User talk:Lquilter/Archive 009

NOR Request for arbitration

Because of your participation in discussions relating to the "PSTS" model in the No original research article, I am notifying you that a request for arbitration has been opened here. I invite you to provide a statement encouraging the Arbcom to review this matter, so that we can settle it once and for all. COGDEN 00:04, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

singular they?

My comment ("I've been brain-washed against the use of the singular 'they'") was in reference to my Emma Goldman userbox, which reads "If this user can't dance with Emma Goldman, he doesn't want to be in your revolution." I wish I knew how to write a gender-neutral version, but my English teachers drove home the point that one never writes "If this user can't dance with Emma Goldman, they don't want to be in your revolution." ;-) — Malik Shabazz (talk · contribs) 09:28, 15 December 2007 (UTC)

Re: WP:RFAR

Hi Lquilter. I've reverted your last few edits to Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration, since you are not supposed to add comments to other people's sections. If you wish to comment, please feel free to add your own statement. --Deskana (talk) 16:25, 15 December 2007 (UTC)

No need - I was half regretting commenting anyway. --Lquilter (talk) 16:27, 15 December 2007 (UTC)

EG

I was hoping to finish my rewrite in the next two hours or so. Any chance I could just get done with what I was doing, and then have you review it? I'd appreciate it. Cheers! – Scartol • Tok 17:10, 15 December 2007 (UTC)

I"m happy to review it, but I can't promise a time. --Lquilter (talk) 17:12, 15 December 2007 (UTC)

I definitely understand. Mostly I was hoping to avert future edit conflicts (which I just had with the voting section). – Scartol • Tok 17:15, 15 December 2007 (UTC)

Sorry about that - edit conflicts are frustrating. --Lquilter (talk) 17:22, 15 December 2007 (UTC)

Fanny Imlay

I am currently working on the Fanny Imlay article. Happily, Janet Todd has just published a biography of her, so an article can actually be written. However, I am running into a problem with the language. As you are well aware, women used to be referred to by their first names and "Mrs" in historical writing for a very long time and it was rather denigrating because it didn't put them on the same level as men who were referred to by their last names. Unfortunately, I am replicating this problem in the Fanny Imlay article (I can't even decide whether to call her "Imlay", "Godwin" or "Wollstonecraft" - these names all end up referring to other people). There seems to be no good way to refer to everybody by their last names (especially since their last names shift - Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin becomes Mary Shelley, for example). I have followed Todd's biography in naming conventions, but I am not particularly happy with the result If you could offer some advice on this matter, I would greatly appreciate it. Please note that the article is a bit of a mess right now - it really is a rough draft. Awadewit | talk 20:02, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

Hi Awadewit! Fun topic. I'll look in on the naming thing. (Names are often a plague in these articles, I find.) --Lquilter (talk) 20:29, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

• I guess I should post these notes on the Talk:Fanny Imlay article ... --Lquilter (talk) 20:33, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

Susan B. Anthony

Hi Laura - just here to let you know that there is a heated discussion brewing on SBA's talk page. Best—G716 <^T·_C> 05:08, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

I'll keep a weather eye out. Tx for the notice. --Lquilter (talk) 17:56, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

Always consider the source

Please look carefully at the context of how "always consider the source" was used, as it no longer has any meaning in the current edit. —Viriditas | Talk 06:28, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

Oh, great. I can see you are in librarian mode now. I'll wait until you're asleep, then. :) —Viriditas | Talk 06:37, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

What does that mean? I am always in librarian mode! Actually librarian / lawyer, which is the worst combination for persnickety text-fiddling, ever! ... As for the first comment, I have to say that I didn't think it had much meaning where it was. I thought perhaps in the general first paragraph it would be a helpful admonition. --Lquilter (talk) 06:39, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

I see what you are trying to do, and maybe I can work around it later to bring back the original intent, which was to consider the secondary source used to interpret scientific research. It wasn't intended to apply to primary sources (and I can source that too). Always consider the source is used in the context of secondary sources reporting research and the errors that often occur. As for the "translation", please do not add that again. I'm discussing it on talk, and I hope you'll visit. —Viriditas | Talk 06:44, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

Good night, and get some sleep.  :) —Viriditas | Talk 07:46, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

How dare you "struck teh sentence"! You are obviously trying to drive me completely crazy! It's working... :) —Viriditas | Talk 09:20, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

Just wanted to let you know that before the night is up I'm going to try to fix the "consider the source" material and restore the passage. I can source the "primary sources in the sciences" bit as well; I don't find it confusing. You may not have noticed, but the problem isn't with primary or secondary sources: it's with tertiary. See if you can figure it out. Hint: newspapers and magazines... —Viriditas | Talk 09:29, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

Newspaper sources were one of the things that led me to the whole NOR imbroglio. I had hoped that there would be clarity in the policy language that distinguished between editorials and professional journalism published in the same source. An editor suggested that the only significance was the source; I feel strongly that simplistic labeling of a journal or newspaper as "primary" or "secondary" or even "reliable" will greatly confuse people. The individual piece of writing that is being cited is the thing to review for reliability. An editorial published in the New York Times has different standards of reliability -- even basic fact-checking -- than professional journalism. Its journalism has standards and fact-checking; the NYT might screw up the application but they're there. An editorial doesn't typically get fact-checking in most publications. Editorials and journalism have different levels of reliability. That applies whether the content includes original previously unpublished research or not. ... Aha. I think this is one important reason that the PSTS model is not always helpful. --Lquilter (talk) 15:16, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

Sorry to make you nuts, V! I'm really, earnestly, trying to understand and make sure we're all on the same page. Sorry if I'm being particular! But as you know there are a lot of people and a lot of different ideas and I think it's better to be absolutely certain we all know what we mean we know we want to say, if you know what I mean. --Lquilter (talk) 04:20, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Em dashes

(Since this doesn't apply to EG specifically, I figured it best to reply here.) As a reader I feel that punctuation should serve to help me break down the elements of the sentence and make sense of what's being said. Unspaced em dashes feel like they're rushing me along into tangential clauses, without letting me "catch my breath" (metaphorically, of course). I used to be in the habit of – like you – using spaced em dashes, but then I learned that it's supposed to be either unspaced em or spaced en. Since the spaces are essential for me, I switched to spaced en dashes. It's part of my relentless addiction to typographical aestheticism, which began when I first discovered that my Macintosh LC could print different fonts. It's all been downhill since then. =) Cheers, and thanks for all your work on Emma. – Scartol • Tok 20:08, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

Interesting and thanks for taking the time to spell out your thoughts. The en-dash is a relatively new plaything for me -- in law school journal editors are quite particular about hyphens, en-dashes, and em-dashes -- but I personally prefer the length and solidity of the em-dash when used in a sentence. However, like you, I feel that the spaces are important, and I like how you described the rushedness of non-spaced em-dashes. (It also screws up line breaks in HTML, which is probably one of the practical reasons behind my adoption of spacing.) So I've just resigned myself to being "not correct" with my spaced em-dashes in my less formal writing. I'd never enforce it on anyone else, of course. ... I really do appreciate your time in laying this out; it's a lovely geek indulgence to contemplate typography. --Lquilter (talk) 20:16, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

There are myriads of closet typography geeks whom the Macintosh liberated to indulge in this pleasant and harmless hobby. I hadn't realize how not-alone I was. --Orange Mike | Talk 04:19, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

Ohmygod -- un-spaced em-dashes?!?! When I become dictator, they shall be strictly outlawed! Cgingold (talk) 04:13, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Who knew they were so unpopular? And, did someone announce a font-party here on my talk page? Not that I'm complaining! --Lquilter (talk) 04:18, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Typographic nerds will get a real kick out of Behind the Typeface: Cooper Black. – Scartol • Tok 12:54, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Catching up

Hello, Lquilter... First, apologies for not responding to your notes on my talk page. I've been taking a rest from CFD stuff, but now I'm doing some catching up (including one of my own that almost got renamed without my even knowing about it!). Anyway, I've added comments re Category:Worker's NGOs and Category:Joke religions. And a new proposal re Category:Natural sciences (which I think you've skipped so far) oops, don't know why I said that! :). Regards, Cgingold (talk) 04:28, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Drama

The whole area seems odd the few times I've looked - see the "main article" Twentieth century theatre or Category:20th century theatre. But Brecht stuff gets churned out by the yard. Johnbod (talk) 22:43, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Twentieth century theatre - ouch. That's stubby. That's like the definition of a stub. I like how each bullet point has a single Great Man and his contribution. Brecht has a fanclub, I guess. There's other stuff on Modernism but it's not really as detailed as it should be, IMO. Sigh. --Lquilter (talk) 22:50, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Pinkerton

Sorry, didn't notice it had it's own page. As such, the origional is fine :) Larklight (talk) 21:56, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

Category:Cuban contemporary artists

Hello, Lquilter ... since you participated in this CfD, I wonder if you would care to comment on this posting at WP:COI/N regarding the plethora of unsourced articles created by ArleArt (talk · contribs) to populate this category that they created ... Happy Editing! —72.75.72.63 (talk · contribs) 18:04, 23 December 2007 (UTC)