User talk:Stephen Turner/archive8

John Warr

Thank you for further referencing the article! I've left a thank you on Talk:John Warr too for both editors who helped. TransUtopian 18:21, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

W G Grace

Please do not describe my actions as stupid. There is nothing more stupid than the pedantic use of full stops all over the place.

Furthermore, use of full stops after initials and abbreviations is NOT a convention and certainly NOT a consensus, except among the handful of Wikipedia members who once discussed the subject and who are hardly representative of the full membership, let alone the real world. In the literary and business world, full stops are disappearing fast and true convention is to write either W G Grace or WG Grace. The latter is probably most common since texting began.

If you reproduced a full cricket scorecard on here and used the players' initials as per normal scorecards, that would mean writing a total of 44 names over four innings. Plus umpires. Would you actually go through the lists and religiously apply full stops, perhaps a hundred or more in total, just to meet Wikipedia's current "convention"? Even more so if you used initials for fielders and bowlers too, as some cards do. And for a real world example of how to present players' initials in a scorecard and in a team list, see: BBC card.

As you can see: Younis Khan c E C Joyce b J W M Dalrymple 47 and not Younis Khan c E. C. Joyce b J. W. M. Dalrymple 47. The England team is : A J Strauss, E C Joyce, I R Bell, K P Pietersen, P D Collingwood, J W M Dalrymple, M H Yardy, C M W Read, S I Mahmood, J Lewis, S C J Broad. Not a full stop in sight until you get to the end of Broad's surname. Modern business writing follows the same convention except that sometimes you will see JWM Dalrymple.

Full stops are an anachronism. They do not add value. They waste the writer's time and create additional editing difficulties. They do not make things easier for the reader. They are a nonsense and an outdated nonsense at that.

The only places where a full stop should be used according to common practice and accepted modern English grammar is: (a) at the end of a sentence; (b) at the end of an abbreviation where the last letter of the abbreviation is not the last letter of the full word, hence we have etc. and Dr (not Dr.); (c) in expressions such as e.g. and i.e.; (d) decimals.

I propose that the Grace article is changed to William Gilbert Grace but that the opening sentences remain as is, given that they explain the use of his initials as a sobriquet. I propose the same re Fry, Hornby and everyone else who habitually used initials. In any case, I have looked at quite a few of my books and I see that WG without even a space is in common use. This emphasises that the two letters formed a sobriquet and effectively his "first name". Which would suggest that WG Grace is the right title for the article?

I will leave you to do as you please. Obviously if you are going to quote WP:this and WP:that, I cannot win on Wikipedia and I certainly will not get involved in an inquest like jguk evidently did. But in the real world full stops are as outdated as the telegraph. And the B B C (or BBC) evidently agrees. --BlackJack | ^{talk page} 15:04, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

Jack,

First, I apologise for calling your actions "stupid". It was completely wrong of me to do so. I have removed that comment from WT:CRIC: unfortunately, I can't remove it from Grace's page edit history.

On the rest, I'm afraid you won't get me to agree with you. I understand your view on dots after initials, although I don't agree with it, but the issue isn't about that. It's about whether it's permissible to change an article from an accepted format because of stylistic preferences. Even if you dislike the "W. G. Grace" style, you must admit that other editors take exactly the opposite view. In that situation, long-standing Wikipedia rulings forbid changing the article to one's personal preference, because it leads to edit wars.

Stephen Turner (Talk) 18:50, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

Stephen, fair enough. I know you didn't mean to use the word "stupid" so that's not a problem. Forget it and lets get on with writing cricket. As you say, long-standing rules are in place and how any individual can go about changing them beats me, especially given the problems I have encountered on the CfD pages. Best regards. --BlackJack | ^{talk page} 19:33, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

BlackJack, your views on stops are understandable, even if I disagree with some of them. I wonder why you think "etc" "ie" and "eg" need stops (presumably because, unlike "Dr", the abbreviation does not end with the same letter as the phrase that is being abbreviated) but initials don't.

A while ago, we had an editor who disagreed with the convention that there are spaces after punctuation,saying that the extra space was entirely unnecessary and saved time and space to omit.Needless to say,there was much disagreement with that approach,andheultimatelyleft. -- ALoan (Talk) 20:41, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

And you are pleased that he left, are you? Would you like me to leave too? The word "clique" is rapidly coming to mind here.

The reason why I write Dr and i.e. and e.g. and W G Grace is because that is the convention in real world modern English. I am a professional writer in the business sphere and I also have connections in the literary sphere. See the example I have quoted above re BBC usage of initials which is the common convention in the REAL world, not in the limited world of a handful of Wikipedia editors who allow themselves to be led by the even smaller handful of Americans who could be bothered to write WP:whatever. --BlackJack | ^{talk page} 05:51, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

Sorry - I have only just noticed your reply. Let me start off by apologising (again) for any offence that I may have inadvertantly caused.

Of course I was not pleased that he left. He was an important and authoritative contributor in a neglected area, but he found the stress of constant criticism for his personal style preferences, and others copyediting to the preferred standards, too much to bear. I could also mention bobblewik, who is constantly criticised for his important work of copyediting (although I disagree with some of what he does, he makes an important contribution) and jguk who left after ArbCom looked into the AD/BC/CE/BCE debacle.

I am just saying that sometimes you have to go with the grain rather than against it, even if you think it is wrong-headed. I understand and respect your opinion, but I and others disagree with it, and I would hope that you can understand and respect our opinions too. I doubt we are going to reach a compromise on a binary issue like this, so we will have to agree to differ. Part of that amicable settlement means me not moving articles in your preferred style to conform with mine, and vice versa.

There is clearly a body of opinion that favours stops and spaces after initials, and clearly another body of opinion that does not. Your experience of "real word" usage clearly diverges from mine; there is not a lot we can do about that, other than learning to live with the difference. -- ALoan (Talk) 11:57, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

WP:CRIQ

Think I should be WP:BOLD and set the next question then? --Dweller 10:44, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

Hyperbole

As per the revers and a nice suggestion of let's stick to facts not hyperbole, even if someone else said it) [1] by User:Stephen_Turner, I have removed few quotes. I am sure that it is in accordance with the previous edits of removing hyperboles. Doctor BrunoTalk 13:14, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

Marcus Trescothick

There is a difference between accusing someone without any evidence of something, and noting the speculation of others. WP:LIVING is being used too much as an excuse to remove information which is not defamatory but factual observation because some people don't like it. The sources are easy numerous to find; look:

• Google "Marcus Trescothick" + marital
• Google "Marcus Trescothick" + stress. — Dunc|☺ 12:01, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

DYK

On 13 September, 2006, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article Karan Bilimoria, Baron Bilimoria, which you created. If you know of another interesting fact from a recently created article, then please suggest it on the "Did you know?" talk page.

Captains and cricketers

Stephen, I see you've been removing the "Leicestershire cricketers" category from those players who are also "Leicestershire cricket captains". Surely the captains are also cricketers and should appear in both? I would reckon that the "Leicestershire cricketers" category should, eventually, contain the name of every cricketer who ever appeared for the county, in whatever capacity. Or should we rename the "Leicestershire cricketers" category as "Leicestershire cricketers who weren't captain"? Johnlp 10:05, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for your note, John. According to WP:CG, "Articles should not usually be in both a category and its subcategory". See also this discussion. The reason is that it leads to someone being in far too many categories. However, there is some dispute about exactly when it is appropriate to be in both a category and a subcategory, and this may be one of the exceptions, because the number of Leics captains is small compared to the total number of Leics cricketers. If you think it's useful to put them back, I won't object. (But I think we've agreed that Category:English cricketers shouldn't be there if someone is also in Category:English Test cricketers).

Stephen Turner (Talk) 10:17, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

Hi Stephen. Thanks for the reply. I think we're probably in a fairly grey area here about when a category is a subcategory of another. My view would be that the Category:Leicestershire cricketers should be the key one containing all players with biogs, including the captains: an alternative way of doing this would be to have a List of Leicestershire cricketers and a List of Leicestershire cricket captains, but as such lists would probably only be used as directories, then the categories do the job just as well and have the merit of being cross-reffed from the individual biogs. (Lists can have a different use: identifying redlinks.) So I'd be inclined to revert your changes, if you don't object. I don't think the Category:English cricketers argument is quite the same, because there isn't a specific job or distinction that unites the people in this category: in fact, I'd be happy to see this category disappear as it's open to abuse (I'm English and have played cricket, albeit at very low grade, so could add myself!) and never likely to be used by anyone either as the starting point for an encyclopedic search nor as a link taking someone from one page to another.

Anyway, my starting point for noticing that you'd made the changes was seeing Ewart Astill move from being a Leicestershire cricketer to being in with all the landed gentry in the captains category and thinking how mortified he would have been to have lost the company of his team-mates just because, when duty called in 1935, he stood in as captain for a year while the club looked for someone they deemed as "more suitable". Johnlp 10:46, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

Fine, I'm happy for you to revert them. It makes sense for all Leics cricketers to be together in Category:Leicestershire cricketers, even if they are already also included in that category by virtue of being in its subcategories. Stephen Turner (Talk) 11:56, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. Done. Johnlp 12:27, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

Namibian cricketers

Four more names into the Namibian cricketing cooking pot, I got Kirsten Isaacs, debutant Louis Klazinga, Ronald Cloete and Colin Steytler added to Wikipedia this morning.

I was looking on my main source for Namibian cricket news, the snappily titled Cricket Namibia, and found some very dodgy inclusions, that is, players from the non-senior teams (I ‘’think‘’ purely the under-19s), and, to put it bluntly, wondered whether they were worthy of inclusion, being that their profiles don’t even exist on Cricket Archive yet..

These are the following:

Johan Nel · Michael Durant · Dawie Marx · Konrad Kubirski · George Pickering
Johan Baard · Daniël Tjongarero

How important do you think it should be to have every member of the World Cup squad within Wikipedia, regardless of whether or not they have played a game for their representative country? (Similar to something that we would do, for example, for the English national football team).. I wouldn’t mind your thoughts before I go ahead and do something overly rash. Thank you. Bobo. 17:56, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

London County Cricket Club

Your (very good) article begins: London County Cricket Club was a short-lived cricket club founded by WG Grace in 1898 and also captained by him.

According to the chapter on WG in Alan Gibson's The Cricket Captains of England: "In 1899... Grace fell out with Gloucestershire... A new cricket club had been formed... It was to be called London County, and W.G. was offered the post of secretary and manager... He saw no reason why this new post should interfere with his cricket for Gloucestershire. But the Gloucestershire committee were not pleased... [Gibson then describes an acrimonious exchange of letters.] ...He never played for Gloucestershire again." (p57 of the 1989 edition.)

Christopher Martin-Jenkin's The Wisden Book of County Cricket (1981) concurs. On page 441 it says: "London County Cricket Club was founded in 1899, with W.G. Grace as secretary and captain.. In 1900 first-class status was granted..." The short piece on London County has the initials R.W.B. appended - presumably Robert Brooke.

Having now read the good Cricinfo piece, it does seem that the founding was in 1898 (as you have it) rather than 1899, but that it's not really true to say that Grace founded the club. I've therefore taken the liberty of amending and extending your first paragraph. JH 19:23, 20 October 2006 (UTC)

Thanks very much for your message, John, and for correcting the article!

Stephen Turner (Talk) 20:02, 20 October 2006 (UTC)

Links to external websites

Hi Stephen,

Thanks very much for contacting me regarding the links I would though like to ask why North Berwick still has a link called North Berwick website added when ours was removed and are both doing the same thing, if this could be removed I would very much appreciate it.

Thanks very much

Rob

Thanks for your reply, Rob. I guess it was just because nobody noticed it previously. I've removed it now.

PS You can sign your name on Talk pages using four tildes, like this: ~~~~. It inserts your name and the date, like this: Stephen Turner (Talk) 12:42, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

North Berwick

Hi, the "north-berwick.co.uk" site is an independent site run by and for people from the town and is a comprehensive, constantly updated resource that features much more information than a Wikipedia article, even one of featured article status, ever would. The links that were removed from North Berwick (and various other articles) were to basic information pages on a commercial directory added by someone from that organisation. I'm going to re-add the former and leave out the latter in accordance with WP:EL. I know this all happened in good faith, but I hope you'll agree it's perhaps a little keen to remove links to valuable external sites that have been around for quite some time because someone unfamiliar with the topic and / or Wikipedia and unhappy with having their commercial link removed requests it. Thanks, Deizio talk 13:15, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for your message, Deiz. I apologise for removing the link carelessly. I thought it was just another affiliate portal. Thanks for reverting me. Stephen Turner (Talk) 13:47, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

Cool, I thought that was the deal. I'm guessing from what I've seen that this guy is creating a username, dumping about 10 links and then repeating the process to stop getting a) caught and b) mass-reverted. clever boy, knows how to game the system. This site he's linking to isn't too bad compared to some of the spam on WP but it's definite revert-on-sight material. Nice one, Deizio talk 14:15, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

Peter the Lord's cat

Sorry to be pedantic, but shouldn't that article be titled, Peter, the Lord's cat? Is there an article about Humphrey, the cat from 10 Downing St yet? --Dweller 10:19, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

Found it. Following the convention used with that notable feline (Humphrey (cat)), presumably, this should be Peter (cat)... --Dweller 10:20, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for your note, Dweller. You're probably correct grammatically, but I still think Peter the Lord's cat looks more natural for some reason; but I don't have a strong preference. Humphrey is at Humphrey (cat).Stephen Turner (Talk) 10:22, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

And as for Peter (cat) — I think he's always known as "Peter the Lord's cat". Look at the book title, for example. (No comma there, either). Stephen Turner (Talk) 10:25, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sure that Humphrey was known as Humphrey (cat), but I see where you're coming from! --Dweller 10:28, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

Does the Wisden archive require registration ? I never had a problem. Tintin (talk) 11:33, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

Hi Tintin,

It definitely asked me for my password today. Maybe you just have a cookie from them? Try clearing out your cookies and seeing if you need to log in again.

Stephen Turner (Talk) 11:56, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

Barnstar

Thank you, Stephen. Much appreciated. I'm afraid I haven't created articles for all the English seasons yet and I must confess to having done the easier ones thus far. There's still about ninety years to go from 1773 to 1863! All the best. --BlackJack | ^{talk page} 14:33, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

Did you know

On 6 November, 2006, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article Peter, the Lord's cat, which you created. If you know of another interesting fact from a recently created article, then please suggest it on the "Did you know?" talk page.

--GeeJo ^(t)⁄_(c) • 08:54, 6 November 2006 (UTC)

Cricket Quiz

You were right about Doug Walters, so feel free to ask another question. --Roisterer 12:27, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

thanks

thanks for your help a while back with Legal nullity! I'd offer you a gift, but all I have are legal nullities!
 :-) they're not even good as paperweights! anyway, thanks for your help. see you. feel free to write anytime.--Sm8900 15:57, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

Image:Mohammad yousuf.jpg

Do you have an alternative image? Or can you please find one? --- ALM 12:14, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for your reply, ALM. Unfortunately I don't have one, but that doesn't permit us to use photo-agency photos. Somebody who went to a cricket match could create one, for example, and that's enough to stop it being fair use. I know the article looks better with a photo in, but I'm afraid we just can't use commercial photos like that. Stephen Turner (Talk) 12:33, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

Kervezee photo

Hi Stephen, I just read your message about the image. You can nominate it and I will also vote for deletion. If you have the ability to remove the image, you may also speedy it. Cheers, SportsAddicted | discuss 17:42, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

Great, thanks very much for replying. Stephen Turner (Talk) 14:00, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Cambridge University Automobile Club

Would you please consider withdrawing this nomination and allowing the author to work on in his userspace, as I have suggested in the discussion? We are dealing with a newbie and a topic which may have some potential, given a little time and work. It can always be nominated for deletion again if nothing happens. Upp◦land 13:24, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for your message, Uppland. As you may have seen already, I've changed my vote to keep because I think the club probably is notable enough. I haven't yet seen any evidence that the author is willing to rewrite the article to make that notability clear, but the best chance is probably to let him get on with it. (Moving the article into user space would have either involved deleting it anyway, or leaving a redirect from article space into user space, which is probably not allowed).

Stephen Turner (Talk) 10:58, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

WP:CRIQ

Hi Stephen. I think you've forgotten to set the next question!!! :-) --Dweller 09:50, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

Thanks, Dweller. I was just having difficulty thinking of a question. Stephen Turner (Talk) 13:25, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

lol - been there? --Dweller 13:35, 13 December 2006 (UTC)