User talk:Bdell555

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Photograph of China's Sea-battle museum

I would very much like to use this image in my forthcoming book:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Sea_Battle_Museum.jpg

I was wondering if the photographer had a higher-resolution version of the image that I could use.

Many thanks and best wishes

86.27.178.244 (talk) 12:08, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

Unfortunately the higher resolution version is on a computer that I don't expect to have access to for another month or so. I'll try to remember to upload a higher resolution version when I return to Canada about that time, although even then the image will not be especially outstanding given the limitations of the camera.--Brian Dell (talk) 18:48, 25 January 2011 (UTC)

Thank you very much indeed. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.27.178.244 (talk) 21:19, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

I was wondering if you'd had time to find the higher-resolution image of the Sea Battle Museum yet. Many thanks!

86.27.178.244 (talk) 21:45, 3 March 2011 (UTC)

My travel plans ended up changing and I will not have access until Saturday, March 19. Thanks for the reminder, however - if there has not been a new upload on Sunday, March 20 please send another reminder.--Brian Dell (talk) 18:43, 5 March 2011 (UTC)

OK, see Category:Sea_Battle_Museum. I think the photo should get the "auto adjust colors" treatment in Irfanview or "auto color correction" in Photoshop because it too grey as it is. But I have not done this because these sort of enhancements cannot be done losslessly and I don't know what your needs are. I also have a photo that zooms into the middle of the photo more (just the entrance and sign in gold letters above it, more or less) if that's of interest.--Brian Dell (talk) 00:43, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_response_to_the_Fukushima_I_nuclear_accidents

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_response_to_the_Fukushima_I_nuclear_accidentsGeofferybard (talk) 02:05, 17 March 2011 (UTC)

Africa Videos

Hello,

I am an exhibit developer for a museum currently working on an exhibit about our African collection. I stumbled across your video footage from Africa on Wikimedia Commons. I think the video would make great reference material for the exhibit. I was wondering if you had any other footage that you could upload or send directly to the museum. I'm looking for shots showing scenes of daily life from sites across Africa in the same vein as the others you posted. Any additional locations in the same vein that you would be willing to share would be extremely helpful.

If you have any questions please let me know and I can give you more details on the project.

Best,

TheLastShot (talk) 15:57, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

OK. My most colourful video may be of the Timkat ceremony in Gondar, Ethiopia but have not yet uploaded it, in part because I think there is some quality loss with the Theora codec and I have been waiting for the Commons to support the WebM codec, which Google's Youtube uses and is now not proprietary. I suppose I could upload WebM or original MP4 to a file sharing location and then direct you to the URL. I wouldn't advise others of the URL such that you could describe the video as first displayed by your institution. I have some video from Djibouti, Malawi, Mozambique, Egypt, and possibly Zambia that I have not uploaded yet so if there is a priority amongst those feel free to advise. I have another problem at the moment in that I am in China and expect to be here for a few months yet and my bandwidth for uploaded video is limited... I may have timeout problems uploading.--Brian Dell (talk) 16:47, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

ibid

Hi, I'm fixing articles that contain ibid at the moment. You add here in Wojciech Jaruzelski the ibid. Can you explain me this edit correctly? Did you mean:

Malcolm Byrne, "New Evidence on the Polish Crisis 1980-1981," Cold War International History Project Bulletin 11 (Winter 1998), p. 165 citing 24 Session of the CPSU CC Politburo, Document No. 21.

Or? Please don't do this any longer. It can be easily broken by another reference in the middle of the two related. mabdul 15:04, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

Normally I would use < ref name="name" >cite< /ref > for the first and then < ref name="name"/ > for the second but this case the second ref was merely cited by the first. I decided to separate the two completely since connecting the two may just create confusion.--Brian Dell (talk) 00:22, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

A kitten for you!

Red Kitten 01.jpg

For your comments on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Holocaust_denial#Denialism_vs_Revisionism Thanks for not being afraid to show scepticism and challenge the conventions!

DarklyCute (talk) 23:13, 6 September 2011 (UTC)

1RR Violation

You are in violation of the 1RR on International law and Israeli settlements. ([1], [2]). I suggest you self-revert or you could be blocked for edit warring. This article and all other articles relating to the Arab-Israeli conflict are subject to discretionary sanctions. See WP:ARBPIA. Thanks. -asad (talk) 09:53, 7 September 2011 (UTC)


Edmund Burke2 c.jpg Please accept this invite to join the Conservatism WikiProject, an attempt to build a comprehensive and detailed guide to conservatism.
Simply click here to accept! – Lionel (talk) 04:57, 28 September 2011 (UTC)


Irish presidential election, 2011

Thanks for your imput , it clarifies the context in that part , there was a discussion on it after an editor removed the incident (I replaced) . With your addition I can see no problems . Thank you .Murry1975 (talk) 09:57, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

1RR violation

See Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement#Bdell555. 2 lines of K303 09:18, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

Fixed a bracket above to make the link work. EdJohnston (talk) 15:28, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

On the day the Barack Obama article was created, the article said that Obama is "regarded as a liberal". This was subsequently "reverted", given that seven and a half years later "liberal" does not appear anywhere in the body of that article. According to the logic here, should the person who edited the Obama article in March 2004 return to the article in October 2011 and add any reliably sourced phrase containing the word "liberal", that person is "[u]ndoing another editor's work — whether in whole or in part... It can involve as little as one word," and thus is guilty of "reverting" as defined by the rules against edit warring. The absurdity of this sort of wiki-lawyering should be apparent from the fact that this hypothetical edit warrior would not even know who he is warring with without reviewing thousands and thousands of intermediary edits. If there were full disclosure in the complaint about me, then "Revert#2, within 24 hours of the previous revert" would have been preceded by "Revert#1, within 16 months..." but that bit of info wouldn't help create the impression I'm edit warring like "within 24 hours" does, would it? Even if Revert#1 is, in fact, a edit warring "revert", note that "Revert #2" attempted to answer the WP:LINKVIO objection to my edit. "Ah, but you didn't address the WP:SYN objection," you might say. If the objection was, in fact, just WP:SYN the material I added could have simply been moved somewhere else instead of deleted. WP:SYN can be a perfectly valid objection but generally some explanation and elaboration of how and why the WP:SYN rule applies to the particular case it hand is needed before the editor you are taking issue with is likely to find your view very convincing. In my experience WP:SYN, like WP:BLP and WP:OR, are frequently misapplied and are instead just used as substitutes for WP:IDONTLIKEIT. This explanation has now been presented, but the question is why not present this on the article Talk page so not only I but our fellow and future article editors can appreciate your perspective, instead of in a complaint template? I've got more than 1500 edits to Talk pages over the last six years so it is not like you can't discuss with me instead of edit warring if that's what you are interested in.--Brian Dell (talk) 08:04, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

The complaint which is mentioned above is about your edits at Martin McGuiness. You can still respond at WP:AE if you wish. Thank you, EdJohnston (talk) 19:18, 15 October 2011 (UTC)
I find it difficult to believe that you, Ed, truly believe I'm ignorant about which of my edits are at issue, since I would not have been able to note the time span between my "first" and "second" attempts to add material (over 15 months) if I did not know which attempts were being complained about, would I? I understand that someone can revert 10 times in 10 days and not be deemed to be in violation of the letter of the rules against edit warring, while I can be deemed an "edit warrior" by an officious admin because of the timing between the "second" and "third" attempts within the 16 month period between the first and third attempts. In my view my "second" attempt ("Revert#1" - my "revert" of my 15 month old reversion) is not, in fact, the "second" attempt in a 1 - 2 - 3 log given as documentation of an edit war because this supposedly incriminating log was assembled to create a phony "edit war" not document a real one. Believe me or not but in fact it never occurred to me that someone would consider such a move fair play: if the complainant was up against a real edit warrior instead of manufactured one, he would not have 15 month gaps in his log of incriminating edits! The common sense view is that any edit war here started on October 13 when RepublicanJacobite reverted my addition, not in the middle of last year. I've provided examples to illustrate how absurd the situation can become if one is going to insist on a technical view of what constitutes an incriminating edit log instead of common sense one. Whatever the technical factors that go into determining whether an editor is being a problematic edit warrior, the common sense ones include the frequency with which the the editor attempts to undo another editor's work, a willingness to try something other than just bang away at the exact same response (e.g. making an effort to rework, move, add context, or otherwise edit another's contribution vs just deleting it in its entirety over and over again), and a willingness to explain why one is insisting on undoing another's article changes on the article Talk page. But I believe I've already provided the essence of this response.--Brian Dell (talk) 18:26, 16 October 2011 (UTC)
If you look at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement#Bdell555 you will that the filer complained about two of your edits, one on October 13 and one on October 14, that were within 24 hours of each other. What is the deal about 15 months? There is no time limit stated in WP:Edit warring: "A revert means undoing the actions of another editor." The phrase "to the other side" was originally added by you at some previous time, and your October 13 edit restored that phrase to the article (after it had been removed by others). So your October 13 edit was a revert. Since we are in the realm of 1RR, and Martin McGuiness is an important figure, who has connections both to the Troubles and to current Irish politics, you should have been aware this was a sensitive article. The question is, why did you think it was reasonable to test the limits of 1RR here. If you will agree to stay away from Troubles articles for some period of time, the AE might be closed, in my opinion. EdJohnston (talk) 18:44, 16 October 2011 (UTC)
"There is no time limit [associated with one of the definitions used in determining whether someone is edit warring]... So your October 13 edit was [edit warring]" is certainly a technically valid argument, but take a step back here and it's obvious, at least to me, that the absence of an explicit declaration that the time interval is relevant is a technical loophole, since generally the time intervals between edits are not just relevant to determining whether someone is deemed to be edit warring but central. If it's not a loophole in your view, you could address the examples I've raised in order to indicate just how far you are willing to let it be exploited. If you wish to insist on bad faith on my part by claiming that I intended to "test the limits", I can't stop you, but the fact remains I did not expect my October 13 edit to be construed as edit warring, whatever its technical status, and even if it was, that someone would seek a bureaucratic sanction before taking issue with me on the article Talk page. I indeed wasn't "aware" and accordingly got blindsided with this complaint, in large part because my thinking was that since most editors know that they are likely going to end up trying to reason with the other editor on the Talk page anyway, they'll generally make that their first resort instead of their last. In hindsight I should have better appreciated the extent to which certain groups of editors are prepared to get their way by simply intimidating others into backing off the topic of the interest to them. Given that I already stay away from Troubles articles - like many other topics - for many months at at time on my own volition, it seems to me that the practical gain to Wikipedia from any coercion here would just be to give some satisfaction to the complainant. With regard to which particular satisfaction should be granted, I'd best leave that up to the parties who can better appreciate what's needed on that point.--Brian Dell (talk) 20:48, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

NATO attack

You are welcome to express your concerns of the article 2011 NATO attack in Pakistan on its talk page. However, please be more specific and relevant as to what you specifically object to within the article, in a way that avoids WP:NOT#FORUM. Thanks, Mar4d (talk) 15:54, 4 December 2011 (UTC)

A courtesy heads-up

Hi Brian.

Just a heads-up that an edit you made to Cedric Belfrage has invited comment and a request for documentation at the Historians of American Communism news list that is part of H-Net. I will try to amend your assertion with more appropriate footnoting or will be deleting it based upon the results of that inquiry. The H-HOAC log may be viewed at http://www.h-net.org/~hoac/

best regards,

Tim Davenport //// Carrite (talk) 21:23, 20 December 2011 (UTC)

OK.--Brian Dell (talk) 03:46, 27 December 2011 (UTC)

Political positions of Newt Gingrich

Hello Mr. Dell, I appreciate your considered edits to the Newt Gingrich 2012 article today, based on my recent note. If you are willing, would you consider another request regarding the "Political positions of Newt Gingrich" entry, as I've explained on that discussion page? Last week, another editor offered apparent consensus for the change (fixing a clear error in representing Mr. Gingrich's policy views) but chose to wait. And that's been the last of it. I hesitate to make any edits directly, because of my close connection to the subject matter but I'm concerned that no one has yet fixed it. I would appreciate it greatly if you would look into the matter. Thanks, Joedesantis (talk) 16:36, 27 December 2011 (UTC)

OK, I think you'd have a green light to edit yourself having raised the matter on the Talk page and having had an editor largely agree with you, but if it were, in fact, a "clear error" it would probably be at least partially fixed earlier... because of the citation to The Hill, which is generally considered reliable, there isn't an obvious error and so requires some more review. The page isn't going to receiving a ton of editor attention as page views have dropped below 1000 since mid-December to an average of 500 to 600... the main Newt Gingrich article is also attracting fewer readers but that one is still 15 to 20 000 a day.--Brian Dell (talk) 19:23, 27 December 2011 (UTC)

Suggestion for "Newt Gingrich presidential campaign, 2012"

Hello again, Mr. Dell, as you have been willing to help me before, I wonder if you would consider an addition I have suggested for the Gingrich 2012 article. I have noticed this article does not currently have a section about the caucus and primary results, although similar articles for the Romney, Santorum and Paul campaigns do. I've put together a paragraph that I think would work here, and have posted this and an explanation to the article's talk page. I hesitate to add this section myself, and would like another editor to consider its inclusion. Since the talk page has been inactive of late, I thought to approach you since you have previously been active on the page. Thanks. Joedesantis (talk) 02:12, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

3RR Warning

Please be apprised of WP:EW. Cheers. Collect (talk) 00:56, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

I'm already apprised, which is why I have been both altering the edit(s), inviting you to meet me part way by introducing your own preferred reading instead of just deleting, and addressing the issue on the Talk page.--Brian Dell (talk) 01:12, 8 January 2012 (UTC)
Someone is likely to take you to WP:3RRN if you don't self-revert. I haven't decided whether I'm too lazy tonight to do it myself. Nomoskedasticity (talk) 21:18, 8 January 2012 (UTC)
Go ahead. It might be a "teachable moment." It'd be an opportunity for me to explain to persons wanting to mediate and reduce edit wars the importance of applying common sense. The other guy reverted "support" four times in less than 24 hours, twice because he apparently didn't want K Street mentioned at all, and then twice because he wanted a more minimal connection to K Street, despite the fact that "support" is clearly in the New York Times article and he's never identified any reason to believe that source is not reliable. Had he actually considered the material I had originally added in full inside of indiscriminately reverting it all, he would have realized that a fullscale reversion was indefensible and, at a minimum, would have cut the edit war in half by starting yesterday in the war where he started today. In other words the edit war was certainly unnecessarily prolonged by a lack of analysis and, in my view, the edit war would have been completely unnecessary had he done even a modest amount of analysis (like searching news.google.com for "Santorum" and "K Street" and seeing far more sources pop up than he could reasonably deny). I asked him on his Talk page to consider limiting his reversion to the portion of the edit(s) that he finds objectionable (and is prepared to defend his objection), but he's apparently either unwilling or unable to understand the point. I accordingly do not object to getting others involved in a discussion of the origins of and lessons of this edit war. If you're of the view that these considerations are all irrelevant and of issue is just my reversion count, it may still be worthwhile to formally complain because the process of counting our reversions might be instructive to the other guy, who contends that his reversions don't count if they "do not affect any of [the other party's] words." I would actually be fine with that definition if it were applied to all editors equally.--Brian Dell (talk) 00:10, 9 January 2012 (UTC)
It would be nice if you reflected what I have actually written and not what you appear to wish I had written. And what Wikipedia means by "revert" and the fact that you specifically solicited my rewording compromise. Cheers. Collect (talk) 00:18, 9 January 2012 (UTC)
Ah, but a rule is a rule, no? 4 reverts, and of identifiable material (what material can you identify that I have reverted "SIX" times?), in less than 24 hours! You say there's a mitigating factor? You know what, I agree! But that's because I am someone who is open to mitigating factors; whereas you seem to be interested in rules, especially when citing a rule can excuse summary action or otherwise failing to inquire further into something. You've proved to be absolutely rigid with respect to citing what you deem to be an "editorial" even when it appears to be pointless to do so in terms of how the article will end up substantively. Open your mind a little, my friend. Cheers.--Brian Dell (talk) 00:39, 9 January 2012 (UTC)
Again - please treat what I say with honesty and accuracy. And remember that I am far from the only editor who actually follows WP:BLP equally for everyone across the board. Collect (talk) 00:48, 9 January 2012 (UTC)
No "Cheers" this time? What should I infer from this unusual omission? If you want "honesty and accuracy", as I do (which includes not compromising on either in the face of someone going on about a politician's WP:BLP), I would encourage you to use quotes, as this can help verify accuracy. When I said you reverted me four times, I ignored what you reverted that was non-substantive to the dispute and focused on what was, and then put that in quotation marks ("support"). If I've reverted you substantively six times, I would think you could do me the same courtesy by putting the word(s) of yours that I've reverted this many times in quotes. Likewise, a faithful and accurate presentation of Wikipedia policy would involve quoting from the policy. Failing that, the accuracy of a statement about what policy is may be disputed, no?--Brian Dell (talk) 01:15, 9 January 2012 (UTC)
WP:BLP applies absolutely equally to all biographies of living persons - politicians, schoolteachers, novelists, actors - everyone. No distinctions in the policy. Cheers. Collect (talk) 21:31, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ Not true. To ensure "honesty and accuracy" I shall quote from the the policy which explicitly distinguishes "Public figures" from "People who are relatively unknown." WP:WELLKNOWN says that for these people "BLPs should simply document what [reliable published] sources say. If an allegation or incident is notable, relevant, and well-documented, it belongs in the article — even if it is negative and the subject dislikes all mention of it." An example is given of a "politician" with instructions to include if "the New York Times publishes the allegations..." WP:NPF, meanwhile, says for "people who... are not generally well known... exercise restraint and include only material relevant to their notability, focusing on high quality secondary sources. ... Material that may adversely affect a person's reputation should be treated with special care; in many jurisdictions... there is additional protection for subjects who are not public figures."--Brian Dell (talk) 21:44, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

Nice attempt at parsing - but contentious claims even about politicians require strong sourcing. Your elision of that important part does not aid your argument here. Cheers. Collect (talk) 01:10, 10 January 2012 (UTC)
At issue was YOUR "argument" that WP:BLP applies "absolutely" equally with "no distinctions." This is not language that exists in the policy. It's language you've invented and then passed off as Wikipedia policy. If you are not habitually engaging in this you would start QUOTING from policy and stop paraphrasing. You're been removing considerable amounts of material from various articles the "contentiousness" of which is far from obvious. Even if it were obvious, there is no authorization to remove unless the sourcing is "poor" or non-existent. Wikipedia:BLP#Reliable_sources goes into more detail about what is considered poorly sourced and gives examples. If you are going to remove sourced material, you should be prepared to explain why it is "poor," by, for example, calling attention to WP:RS. An "opinion" piece could be a poor source, and even probably is, but is not necessarily a poor source for all kinds of claims and for all methods of presentation within a Wikipedia article. One final observation I'll make here is that WP:NPOV is deemed a "fundamental principle" and a "pillar". WP:BLP does not have this status, which means that there is no general authorization to bias any articles, including BLP articles, in any direction, including in favour of the article subject.--Brian Dell (talk) 02:38, 10 January 2012 (UTC)
And it still does. Your parsing refers only to an example of a politician and is not in any way a apecial treatment of "politicians" as a class. In fact, the section you claim to make "politicians" a separate class applies identically to all public persons. As for asserting that following WP:BLP causes a "bias" in favor of the person, such an assertion is absurd entirely! Collect (talk) 07:03, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

Blackout

Thanks for the info Brian. Best, Arzel (talk) 03:50, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Barnstar

Original Barnstar.png The Original Barnstar
This barnstar is awarded to everyone who - whatever their opinion - contributed to the discussion about Wikipedia and SOPA. Thank you for being a part of the discussion. Presented by the Wikimedia Foundation.

blog post

Hi Brian - I was impressed with and in general agreement with your blog posting about the sopa hysteria and just wanted to give you a bit of support. Youreallycan 23:54, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

The post is too long, dense, and angry, but I've never been a good writer. I just continued to write about the many things that could have been and weren't taken into consideration. What I especially have a hard time with is how "lawyerly" the Wikimedia Foundation seems to have been. It's been as if Wikipedia has been slamming one fist on the table saying we demand our rights and shaking the other one at Wikipedia's many enemies. These enemies are largely imaginary in the sense that very few if anyone is seriously interested in shutting Wikipedia down. The world is a complicated place and the white vs black, good vs evil, rhetoric which incites people ends up creating more problems than it solves.--Brian Dell (talk) 02:13, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

DYK credit

See here for why you might recieve credit for 2011–12 Los Angeles arson attacks's DYK. BCS (Talk) 22:04, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

DYK for 2011–12 Los Angeles arson attacks

Updated DYK query On 24 January 2012, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article 2011–12 Los Angeles arson attacks, which you created or substantially expanded. The fact was ... that the series of arson fires that began on December 29, 2011, was the worst set of arson events in Los Angeles since the 1992 riots? The nomination discussion and review may be seen at Template:Did you know nominations/2011–12 Los Angeles arson attacks.You are welcome to check how many hits the article got while on the front page (here's how, quick check) and add it to DYKSTATS if it got over 5,000. If you know of another interesting fact from a recently created article, then please suggest it on the Did you know? talk page.

—HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 00:02, 24 January 2012 (UTC)

Chaffetz page

Nice, succinct, NPOV edit about Jason Chaffetz's work as a spin doctor on his page. Athene cunicularia (talk) 17:27, 28 January 2012 (UTC)

Archiving frequency

Hello. I noticed your comment in the edit summary here. Please note that the talk page guidelines suggest archiving when the talk page exceeds 50 KB or has more than 10 main topics—both of which existed prior to my manual archive. I tried to verify that all archived threads were inactive (i.e., they had not been commented on for several days) and that they were not integral to the ongoing discussion of other threads. Note also that any archived text is still searchable via the archive search box. Nevertheless, if you ever feel a thread is prematurely archived, feel free to bring it back from the archive. Regards —Eustress talk 23:06, 7 February 2012 (UTC)

Understood, my edit to crank up archiving to 60 days affects archiving henceforth, as opposed to being backward looking. I just noted that the current Gingrich Talk page seems to be dominated by complaints that Gingrich Communications Director Joe DeSantis has been editing the article and the Talk page. In fact DeSantis hasn't edited the article since June 2011 and in 2012 has made all of about 3 lines worth of remarks on the Talk page, something that might be more quickly appreciated if January's discussion weren't in an archive.--Brian Dell (talk) 23:49, 7 February 2012 (UTC)

Rename at Campaign for "santorum" neologism

Hello, since you recently participated in an RfC at Campaign for "santorum" neologism, I thought you might be interested in this proposal for renaming the article, or perhaps another of the rename proposals on the page. Best, Be——Critical 22:09, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

Bill Keller and NYT IP editing

Hello, Brian. I stumbled across your comment about Bill Keller editing his own article and his father's article. But, I don't see edits to the BK article from the NYT IP address. Your comment also appeared to me to say that Bill Keller himself made all the edits to his own article, but that doesn't appear to be the case. I must be mis-reading what you wrote. Can you help understand what you said? On a related note, it blows my mind that Bill Keller's article, about the man who practically set the agenda for the U.S. mainstream media for 8 years as executive editor of the NYT, consists of two short paragraphs and a list of his job titles at the NYTimes. PS: I like your attitude! --Kenatipo speak! 17:25, 19 February 2012 (UTC)

I may have implied that his direct editing was current but don't believe I said "all the edits" or implied that. I linked to the NYT Times article where Keller said he had "corrected" "minor inaccuracies." The edits were this one and this one. For what it's worth, the edits improved the articles. I was just asking why Joe DeSantis was being given grief for editing Talk pages under his own name while there were no comments about Bill Keller editing his own article directly under an anonymous IP.--Brian Dell (talk) 20:41, 19 February 2012 (UTC)
Thanks, Brian. I do see Bill Keller's edits to the two articles now. I added a new section to BusterSeven's "project" about Paid Operatives that deals with the NYT IP editing. --Kenatipo speak! 21:15, 19 February 2012 (UTC)

Thabeet

Thabeet has actually played four games so far this season: [3] I've been watching basketball articles for a long time. The article is much, much more likely to be updated if he gets cut—and if no one else updates it, I'll do it—while mid-season statistics are rarely updated at all. I know that you used an "as of" construction, but those end up looking silly if they remain in the article too long. Zagalejo^^^ 21:22, 21 February 2012 (UTC)

Good editing to that article but I was less concerned with "looking silly" than having something plainly wrong in a highly trafficked article for an extended period of time. The "Basketball" article averages 10 000 hits a day, yet until I changed it yesterday it claimed that Žydrūnas Ilgauskas "is the tallest current NBA player" despite Ilgauskas having announced his retirement five months ago. If Thabeet becomes inactive a person may need to check some of the pages indicated by the WhatLinksHere tool to keep pages, especially high profile articles, current.--Brian Dell (talk) 21:46, 21 February 2012 (UTC)
Thanks for updating the basketball article. I really haven't looked at that one for a while; I've mainly been focusing on the NBA player bios. But I probably should take a look; there's probably all kinds of other stuff that has gone out of date.
Unfortunately, the explosion of navbox templates has made whatlinkshere almost useless, but I try to do as much as I can to reword things so that they don't go out of date. Current-team affiliations for NBA players are usually maintained (in the players' own articles, anyway), but many other things aren't. It's an uphill battle. Whenever I see someone add something that I know won't be maintained, I try to take action. Zagalejo^^^ 22:03, 21 February 2012 (UTC)

Point-counterpoint

I'm soliciting editors for a two-part essay I would like to run in the Signpost, and your blog post shows that you would fill the counterpoint slot quite well in the publication. I was hoping you could spare some time to write up a piece, possibly a condensed version of your argument there? Thanks, ResMar 23:37, 24 February 2012 (UTC)

I could take a stab at this. Feel free to solicit another if you wish as well since I don't mind if you have multiple options for a particular perspective and decide to go with another. Could you give me a rough word count of what you are looking for? If I felt that it was too constraining I could submit more and suggest the matter can't be properly covered in less, but in all likelihood the main points can be made quite briefly. You could alternatively just tell me what the word count for the other perspective is and I'd try to something similar or a bit less. I take it this wouldn't just be a yes/no retrospective on the blackout but would answer the four questions you pose. Structurally, would you prefer a Q followed by A for the four Qs or just general, integrated prose that addresses the four Qs?--Brian Dell (talk) 00:01, 25 February 2012 (UTC)
I'm honestly not sure; try to to keep it short, though. If the contributions get too long we can just split it into a two part publication: one essay one week, the other the next. The two should be about the same length; I think what will happen is that one person will submit a writeup and the other should try to match it in length. So no rough wordcount =). Structurally, prose wrapped around the four questions (but not implicitly repeating them) is best, yes, but they're merely guidelines, and you aren't held to directly answer all of them. Deadline for submissions this week is tomorrow, but I doubt the whole thing will come together that quickly, so I think a deadline of next Sunday is more appropriate. Cheers, ResMar 14:41, 26 February 2012 (UTC)
Yes, best try for the March 5 edition.--Brian Dell (talk) 01:58, 27 February 2012 (UTC)
And on that topic, bump =) ResMar 20:15, 3 March 2012 (UTC)

Mia Love comments

You "it's Utah I know but non-Americans would not know she is a Republican" is an unjustified comment. If Mrs. Love makes it to the general election she will face a Democratic incumbent, so your assumption that all or virtually all politicians in Utah are Democrats has no factual basis. If it was Massachusetts with 10 seats in the House and no Republican elected to any of them in the last 15 years your snide comment might be justified, but there is no justification for such a statement about Utah. This is especially true since before she announced her candidacy for state office when she was just a mayor, Mrs. Love's political affiliation had never shown up explicitly in any reliable source. Her reasoning behind her entering politics made it likely what her political views were, and she may have ran for mayor as a candidate of a specific party, although at least Salt Lake City has non-partisan elections, but the sources that reported on her election did not state what political party she belonged to.John Pack Lambert (talk) 00:34, 18 April 2012 (UTC)