it for articles written in American English, the main units are US units". Why not just "for US-related articles, and where idiom requires it, the main units are US units", since idiom may require it in other varieties too, since they have all switched to metrics at one time or another? Tony(talk) 16:02, 18 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
By "idiom", do you mean, say, "the four-minute mile"? No one's going to use metric units for that and convert them. Tony(talk) 16:13, 18 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Your recent change: "For US-related articles, and where idiom prefers it (especially likely for articles written in American English)"—US-related articles have to be written in AmEng, so it's already covered with the parenthesis. The idiom bit surely refers to other varieties. Tony(talk) 16:16, 18 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
So if your poundcake is in an AmEng article, no problem, it's pound. If we just say "and where idiom requires it" (your "requires" was better than "prefers", I thought), that means in in other varieties you don't say "464 g (pound) cake", if anyone were so out-of-touch as to try that. Tony(talk) 16:25, 18 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Some users requested a move to Aimone, Duke of Aosta. I opposed that and invite you to do the same. We have successfully opposed the move once before - we will do the same - but we need your help. Thanks for your participation. We have additional grounds now. See my discussion in the talk page, there was a Law decree on the Crown of king Zvonimir to which crown the right of rule has been transffered (like in the case of Crown of St. Stephen of Hungary). -- Imbris (talk) 00:38, 21 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
WP:Canvassing by Imbris. Please use your own good judgment and facts in making decisions. --DIREKTOR(TALK) 00:58, 21 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
A new naming convention for places in Slovakia is being discussed at User_talk:Elonka/Hungarian-Slovakian_experiment#Proposed_naming_convention. Your input will be greatly appreciated. Since these new rules might be later regarded as a precedent by non-involved editors (remember the Danzig/Gdansk case?), I think you will find this ongoing discussion and a poll interesting. Tankred (talk) 02:54, 21 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
It's been a long time since Laplace-Runge-Lenz vector, hasn't it? I hope you've been well. Foolishly or no, I took on the task of saving action potential at its FAR and, basically, the article is totally different 500 edits and a month later. I hope you like the new version! :) You voted Keep before, so I thought it only fair that I give you the chance to withdraw your vote, in case you didn't like the new version. If you don't like the new version, could you please leave me a list of things you'd like to see improved? That'd be great. Hoping all's well with you, Willow (talk) 19:26, 24 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, I thought of that. But what if it's 10% and the other ten of eleven are 9%? Or better, 40/30/30. No majority (which is > 50%)? Tony(talk) 16:53, 25 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
"The majority" doesn't work, because it assumes that in all cases more than half will be in agreement. Can you think of a better way of expressing it? Tony(talk) 17:33, 25 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Wow...I feel like you and I have really gotten off on the wrong foot. It wasn't my intention to anger or offend you or anyone else. I must tell you that I don't feel my minor edits warranted such a strong reaction, nor such a peremptory tone. I would really like to work together amicably, particularly as it would seem you are very close to this article, and take it upon yourself to overturn many, many good faith edits to it.
Ironically, my intent in attaching detailed explanations to the edits was not to seem snotty, but simply to prevent users from thinking my edits were too casual. I am trying to offer more of an explanation for my edits so they will withstand any potential criticism, knee-jerk reverting, or edit wars. Edit explanations aside, I am confident that the minor punctuation changes themselves were for the better, and you would seem to agree, albeit with an unnecessary technocratic parting shot. I know there are other ways to go, but this is an American article, and as you stated on my talk page, the usage I chose is "preferable" in this case. I don't think the bit about British usage was particularly relevant or civil.
I am further puzzled and a bit upset that you seem to have deleted a minor--if elective--change I made when I swapped the slightly awkward term 'wide-reaching' for the word 'extensive'. I don't understand why you would jump all over me for what you call a "declamatory" and "annoying" edit summary, and then turn around and make a seemingly retributory edit 'declaiming' my edit as a "cliche" compared to the so-called "vivid metaphor" of the term 'wide-reaching'. Incidentally, the main reason I wanted to change 'wide-reaching' in the first place was because the very next sentence uses the extremely similar phrase 'far-reaching'. It just sounds awkward to use the two nearly identical terms so very close together, so I hope that you will see fit to reverse your choice to 'undo' that edit.
I was driven off of Wikipedia a while back, like many people, by edit-warriors and self-appointed gatekeepers of certain articles. I hope that 'Alexander Hamilton' does not have such a gatekeeper, since I have every intention of making improvements to the article when necessary. I'm sure you know how frustrating it is to make genuine improvements to an article, only to have them reverted for disingenuous reasons, on technicalities, or because of an undisguised control-freak or POV editors.
If you feel you might be a bit too close to this article, that you might be a gatekeeper, perhaps it is in its best interests that you not edit this particular article for six months or so, so that other wikipedians can more freely infuse it with fresh ideas from a wider variety of perspectives.
I say these things now because Wikipedia is about the gradual improvement that is itself a product of the gradual give, take, and compromise among responsible, good-faith edits and editors. When one stifles new edits to an article, the effect on the article, the editors, and the Wikipedia community is just awful. The article suffers, and its editors are unnecessarily denigrated and locked out. I hope you will not take these comments personally, I simply feel that some people have so deeply invested themselves in Wikipedia that they sometimes need to loosen their grip on it from it from time to time in order to let it breathe and grow anew--especially where pet articles are concerned. Obviously, I am passionate about this, and I hope you took the time to read it since I took the time to write it, and because I would really like to avoid going through the same garbage I did last time since it is so totally unnecessary and painful. I will continue to make good edits. I hope you are not one to stifle other people's good-faith, positive, edits. For the record: I intend to make quality, well-sourced edits based upon the consensus of opinion about a given subject, as it should be. I will not be driven away by gatekeepers and edit-warriors ever again. If you should choose to continue to work on this article, please work with me. Please. I absolutely beg you.
Thanking you in advance: AdRem (talk) 01:39, 26 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hello,
The material in the lead on the Quasi War as it stands now is a reasonable summary given its relative importance. The Revolutionary War has only one sentence in the intro, and it is far more important than the Quasi War. To give the Quasi War more weight seems inappropriate. There is ample info in the Quasi War section that delves into all the details.
Again, 'extensive' is not supposed to be a metaphor. It is a plain old adjective. That being said, it is simply NOT a cliche, no matter what you say.
I must also reemphasize that by reverting to 'wide-reaching', the paragraph sounds awkward because only one sentence away, the nearly identical term 'far-reaching' appears. One of those terms needs to go in order to keep the paragraph somewhat readable. I would argue that 'far-reaching' is the one that fits better where it is, and that it is the one that should be kept--but take a look. I will restore my edit only because you have NOT acknowledged nor addressed this fact. I would appreciate it if you would not look upon this as a personal attack, or engage in retributory edits.
Finally, I notice you don't seem to like Hamilton very much. That's fine. Know that I will strive to be fair in my edits. I would like to see this article attain good article status within a year, but I can't see that happening unless the article is based on the consensus of the current scholarship on the subject. That means the more recent top-tier scholarship and biographies need to be given more weight than the old, since by their very nature the older ones had a less complete set of facts and tools with which to work, whatever you might think of their scholarship. That being said, it is also essential to include significant dissenting viewpoints where there is disagreement. However, I have noticed there is a lot of strange anti-Hamilton stuff cited place in the leads of certain paragraphs, or given undue weight overall. You don't seem to like any of the recent Hamilton scholarship. Do you prefer the older, outdated biographies? I really mean that not as a dig, but as an honest question. It has surprised me that this article is as contentious in some ways as the current political articles. Hamilton was a strange guy, but a fascinating one, and one who had great influence on the direction of this country. Let's each try to actively seek out and chip away at our respective biases, and thereby, do justice to what Hamilton actually was--whatever that might be.
For the record, my bias, my view of Hamilton is that he came from nothing to exert astonishing influence on the structure, direction and identity of the early United States. He was extremely intelligent, but deeply flawed. He was extraordinarily ambitious. He had a mercurial personality that led him--more than once--to make terrible mistakes, which were made all the more terrible and complete by the way his brilliant mind seemed to deal with everything in an exhaustive, comprehensive, all-in, all-or-nothing fashion. There's a lot more that could be said, but, so that you know where I stand, that is my view in a nutshell.
I hope you understand where I am coming from a little better, and that we can work together well to improve this article drastically over the long haul. Thanks again AdRem (talk) 20:12, 26 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I compromised with the word 'widespread' instead. This preserves the 'wide-reaching' quality of your desired term, while eliminating the near repetition that caused me to make the edit in the first place. I think that is a reasonable compromise--what do you say (assuming you have read my reasons for changing it above--that is important). AdRem (talk) 20:32, 26 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you very much for having a dialog, PMA--I think it helps a great deal. Again, in the interest of making my biases transparent, I must say that I do not share your negative opinion of Chernow's bio. By the way, if you have never read it all the way through, I can say that you would likely not regret making he time to do so. My view of his Hamilton bio is very close to that David McCullough, who calls it "Grand-scale biography at its best--thorough, insightful, consistently fair, and superbly written...a genuinely great book" or that of Joseph J. Ellis, who called it "a robust, full-length portrait, in my view the best ever written." Whatever you might think of Chernow's very, very detailed style (I happen to think it serves the subject matter quite well), I think if you look at his work again, you would be hard-pressed to find much if anything in his treatment of the subject matter that is even remotely unfair or slanted. He went out of his way to examine and all the new information available, and to analyze it exhaustively. He even commissioned genetic testing of some of Hamilton's hair to put to rest one of the many, many old rumors that found their way into many of the older bios. His scholarship is excellent in spite of the fact that he does not come from a history background, but a financial one. I have read two other Hamilton bios, but not Flexner's partial bio (it is only the younger years, right?). However, since you think it is good, I will make it a point to read Flexner's book as soon as I can. Just out of curiosity, would you be willing to share with me specifically why do you dislike Chernow's bio so much? I would honestly like to understand. Thanks again for the dialog. AdRem (talk) 19:18, 27 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I still say it's a shame you won't read Chernow, especially since he really is one of the very best for all the reasons I stated previously. The book flows smoothly once you get out of the very early years, for which there is so little information available. There are a few things that got by Chernow and his copy editor. I caught a few sentences or ideas being repeated a few hundred pages later, and a few tricky sentences, but that's really as bad as it gets unless you don't like his slightly wonky Yale/Cambridge English.
I also still say that if you read the whole thing, you could never, ever believe that Chernow is an "oleagenous apologist" for Hamilton. He simply isn't anything of the sort (as I already explained). Anyway, I do hope you change your mind and decide to read the whole thing, especially if you want to keep working on the article. Meanwhile, I will try to get a hold of a copy of the Mitchell 2-volume set, but it is so old that neither it nor the condensed version are in our metro area's public library system. For that matter the full 2-volume is so rare, Amazon only has a few used copies for about $90. Nonetheless, I will read it if I can find it for a reasonable price. I will take all the perspectives I can get. Later, AdRem (talk) 23:34, 27 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Haha. Well, it sounds like I'm probably not going to convince you that it's actually quite good. Well...one final try:
I am totally at a loss to understand how you can lambast something you have never read as dishonest and unreadable when you've never read it (or any of the many reviews of it I've ever read for that matter). The reviews really were universally positive, as I think they ought to have been. In addition to getting good, even glowing reviews from most of the major historians and biographers who did comment on it--including the two-time Pulitzer winner I already mentioned--it actually did get good reviews from the historical journals. I read this one a while back in the JAH.[[6]] And if there was a bad review of it, even in a historical journal, I never read it, and I would challenge you or anyone to provide one. I actually read a number historical journals at the time (I was an undergrad then). As I recall, one had a quibble about how the formatting of the footnotes. Honestly though, even that was in the context of a very positive review. I don't want to alienate you--especially since you've been decent so far--but to say that Chernow isn't a reliable source, that his work is garbage, or that it was condemned as such by anyone of note are charges that are totally without merit. I am totally open to seeing any that do condemn him, his book, his honesty, or his scholasticism in any meaningful way. Again, I don't mean any of this as a personal jab at you. I just had to do my best to defend an author who produced such a great bit of biography and history.
I still hope you read the book (preferably sometime before purgatory). I also still say that if you gave it a shot, you would get into it, and realize it is good, reliable, etc. Anyway, have a good one. AdRem (talk) 03:24, 28 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I still stand by what I said about Chernow and his bio. On another point, you removed Hamilton' s description as a "prolific writer". We could disagree about whether or not that belongs in the lead sentence (I obviously would argue that it does), but to say he wasn't a prolific writer within a generation of very productive writers simply isn't the case. He produced an astonishing amount of writing even compared to his contemporaries (during the same period of time, since he obviously died decades earlier than many of the Founding Fathers). Part of that was, of course, due to his job as superclerk for Washington, but nonetheless, Hamilton's relatively extensive body of written work is a pretty major theme in every AH bio I have read, and is at least mentioned in passing in many of the bios of his contemporaries--at least in those who crossed paths with him. I would go so far as to say is one of his defining characteristics. What do you say? I would really appreciate it if you would put it back yourself. AdRem (talk) 19:20, 28 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I have to say I am becoming a little frustrated that even though I am being as specific as possible in how I phrase things, and how I support them, you are not talking to me on my specific points where it is in inconvenient, but are slaloming around them. Again: disclaimer: I really, really don't mean any of this as a personal attack. I specifically did not want to argue on the total volume of work alone. I said: "(during the same period of time, since he obviously died decades earlier than many of the Founding Fathers)" As far as Washington goes, of course you know Hamilton wrote a huge amount of Washington's war correspondence under Washington's name. Hamilton's papers are not inordinately bureaucratic. He minted reports and fully-fledged plans for the institutions he himself dreamed up, as well as the tomes to support them, and so much more that you must already know as well as I do. I don't see why it should be necessary to grind this point out. To deny that he was a prolific writer for his generation (again:for the same given period of time) is a not sound position to say the least. I will find references. It is true. It is verifiable. The issue I put to you was whether or not you thought it belongs in the lead. Again, I say it does because it was such a defining characteristic of Hamilton's. Furthermore, it is presented as such all over Revolutionary and early American Bios. Surely we can agree that he was a prolific writer at least? If you can't agree on something as easily verifiable as that, then, no disrespect, but I have absolutely no idea how I or anyone else can have a substantive discussion with you on points of disagreement. I need to be able to have a reasonable discussion with you without digressions or getting bogged down in secondary, tertiary, or completely irrelevant side-issues. If you cannot believe the consensus of today's Hamilton bios, if you think that they are "an appalling wilderness", and substitute your own judgments in their place, then you know as well as I do that that is POV and Original Research (and that is absolutely deadly to the article's progress). You hold the truly unique position that Chernow's nearly universally-acclaimed bio--one often cited by top scholars and biographers as the "the best of all, a truly great book," etc.--is "imbecilic", "oleaginous apologetic written by an "illiterate, dishonest, Mammon-worshipp[er]." That you made the totally false assertion that Chernow was widely panned in the historical press is very troubling. What is absolutely frightening is that you could seem to care less that what you said was totally false.
I would like to work with you or anyone else on this article as long as they are not actively POV, not acting in bad faith, nor actively harming the articles in any number of ways. However, if you cannot set aside your extremely minority opinions about Hamilton and the whole field of study that surrounds him, if you cannot admit you are wrong sometimes, then you need to walk away from the Hamilton article altogether right now. AdRem (talk) 22:38, 28 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I appreciate your post on my talk page and agree with everything you said. It was unwise to have started a straw poll but it doesn’t surprise me in the least that someone started one. And I also tend to agree that now that one has started, it is best to participate. Francis Schonken said “I advise against vote-like procedures (now and probably also later)” and I quickly understood what he was talking about.
As I am here on your personal talk page, I will not mince words; I will speak the truth as I feel it. The most extreme elements of promoting SI (what I refer to as “SI Nazis” when I’m in a less charitable mood), and the proponents of the IEC binary prefixes are extraordinarily vocal and extreme and don’t represent the views of the vast majority of Wikipedia’s editors. They are using the visibility of Wikipedia and the access it affords any editor as a soap box to promote systems of measurement that only confuse readers. Warning flags should have been raised years ago when Wikipedia was the only damned place for a general-interest readership that was using the the IEC prefixes. You and I both know why this went on for so long: because a small, entrenched minority of editors and one active administrator gamed the system to block change. Wikipedia is absolutely broken beyond all recognition when it comes to affecting change for the good. Votes are the very tool this minority used for so long because the moderates aren’t as impassioned.
Having said all that, a poll has started. It was coming and it was only a matter of time before someone got one going. It just happened to be you. Fine. Once started, I believe it is incumbent upon all of us—including you—to drum up votes from the others. So many editors simply want to have an enjoyable time at editing on Wikipedia. They’ve had a belly full of the conflict that the most extreme elements seem to absolutely thrive on.
Finally, Fnagaton is doing the heavy lifting here. Though I agree that it is now time for me to participate in the vote, I will honor all of Fnagaton’s efforts and unflagging, long-term energy on this matter by waiting until he sees fit to vote. Sorry, I believe that is the right thing to do here. Greg L (talk) 21:27, 27 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
(copied from my talk page) Regarding WP:CANVASS: without ever reading it, I had anticipated that there must be such a policy and in the past simply sent the same message to all participates—even the “no” votes. That satisfies the spirit of the policy. I never let myself be hemmed in by piss-poor rules. And fortunately, there is no need to violate any rules in this case with even-handed canvassing. It boils down to being fair to all parties; doing the right thing. Greg L (talk) 21:40, 27 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Greg, I don't think Sept was directing that at you, I think he was talking to me, because I asked you to come vote. Sept, Greg had already voted, and then deleted his vote (and not because he intended to change his vote). I wouldn't think WP:CANVASS applies there, especially since I don't have any doubt about the outcome, but I could be wrong. I was only asking him not to get discouraged and give up, in this situation, because I think things are going better than he realizes. - Dan Dank55 (talk)(mistakes) 02:04, 28 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hi Septentrionalis, I suppose you meant your comment under Rembaoud's vote under modification F as an explanation of that option, but I think you misinterpreted modification E. E only applies to contexts after 1918, the "has or had a significant Hungarian minority" argument is not used in any option for contexts before 1918. There is a connection with option D. If D is rejected, the rule for "others before 1918" is:
the first reference of one name in an article should also include a reference to other names, e.g. "Eperjes (Prešov)" or "Prešov (Eperjes)"
the order of the names, and which name is used in the rest of the article is arbitrary. If a dispute arises, the name most used in the given context in reliable sources (see WP:NCGN) should be used first, and the other name(s) should be listed in parentheses at the first occurrence
If D passes, the rule for "others before 1918" becomes:
the first reference of one name in an article should also include a reference to other names, e.g. "Eperjes (Prešov)" or "Prešov (Eperjes)"
use the modern official name (=Slovak) as the primary name ("Prešov (Eperjes)" and later "Prešov" exclusively), unless it is established (and discussed and documented on the article's talk page) that a different name is widely used in the given context
Hope that makes it a bit clearer. Could you change your comment accordingly? MarkussepTalk 19:10, 29 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Alexander Hamilton: Founding the Federalists[edit]
Please don't make these retributory edits. There is a comparison to be made, and it doesn't need to be a pro-Jefferson or anti-Hamilton POV thing. We don't need the whole backstory of Freneau inserted. It doesn't help the paragraph, the section, or the article to digress so much. I am really striving to eliminate the digressions that have accreted needlessly over the years. Don't add more like it, please. Thanks AdRem (talk) 17:20, 1 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
You've been extremely helpful. Now can you help regarding the above capitalization? Hitler didn't publish such a pamphlet. I want to know exactly where the precise expression come from. --Ludvikus (talk) 16:42, 2 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
It's just a Copyediting issue. Don't you see the sloppiness in the Capitalization? Common, help me out. It's no big deal. I'm trying to get us to be exact and precise in the use of language on such an emotional topic. Why is that so difficult to understand? --Ludvikus (talk) 16:55, 2 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The Military history WikiProject Newsletter : Issue XXVI (April 2008)[edit]
The April 2008 issue of the Military history WikiProject newsletter has been published. You may read the newsletter, change the format in which future issues will be delivered to you, or unsubscribe from this notification by following the link. Thank you. This has been an automated delivery by BrownBot (talk) 01:57, 3 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I was surprised to see that you reverted my correction to this article's first paragraph, with an accusatory and false edit summary. I must remind you that the move proposal to move this article to "Franjo Tudjman" was closed as "no consensus", proving that not only the current name "Franjo Tuđman" was deemed valid on Wikipedia, as also widely used in the English language. Turning your frustration into disruption is highly reprehensible. Both "Franjo Tudjman" and "Franjo Tuđman" are acceptable spellings in the English language, as already mentioned at the top of the article. Having the first paragraph to state that this person's name in English is "usually spelled Franjo Tudjman" reflects an obvious point of view, easily disputed and therefore unsuitable for the article. Please do not persist in reinstating that statement, as it shall be treated as unilateral pov enforcement. Regards, Húsönd 01:02, 7 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
There is no such consensus, Septentrionalis. The statement you insist in inserting is blatant point of view. Please drop it, or I shall be forced to report your behavior for further analysis. Húsönd 01:15, 7 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
My position was not suppression of information, it was suppression of what in my view would constitute a blatant and undue point of view. I have fairly simple recall criteria, check here. Regards, Húsönd 01:18, 8 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for your edits, I had not noticed User:Tony1 had attempted to misrepresent the situation after the section had been archived. What a bad breach of etiquette he attempted. Fnagaton 13:28, 7 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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Why must you insist on lacing everything with snide, really downright nasty comments, and insults? If you don't like my edits, be respectful about it--it saves time and grief. I am not a partisan 'Federalist' or anything of the sort--nor is my writing. I try to write things that approximate the closest thing to the truth that a consensus of current sources can manage--like anyone else, I do not always succeed. When I do not succeed, I change it. I understand that you have a non-mainstream POV on Hamilton that you do not seem to recognize as such. We all have POVs whether or not we realize it, of course.
However, since you have repeatedly called Chernow's bio, "the worst", "dishonest and oleagenous", "terrible history", etc., and since the 'popular press', historians, and historical journals alike commonly cite it as among the best (if not as the very best), I would argue that you have an insurmountable bias on this particular article. As a result, I think you ought to recuse yourself from edting it. You seem to be completely unapologetic about your rather extreme, and self-described, bias. Would you agree that your rather unique disgust with Chernow's reliability, that substituting your own judgement about the reliability and suitability of sources in place that of historians and biographers makes you an unsuitable candidate for editing this article? If not, please explain why not. You owe that much to the article at the very least. AdRem (talk) 16:32, 13 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
You didn't speak to your own bias as I asked. It is your unique interpretation that Chernow and all the rest of the Hamlton bios have an "axe to grind". I would like you to speak to your own view that Chernow and much of the rest of the Hamilton literature is biased, because that belief goes against the overwhelming professional and popular opinion. Why do you think you should you be allowed to work on the Hamilton article when you are so far out of the mainstream popular and professional views? AdRem (talk) 18:26, 13 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
You still didn't answer for your unusual bias against Chernow. That quote, from Flexner, which was from a partial biography of Hamilton written when he was 89 years old--and, like many of your quotes, is from the preface. He grew up with the really old bios. What I am talking about the modern stuff, including Chernow. Chernow, like it or not, seems from press and professional reviews, far and away the favorite Hamilton bio--it is praised for its evenhandedness, regardless of your belief to the contrary. That is what I want you to answer for. That is what I think you ought to explain before you edit the Hamilton article anymore. I think that is a totally reasonable and simple request. AdRem (talk) 20:13, 13 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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Greetings! I have made a few improvements in the article for Samuil of Bulgaria as prescribed in your post-FA nomination summary. Do you think that it should be renominated and I would gladly accept any suggestion for further improvement (although it might be slow as my exams begin next week...) Regards, --Gligan (talk) 20:39, 16 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for your wishes: ) Yes, the article would definitely take several weeks. I hope you can help with the language and the English-language sources if you think that they are needed. The citation of Ostrogorsky, however, I took from one of the large volumes History of Bulgaria, not from his book which is not to be found in the library in the University - unfortunately it is a university of economics and there is not rich literature on history... I will continue to search in the Internet. --Gligan (talk) 21:43, 16 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you very much : ) --Gligan (talk) 21:49, 16 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I have added around twenty more citations of non-Bulgarian authors. Now the Bulgarian authors cited are 32 while the foreign ones (excluding the Byzantine historians) are 55 which I think is a good ratio. I hope that there should be no problems with the citations now : ) I have put "Samuel" everywhere. Another thing which I would like to ask you to do is to refine my rude translation of John Kyriotes' poem on the battle of the Gates of Trajan. That is, of course, when you find time. If you are concentrated on other articles right now, do it later but please don't forget. Best, --Gligan (talk) 16:07, 24 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
And what should I do then? --Gligan (talk) 16:18, 24 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The citations from Zlatarski are from here Chapter VI, 1., 2. and 3. The Bulgarian title is
История на българската държава през средните векове. Том I. История на Първото българско царство. Част II. От славянизацията на държавата до падането на Първото царство (852—1018), Васил Н. Златарски (I изд. София 1927; II изд., Наука и изкуство, София 1971, под ред. на Петър Хр. Петров);
meaning: History of the Bulgarian state in the Middle Ages Volume I. History of the First Bulgarian Empire. Part II. From the Slavinization to the fall of the First Empire (852-1018), Vasil N. Zlatarski (I ed. Sofia 1927; II ed. Nauka i izkustvo, Sofia 1971 under the edition of Petar Hr. Petrov --Gligan (talk) 14:43, 25 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I also found this among the references of one of Samuil's battles:
Златарски, Васил, История на българската държава през средните векове, том 1, част 2, Академично издателство "Марин Дринов", София 1994, ISBN954-430-299-9
Zlatarski, Vasil, History of the Bulgarian state in the Middle Ages, Volume 1, part 2, Academic edition "Marin Drinov", Sofia
Is the IBSN what you needed? --Gligan (talk) 14:43, 25 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Actually LOOK AT MY CHANGES BEFORE YOU BLANK ME! I addressed many of your concerns, and made additional beneficial changes to the article that you wouldn't dispute. Don't be rude, and don't lie, I didn't blank you, I removed the tags you throw around like confetti. Where there was a legitimate argument, I addressed it by changing a word or two. Your incivility is becoming extremely upsetting. AdRem (talk) 19:36, 18 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
If you looked at the entire edit, you would see what I added and what I changed. But you didn't. Most of my changes were in the latter edit section. But I really just want to put this whole mess to rest. AdRem (talk) 01:03, 22 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I was wondering if you would mind creating a stub about reprimands in the American military under the title Reprimand (American military) or some other analogous title. You suggested that this stub could be created on the Requested moves page. I would really appreciate it if you would create this stub so that I can make Reprimand a disambiguation page rather than a redirect to one particular conception of reprimands. It doesn't have to be anything fancy, just enough to justify the disambiguation page.
WP:CONSENSUS was considered primarily, as policy, but remembering the statement there Consensus among a limited group of editors, at one place and time, should never over-ride community consensus on a wider scale, so what you check then is guidelines and precedents. See Category:Yugoslav politicians for just a snippet of how Serbian names are generally treated in practice on wikipedia, notably Slobodan Milošević. Guidelines aren't policy; they should be considered of course, but it was proved that both forms were used in reliable sources. Serbian names aren't covered by guidelines adequately, and guys like me moving pages need stronger more unambiguous guideline and policy pages. But see Wikipedia:Naming_conventions_(Cyrillic)#Serbian (unhelpful) and the talk page at Wikipedia_talk:Naming_conventions_(Cyrillic)#Confirmation_for_Serbian_and_Bosnian.3B_a_note_about_Macedonian (more helpful) for how it was meant. It wasn't a case of just Serbian nationalists turning up and overwhelming the page as you might be suggesting, there were other good arguments, such as those by The Rambling Man. But seriously, in this particular case, the two options constitute the same name, one with diacritics and one without, so that that would be the most serious guideline consideration given absence of guidelines for Serbian names. And as you know diacritics are a bone of contention across the community for which no consensus has emerged on a wider basis. You can remind yourself of this by looking at Wikipedia:Naming conventions (standard letters with diacritics). I think you both know the vast majority of admins would have closed it as I did, but thanks for your concern nonetheless. All the best, Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 02:04, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
...of most of the sentence you just deleted at WP:MOSCAPS, but lowercasing pronouns does seem to be nearly universal in "persuasive" writing these days (whatever that is). Can we leave that in? - Dan Dank55 (talk)(mistakes) 18:35, 29 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Signpost updated for May 19th and 26th, 2008.[edit]
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The Military history WikiProject Newsletter : Issue XXVII (May 2008)[edit]
The May 2008 issue of the Military history WikiProject newsletter has been published. You may read the newsletter, change the format in which future issues will be delivered to you, or unsubscribe from this notification by following the link. Thank you. This has been an automated delivery by BrownBot (talk) 01:45, 3 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
You previously participated in a move request of ume. I have revived the request so please visit Talk:Ume#Requested move if you care to contribute. — AjaxSmack 16:12, 7 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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I replied on my talk page, if you'd like to continue the discussion. If not, that's cool too. Regards, Parsecboy (talk) 03:05, 13 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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I've reinstalled (is that right?) the merger on Foreign Office (Germany), because I think strongly, it schould be in one article. I post this only to inform you ;-) Greetings Sebastian scha. (talk) 11:04, 19 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I don't care much about ß anyway (in English, that is). Using the same word "Strass/ße" in two different spellings in the same paragraph strikes me as odd (maybe like colo(u)r in the same paragraph), but if interested parties have found such a compromise, I will not interfere with that.
As a side note, you can always revert my edits without asking my permission, I really don't mind, and I trust your good faith and judgmentJasy jatere (talk) 08:44, 20 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I think we could come to see each other as allies on some issues. Any group of co-workers has a tendency over time to support each other at the expense of the product and the customers, and that has happened to some extent at WP:FAC. I think that annoys you, and I think you've asked for my help at tackling "institutionalization". Let's explore where we agree before exploring where we differ. Are there any current articles at WP:FAC or WP:FAR that you'd like me to look at? I'm currently looking at the Everglades article. - Dan Dank55 (talk)(mistakes) 23:43, 20 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Okay, I've run several proposals by you, here and in email, with no response, so I'm going to take that as a "no". - Dan Dank55 (talk)(mistakes) 15:23, 26 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Listen if you don't have any source to back up your claim and if you don't expand the article yourself I will have to remove those tags as they are added without any base, solely on your personal POV that the article is not complete. I can suggest you a solution though. Open a new section called "Different views" or smth like that and the expand tag there but don't tag the whole article as the article is lengthy enough and well referenced.--Avala (talk) 15:58, 23 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
You currently appear to be engaged in an edit war according to the reverts you have made on Serbian-Greek relations. Note that the three-revert rule prohibits making more than three reversions on a single page within a 24 hour period. Additionally, users who perform a large number of reversions in content disputes may be blocked for edit warring, even if they do not technically violate the three-revert rule. If you continue, you may be blocked from editing. Please do not repeatedly revert edits, but use the talk page to work towards wording and content that gains a consensus among editors. If necessary, pursue dispute resolution. Jaysweet (talk) 16:16, 23 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Checking again, you are correct, you are currently on your 2nd revert, not your 3rd. (In my initial count, I counted the initial tagging of the article as a revert, which is not current) Still best to be careful :) You are also right that I was remiss not to warn the other editor; will do so now. --Jaysweet (talk) 16:30, 23 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
These draft proposals are all pretty pointless in my view. In 6 months time the paragraphs will be worded differently. Arguing the toss over the words "traditionally" or "conventionally" is merely polishing a turd. Jooler (talk) 23:46, 23 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
This is true (at the moment). It's the existence of the section detailing the 1937 invasion that is of more concern to me. Jooler (talk) 00:00, 24 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
If you spend time reviewing/reading the nominations, you'd be in better mind to avoid this boring way of starting the lead. So many of them were doing it, that is, until the directors started cracking down on it.
This list contains the largest settlements of the United Kingdom, ordered by population, according to
Certainly don't want a bolded "list" as a drifting island. The reader has just read the title; they know it's a list. We're trying to avoid the word altogether at the FLC room, since this is the prime opportunity to engage the reader with further information, not what they've just read.
If a list contained settlements, it would have to be hundreds of square kilometres in size. I think we're down to a computer monitor. One person.
Settlements of the UK. Hmmm, bit awkward.
For all of these reasons, your version makes it worse. What is your problem with the new version? Tony(talk) 16:06, 24 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Don't annoy me on my very own talk page. It amounted to a personal attack. Now, just be reasonable: the reader is faced with THREE statements that start more or less the same way. If you have a problem, take it up with the experts at FLC talk—namely, the Directors of FLC and FLCR, who are much in favour of stopping nominators (all list writers) from doing this. Note that the guideline in MOSLEAD has always given a way out of this. People at FLC have approved of my recent clarifications there for lists. Tony(talk) 16:25, 24 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I couldn't agree more. By the advice of a very wise man, I try not to play the "featured article" game any more. I once brought an article to that standard, and spent probably three times as long "jumping through hoops" as I did adding useful content to the article. My current philosophy (which I'm not very good at abiding by) is that one should only spend one's valuable time adding useful content to the Pedia, and leave it to the hoards of (false stereotype alert) spotty teenagers with nothing better to do to fight over whether your quotes should be curly or not, and other such Important Issues. Or in other words - if it doesn't matter, ignore it!
At the end of the day, a GA or FA mark next to an article is all very well if you want a pat on the back from wikipedians, but of minimal actual importance - I wish I'd spent my time enjoying the sunshine rather than replacing –s with −s to get a FA...
Back with records, citation templates save me and many others a great deal of time; if people are willing to go around converting plain text references to "citation"s, so much the better - but "real" editors - who actually add content - shouldn't be wasting their time even reading the MOS, let alone worrying about following it! Martin(Smith609 – Talk) 19:24, 24 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Discuss your change. I will go to the end on this with you if it takes that far. Discuss it or I will do what i have to do to make that article NPOV and improve your english first. 71.237.70.49 (talk) 15:22, 25 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
What is un-English about "World War 2"? Are you smoking something. There is no such thing as "novel" in wikipedia and I don't know what novel thing you are trying to create. 1939 or 1937 and 1931 are all matter of dispute. English are already eurocentric. I can provide plenty of sources in Japanese and Chinese that say it started in 1931 or 1937. We can exchange evidences and references. We should state both points because that is necessary. Calm down and think about this. 71.237.70.49 (talk) 15:37, 25 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Ok we disagree. I already wrote about this in the World War 2 discussion section. We should discuss this. No one monopolizes wikipedia with his/her opinion. Let's soundly discuss and get other's opinion. The disputed tag is good one. Let's talk. Onetwo1 (talk) 15:46, 25 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I didn't say "the World War 2" I said "World War 2." See discussion page. We obviously disagree. Let's get other's opinions. 71.237.70.49 (talk) 15:48, 25 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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Hi, you participated in a recent straw poll at Talk:The Great Hunger on a possible name change. Most of the editors that participated in the recent polls were invited to participate in the most recent, but as far as I can see you were not. Your opinion should still be heard. The editor who opened the new poll said this to the other participants. "This is a friendly notice that I have opened another straw poll, this time to find the names that editors are most opposed to. If you know of anybody who did not vote in the last straw poll, but who has an interest in the name debate, please feel free to pass this on. Scolaire (talk)". Regards Wotapalaver (talk) 13:53, 2 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
PS. The poll closed 36 hours ago. The result was move to Great Famine (Ireland). I posted friendly notice to everybody who took part in this poll (you didn't) on June 18, but Wotapalaver apparently "didn't have time" to pass it on until just now. Confused? I sure am! Scolaire (talk) 15:46, 2 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Could you take a look at this article and render an opinion at Talk:Conscript Fathers? Conscript Fathers currently redirects to Roman Senate, so you may have to look around in the page history to see the article's text.
I hadn't looked at Roman Senate until recently, but it sure looks like it needs some work... --Akhilleus (talk) 23:16, 2 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hiya. I was wondering if you could maybe walk away from the naming conventions debate for a short time and go easy on Prince of Canada, who is still quite new to it all. :-) Here's me trying to be the peacemaker, and as you can probably tell I'm not very good at it, but I don't like to see this between two good contributors that I respect. (It would be different if I hated one or the other of you, of course.) Deb (talk) 19:30, 3 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
He can do what he likes; I am no longer participating in that page, period. Bully wins. Same old story. Prince of Canada t | c 19:32, 3 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Prove him wrong! Deb (talk) 19:38, 3 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
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Vote at Fête nationale du Québec (Saint Jean Baptiste Day)[edit]
Hi, I've set up a vote to try and resolve this here. As you've commented on the issue already, I wanted to ensure you take the opportunity to vote. Gabrielthursday (talk) 01:08, 5 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The Military history WikiProject Newsletter : Issue XXVIII (June 2008)[edit]
The June 2008 issue of the Military history WikiProject newsletter has been published. You may read the newsletter, change the format in which future issues will be delivered to you, or unsubscribe from this notification by following the link. Thank you. This has been an automated delivery by BrownBot (talk) 19:58, 5 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
How do most articles deal with capitalizing kings and emperors, and with "7th century" vs. "seventh century"? I'm guessing I write "Nero, emperor of Rome", and I would think "Emperor Nero made a proclamation..." would be right, but how about "...signed by the [E]emperor Nero"? (Feel free to reply here.) - Dan Dank55 (talk)(mistakes) 13:25, 6 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Btw, good job at Wikipedia_talk:Naming_conventions_(names_and_titles)#Anglocentric. The page needed someone who knew the consensus on and concerning that page to say what the consensus was, without getting into a fistfight over it. It's really hard to deal with folks who are relatively new who engage in trying to change the rules for everyone else without asking around first. - Dan Dank55 (talk)(mistakes) 13:38, 6 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The "Aveni, Anthony F" reference refers to page 92, but the accessible pages at that link stopped just before that. I wanted to look at it to figure out what to do with this: "It is possible, however, that [the Greeks'] search for increased precision was not due to their interest in science, but rather their desire to imitate nature and the heavens, which formed the basis of their religion." I'm not a classicist, but my sense was that saying that it might be one but not the other doesn't paint the right picture; these two motivations were entertwined for the Greeks of that time. That is, science was to a large degree the pursuit of a way to understand nature and bring man in line with nature, especially for the Stoics. Thoughts? - Dan Dank55 (talk)(mistakes) 03:18, 6 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Odd, it was on googlebooks before; anyway, that's exactly what he suggested, with different wording of course (the author was proposing this view, not saying it was a fact). If you think it's out of place or doesn't make sense, then feel free to remove it, since it'll never be known for certain what their motivations were. · AndonicOEngage. 11:17, 6 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
When referring to "the abbot Richard of Wallington", do you prefer "the abbot's" or "Richard's"? - Dan Dank55 (talk)(mistakes) 19:59, 6 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I'm back, but only slightly. I simply cannot sustain the level of involvement that I gave during the WP:ATT debates. Let me know of anything you think may particularly interest me.
BTW, so far no one has yet commented on my move of GWH, let alone reversed it. We'll see what happens.
In a similar way, some strong Earldoms in strategic border areas were granted the privileged status of county palatine were created shortly after the Norman Conquest of England along the Welsh broder, but only that based on Chester survived for a long period. The term analogous with the continental count palatine (in German Pfalzgraf) but not so equivalent as the margrave.
Any clue what might be meant by the last sentence? Robert A.West (Talk) 19:04, 11 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for the reply. I straightened out the first sentence and eliminated the second. Robert A.West (Talk)
If I were writing the article from scratch, I would probably write "Kassel" and not even think about it, but as you have noted, I germanicize more than the typical monophone native speaker of English.Robert A.West (Talk) 02:20, 12 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Article whose FAC you commented on before, up for FAC again[edit]
Hi Pmanderson. I listed some MoS issues at Some MoS issues. Also, I added and populated some subcategories to Category:Wikipedia style guidelines in hopes of getting a better handle on what are official MoS' page and what are not. If you have some time, please take a look. Thanks. Bebestbe (talk) 20:55, 12 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
You are receiving this message because you have signed up for the Signpost spamlist. If you wish to stop receiving these messages, simply remove your name from the list. Ralbot (talk) 09:13, 13 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Interesting points on the actor/actress thing. One thing I wanted to digress on -- you mention chronology, self-identification, and genre as differentiators. Chronology and self-identification I get; curious as to how you think genre would influence this choice. Jgm (talk) 22:42, 13 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I am contacting you because you participated in a recent discussion at Talk:Julian the Apostate about changing the title of the page. That discussion closed, and immediately afterwards a new proposal was created to move the page to Julian. Please give your opinion of this new proposal at Talk:Julian the Apostate#Requested_move_2. --Akhilleus (talk) 19:31, 14 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
You might wish to contribute to a query on this here. Thanks. Tony(talk) 04:18, 17 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I need to sit down and fan myself. - Dan Dank55 (talk)(mistakes) 11:19, 17 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Sept, not that I'm needed as an interpreter, but FWIW, I think this is a genuine invitation, and I hope you'll join us. Ellipses come up again and again, and no one really gives a rat one way or the other how to write them...they just want to know what WP:MOS says so they can do it. I think some kind of simple guidance would be much appreciated by most. - Dan Dank55 (talk)(mistakes) 15:49, 17 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Dear PManderson, i saw a languistical remark of yours on Krkonoše and I wondered whether you would be able to help me out this little daydream of mine... In my opinion Ptolemy's Orcynian Forest could be somewhere around nowadays Krkonoše - at least east of the Sudeti. My question then is whether the Slavic Kr-kon- could in any way be derived from ancient (H)er-c/kyn-? Ofcourse this is all very Original Researcherish and I have no intention to add this to the encyclopdia - I 'm just curious. Hope you have an answer for me. Best regards, Notum-sit (talk) 13:15, 21 July 2008 (UTC) Never mind. Notum-sit (talk) 07:15, 24 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hi Sept! Are you interested in offering your input in the above discussion, concerning an ongoing edit war. Knowing your excellent knowledge on ancient Greece-related subjects, I thought that you may have sources or expertise on the subject, which would be highly appreciated. Cheers!--Yannismarou (talk) 17:03, 21 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Your comment on the article as a whole are also appreciated, since there are proposals for rewriting and cleaning up.--Yannismarou (talk) 17:04, 21 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Pmanderson, as you have been informed before, the first mention of the subject in an article must conform to the respective article's title. Repeated attempts to enforce otherwise are to be reverted as WP:POINT/WP:POV disruption. In fact, such persistence falls no short of vandalism and you may therefore be reported to WP:AIV or WP:ANI if you continue in this manner. Thank you. Húsönd 18:17, 22 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
You are receiving this message because you have signed up for the Signpost spamlist. If you wish to stop receiving these messages, simply remove your name from the list. Ralbot (talk) 06:04, 27 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I just thought I would mention that I am disappointed you have not put a copy of the tiger on your user page on my user page gallery for my efforts at Jon Corzine.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:LOTM) 21:29, 28 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I have added some further comments. Thanks for your responses and for your eagerness to produce a new draft. Nevertheless, I still fail to understand your evoking FARC and dispute resolutions procedures at such an early stage. But, it is your right to do so.
To the essence of the problem, I'll just repeat that Shapur is not the same case with Khosrau; in the second case the threat was much much bigger, and this is a fact. And I'll insist on that!
And, by the way, I am not Iranian! If you want to accuse me of nationalism, label me as Greek nationalist! It fits me better! If you refer to Zbuhr, you are totally unfair towards him. The only thing he hasn't done all this time contributing to the article is to defend Iranian nationalism. He's an expert on the topic, with much profounder knowledge than both you and me, and he does not deserve such comments.--Yannismarou (talk) 15:43, 29 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Ok, I'll wait until Zbuhr comments on your change, which are now better than before. But I still believe you're making a huge mistake by comparing Shapur with Khosrau. There is a different level of threat! In the first case yes the eastern territories were occupied as well, but in the second case also Egypt was occupied, Persian troops reached Chalcedon, and, most importantly, at the time eastern territories were all the empire! Don't you see the difference! By occupying eastern territories, Khosrau had most of the empire under his control. It is not the same case. Your edit, in the way you phrase it, is still historically inaccurate.
I'll ask for third-party input. Let's "globalize" a bit our discussion.--Yannismarou (talk) 15:53, 29 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
This article is a featured article. Reviewed by third party user. Even you have problem with a sentence. You can't add POV tag for the whole article. You should first read the related section, raise your concerns there. --Larno Man (talk) 16:02, 29 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
^ Ditto. Please do not call my edit "vandalism" and remain civil. I have justified my edit in the talk page. Regards. - Fedayee (talk) 21:49, 29 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I've blocked you for 24 hours for a clear 3RR violation at Roman–Persian Wars. The four diffs that I've blocked you are as follows; [8][9][10][11]. I also see a few other partial reverts from you within the last 24 hours as well. Please think about discussing on talk pages rather than reverting in the future. Ryan Postlethwaite 00:07, 30 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
{{unblock reviewed|1=The first is not a reversion; the last reverts vandalism. These are in any case spread over 23 hours, which should show I did not intend to revert war; I would have waited if I had thought myself in danger. (I will also pledge to leave the article alone for 24 hours; I tagged in preparation for walking away from this disaster.|decline=Looks like you are trying to push the boundaries to me "These are in any case spread over 23 hours". Also, note that you are blocked for edit warring not violating 3RR. Block stands — Tiptoetytalk 01:47, 30 July 2008 (UTC)}}[reply]
For the record, I agree with Ryan's advice; I tagged to get the attention of third parties to my arguments on the talk page. SeptentrionalisPMAnderson 01:50, 30 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Fair enough, the first diff was not a revert, but the last certainly wasn't vandalism. As I said, you've also made a number of partial reverts taking you over the 3RR ([12][13]]). Ryan Postlethwaite 01:51, 30 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry, I missed your comment that you're willing to stay away from the article for 24 hours. Is this something you still agree to? Ryan Postlethwaite 01:52, 30 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Nope, you were blocked for edit warring, not fron discussion. Please just stay away from the article page itself. I'll unblock you now - I'll try and find any autoblocks, but if you find you can't edit still, just post here and I'll take another look. Ryan Postlethwaite 02:03, 30 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for withdrawing the oppose.--Wehwalt (talk) 19:37, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The Military history WikiProject Newsletter : Issue XXIX (July 2008)[edit]
The July 2008 issue of the Military history WikiProject newsletter has been published. You may read the newsletter, change the format in which future issues will be delivered to you, or unsubscribe from this notification by following the link. Thank you. This has been an automated delivery by BrownBot (talk) 02:31, 3 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Dear Pmanderson.
As far as I understand you have places two tags on the "War breaks out" chapter. I looked carefully through the chapter and I couldn't understand reasons that rised your concern. Would you please explain me or (refer to) reasons for doing that? Thank you in advance, --Paul Siebert (talk) 22:51, 4 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Dear Pmanderson. Could you please have a look at the modified version of the "War breaks out". If you are satisfied with it, please remove tags. --Paul Siebert (talk) 15:58, 17 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Pmanderson, this is a gross abuse of the admin recall process, please remove it from the talk page. It's not only canvass, as it's also very rude. You have already participated in my voluntary recall process, you are not allowed to advertise it. Húsönd 00:57, 5 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The words I object to, are the ones that compose your request for other users to join you on my recall page. That's canvass, or pointless canvass as a matter of fact (as I would simply dismiss any canvassed participants in my own recall process). As for your judgment, I do not find it within my array of concerns. Regards, Húsönd 01:45, 6 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Changing your position when no one else on your side has is fairly convincing evidence of independence; thank you. But these conversations are inundated by sockpuppetry; I am glad to be wrong for once.
My position on Bjorn Borg differs because the evidence of English usage differs; if three encyclopedias used Đ for Djokovic, my opinion there would differ also - but the Britannica is the only one I know of that notices him, and they use Djokovic. SeptentrionalisPMAnderson 20:10, 3 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
You can't deny that both arguments you brought up for Djokovic work for Borg as well. I now have a firm position about this problem: "Björn" and "Đoković" are certainly correct, but they should be transliterated (unfortunately impossible as you will see further down), so people who don't have a clue how "đ" or "ö" sound, can eventually get an idea how to pronounce it when they see them for the first time. For example, I didn't have an idea how "ö" is pronounced until I learned German; before that I was simply neglecting the umlaut. Furthermore, orthography consistence and logic is important; if you try to consistently use Latin alphabet for languages which use it (but have diacritics), it doesn't help you a lot (because reader most of the time just gets confused), and you get a huge inconsistency with non-Latin scripts.
Now, transliteration "dj" for "đ" is ubiquitous but really said - "j" in English is *never* pronounced in a way that is suppose to stand for in "dj". Better transliteration would have been "dy"; if you try to "merge" together these two consonants, you are really close to pronounce it correctly. However, I guess it is too late for "Dyokovich" by now, same as for "Bjoern" after years of neglecting umlaut. As Serbs use to say, "no matter how you turn around, the ass comes always behind" ;o) --D1111 (talk) 20:38, 5 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
We discussed the other day the trend towards having ``Title`` be an article with a hatnote pointing to ``Title (disambiguation)``. I am becoming convinced that this practice tends to make Wikipedia worse. Here is my proof:
Let specific articles be ``Foo (bar)``, Foo (fubar) and Foo (foobar), and let Foo (disambiguation) point to each. Consider WLOG the options (A) Foo -> Foo (disambiguation) and (B) Foo -> Foo (bar).
We have the following cases of interest:
1) A reader specifically interested in Foo (bar).
2) A reader specifically interested in some other Foo, with sufficient knowledge of the subject to realize when he has ended up on the wrong page.
3) A reader specifically interested in some other Foo, but either knows little about the subject so may be confused if he lands on the wrong page, or is a newbie unfamiliar with hatnotes, or both.
4) A careful editor who wants to link to Foo (bar).
5) A careful editor who wants to link WLOG to some other Foo.
6) A careless editor who wants to link to Foo (bar).
7) A careless editor who wants to link to some other Foo.
Reader 1 is overwhelmingly likely to enter "Foo". Option A he must navigate a dab page: one extra operation. Option B he ends up at Foo(bar) with no extra operations.
Reader 2 is overwhelmingly likely to enter "Foo". Option A he must navigate a dab page: one extra operation. Option B he ends up at the wrong page, must realize this fact and read the hatnote, click on the link to the dab page, and navigate it: three extra operations.
Reader 3 is like reader 2, but the cost is much greater. Under the rule "Don't bite the newbies," this cost should also hold greater weight. Confusion is very possible -- I recall one news article that mentioned visitors to Philadelphia, PA who want to see where the apostles walked.
Accordingly, Option B offers a comparitive advantage to experienced readers only if Reader 1 is significantly more than three times as common as Reader 2: how significantly depends on how common you think Reader 3 is.
Careful editors (4 and 5) will likely enter "Foo", check the link and then disambiguate only if needed, or if they are paranoid about moves.
Editor 4 will spend extra effort in option A.
Editor 5 will spend the same effort regardless of option.
The effort needed to check the link is vastly greater than that needed to modify the link to a piped link, so while there is an advantage to B, it is tiny.
Careless editors (6 and 7) will enter "Foo" and be done with it, either because they did not bother to check, or because they simply did not see a dab page.
Editor 6 ends up with a valid result with either option at the same effort. Readers who follow the link are covered under case 1 above, and a bot can later identify the link so it can be disambiguated.
Editor 7 ends up with a valid result in option A, but a wrong link in option B. A reader following the link with either be case 2 or case 3 above, but no bot will ever discover the problem.
Since I believe a wrong link that will not be discovered by a bot to make Wikipedia worse, while making a reader navigate a dab page is merely inconvenient and does not affect the quality of Wikipedia itself, I conclude that choosing option B makes Wikipedia worse and should be avoided.
I see that the Russians have invaded Georgia proper. I also found an editor who feels [14]
that "Russian forces advance" sounds like peaceful transit. I agree that "invade" is more direct, so preferable, but still. And at the same time.
Oh, and in the "gimme a break" category, a user tagged as unsourced a stub a mere 90 seconds after creation and while I was still in the act of looking up Template:citebook for syntax. I grumbled at him, and he remarked that "readers must be warned..." I explained, now only in low dudgeon, that this was not the purpose of the tag. Since I have added two references, such as they are, the point is now moot, but I thought you would be bemused. And I thought that editing obscure articles for a while would help my sanity. Robert A.West (Talk) 16:22, 11 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Please don't revert people based on the Manual of Style[edit]
The Manual of Style is not the consensus of Wikipedians. Most of it is what has managed to get revert warred in by a handful of editors, most of them with a project to reform the English language, which few of them are qualified to do. This is particularly true of logical punctuation, which is largely supported by Commonwealth editors who don't know any better, and by one American editor who has admitted that he is paying off his grievances with his liberal arts professors who marked him down for using it. SeptentrionalisPMAnderson 21:10, 17 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
This is a novel interpretation of WP:MOS. Right up front, it says:
Editors should follow it, except where common sense and the occasional exception will improve an article. Before editing this page, please make sure that your revision reflects consensus.
What I said to Felicity4711 after reverting her changes to Satellite of Love (Mystery Science Theater 3000) was a carefully considered description of the quotation marks guidelines that long ago reached a consensus that has not changed in many years, despite nearly continuous efforts to do so. When I participated in style policy discussions a few years ago, I spent six months researching both the archived discussions back to the beginnings of Wikipedia and a dozen or so of the most prominent U.S. and British professional style guides. (I admit I had little success getting my hands on Canadian, Australian, or Indian English guides.) When I revert style changes as I did, I typically check the current WP:MOS and/or related pages to see what if anything has changed. If it's the same as the consensus I recall, I stand by my effort, as I do here.
I assume you came here because of the current Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style#Quotation marks discussion, which doesn't say anything (right or wrong) that hasn't been said a hundred times before. You've got twice my edit count for almost as long a time as I've been here, so I don't really understand your perception that these style arguments are merely bickering coming from "Commonwealth editors who don't know any better, and by one American editor who has admitted that he is paying off his grievances with his liberal arts professors who marked him down for using it". Whoever the current people at WPt:MOS who argue against long-standing guidelines may be, the true community support for these hard-won compromises goes back many years and is available for anyone willing to do the research. Don't make the mistake of thinking that the handful of editors making arguments at any given time represent the masses of historical or current-but-silent editors watching the proceedings. ~ Jeff Q(talk) 00:57, 18 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
There have been nearly continuous efforts to change it because it is not the consensus of Wikipedia as a whole, nor ever has been. If there has been one objector every two months for the last five years (and that estimate is certainly low) then the discontents outnumber the contents; which is more than enough to dispell the claims of consensus. (Silence does not imply consent here, as usual on Wikipedia; it implies not knowing the point is at issue, or not caring.) SeptentrionalisPMAnderson 17:45, 18 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
You seem to be dismissing the thousands of people who aren't foolish enough to get involved in such acrimonious debates. ☺ Not every person has, or is willing to commit, the time to argue about style issues. But these pages are much more widely read than the copious talk-page material would suggest. Whether these silent observers are deliriously happy or just grudgingly accepting of the status quo, they vastly outnumber the people participating in the discussions. And there is considerably more than one different person every 2 months who tries to explain to the objectors that their arguments have been gone over a hundred times before, that they should review the reams of material that cover all the good reasons for change and for stasis, and that they should learn why some of these basic compromises have been made. Only then can they be expected to be taken seriously, and only as yet one more person to tally why they believe style issue X that they dutifully learned in their parochial education (as all English-speaking education necessarily must be) should take precedence in a global encyclopedia that, like many other prominent educational publications, has a right to have its own style guidelines. You're welcome to keep hammering at me on this, but I've got other things I'd rather be doing. ~ Jeff Q(talk) 18:47, 18 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I voted to delete, but there are a scattering of GHits (~3K before duplicate elimination, at least half of those of the "don't risk a new cold war" variety) and a book. Your threshold of notability is lower than mine -- I'd be interested in seeing what you think. Robert A.West (Talk) 03:05, 18 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hello, Pmanderson. You have new messages at J's talk page. You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.
my bad, changed the phrasing per your recommendation to avoid ambiguity of what is an estimate and what is confirmed. keep up the good work Anatoly.bourov (talk) 22:38, 20 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Looking at this edit, you say "undoing date warring." As far as I can see there is agreement on the talk page that International Dating is appropriate for this article, and the only one warring is you, contrary to WP:DATE. --Pete (talk) 03:45, 22 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Looking at the Manual of Style, we see the guideline in full:
Articles on topics with strong ties to a particular English-speaking country should generally use the more common date format for that nation; articles related to Canada may use either format consistently.
Articles related to other countries that commonly use one of the two acceptable formats above should use that format.
Both Georgia and Russia use day-month-year format. An article on a conflict between them should use this format, and I can see no good reason for you to change all the dates in the article to American Dating format. Looking at the talk page discussion, there is only one voice in support of American dates. You. Consensus is clearly against you. Please restore the dates to their correct format. Regardless of your own strongly-held personal preferences, this is a community and we follow established standards and consensus. --Pete (talk) 10:45, 23 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
If you continue to edit-war on this article, contrary to the MoS and the consensus on the discussion page, you will be reported and banned. --Pete (talk) 00:17, 24 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Signpost updated for July 28, August 9, 11 and 18, 2008.[edit]
Sorry I haven't been sending this over the past few weeks. Ralbot (talk) 05:41, 23 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
You are receiving this message because you have signed up for the Signpost spamlist. If you wish to stop receiving these messages, simply remove your name from the list. Ralbot (talk) 05:41, 23 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I noted we had no article on this story -- I thought you would be amused by the associated memory. I think this can remain a two-sources stub for a while. Robert A.West (Talk) 05:09, 26 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Oh, and you might be interested in New Great Game. I don't know how I feel about the AfD. It looks a lot like novel synthesis and sounds like a neologism, on the other hand, a fair amount has been written about the subject, so it may just need cleanup to avoid the first problem and renaming to avoid the second. Thoughts? Robert A.West (Talk) 05:53, 26 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
MoS wording on national ties to date formats[edit]
Could you hang off on the delete button for a while, please? I'm not opposed to change - I just think that this is something that needs a pretty high level of consensus, considering the long history of conflict on this topic. Conflict that was intense enough to cause the autoformatting hack in the first place. We seem to have consensus on removing autoformatting, but you appear intent on restoring the conflict that caused it. Just cool it for a while, OK?
I'm writing a new section that will include all the proposed wordings of the past week - including yours - and we can talk about it in an atmosphere of co-operation, working towards consensus. If consensus is for your version, then I'll go along with it, but your repeatedly changing the text without consensus is just going to get people's backs up. Maybe that's what you want, but at the moment passions are pretty high on the autoformatting removal, and stirring the pot needlessly is not helpful. --Pete (talk) 01:40, 27 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I would agree that a dispute exists for the fact that Pete is still making diff disputed changes without a consensus being reached. However, if his continued activity is the way that consensus works in disputed instances, then I have made my point and will await the outcome, if any. I maintain that where countries are not native English speakers, the established dating convention of the article should override any attempt to change it to reflect the way the country would write it IF they were native.--«JavierMC»|Talk 18:47, 27 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I do not disagree that if an article on English WP has a distinct British or American "flavor", then the article should follow a dating convention to reflect the distinction. What I do object to is having to determine the dating convention of non-English speaking counties and making a third convention of articles dating styles, solely based on what they use. This is English wikipedia. Pete's arguments are, in my opinion, so "out there" that any argument in opposition reminds me of arguing with one of my children why it is prudent to wear a coat when it's 35°F outside.--«JavierMC»|Talk 21:19, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I noticed your comment on the St Pancras poll. Which proposed naming convention were you referring to? There are so many different proposals and polls going on at the moment that I may have missed something! Thanks, JRawle (Talk) 22:36, 31 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
"Welcome to St Pancras International. This is a Network Rail owned and managed station with train services provided by First Capital Connect."
Hi there. I noticed you contributed to the debate and survey on the proposed move to St Pancras International. I saw the above static message on the platform monitor screens on the Low Level platforms (Thameslink) this very morning. I have taken a piccy and will upload as "Exhibit O" hopefully within the next 12 hours. best, Sunil060902 (talk) 10:14, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The Military history WikiProject Newsletter : Issue XXX (August 2008)[edit]
The August 2008 issue of the Military history WikiProject newsletter has been published. You may read the newsletter, change the format in which future issues will be delivered to you, or unsubscribe from this notification by following the link. Thank you. This has been an automated delivery by BrownBot (talk) 00:06, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Please do not revert the Macedonia entry because you are wrong. The UPU lists Macedonia under T not M on the members page here. That is a verifiable source and to put in anything else in incorrect. Thanks ww2censor (talk) 17:53, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hey, we have Wikipedia:WikiProject Middle Ages. Regarding MOSNUM, I find it pretty tedious to be told one month to do it one way, and to be told the next (as if I was supposed to know the new ancient truth) to do it another. Regards, Deacon of Pndapetzim (Talk) 03:08, 6 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I was certain that this mantra linked to an essay or guideline section somewhere, but I can't find it. Advanced search comes up empty. WP:WORSE and suchlike come up redlinked. Any ideas? Robert A.West (Talk) 15:42, 6 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Since you brought it up, my point of view is that Wikipedia generally does an excellent job of disambiguating as far as this matter is concerned (a matter that generally concerns me little, except for the usual exaggeration by either side, to be honest), something that most other media don't, at all, so some objections might be far-fetched (though, I have to admit, the request that every mention of the country include "Rep. of" isn't nearly as outrageous as you're suggesting -no matter, I didn't pay much attention so I might be off a tad).
In any case, I thought your comment exuded sheer arrogance. Some of your concerns, sure, might be understandable but the way you chose to express them was, frankly, highly unacceptable. It was doubly disappointing after having noticed your contributions to the project in the past (now and then, here and there; cheers to that, "you people" give this any credibility it has). Regards. 3rdAlcove (talk) 00:47, 7 September 2008 (UTC) (PS: Nice ending touch here. ;-)[reply]
Hi, you removed some information from this article. I am assuming that this was a mistake, as the content wasn't redundant. The original tilers placed blue stones to sign the floor, but the people who fixed the tile during the renovations placed heart-shaped stones to sign the floor. GaryColemanFan (talk) 20:22, 7 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
...if I were to ask you to stay calm and civil in discussion. I think we are making solid progress on the talk page at WP:DATE. I quite reject your latest accusations, which I find bizarre and unhelpful. You shouldn't attempt to edit-war when there is no consensus in a long and detailed discussion amongst many editors for your own personal POV. Just cool it, please. We'll get to general agreement in due course, and I can't see any great need to change the long-standing wording. You contributed to the page for a long time and left it alone for nine months - why do you now feel that it is so completely wrong that you want to edit-war over it? --Pete (talk) 23:41, 7 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I do believe that your move to purely provide a link from MoS to MOSNUM for the numbers section should be extended to all of the sections in which both pages duplicate each other. Either that or straight transclusion from MOSNUM to MoS. Your thoughts? Tony(talk) 03:55, 8 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
OK, I'm quite happy to push for links to MOSNUM. Not so happy about attempting summaries of these sections at MOS; it's very hard to summarise them without excluding important details (let's face it, it's all about detail). So are you fine with that? If so, are there any exceptions where one might transclude fully? Tony(talk) 13:08, 8 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Your recent cotribution to DYK suggestions was not well phrased ot in my opinion constructive (re Daniel Kievsky). Please be gentle with your criticisms. If there are errors in articles then surely it is best to fix them. Positive advise that you offer the author on his/her talk page should be welcomed and appreciated. Thanks for your time Victuallers (talk) 15:16, 8 September 2008 (UTC) thx for your considered reply. Good luck Victuallers (talk) 16:43, 8 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I'm going to be spending all my time over the next few months trying to do something useful with the style guidelines. My approach will be to make a list of all the issues currently under discussions, and all known arguments about those issues, somewhere in my userspace, and if people find that useful for arriving at style consensus, great.
I hope I can get your support on the process, but I'm not asking anyone for support on positions. While I'm doing this project, I have to largely avoid taking positions on anything, to avoid both the reality and the appearance of favoritism. - Dan Dank55 (send/receive) 16:00, 9 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Signpost updated for August 25 and September 8, 2008.[edit]
You are receiving this message because you have signed up for the Signpost spamlist. If you wish to stop receiving these messages, simply remove your name from the list. Ralbot (talk) 21:05, 10 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hi - I'm interesting in your comments on User:Dmadeo/DA which I've been noodling with. Take a look if you're interested, please leave brief, civil and constructive feedback if you'd like. I think it addresses all the concerns I've seen brought up, but I could use some other opinions before I point it out to a larger audience at MOSNUM Thanks dm (talk) 05:29, 11 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I see you insist on voting with a -1 vote on a poll where the editors are asked to vote on a 0–4 scale. It is not too much to ask that you abide in good faith by the same rules the other editors are abiding by. The final tally can’t be skewed any extra points beyond these bounds. I might be tempted to vote for option C with a 5 or a even a 6 vote. But I don’t consider myslef *special*, so I wont. Greg L (talk) 01:51, 12 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
You currently appear to be engaged in an edit war according to the reverts you have made on Serbian-Greek relations. Note that the three-revert rule prohibits making more than three reversions on a single page within a 24 hour period. Additionally, users who perform a large number of reversions in content disputes may be blocked for edit warring, even if they do not technically violate the three-revert rule. If you continue, you may be blocked from editing. Please do not repeatedly revert edits, but use the talk page to work towards wording and content that gains a consensus among editors. If necessary, pursue dispute resolution. Jaysweet (talk) 16:16, 23 June 2008 (UTC)
Done - You should be ready to go now. Ryan Postlethwaite 02:03, 30 July 2008 (UTC)
