Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Miscellaneous/2013 May 4

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May 4

What is the symbol?

The symbol is here. I saw it a few times and wonder what it is. --Justin545 (talk) 01:55, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

See peace symbol. Dismas|^(talk) 01:57, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

Thank you! --Justin545 (talk) 02:03, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

Resolved

As our article says, it's a representation of the letters "N" and "D" in the Semaphore code, for "Nuclear Disarmament". The symbol is actually the logo of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament. Alansplodge (talk) 08:27, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

It also neatly resembles the footprint of a dove. Ah, the 70s, where are you now? -- Jack of Oz ^[Talk] 08:38, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

Also that of a vulture. They've gotten a bad reputation, but they live in communes, don't mind smelling "natural" and almost never kill to eat. Doves have always struck me as ivory tower types. InedibleHulk (talk) 17:39, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

"Ivory tower" - now you are finally talking my language. Come on down. Or rather, up. Or rather, just keep away and leave me alone. -- Jack of Oz ^[Talk] 20:12, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

They (the 70s) are in the North Laine, Brighton & Hove. Itsmejudith (talk) 11:12, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

Yes, it rather got appropriated didn't it. The original CND crowd were often rather earnest middle aged folk in gaberdine mackintoshes, who wouldn't be seen dead without a tie. Alansplodge (talk) 20:02, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

Right wing types in those days fancied that it looked like the track of a domestic bird, and said it was, "The sign of the American chicken". ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 20:58, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

And don't forget, the broken upside down cross, therefore a symbol of .....Satan? Gzuckier (talk) 05:26, 5 May 2013 (UTC)

Given that CND was founded by an Anglican parson and a Methodist minister, I think that's rather unlikely. Alansplodge (talk) 08:31, 5 May 2013 (UTC)

Double Brackets Edit Summary

When placing double brackets around a word what would an appropriate or useful edit summary be? I searched Wikipedia for an answer but could not find one. All I could find was something about "red links" aka WP:RED but what I'm inquiring about is creating "blue links" when placing brackets around a specific word/words. 24.90.154.201 (talk) 04:15, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

If the word I doubly bracketed was 'gizmo', I'd write "linked gizmo". It's as simple as that; that's all you're doing, linking it to an article. -- Jack of Oz ^[Talk] 05:02, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

I usually say "wikilinking", but "linking" is fine. Looie496 (talk) 05:16, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

Please don't post the same question in multiple places. The help desk is the right place for this question, and it is already posted there. RudolfRed (talk) 05:32, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

Jeremy Forrest

What is the current situation regarding Jeremy Forrest, the man who allegedly abducted a British teenage girl last October? This story says his case was listed at crown court on 11 January, but I can find no information on what, if anything, happened in court that day. If he has not yet been tried, when will he be? --Viennese Waltz 06:52, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

Googling "Jeremy Forrest" gets lots of results saying that he pleaded not guilty, and one (not RS)says he is currently on remand waiting for his trial to begin. He is also appealing against his extradition from France. Rojomoke (talk) 07:47, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

fundraising

Could I post the same project on both Indiegogo and Kickstarter to increase the number of people that see it and the amount of money we can raise, or is that just 'not done'?

213.104.128.16 (talk) 10:52, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

My guess is that it would violate the TOS of some such sites, but not all. ¦ Reisio (talk) 12:22, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

I'm not sure about Indiegogo - but I don't think it violates Kickstarter rules. I'm posting here as a once-failed, twice-wildly-successful kickstarter veteran myself (my most recent project finished last night after raising 700% of goal and $60,000!). Bottom line is that I'd strongly advise against doing this.

The problem is that these services are not like eBay or Amazon store fronts. They aren't intended to be places to sell things (although they are often used that way). The culture amongst "backers" (we don't call them "customers") is entirely different - and the way that projects become successful is different too.

If you think that these sites are providing free advertising, you're severely misinformed. I assumed that with my first kickstarter - and it failed miserably. Your project will be visible on their front page for less than an hour...and unless you're lucky enough to become a "staff pick", or you are one of those crazy viral million dollar projects, you almost certainly won't appear there again until the last half hour of your campaign.

The way they work is by word of mouth. You have to work hard to get some critical number of people to see the site - then you have to get them sufficiently interested in your project (not your product...your *project*) to make them want to go out there and promote it for you. If you get that right, then a few hundred people will promote the heck out of your project to all of the blogs, forums and social media sites imaginable - and if what you're doing is good - then hundreds more will join in and a snowball effect will deliver all the promotion you could possibly hope for. If your project "goes viral" then magazine and major news sites will pick it up - and yes, you can earn millions of dollars.

But the key here is that you're entirely reliant on your own efforts to get that initial ball rolling - and then you're reliant on those people to get the word out.

By splitting your project over two or more sites, you'll achieve the following:

• You'll halve the number of those initial people at each site. You only have so many friends and family (or whatever) and by dividing their efforts in two, you halve the size of the message going out there. This could easily cause you to fail to reach that "critical mass" of backers that make the project snowball and take off.
• You'll confuse the message. When news of your project reaches these key blogs and forums - people will be confused by the tangle of messages pointing them at different URL's.
• You'll upset the community. These key backers who'll promote you are generally very savvy in their chosen crowd-funding site. If they see that you're double-dipping, they may well give up on you. I know I would!
• Running a Kickstarter (or an Indygogo) project is an insane amount of work...at least if you do it well. For our last projects, my partner and I had to write a significant news item every two days - with meaningful content - and we personally responded to over 600 postings from our backers with over 200 messages, answering their questions, being friendly, joining in their jokes, being amusing, interested and so forth. Doing all of that twice would simply halve your ability to be helpful and responsive...which is death to a small project.
• If you set your goal amounts realistically - then this is the minimum you need in order to achieve your project. By splitting your backers over two sites, you run the risk that you fail to make goal on either of them...or (possibly much worse) you might make the goal on one and fail on the other - getting only half the funding you need, yet still being on the hook to complete the project rewards. That's a very dangerous situation to be in! If you set your goal amounts unrealistically - then your backers will be suspicious because (at least in Kickstarter) you're asked to explain how you'll use the money to start and complete your project. Either way is very bad news.
• Indygogo and Kickstarter are subtly different - but the result is a CONSIDERABLE issue for some kinds of project. In the case of our second Kickstarter, in order to produce our rewards, we had to purchase a $10,000 piece of equipment - give 10% of the funding to Kickstarter and pay postage to ship the rewards (which turns out to be about 20% of our costs). So we had to earn a minimum of $10,000+$2,000+$1,200 (naively)...so we needed a $13,200 minimum. If we fell even $1 short of that, it would be a disaster.
  • Kickstarter was perfect for us because it says that if you fail to make your goal by even $1, you get no money at all and are not obligated to provide rewards. Great! Either we get our money and have a business - or we don't - but we're not in trouble because of doing that
  • .Indygogo gives you whatever money is raised no matter whether you meets your goal or not and if you fail, it requires that you either complete the rewards anyway at whatever personal cost - or that you return the money to your investors yourself...which is bad news because they use PayPal and that service requires you to pay the credit card service fees...so you'll actually have to pay money to PayPal if you fail.

This means that those two sites are best suited to different KINDS of project. Kickstarter is great for starting a new business from scratch...you either succeed or fail - but the price of failure is nothing whatever. You are not taking any risks on board - except that you might screw up your cost estimates or something. Indygogo is better suited to an established business that knows that it can make and sell just one reward and still make a small profit no matter what...so no "goal" is really needed. You can't be both of those things. Savvy backers will notice that and call you out on it.

• You have to become friends with your backers. They need to understand that you're a living, breathing human being - someone they like - and especially someone they can trust. They are taking an considerable risk by backing your project...many projects fail and most people who back multiple projects will eventually hit one that screws them over and never delivers it's rewards. So they are super-careful to check you out. Reputation is everything. Many of them hang out on both Indygogo and Kickstarter - so the news that you're promoting your project on both sites will be known and written about on both sites within a day or two. I strongly suspect that they'll see this as a breach of their trust...rightly or wrongly...and they won't like it, even if you are up-front about it. The viral promotion aspect of these sites would swiftly be poisoned as the news that you're not a nice person (rightly or wrongly) spreads as fast as the news of your product. Bad news travels faster than good...your personal reputation will soon be in the toilet - and not only this project - but every other one you try to launch afterwards will be tainted.
• The terms of service of both Indygogo and Kickstarter allow those sites to kill a project at any time without giving you a reason and with no right of appeal. You accept those terms when you create your project - so you have no legal recourse. When they cancel a project, you lose everything. So if someone at either site doesn't like that you're doing this (and I can certainly see that they wouldn't like it) - they can kill your project stone dead regardless of what their rules say. Worse still, every new project has to be "approved" by them before it gets posted...and after once pissing them off like that, they might never approve another of your projects in the future. These sites are not democracies and they aren't places where you can apply their terms of service like a legal document. They are privately owned and their owners have a perfect right to do what the hell they like. They can (and often do) kill projects without anyone ever knowing why. You're taking a risk here. Once you've had a project killed - your backers will be disgruntled and are going to wonder why - and your personal reputation is in the toilet again - and now you won't be able to start a new project in the future without a great deal of resistance.

So I think that splitting your project is a dumb idea. You won't get twice the backers - but you will get twice the workload. Don't do it. SteveBaker (talk) 13:37, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

perfect answer, thank you. I think in my case kickstarter is the way to go, if I can't get at least the initial costs it all falls apart. though, interestingly as it would be an expansion of an existing idea, the cost of producing and shipping at least some of the rewards is effectively just a slight discount and a different manner of advertising for my existing sales, which so far have only reached a few people. 213.104.128.16 (talk) 15:04, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

Again though, Kickstarter won't bring you more than a handful of sales unless you can self-promote it enough to get the ball rolling. We failed to understand that on our first project - and we got about $900 during the hour or so the project was on the front page...then nothing. For our second project - with a very similar product - we teamed with another company who produces complementary products to ours and ran a joint promotional competition. They supplied a 250 person opted-in email list and we donated the prizes. We got about 800 entrants. On the day that the competition finished, we started the kickstarter and used the excuse of announcing the competition winners to send email out to all 800 entrants. Of those, perhaps 50 or so pledged to the project - nowhere near enough to reach our goal - but they liked our pitch and enjoyed interacting with us - and they posted out to several important forums...which brought in more people...which caused more blogs, tweets, reddit's, forums and other social media to notice us. We hit our $12,800 goal in just a few days - and we rolled in about 300% over-goal at $42,000 after 30 days. Once we'd completed shipping all of those rewards, we ran a second kickstarter with a new line of products - but with our good reputation for doing what we promised, we met goal within a few hours - and went about 700% over-goal at $60,500 last night.

So in my experience, it's all about:

• Getting that initial collection of enthusiastic backers.
• Giving them incentives to promote you (eg: If we go 200% over goal, we'll give every backer a free widget! If we go 300% over goal, we'll improve the product by making it out of Kryptonite!). They'll want the free widget and the kryptonite version - so they have an incentive to push out the word.
• Being a nice person who comes across as honest, generous, friendly and generally likeable. People will work for you for free if they like you! Your project video is crucial for that reason...we filmed ours with crappy lighting in our kitchen and ad-libbed the whole thing - but we were funny and "real" and very, very human. People loved that more than a professionally made glitzy video.
• Delivering on every single promise...even if you made it in error or in haste. A corollary to that is be *VERY* careful about what you promise...if you promise every backer a free T-shirt, then expect to get 10,000 backers at the $1 pledge level!

SteveBaker (talk) 15:32, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

I didn't read much of the discussion between you and SteveBaker but I would note I agree with SB that it's unlikely the plan violates Kickstarter's TOS per se. I doubt it violates Indiegogo TOS either. Note in the case of KS, there are a large number of people particularly in the video gaming category who have crowd funding campaigns from their own website using PayPal. These campaigns are usually primarily targeted at people who cannot use Amazon (for US campaigns) for whatever reason such as having no credit or debit card but do have access to PayPal funds and that particular reason also applies to UK campaigns. That means most of the campaigns are focused around their Kickstarter efforts. However this isn't universal, for example Star Citizen's campaign started on their website, and their total collected outside when they closed was higher than from KS at the time. Since they've continued their crowd funding efforts after, the amount collected outside KS is now even more. Other projects have done other sometimes controversial things. E.g. while Shroud of the Avatar's fundraising primarily happened on KS, a lot of the discussion was on their website (they also used live video streams and developer chats which were linked from their KS). You may remember I said 'per se' above, the reason for this is because in KS's case and I strongly suspect in Indiegogo's case (whether you use flexible funding or fixed funding), even though neither is intended as a presales platform, you are still required to complete your project and fulfill promised rewards. Again in the KS case, if you fail to, you're supposed to return funds, or at least explain what happened to them. What this means is actually untested AFAIK, there have been a few failures but so far no one have taken the project creators to court. In other words, if you're going to run a campaign on both, consider what you will do if you met your target on one (I'm presuming fixed funding for Indiegogo), but not the other. Will you have enough funds? If you will have enough funds, this means your total collected if both succeed would potentially be double what you need. This may be an issue in that since most people aren't going to back both and there's no guarantee you'll get more exposure or more support (in fact as I think SB has higlighted you could get less), you could end up with both failing when if you'd just run one you would have succeeded because of the split in support. Of course if you don't have enough funds if only one succeeds, your problems are fairly obvious. (In cases where for some reason you don't really need any additional funding, as I presume is the case for Indiegogo flexible funding campaigns, this isn't an issue but bear in mind people may be less likely to support you if they feel they you don't need their money at all or alternatively they may think you are up to no good. In any case, it's important you are honest with your backers and potential backers.) Most projects that accept PayPal outside KS have waited until they've met their goal before opening up PayPal for these reasons. Nil Einne (talk) 21:42, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

Good thoughts! I agree that opening up additional ways to *PURCHASE* your product while the Kickstarter is running are just as dubious as running a campaign on two sites at once. Opening up online sales once the Kickstarter is over is something that a LOT of backers ask for though - and we will be doing that, but only for a limited time.

There are really two distinct cases here:

• Projects (like ours) where we have to slowly manufacture the rewards and ship them out as we make them (typically in first-to-pledge is first-to-deliver fashion). The more people pledge and the more widgets we sell, the longer it'll take for those rewards to get done. In this kind of project, backers are justifiably nervous that any business activity whatever outside of Kickstarter will delay the day when they get their rewards. So proudly announcing that you're selling stuff online will just get people upset with you.
• Other projects, such as (say) producing a stage play or writing a book have the exact same delivery date no matter how many people pledge. In that case, nobody should be too concerned if you've found other ways to fund your project outside of Kickstarter because any additional money you get will not make their rewards any worse, or any later.

So in our case, we are VERY careful to specify that making rewards for our backers takes precedence over any other commercial activity. So for our online store, we'll only open it for a few weeks - and orders received that way will go to the back of the queue for our manufacturing process. In effect it's just as if the project had run for a couple more weeks...but we can get started with ordering equipment earlier than if we'd just added two weeks to the Kickstarter project duration.

As for failed projects - or horribly delayed projects...there are a lot of them out there. Some failed because the project owner made stupidly rash promises...others because they simply hadn't thought through the costs of doing what they claimed they'd do. There are a few that were outright fraud...but those are very few indeed. Mostly, backers feel sorry for the project owner - and give them a spectacular amount of leeway...especially if the owner is trying to get rewards out. That's what makes Kickstarter different from just buying things online. As a backer, you are (mostly) getting a new business venture started...you have to be aware that businesses fail - and that project owners are fallible. You actually have to do your homework.

Here are some typical failure modes:

• Here, for example, is a guy who made crazy promises. Several people tried to tell him that what he was doing was unrealistic - but he pushed on with it anyway. Fortunately, he seems to have come to his senses within days of the end date of the project and cancelled it - so nobody lost money - but his backers were less than happy about it.
• Here a guy promised more than he could reasonably achieve. He seems to have spent all of the project funds without completing the work he promised and is now selling stuff to online customers before he's finished sending rewards to all of his backers. Now he's close to a year late on some unknown percentage of his reward shipments. About half of his backers are angry and demanding their money back...the other half are patiently trying to help him get through it. The degree of tolerance and support from these people is amazing given the ineptitude of the project owner.
• This one was an outright scam. The project owner stole pictures from other projects - lied, cheated and generally abused the system - he was almost certainly going to take the money and run. Fortunately, backers noticed before the project ended and Kickstarter pulled the plug on it in time.
• This one seems to be a rather sad case...but it's quite notorious. The project owner contracted a company in China to make his product - and they ran off with his money - and his hugely expensive steel molds - and may even be making his product in competition with him. He tried his best to recover the situation - trying to raise more money to pay for new molds, etc. But in the end, the stress of the situation caused him to suffer some kind of a breakdown. Some of his personal friends came in to try to help him out - and even started manufacturing his reward products with a 3D printer - very, very, slowly. Two years after the project ended, people are gradually getting their rewards...but it'll take many years for the project to complete...if it ever does. It's hard to know what the project owner could have done differently.
• This one - which is still in progress - looks like a complete "no-hoper". The projects owner is trying to sell what looks to be a few bits of foam polystyrene stuck to gether for $100! It's a complete non-starter...
• This one was a case where Apple prevented the project owner from making his cellphone charger gizmo. He earned $140,000 or so - and now has to return that money to his backers. Sadly, Kickstarter took 5% and Amazon credit services took between 3% and 5% - so he's going to be around $14,000 in the red at the end. There is a message for business owners here!

Our own second kickstarter (here) was successful - 300% over-goal - but we badly mis-estimated the time to complete the rewards, and we are finishing with the last shipments about 2 to 3 months late. This is absolutely typical of first-time businesses - around 70% of Kickstarter projects are late in delivering rewards. We were too "gung-ho" about being able to ship sooner just by working harder - but even working 12 to 14 hours a day, we were horribly over-optimistic. However, we were unfailingly honest with our backers - we kept them informed, and we made steady progress. They understood - and not a single one of them complained...that's the nature of the game.

However, in our most recent Kickstarter, we're an established business - seeking to expand our product range and to double our production capacity. I suspect we'll be held to higher standards (and justifiably so) - but with what we learned from the first successful venture, we're being much more hard-nosed about what we're capable of achieving...and reward shipment dates are around 8 months for our last backers. But again, so long as you're open, clear, honest and up-front - backers will understand.

SteveBaker (talk) 15:13, 5 May 2013 (UTC)

Caffè latte vs. café au lait

What's the difference between caffè latte and café au lait? --107.207.240.46 (talk) 18:58, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

According to the article Latte, in general it is just two different ways of specifying the same thing. But, in the US, apparently, "au lait" could mean use scalded milk. RudolfRed (talk) 19:03, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

And according to the article Café au lait: ""Café au lait" and "caffè latte" are used as contrasting terms, to indicate whether the beverage is served in the "French" or the "Italian" way, the former being in a white porcelain cup or bowl, the latter in a kitchen glass and always made from an espresso machine, whereas "Café au lait" might be espresso or dark coffee based." Personally, I'd rather have a nice cup of tea, but there's no accounting for taste is there? Alansplodge (talk) 19:54, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

I like how the Dutch call it "koffie verkeerd" (incorrect coffee). If I can ask two follow-ups, what's supposed to be incorrect about it? And is there any evidence that France stole the idea from Italy (or vice versa), à la Flaming Homer? InedibleHulk (talk) 01:42, 5 May 2013 (UTC)

It is likely a play off of the drink caffè corretto ("proper/correct coffee" in Italian), which is a shot of espresso with a shot of liquor. If one substitutes milk for the alcohol, that might well make your "coffee correct" into a "coffee incorrect". -- 71.35.99.144 (talk) 16:04, 5 May 2013 (UTC)

Actually I think it means "corrected coffee" (meaning that the liquor corrects the taste of the coffee). --Lgriot (talk) 09:21, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

Also not to be confused with Café Olé, which I think is Mexican coffee... --Jayron32 04:03, 5 May 2013 (UTC)

I'm surprised that we don't have an article on a proper "milky coffee" - hot milk (microwave or saucepan) with a big spoonful of instant coffee and two or three sugars. Much better than this foreign muck made from beans! Tevildo (talk) 12:06, 5 May 2013 (UTC)

Agreed, but it has to be full cream milk ("milk wi' nowt taken out"). Adding sweetened condensed milk makes an even richer drink. Dbfirs 15:40, 5 May 2013 (UTC)

Sad, very sad. -- Jack of Oz ^[Talk] 19:50, 5 May 2013 (UTC)

Now I've seen Wikipedia from Alpha to Omega, impressive! ^{Market St.⧏} _{⧐ Diamond Way} 07:01, 6 May 2013 (UTC)