NathanielDawson

I suggest that you discuss your contributions with other editors rather than continuing to revert. Disputes are resolved here by discussion and collaboration. You might also like to take a look at our external link guideline. Thanks, SpinningSpark 09:46, 7 November 2009 (UTC)

A brand new account, User talk:CasesBased, has just redone those edits. Both of you have done nothing else on Wikipedia besides insert the same external links in articles. The working assumption must be that you are the same person. Please do not use multiple accounts, it is against policy. Please take my advice above and discuss this issue rather than edit war, which is also against policy. Thanks for listening, SpinningSpark 21:24, 7 November 2009 (UTC)

I see that you have once again inserted the same external links. Once again, I am asking you to desist from edit warring over this and open a debate, preferrably on the article talk page where other editors can see it and take part. None of your edit summary reasons are valid reasons for external links, but until you show willing to engage I am not going to waste effort responding in detail. There is little doubt that if I was uninvolved, I would have already blocked your account indefinitely as spam only without a second thought, but I do not now wish to use my admin powers to win an argument. So once again I request that you desist from edit warring, if you continue, you will be blocked, if not by me, another admin. SpinningSpark 09:39, 8 November 2009 (UTC)

"Powerpoint presentations are generally useless" and "the external links section is bloated" are not valid reasons for deletions under deletion policy.

As I noted in my edit comments, one of the presentations that you deleted had been up there for two years; it contains many cable maps and data tables and was the source for many of the cables in the International Submarine Cable list. There had already been an open debate about the usefulness of that presentation and consensus was to keep it. The newer presentation is similar to that one, except that the information is much more up-to-date. As I also mentioned in my edit comments, your good faith in cleaning up the "bloated" external links section is called into question by the fact that you deleted only these two presentations while leaving others that are blatant advertising, such as the one which directs to the marketing site of a cable operator.

Furthermore, I am in agreement with others who believe that this article is too heavy on 200-year-old history with very little mention of the contemporary role of submarine cables. These external links are some of the only documents available that explain the modern day role of submarine cables, particulary in the marketplace. I challenge you to explain how, for example, slides 3, 4, 5, 8, 10, 11, 12, 14, 14, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, and 41 of the November, 2007 presentation as well as slides 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 20, 21, 22, and 24 of the September, 2009 presentation fall into the "generally useless" category and why they would need "the lecture that went with them." A large percentage of the users who visit this page are looking for just such data, not a lecture about the telegraph and copper cables of yesteryear.NathanielDawson (talk) 12:41, 8 November 2009 (UTC)

Actually, Spinningspark, I've just read your truly fascinating page on Distributed Element Filters, so obviously the technology (and I suppose the analog technologies in particular) is extremely important to you. Obviously the history of copper cables belongs in the article, but I do honestly believe that many of the visitors to the submarine cable page are looking for an explanation of the present-day role of fiber optic cables, or at least the development of cable infrastucture during the fiber optic era. Right now the only mention of submarine cables in the last 20 years (other than cursory references to the first transatlantic and transpacific fiber optic cables) is an extremely unrepresentative list of cable breaks. Overall I think most visitors to this page would come away with an extremely narrow understanding of submarine cables, so I question if the page is meeting its objectives. NathanielDawson (talk) 15:21, 8 November 2009 (UTC)

Hi Nathaniel, thankyou for responding. First of all, the deletion policy is not relevant here, that is concerned with the permanent deletion of entire articles or other pages. The relevant document for this question is the external links guideline which I linked for you above. I think you have a fundamental misunderstanding of what external links are for on Wikipedia and I would urge you to read the document. Wikipedia is about writing encyclopedia articles. It is not part of our function to link to other people's articles. If our article is deficient, it should be improved. The solution is not to direct our readers off our own site. This is why there are some quite definite guidelines on which external links should be included. Here are some extracts of the relevant parts of the guideline. On what should be included:

• Sites that contain neutral and accurate material that cannot be integrated into the Wikipedia article

Is there any reason that any relevant fact in the documents you are linking could not be included in the article? No? Then it is not a fair external link under that clause. On what should not be included there is a long list, but it is the first clause that is the killer:

• Any site that does not provide a unique resource beyond what the article would contain if it became a Featured article.

In other words, if the site only contains information that should be in the article, then it should not be linked. I might have more sympathy (but the above would still be valid) if you had done some substantive work on the article as well, but your edit history shows only adding external links. To address your other reasons for wanting to keep this link;

• It "has been up there for two years". Wikipedia has no time limit. In our 3 million articles and half million edits per day there is a lot wrong, it doesn't all get fixed at once.
• It "was the source for many of the cables in the International Submarine Cable list". Sources of information should be referenced with an inline citation. This is a completely separate matter from external links and the rules are very different.
• "There had already been an open debate". Could you please provide a link to this consensus. I can identify nothing in either articles talk page, your talk page or your edit history that could be such a debate.
• "you deleted only these two presentations while leaving others that are blatant advertising". Other stuff exists is not accepted on Wikipedia as being a valid argument. I have no problem with deleting more external links from the article, I simply did not look at any others (well I did look at one, but I deleted that one as well). There is only so much spam, tracking cookies, attack scripts and spy programs my poor computer can take in any one day from all these external sites. 3 million articles 0.5m edits/day, they are not all going to be fixed instantly - at least not by me alone.
• "the only documents available that explain the modern day role of submarine cables". Again, an argument for improving the article, not for directing elsewhere.
• "A large percentage of the users who visit this page are looking for just such data, not a lecture about the telegraph and copper cables of yesteryear". I have no idea how you determined what readers are looking for and the statistics, but Wikipedia is not paper, there is room for both on Wikipedia, we do not have to choose, and can split the article if necessary if it becomes too large. By the way, here are some statistics from me, submarine cable got 2,000 hits last month, according to you, all looking for modern fiber-optics, but transmission line, an article entirely about copper cables, got 18,500.

SpinningSpark 22:29, 8 November 2009 (UTC)

Thank you for taking the time to provide a thoughtful response, Spinningspark. I would propose that the links be included because (as stated in the external links guidelines), they "contain further research that is accurate and on-topic," which is "information that could not be added to the article for reasons such as copyright or amount of detail." There are a total of about 60 or 70 slides' worth of information between the two presentations. You're right that in some readers' opinion, some of the slides may qualify as, in your words, "management ppt" slides that can be "saved for the marketing department pep talk." But only a few. The majority of slides, the numbers of which I have listed above, provide a lot of detailed, on-topic information that would be too detailed to integrate into the article. For example, how would you propose integrating into the article the total annual investment in submarine cables over the last 20 years? This, together with an explanation of the market's investment cycles, is valuable, on-topic information which is of use to readers but would be too unwieldy to integrate into the article without violating copyright.

When I say that "a large percentage of the users who visit this page" are looking for the data contained in the 40 or so slides from the two presentations that I've identified as being the most relevant and self-explanatory, it is patently untrue to say that "according to me," the 2,000 monthly visitors were "all looking for modern fiber-optics." Regardless, your comparison is irrelevant. Certainly transmission line has a much broader scope than submarine communications cable. If, on the other hand, you were to compare a page on "Coaxial submarine cable" vs. "Fiber optic submarine cable" I don't think that your 9:1 ratio of visits would hold. Anyway, I was only asserting that many ("a large percentage") of page visitors are looking for information on fiber optic submarine cables, the submarine cable market, and the role of fiber optic submarine cables in the global telecommunications infrastructure (this is only logical, given the fact that the last of the long-distance coaxial submarine cables were retired from service five years ago and have all been replaced with fiber optic systems). Very little about these topics currently exists in the article, whereas the two links contain a lot of detailed information about these subjects.

All of the information in the two presentations is relevant, accurate, and on-topic, so remember that your call for "improving the article" if it is deficient certainly applies to Wikipedians such as yourself. The information in the two presentations addresses concerns about the article's deficiency that not only I but others have expressed. If you feel that the data from the presentations could be included in the article then I invite you to do so; I myself would refrain from doing this because it is my opinion that the data is too detailed to be included without violating copyright.

Because the two links conform with the external links guidelines, and because they provide valuable, on-topic information, I cannot see how deleting them, as you have done repeatedly because "ppt presentations are generally useless" and because the external links section is, in your opinion, "bloated," would be in any way productive.

[The following is irrelevant, but for the record, I have indeed made other contributions to the submarine cable article and to the list of international submarine cables; I generally create new usernames each time I contribute to Wikipedia, for privacy reasons. You can certainly choose not to believe this, but in either case my past contributions (or lack thereof) are not a factor in deciding whether to "have more sympathy." This is an unambiguous, factual debate so please try to remain objective and avoid personalization.]

NathanielDawson (talk) 00:10, 9 November 2009 (UTC)

External links

Why do you keep on re adding external links deemed in appropriate per wp:elno .Take this debate to the articles talk page--NotedGrant Talk 16:15, 12 November 2009 (UTC)

There has been a discussion about this for several days. Please read and join the discussion before making changes. NathanielDawson (talk) 16:23, 12 November 2009 (UTC)

November 2009

You currently appear to be engaged in an edit war according to the reverts you have made on Submarine communications cable‎. Note that the three-revert rule prohibits making more than three reversions on a single page within a 24-hour period. Additionally, users who perform several reversions in content disputes may be blocked for edit warring even if they do not technically violate the three-revert rule. When in dispute with another editor you should first try to discuss controversial changes to work towards wording and content that gains a consensus among editors. Should that prove unsuccessful, you are encouraged to seek dispute resolution, and in some cases it may be appropriate to request page protection. Please stop the disruption, otherwise you may be blocked from editing. MrOllie (talk) 16:55, 12 November 2009 (UTC)

You have been blocked from editing for a period of 48 hours to prevent further disruption caused by your engagement in an edit war at Submarine communications cable. During a dispute, you should first try to discuss controversial changes and seek consensus. If that proves unsuccessful you are encouraged to seek dispute resolution, and in some cases it may be appropriate to request page protection. If you believe this block is unjustified, you may contest the block by adding the text {{unblock|your reason here}} below. SpinningSpark 19:42, 12 November 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, that's just going to far, your disruption is helping neither the debate nor the article. SpinningSpark 19:44, 12 November 2009 (UTC)

ANI notice

Hello, NathanielDawson. This message is being sent to inform you that there currently is a discussion at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents regarding an issue with which you may have been involved. Thank you. GiantSnowman 20:47, 12 November 2009 (UTC)