User talk:Fifelfoo/Archive2011

United States and state terrorism

Recently User:V7-sport stated that the following statement from you:

"The following sections contain no claim, or sources for a claim, that the action is considered state terrorism by a noteworthy academic or expert: Indonesia's anti-Communist purges (1965–66) ; Operation Speedy Express (1968–1969) ; Cuba (1959–present) ; Operation Mongoose ; Allegations of harboring terrorists ; Iran (1979–present) ; Jundullah ; People's Mujahedin of Iran ; Iraq (1992–95) ; Lebanon (1985). This is significant as it means these sections are Synthesis. A list of abhorrent actions is synthetic; please find reliable sources of note making the claim that these particular actions constitute state terrorism.

somehow stated that you believe that for anything to be included in United States and state terrorism, that it must use the exact phrase "state terrorism". That is, he thinks that, based on the above passage, that you were saying we should exclude anything that says something like "the U.S. government did X, which is clearly an act of terrorism". I don't see how he could read that from this passage, so I responded to him that the above passage in no way said that.

I then shared with him your statement "the core issue is to make sure the sources actually hold a position that the events constitute state terrorism, or, in the opinion of that commenter, a position which is so fundamentally similar to the state terrorism thesis that it is identical." (emphasis mine). I wanted to make sure that you were saying that as long as the source is making the claim that a particular action was X, where X is "so fundamentally similar to the state terrorism thesis that it's identical" (such as saying that "Government Z committed a terrorist act"), then it warrants inclusion (this is my position). I provided him with another example, of "media consolidation" vs. "concentration of media ownership" vs. "centralization of media control", which all clearly are talking about the same thing. This is what you were talking about, no? I don't want to be misrepresenting you myself, if you weren't saying this. Could you please clear up what your position is on this at Talk:United States and state terrorism#Reboot. Thanks, and happy new year. -- Jrtayloriv (talk) 04:30, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

I believe I've clarified myself at the article talk page. Thanks, Fifelfoo (talk) 04:17, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. -- Jrtayloriv (talk) 14:18, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Milhist A-Class and Peer Reviews Oct–Dec 2010

		The WikiChevrons
		By order of the Military history WikiProject coordinators, for your devoted contributions to the WikiProject's Peer and A-Class reviews for the period Oct–Dec 2010, I am delighted to award you the WikiChevrons. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 23:05, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Definition of an expert

I found your reply to Wikipedia:RSN#Is_this_book_an_reliable_source_or_would_it_be_classed_as_self-published very interesting. I was thinking that we had no sources to our expertise. But after reading your comment I see we have a few as does another Tree shaper Dr Chris Cattle. Before I write up that Dr Chris Cattle is an expert on the Tree shaping article. Would you please give me your opinion on whether he has enough sources to be class as expert on the article?

• Big Tent at Falkland Palace in Scotland.
• World's Fair Expo 2005 in the Growing Village pavilion, Japan.
• In Paris, an exhibition entitled 'Matieres a Cultiver' was held in early 2008 at the Avenue Daumesnil showrooms of VIA
• 2009 exhibit, this time in the 'Salon Habitat Jardin' held in one of the prestigious department stores in Lausanne
• I know doesn't count as it is original research but my partner and I (we founded Pooktre) would class Dr Chris Cattle as an expert.Blackash have a chat 11:59, 5 January 2011 (UTC)

I am not a practicing fine artist / arts professional / curator. This is really a matter for discussion on a project's message board where people with appropriate knowledge sets can evaluate. Fifelfoo (talk) 12:02, 5 January 2011 (UTC)

Thanks I go to the fine arts and ask if sources these are big enough to be able to class him as an expert. Blackash have a chat 12:11, 5 January 2011 (UTC)

Iowa class battleship

I have a quick question for you (I'm asking now since I am sure that this is going to be brought up either at the ACR or the FAC, when I finally get there): you've added a "pp." for the citation given for the national defense authorization act of 2007, but the rest of the article makes use of the "p." system. Shouldn't the "pp." be changed to a "p." for conformity, or is the use of the "pp." correct from the perspective of citation guidelines? TomStar81 (Talk) 00:51, 6 January 2011 (UTC)

Oh goodness, I'm sorry, I noticed "Garzke and Dulin, pp. 45–51" and thought this was the citation style you were using. There's currently a mix of "p." for multiple page runs and "pp." for multiple page runs. You can pick either, they're both good. FAC only requires consistent citation. I'm not so familiar with MILHIST's in house citation style for A-class, but FAC is simply "Consistency in chosen style." Fifelfoo (talk) 00:57, 6 January 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. I've got both "pp" and "p" in the article because both were previously used, and I am aware that its an issue that needs to be addressed; but I got confused when you put "pp" since I was in the process of converting all instances of "pp" to "p". Thanks for the clarification, I appreciate it, and I will get to work on this issue as well. TomStar81 (Talk) 01:08, 6 January 2011 (UTC)

No worries. My personal citation style has grown more minimal with markers such as p. pp. etc. I only tend to include them if I'm referencing non page material such as Table 1.3–1.7; Plates 2–3; or, §2¶5-§3¶1. Regarding n-dashes, I think FAC likes 'em for page ranges, and also they've got some weird thing about non-breaking spaces which I don't fully understand myself. I understand why we need to use non-breaking spaces, but I'm not fully up on the Manual of Style for its use. Fifelfoo (talk) 01:13, 6 January 2011 (UTC)

I'm not all the way up on the MoS either, which is one of the reasons why I opted for the PR instead of the ACR/FAC route since I was certain that there were still underlying issues here. Based on your comments (some of which echo points raised by Brad101 (talk · contribs) on his talk page) I made the right call :) TomStar81 (Talk) 01:18, 6 January 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, man

Really appreciate the kind attaboy, the push to still raise the game, and then the specifics on what to look out for, and then the trust. We "took a turn" on our own to really look at the refs again and found several formatting flaws which we are fixing.

There are a few times where a judgment call is required like on naming the publisher or how to present a commercial report versus a technical report. But I really think we are working to the spirit of the law here, and thinking of the reader on the tricky ones. Can see the sausage getting made in the talk page.

This was a good motivator for me. And brings me back a little to me roots of doing all this stuff manually (which I used to be fast and good at). The cite templates can lead to a pattern of throwing stuff in and not looking or thinming about the output. But we did now. Also, the templates (and even different tools for using them) can lead to some little inconsistencies. But we are working to buff stuff up to a thesis level.

Thanks again.

TCO (talk) 03:50, 6 January 2011 (UTC)

• No worries! Glad to help. It was always obvious from the mix of sources, the emphasis on quality sources, but the need to discuss popular sources; that you guys did have a deep handle on why to cite and what to cite, and could handle it yourself. However, having someone else pick over the commas and italics often helps anyway. I had a brief look at the Talk: page and it is going well there. Remember, I'm always about the editors having a considered reason for their citation presentation and its consistency. My tastes aren't everyone's; so if you've got an argument to make, let me know where I'm wrong and you're right! Fifelfoo (talk) 04:29, 6 January 2011 (UTC)

Boaz Libertarian Primer

I'll grab a copy of Boaz' Libertarianism: A primer through interlibrary loan -- it's in our regional system, so I should have it in a few days. I'll let you know when I've verified the bit in question. -- Jrtayloriv (talk) 03:48, 14 January 2011 (UTC)

I'm sure that the text is in the chapter; but, the chapter requires Author, Verification of Existence (it isn't listed in the CATO TOC), and proof that its the editor's introduction, and not a PRIMARY source for verification. Fifelfoo (talk) 03:50, 14 January 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Painted turtle/archive1

Hello friend. A little while ago you left a review at the above FAC. Bare comments tend to be offputting to new editors who would otherwise leave commentary; would you mind checking out what we did and letting us know if your concerns have been addressed?--NYMFan69-86 (talk) 15:59, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

rsn - Infobase publishing

I'd be interested in your opinion at Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard#Infobase Publishing, if you wouldn't mind sharing it. Thanks. -- Jrtayloriv (talk) 11:57, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia Ambassador Program is looking for new Online Ambassadors

Hi! I noticed your activity reviewing Featured Article Candidates, and wanted to let you know about the Wikipedia Ambassador Program, and specifically the role of Online Ambassador. We're looking for friendly Wikipedians who are good at reviewing articles and giving feedback to serve as mentors for students who are assigned to write for Wikipedia in their classes.

If you're interested, I encourage you to take a look at the Online Ambassador guidelines; the "mentorship process" describes roughly what will be expected of mentors in the coming term. If that's something you want to do, please apply!

You can find instructions for applying at WP:ONLINE. The main things we're looking for in Online Ambassadors are friendliness, regular activity (since mentorship is a commitment that spans several months), and the ability to give detailed, substantive feedback on articles (both short new articles, and longer, more mature ones).

If accepted, you'd be welcome to apply now, and wait until you return from wikibreak to start serving as an ambassador.

I hope to hear from you soon.--Sage Ross - Online Facilitator, Wikimedia Foundation (talk) 01:04, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Almirante Latorre-class battleship/archive1

Fifel, thanks for taking the time to look through my references, it's always a help! Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 08:15, 25 January 2011 (UTC)

Richard Winger

I saw that you had asked about Richard Winger and his Ballot Access News on the reliable sources noticeboard but your request was archived before anyone had responded to it. I believe that Winger's Ballot Access News newsletter is in fact a reliable source for topics like the number of people registered to vote in the Libertarian Party. A Google News search indicates that he is frequently quoted as an expert on issues relating to third parties in elections by mainstream news sources such as the New York Times, USA Today, NPR, and others. Furthermore, in the case of the number of voters registered as Libertarians, it ought to be possible to check the web sites of the states and look up the voter registration statistics there to confirm Winger's data. If you disagree with the use of this newsletter, or someone else disagrees with the use of this newsletter, I recommend taking this back to WP:RSN. --Metropolitan90 (talk) 16:17, 26 January 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, my expectation was that his expertise would overcome his SPS; which has commonly occurred with other professional pundits of election materials on wikipedia. I'm slightly concerned with the idea that verifying the truthiness of a pundit's analysis by conducting that analysis separately is a good idea: reliability isn't truth, and independent calculation by non experts (such as any Wikipedia Editor while acting as such) is far too close to OR for my take on conduct. Whereas, we can simply verify that he's an accepted expert and accept his ability to self-publish in his area of expertise. Fifelfoo (talk) 16:59, 26 January 2011 (UTC)

Iowa class battleship Peer Review

The Iowa class battleship Peer Review will be closing in the next few days. If you have any additional comments, questions, suggestions, complaints, or advise on how to improve the article, or if you wish to strike any comments you believe to have been addressed, please do so now before the review closes. TomStar81 (Talk) 23:48, 27 January 2011 (UTC)

Inflation

Greetings! User:Wehwalt suggested I consult with you regarding inflation. I've been working on the Warren County, Indiana article in an attempt to get it to FA status, and User:JKBrooks85 suggested providing modern equivalents of some of the prices given (such as $2000 for the first courthouse in 1835 and $48,000 for the second one in 1872). I agree it would be nice to provide some context, but I don't know how to go about that and Wehwalt felt you might have some thoughts. If you have the time, I'd appreciate any ideas you might have. Omnedon (talk) 14:41, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

I know you're on leave and all...

....but when you get back, if you feel like making (a) new citation template(s) that actually make the citations correct, I'd absolutely love you forever if you made one/a few for Chicago style. :-) Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 07:45, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

I've thought about this for a while. My recent frustration with citation templates has kind of hit a peak. It may well be worth implementing ccbook, ccjournal, ccthesis, ccchapter, etc. (I'm still on leave, about to do archival research). Fifelfoo (talk) 07:31, 6 February 2011 (UTC)

Please

Remove your personal attack Here. I object to being called arrogant. Tentontunic (talk) 12:01, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

Arrogance is a behavioural characteristic. Your behaviour is arrogant. Arrogance is a form of aggression—an attack in and of itself—in your case placing your personally discovered knowledge above reliable sources; failing to acquaint yourself with the article's discussion archives; and, playing IDHT games regarding core policy. In particular I draw your attention to this comment, "... Valentio`s estimates? He is but one scholar, why do we not estimates by others?" two hours and fourty minutes after Valentino's centrality to this article was explained to you, "It does not meet the criteria for the only source presented in the article that defines "mass killings under Communist regimes"." This IDHT is the pinnacle of arrogance, and an insult to other editors. Fifelfoo (talk) 12:22, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

I have requested you be sanctioned for your continuing personal attacks, you may respond here. [1] Tentontunic (talk) 13:12, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

Nice dispute resolution skills. Fifelfoo (talk) 13:29, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

I asked you to remove your attack, you refused. Were else am I to complain. Please let me know and I`ll move the complaint there. Tentontunic (talk) 13:32, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

For one, you've failed to hede any of the dispute resolution attempted with you on the Talk page of the article, such as suggestions to read policy, suggestions to stop playing IDHT games, suggestions to read the article's talk page archives which answer the questions. You are entirely unfamiliar with the core sources. You clearly do not understand core policy such as reliable sourcing, original research and synthesis. Dispute resolution needs to be added to this list. Rather than discussing the matter with me here, you have gamed dispute resolution and run directly to disciplinary methods. Its highly impressive tendentious and gamey editing. Fifelfoo (talk) 13:35, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

And there you are again with attacks, there is no Or nor Synth. The source clearly says what I have written, instead of attacking with false accusations perhaps you ought to actually look at it? A book published by the academic press is well within reliable sourcing, to say it is not is silly. I asked a question, you attacked, I asked another and you attacked again. I am not playing any games of IDHT, or are you saying we are not allowed to look at sourcing other than Valentino? Why not try and be a little more collaborative and not combative? It is your failure to AGF which has lead to this, why not remove your attacks on me? I am not arrogant and do not appreciate your name calling. Tentontunic (talk) 13:42, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

Author, Publisher, Context. Your sources are failing context: literary criticism for history, discourse theory of US presidents for demography of mass population loss in a cross cultural comparative sense going to causes. Valentino is the only source which even remotely proposes a communist cause for mass killing in multiple societies in the scholarly literature and you would know this had you read the article archives. Valentino proposes a cause (dispossessive mass killings) of which he produces an example across multiple societies (communist instances of his category dispossessive mass killings). Rummel does not go to causation, he merely notes incidence. Courtois' claim that non-catholicism causes communist mass killings is fringe. Wirth, Applebaum, etc make single society claims that are not generalisable.

Your demonstrated repeated conduct failures over rule any assumption. You are unfamiliar with policy, and it has been suggested repeatedly that you familiarise yourself. No assumption can be made when you have demonstrated you are not acting in good faith. Fifelfoo (talk) 13:53, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

Courtois describes communist ideology as one of important reasons and justifications of the communist repressions, including the killings, in the last chapter of their book (without mentioning catholicism at all). So do Richard Pipes and Robert Conquest in their books.Biophys (talk) 17:10, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

Courtois' final chapter only discusses the Soviet Union (there are two paragraphs devoted to China with an "exercise for the reader" hand flourish). Pipes and Conquest are Soviet specialists likewise. The Courtois final chapter, and the Pipes and Conquest bodies of text would make excellent sources for "Mass killing in the Soviet Union". None of them are reliable for a general theory of communist ideology being causative because their texts don't deal with a general object. I've said this repeatedly:

The article's subject is communism generally: RS have to be a general theory and have grounds to make that claim. Valentino discusses three comparative case studies at length. Conquest does not, neither to Pipes or Courtois.

The article's subject has a causative claim: that the mass killing is related to the communistness of the regimes. Valentino may or may not do this (his category is dispossessive mass killings, communist dispossessive mass killings is an example of the category), but it is a !@#$%^&* sight closer than Rummel's absence of theorisation or Courtois' fringe science Catholic argument in his introduction.

That the rest of the content of the article ought to be derived from both the history of attempting to describe the concrete object (a literature review of explanations in the field, from the "Communist Genocide" thesis supported by Lemkin as fringe science, through to the Swedish report); and that case studies ought only to be ones drawn:

Immediately from Valentino

By basic and fascile synthesis: those obviously meeting the Valentino criteria of time, space, civilian death, civilians under state control, caused death, dispossession, and Valentino's definition of "communism" for his example. Even though Valentino, for example, doesn't mention the Ukraine substate unit as a separate case (though he mentions the incident in relation to the Soviet Union), it would be trivial to note, for example, that the 1932 grain requisition famine meets time, space, death, civilians under control, caused death and dispossession and "communism". Fifelfoo (talk) 23:05, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

The entire "Black book" is about communist repression in many different countries. They make a lot of references to other published sources about the same. Pipes wrote a short but instructive book "Communism: the history". Actually, I never thought about communism as a scientific theory, but rather as a dangerous ideology (or maybe pseudoscience like Lysenkoism). That's after passing a lot of Marxism-Leninism exams in the former SU and reading books by historians here.Biophys (talk) 23:35, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

I think we've had this section of the conversation before Hodja; its like we're turning over a Nasrudin joke over and over again.  :). The problem with the Black Book is that the compilation of various chapters in and of itself doesn't advance an argument about a general cause, or infact, a connection between large scale demographic loss "A" and large scale demographic loss "B". They also advance single state causes. There's one person who is responsible in a scholarly book like this for tying together the chapters into a coherent whole and advancing a general thesis (no matter how tentative). That's the editor. And that's Courtois. And he utterly fails at it. If you could find an alternate general theory in Pipes' Communism: the history that could stand in the article. Remember: short books by historians are often popularisations, textbooks aimed at a general/undergraduate audience, or similarly untheoretical. Valentino's theory has found general acceptance, we'd need to show the same for Pipes. And it'd have to be non-pseudo science like Courtois' "catholic" thesis.

It doesn't matter if the theory deals with an ideological cause, or with a common structure of government, or with a "genetic" organisational heritage derived from the RSDLP(b)—but a common cause of the Soviet Chinese and Khmer killings needs to be indicated in the theory, and ideally an explanation of why such killings didn't occur in Hungary, Yugoslavia, Albania, etc. etc. etc. Hell, Hungary's paroxysm of violence wasn't related to Valentino's concept of dispossession and occurred in a situation of civil and international war rather than pure state agency. Valentino's theory provides this (the dispossessive theory). In fact, there's a problem with the "ideological" theory: Stalin's best Hungarian Disciple didn't dispossess Hungarian peasants by mass killing, Hoxha didn't engage in dodgy agricultural policies leading to 50000 in under 5 years for dispossession, Tito's politics were related to Lenin's in a closer way than Stalin's, but he didn't go around offing masses of population.

"Scientific socialism" sucks. The last place you could find public expressions of creative socialism was the Soviet Union and allied societies. What I've read of the Short Course or Western Stalinists makes me feel for you having to sit through those exams. Fifelfoo (talk) 00:16, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

I think they did it wrong by focusing on the killings rather than on political repression in general, which would be a more reasonable subject per sources.Biophys (talk) 05:26, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

The article began as the completely unsupportable "Communist Genocide". I've not seen many general theses on Communism / Marxism / Bolshevism as a generally and concretely repressive apparatus. They tend to focus on single cases, or entirely idealist analyses. There are a couple out there, but often the analysis is idiosyncratic even when entirely credible, which makes pulling an article together more difficult. Most scholarship believes that the repressive and murderous behaviour of soviet-style societies were society specific; general and comparative analyses are the atypical ones. There is a need for comparative articles, but, given that most sociologists and historians specialise, comparative articles ought to be focused on the comparative theories themselves and then shunt the examples off into the "Mass Killing in X" and "Repression in Y" where other theories (such as national and historical specific ones) ought to appear. The exception of course is explicitly transnational work, such as "Repression in the Comintern." Fifelfoo (talk) 05:45, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

Right, it would be Cambodian Genocide rather than "Communist Genocide". I am also well aware that each specific campaign had its own official and nonofficial justifications. For example, Great Purge was allegedly conducted by Stalin as a practical preparation for the Great War, which seem to be indeed the case. The changes in societies of communist countries are indeed undeniable, but they came as a result of the forcefully imposed political system. We will hardly have a lot of disagreements if I resume editing in this area. Yes, it sucks [2]. Thank you for the conversation. Biophys (talk) 17:13, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

Hello, Fifelfoo. You have new messages at Paul Siebert's talk page.
You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

Arbitration enforcement warning

The Arbitration Committee has permitted administrators to impose, at their own discretion, sanctions on any editor working on pages broadly related to Eastern Europe if the editor repeatedly or seriously fails to adhere to the purpose of Wikipedia, any expected standards of behavior, or any normal editorial process. If you engage in further inappropriate behavior in this area, you may be placed under sanctions including blocks, a revert limitation or an article ban. The committee's full decision can be read at Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Digwuren#Final decision. In particular, you may not continue to make personal attacks about editors with whom you disagree. See here for details about the conduct that triggered this warning.  Sandstein  16:13, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

• Thanks. I've read the request leading to this, and, in particular paid attention to the points raised by Paul; and will closer inspect my posts and the context of my posts when frustrated to avoid acting in the way which led to this notice. Fifelfoo (talk) 22:55, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

Hello, Fifelfoo. You have new messages at Paul Siebert's talk page.
You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

Empire of Brazil FAC

Yes, it took us a long time, but I believe it paid off. Nonetheless, I'd like to thank you for having reviewed the article. It takes time and a lot of patience to read such a long article. I'm very grateful. Regards, --Lecen (talk) 18:11, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

Imperialism article

Please do not remove content or templates from pages on Wikipedia, as you did to Imperialism, without giving a valid reason for the removal in the edit summary. Your content removal does not appear constructive, and has been reverted. Please make use of the sandbox if you'd like to experiment with test edits. Thank you. Diff: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Imperialism&diff=415466307&oldid=415462667 Ghostofnemo (talk) 12:12, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

• Please don't use template warning spam, and inappropriately chosen template warning spam. Your contribution to "Imperialism" is sourced to non-scholarly sources, and refers to trivial non-term uses of the world. Go read, use, and then source to some serious political science of sociology. Your standard of sourcing is far below the claims you're making. Fifelfoo (talk) 20:48, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

Citation

No, I didn't break them. Looks at how they end up formatted. They are exactly correct, attributing the article (i.e. the introduction) to Otero, and the book itself to Chomsky. It's the template that doesn't work right. The way you had it, it attributed the intro to Chomsky and the book to Otero. Yworo (talk) 21:29, 3 March 2011 (UTC)

(Actually the template would work perfectly correctly for what it's intended for, which is a collection of papers by different authors edited by an editor. It's not intended to reference an introduction by a different author in a collection of papers by a single author.) Yworo (talk) 21:34, 3 March 2011 (UTC)

Except Chomsky doesn't bear responsibility for the book, and the item in question, the introduction is authored by Otero; and your citation does not make this clear. Fifelfoo (talk) 21:44, 3 March 2011 (UTC)

Perhaps it would be better then not to use the template. See Template:Cite book for this confusing instruction:

editor: Name of editor/editors. Do not Wikilink any values in the editor field but use editor-link instead. The template automatically adds "ed." after the editor's name unless the chapter parameter is used in which case the template adds "in" before the editor's name which appears after the chapter and before the title. This implies that the author is responsible only for part of the book (including the cited chapter) and the editor responsible for the whole book. If, however, the author(s) and editor(s) are responsible for the whole book, then the editor field or its alternates described below should not be used if the chapter field is being used. Instead, the editor(s) should be included in an author field with possibly "(ed.)" after the surname(s). Alternatively, the editor field may be used if the chapter detail is included in the title field instead of using the chapter field.

Note that the behavior of how the template uses author and editor fields changes depending on whether or not the chapter parameter is used. Yworo (talk) 21:47, 3 March 2011 (UTC)

I take this to mean that when the chapter field is used, the author field is supposed to be the author of the chapter, not the book; it's no longer used for the author of the book and the editor field is used instead to apply to the whole book. Yworo (talk) 21:51, 3 March 2011 (UTC)

In Amazon at least, Chomsky is credited as the author of the book, with Otero as the editor of the book. Perhaps the editor2 field would add this. Yworo (talk) 21:53, 3 March 2011 (UTC)

OK, I believe I've fixed this. Take a look at the cover on Amazon, the authorship of the book is credited to Chomsky, with Otero as the editor of the book, who also wrote the introduction. When using the "chapter" field, the "author" field is used for the author of the chapter, the "editor" field is used for the author of the book (or editor of the whole collection). Therefore the "other" field has to be used for any other involved parties, including the editor. The field usage is counter-intuitive, but the output is correct. Yworo (talk) 22:03, 3 March 2011 (UTC)

It is good. Well done. The output is superior to My Otero in Otero (Chomsky, Book Author).  :) Fifelfoo (talk) 22:23, 3 March 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. Though I have to say I can't thank the template coder for making such a confusing mess of the template usage. :-) Yworo (talk) 22:52, 3 March 2011 (UTC)

4 rr

You currently appear to be engaged in an edit war according to the reverts you have made on Libertarianism. 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. CarolMooreDC (talk) 16:06, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

You have got to be kidding Carol. Diffs please. Fifelfoo (talk) 21:26, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

1. started 01:49 March 3, 2011
2. started 18:27 March 3, 2011
3. started 18:49 March 3, 2011
4. started 23:01, March 3, 2011

CarolMooreDC (talk) 22:52, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

• Thanks for replying Carol. I'll attend to your complaint within two days. Timezone issues mean that I cannot respond now and am out of time; but, if you read the policy regarding reverts, and look at the blocks of my edit, you would be able to see that I am not reverting the same thing repeatedly and that these are different edits. Thanks, Fifelfoo (talk) 23:09, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:3rr#The_three-revert_rule: An editor must not perform more than three reverts on a single page within a 24-hour period. Undoing another editor's work—whether in whole or in part, whether involving the same or different material each time—counts as a revert. Violations of the 3RR rule normally attract blocks of at least 24 hours. Any appearance of gaming the system by reverting a fourth time just outside the 24-hour slot is likely to be treated as a 3RR violation. See below for exemptions. While wikipedia may have different time zones pop up, it still remains clear what is a 24 hour period. And note I didn't report you. Just an FYI since it's easy to forget when one is motivated. CarolMooreDC (talk) 14:29, 5 March 2011 (UTC)

Carol, I've not been able to match these up times up b/c apparently you have a local timezone set. But you are aware that unbroken series of edits count as a single edit for the purposes of 3RR, aren't you? That's so editors do not have to make huge monolithic edits just so they can avoid 3RR and can explain each separate edit in an edit comment. Fifelfoo has made quite of few unbroken series of edits so I suspect this may apply. Yworo (talk) 16:24, 5 March 2011 (UTC)

Kitten

Carolmooredc has given you a kitten! Kittens promote WikiLove and hopefully this one has made your day better. Kittens must be fed three times a day and will be your faithful companion forever! Spread the WikiLove by giving someone else a kitten, whether it be someone you have had disagreements with in the past or a good friend.

Spread the goodness of kittens by adding {{subst:Kitten}} to someone's talk page with a friendly message, or kittynap their kitten with {{subst:Kittynap}}

Note: the kitten was both a test of the New Wikilove program and thanks for being that last straw that broke me free of my addiction to a certain article that shall remain nameless. At least til I finish a couple relevant articles. But bottom line is MY job must be restructuring the libertarian movement and leading it to primacy in human consciousness; then all sorts of WP:RS can write about me and you all will have to rewrite the article just the way I want it. Ho Ho Ho :-) CarolMooreDC (talk) 00:10, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

quote you

Over at my AE appeal [3]. It's a good quote, should be the page's slogan or something. "WP:AE. Putting the arbitrary in arbitration since March 2006!".Volunteer Marek (talk) 03:48, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

Inflation and conversions

I've made this argument on a few occasions, generally with little success. Most academic and even popular historians stay well away from trying to convert the cost of military equipment into modern terms due to the many problems with this (as well as the loss of context), but such conversions often pop up in Wikipedia articles. Cheers, Nick-D (talk) 05:08, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

Fifelfoo, can you point me to the specific instances of the (mis)use of the inflation template?Volunteer Marek (talk) 05:49, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

(btw, I'm not stalking your edit, I just saw Nick's comment above and clicked on your contributions to try and figure out where this inflation-abuse was happening, then saw the RSN Poland related thread which grabbed my interest).Volunteer Marek (talk) 06:42, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

No worries. A ship article at FAC was using CPI to inflate 19th century figures. They said the dodgy inflation was recommended at MILHIST-A; so I took it to MILHIST-A to advise on policy changes. I scanned MILHIST-A for inflation, and found one instance of a CPI inflation of a battleship (ironclad, blockade, 1861). I think you can see a fairly clear consistency in my RS/N and sourcing in general. For scholarly articles I'm insistent on scholarly modes regardless of what politics the scholar has, or what ethno-linguistic background they have. Finding editors who share similar interests is always good, and they become worth watching, even when there are disagreements. You may find material worth expanding or improving that way. :) Fifelfoo (talk) 06:47, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

Hmm, on the HMS Speedy I do agree that converting it by CPI in that way smacks of WP:OR. If that conversion had been in a reliable source I'd probably be ok with it though. Note that the conversion is of the cost of building it in present currency, rather than the value of the ship, which is something different. The first one's conceptually fine - there's no problem, or at least no more problem than usual, in converting dollar amounts. But since this is, as you rightly point out, a capital good, saying something about how much it contributed to GDP or national income, or something like that, would indeed be more problematic. The ideal thing to have in this kind of case, if the sources exist, would be to compare the cost of the ship to contemporary annual wages or something. But yes, if no source for these kinds of calculations is given, I'd keep it out.Volunteer Marek (talk) 06:57, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

Well, unless you're Mandel etc. and willing to admit sectors for "Waste" and "War" in order to save the 2 sector simplified Marxist model—weapons of war have a difficult "value" to construct at all! I try to use GDP growth inflation or GDP proportion inflation for capital goods. Skilled labour is more difficult. But I do "skill" as my current problem for a living. Lots of 1950s pay relativities data. Fifelfoo (talk) 07:14, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

Can't say that I am all that (or at all) familiar with Ernest Mandel but the point here is that it's not about comparing "value" (which does open up lots of cans with lots of worms in'em) but about comparing units of account. Basically, it's just counting stuff - and counting stuff can be very hard, true.Volunteer Marek (talk) 07:54, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

This man is undeserving

of a kitten. Therefore, I shall not be giving him one.

Trev, Rex et Imperator aka Anthonyreflected (talk) 10:55, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

Franklin coverup hoax

Hello, you seem to be a regular at WP:RSN . I would appreciate your opinion on the reliability of the Bryant source in the following discussion: [4] Thanks. Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 17:33, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

class projects

Regarding this, it's nice that they're starting well with involvement of groups, rather than just putting up an article, as they could. I noticed several students from this group editing the externality page, could be more of them. CRETOG8(t/c) 04:26, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

If I were running a "contribution to an online project" assessment module; then, "Identify and make use of appropriate community collaborative forums" and "Assimilate to the community culture" would be key learning outcomes. I think its great work on the part of the students. I meant the request on the project page to be welcoming rather than combative—this is the kind of external organisation collaboration I enjoy seeing. Fifelfoo (talk) 04:59, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

It's a good thing, and I think they do as much as they can within the limited scope of a semester with college kids who have many other things on their plate. I've declined to be a part of it because I felt the application process was a bit much. My application is my articles, take them or leave them.--Wehwalt (talk) 05:32, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

I had an extensive debate with one of the organisers about substituting voluntary labour in academic teaching versus developing cooperative post-capitalist production methods here and now. I'm too much of a trade unionist to provide the standard of work I'd provide for free. But, on the other hand, I'm not going to piss in their teapot. I would note, however, that on the labour front substitution of voluntary for paid labour has massive and detrimental effects in the social services, social work, religious and health industries. I don't notice anyone fitting-and-turning for free like that (I lie, there's a retired skilled worker programme in my very city to pass on skills to youth and build community projects unsupported by the state). I'm in two minds. I love cooperatives and social projects; but, not in the area where I do paid labour when the employers are hungry for unpaid work. Fifelfoo (talk) 06:36, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

Shoot myself in the foot, I forgot one industry where unpaid substitute labour has a massive and detrimental effect: the household. A bit stupid on my part given the gender interests of the new editors discussing things on the economics project. Fifelfoo (talk) 06:37, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

I hadn't thought of it that way. Yes, the Wikipedians who are participating are rather unpaid TA's, aren't they? Hopefully, the schools pay something to the Foundation to get us better servers and so forth (not to redecorate Jimbo's office, I hope).--Wehwalt (talk) 07:50, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

Milhist FA, A-Class and Peer Reviews Jan-Mar 2011

		The WikiChevrons
		By order of the Military history WikiProject coordinators, for your devoted contributions to the WikiProject's Peer, A-Class and Featured Article reviews for the period January–March 2011, I am delighted to award you the WikiChevrons. AustralianRupert (talk) 06:48, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

Technocracy

I am not sure why my edit was removed? Space Commander Plasma (talk) 04:49, 7 April 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for asking. The external link you added fails reliability and notability. The organisation you linked to has a street postal address in a rural area, and its contact information lists a different website as its authority. Its contact email address is linked to this secondary site. The site you linked to appears to not be of significance to the topic, and appears to have been added to advertise that site, rather than improve the encyclopaedia. World significant technocratic advocacy websites are worth linking to, backyard operations which are not self-responsible aren't. Fifelfoo (talk) 07:34, 7 April 2011 (UTC)

A little clique controls the Technocracy articles to very very bad effect

The same group of scum bag tandem editors that have controlled and now want to misrepresent any and all articles connected with Technocracy issues ... even to the point of trying to delete the article now. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Johnfos#The_Signpost:_17_October_2011 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Epipelagic http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Beagel http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Lawrencekhoo

Mostly they collude to give bad information.

The same group of tandem editors from several years ago still try and control this article. They want to eliminate an article about one of the major social movements ... the group that started it. Wikipedia is known for special interest control and buddy editing. Its a pity and the reason a serious article on an important American group is being tried to be done away with by tandem editors that obviously object for some reason to the content. The past clearly shows the same team of tandem editors here. Beagle and Johnphos are tandem editors as is Lawrencekhoo and Epipelagic... One of the most significant groups in American history and they want to get rid of the article. Its pathetic and shows the weakness of en. Wikipedia. Lawrencekhoo is a mainstream economist who ax grinds economic articles Google his name for his economic 'beliefs' Gino — Preceding unsigned comment added by 111.67.106.113 (talk) 11:22, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

WT:HISTORY

Hello, Fifelfoo. You have new messages at WT:HISTORY.
You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

- Dank (push to talk) 12:26, 23 April 2011 (UTC)

Katyn massacre

Hi Fifelfoo - I noticed that back in December you began a discussion on the Talk:Katyn massacre page regarding the need for either major cleanup or a FAR. Has this cleanup been completed to your satisfaction? I know that there are still several cleanup tags (dead link and citation needed mainly) on the article, but wasn't sure if any ref cleanup had been done. If it hasn't been done, are you still interested in taking this article to FAR? Thanks, Dana boomer (talk) 15:55, 25 April 2011 (UTC)

• Thanks Dana for the prod. It needs to go to FAR. I don't have the capacity to clean the article up. Fifelfoo (talk) 05:27, 27 April 2011 (UTC)

Re: Native languages and mother tongues

Thanks. I wish it was seen as such by GA/FA reviewers, too :) --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 18:02, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

Katyn Massacre

Re your edit summary about the removal of non-English language references. Although references in English are preferred, the use of non-English references is not prohibited, subject to them meeting WP:RS. Further info on this subject can be found at WP:NONENG. Mjroots (talk) 08:33, 18 May 2011 (UTC)

• Please see WP:Further reading, they weren't "sources". Fifelfoo (talk) 08:53, 18 May 2011 (UTC)

Inflation query

Two of "my" articles were promoted at FAC before, I think, you or anyone else was particularly querying the appropriateness of {{inflation}} in various contexts. If you got a moment, would you mind casting your eyes over Buildings of Jesus College, Oxford and Buildings of Nuffield College, Oxford to see which usages (if any) are appropriate, and what alternatives (if any) I might try to use? I suspect, from reading some of your comments on later FACs, that you won't agree with the way I used the template in those far-off innocent days, but it's always possible that I may have done something right accidentally! Needless to say, but there's absolutely no rush in this at all, nor any obligation to help if other commitments are more interesting/pressing. Thanks, Bencherlite^Talk 11:28, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

• Nuffield is easy: you need to cite the source correctly and fully, and change from CPI to a capital expense inflation measure (I'll advise on a good one shortly, but with the low figures, it is likely to be a simple one). Jesus is harder; the figures go back, way back, I'll need to examine and think about it. Fifelfoo (talk) 12:11, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

Logarithm

Hi, your citation fixing requests at Logarithm have been dealt with. Jakob.scholbach (talk) 20:12, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

• Ta, done. Fifelfoo (talk) 01:09, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

The Copyright

It says "Copying and distribution of this work are allowed under the following conditions: the work must be attributed properly; the work may not be used for commercial purposes; the work may not be altered, transformed, or built upon. © 2006 Niklas Dougherty." I don't think that I violated the copyright. 陳鬼 (talk) 05:30, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

"the work may not be altered, transformed, or built upon." is incompatible with wikipedia. "the work may not be used for commercial purposes" is incompatible with wikipedia. Unattributed plagiarism is incompatible with wikipedia. Fifelfoo (talk) 05:35, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

陳鬼, you did violate copyright. That thesis is released under a Creative Commons license, which doesn't give you permission to plagiarize it. rʨanaɢ (talk) 05:37, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

FYI

[5], not the "not promoted" part, my reply regarding Conway's :-) Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 03:35, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

999Zot

I don't understand your "999Zot". Ah, I see that's the name of another user. Bye bye. Cuddlyable3 (talk) 20:35, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

MKuCR question

I asked on the article talk page the other day but you seem to have overlooked it: what is the fringe "Courtois' non-Catholicism argument" that you refer to? I've gone back to look at the intro to the Black Book of Communism and I don't see that argument made there. AmateurEditor (talk) 03:32, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

Sorry, I find MKuCR to be a hostile editing environment which is difficult to read due to waterfalls of text, and didn't mean to neglect your question. If you read Courtois' introduction looking for a theorisation of why mass deaths occur in Communist societies, he doesn't offer one until the final few pages. See p29–30 of the Harvard edition, available on Google Books for Preview (if you're in Australia at least). To provide a quote solely for the purposes of producing knowledge in an educational context (ie: wikipedia)

The responsibility for preserving history and memory have a moral dimension…"Who has given you the authority to say what is Good and what is Bad?" According to [my criteria in the introduction]…the issue was addressed well by…Pope Pius XI…in Divini redeptoris…that God endowed humanity with certain rights, "the right to life, to bodily integrity…" … the importance of the pope's appeal for the respect of human dignity is beyond question. [Elucidation of Pius XI's anti communism by quotation] … [E]ven if the church … [is] a guardian of morality, how is a historian to respond? [Representative democracy, life and human dignity as a normative morality].

I have (sadly due to MKuCR) repeatedly and closely read Courtois' Introduction as this is where the book's generalised argument should be made as to multiple society causes. This argument, that Communism refutes normative Catholic morality, is Courtois' sole claim to a general causative principle. In all other cases Courtois' either avoids causation, or gives examples from the Soviet Union (the particular focus of his introduction). Courtois' causative argument is that there is a normative morality, that the Catholic Church's encyclicals from Pius XI exemplifies this. Therefore, I describe Courtois' theory of causation to be "non-Catholicism." As you can tell, I am angry with Courtois' more because of the deficiency of his research than due to his conclusions. Courtois' doesn't explicate anything nearly as juicy as Valentino's dispossession cause for generalised mass killings.

I've also closely read his conclusion, he doesn't explain any theory of general causation there either other than "Communism is nasty!" which is reliant on his introduction's normative morality, which is, as noted immediately above, a morality of normative Catholicism. Fifelfoo (talk) 03:48, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

This may be helpful:

"He assumes the role of prosecutor, but often behaves more like a preacher, calling on Communists and philo-Communists to repent. In the introduction to Le Livre noir, he presents his case for a moral alternative to Communism through citation of papal encyclicals" (the author's footnote says: "However, Courtois forgives in the Church the sin he attributes to Communists of pursuing practices that undercut moral pronouncements. He moves in the introduction to Le Livre noir from Pope Pius XI's encyclicals condemning Nazism and Communism to the type of accounting he used elsewhere to condemn Commumst regimes: 'Admittedly, these words originated from an institution diat for several centuries had systematically justified the murder of non-Christians, spread the Inquisition, stifled freedom of thought, and supported dictatorial regimes such as diose of General Francisco Franco and Antonio Salazar1: Courtois, Black Book, p. 29.") (Reid, Donald(2005) 'In Search of the Communist Syndrome: Opening the Black Book of the New Anti-Communism in France', The International History Review, 27: 2, 295 — 318).

--Paul Siebert (talk) 04:44, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

Thanks to both of you for the responses. I thought I would have time tonight to respond, but I will have to try again tomorrow. AmateurEditor (talk) 02:40, 1 June 2011 (UTC)

Sorry for the delay. I wanted to reread both the foreword and introduction before responding, but because I could only find the time just before going to sleep, and perhaps because of the style of writing, I found myself nodding off before finishing two nights in a row. (As an aside, I completely agree with you about the MkuCr talk page being difficult to read. It is often too much for me to even keep up with the volume of discussion there, let alone contribute anything of value myself.)

The cause to which Courtois attributes the crimes of Communism is the attempt by the regimes to achieve their ideological goals. And he doesn't consider them crimes against Catholicism, but against natural law. Here are the quotes, with the most relevant passages in bold:

• (page 2)"Having gone beyond individual crimes and small-scale ad-hoc massacres, the Communist regimes, in order to consolidate their grip on power, turned mass crime into a full blown system of government."
• (page 3)"Some will say that most of these crimes were actions conducted in accordance with a system of law that was enforced by the regimes' official institutions, which were recognized internationally and whose heads of state continued to be welcomed with open arms. But was this not the case with Nazism as well? The crimes we shall expose are to be judged not by the standards of Communist regimes, but by the unwritten code of the natural laws of humanity."
• On pages 5-10 Courtois discusses legal definitions of "crime" which also apply, including "crimes against peace", "war crimes", "crimes against humanity", and "genocide" under international and/or french law. He emphasizes that just as the crimes of Nazism were systemic due to the underlying ideology, so to the crimes of Communism. (page 7)"All these definitions, especially the recent French definition, are relevant to any number of crimes committed by Lenin and above all by Stalin and subsequently by the leaders of all Communist countries, with the exception (we hope) of Cuba and the Nicaragua of the Sandinistas. Nevertheless, the main conclusions are inescapable - 'Communist regimes have acted in the name of a state practicing a policy of ideological hegemony.' Thus in the name of an ideological belief system were tens of millions of innocent victims systematically butchered, unless of course it is a crime to be middle class, of noble birth, a kulak, a Ukrainian, or even a worker or a member of the Communist Party."
• (pages 16-17)"Therefore, it would be foolish to pretend that Communism is a form of universalism. Communism may have a worldwide purpose, but like Nazism it deems a part of humanity unworthy of existence. The difference is that the Communist model is based on the class system, the Nazi model on race and territory. Thus the transgressions of Leninism, Stalinism, Maoism, and the Khmer Rouge pose a fresh challenge for humanity, and particularly for legal scholars and historians: specifically, how do we describe a crime designed to exterminate not merely individuals or opposing groups but entire segments of society on a massive scale for their political and ideological beliefs? A whole new language is needed for this. Some authors in the English-speaking countries use the term "politicide". Or is the term "Communist crimes," suggested by Czech legal scholars preferable?"

It is only when considering the moral aspect of documenting Communism's crimes that Courtois uses those quotations from Pope Pius XI. To answer a question he anticipates historians of this topic will hear (page 29)("...,'Who has given you the authority to say what is Good and what is Bad?'"), he cites an authority on morality. But immediately after each quote he questions the Catholic Church's standing to make such moral pronouncements. He simply thinks the quotes are well stated reinforcement of his earlier stance that the actions of the Communist regimes violated natural law, not that they are the final answer to his stated question. He states his actual answer in two places on the next page, after also quoting and not fully endorsing a passage by François-René de Chateaubriand: (page 30)"Nonetheless, this kind of historical knowledge cannot be seen in isolation from certain fundamental principles, such as respect for the rules of a representative democracy and, above all, respect for life and human dignity. This is the yardstick that historians use to 'judge' the actors on the stage of history." And (page 30)"The Crimes of Communism need to be judged by from the standpoint of democratic values, not from the standpoint of ultranationalist or fascist philosophies." AmateurEditor (talk) 01:48, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

I think, the Courtois' introduction has been too extensively criticised by various scholars to deserve any serious attention. It hardly deserves to be used as a source, just in a context of commentaries made by other scholars on it. Even the quotes you provided contain numerous errors, starting from some very questionable "unwritten code of the natural laws of humanity" (an absolutely ahistorical idea, because during different periods of history, or in different cultures these "laws" were stipulating killing of old clan members, or heretics, or children with physical defect, or division of peoples onto slaves and masters, or subordinated position of woman, etc), and ending with the reference to "systematically butchered tens of millions of innocent victims" (which is totally incorrect, because most deaths under Communists were not a result of systematic intentional mass killings).

In connection to that, I suggest you to forget for a while about the BB, and to discuss major rewrite of the article based on the new source provided by Filefoo. --Paul Siebert (talk) 02:54, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

I disagree about Courtois' intro. That something on such a sensitive topic is heavily criticized means virtually nothing. It all depends on what the specific criticisms are. Criticism of the death totals, for example, hardly invalidates the intro when Courtois states immediately before providing the figures (page 4) that they are "rough approximations" because "we have to start somewhere" and they give "some sense of the scale and gravity of these crimes". Natural law is a well-established philosophical idea, not a reference to history. The statement about the tens of millions being systematically butchered is not totally incorrect, it's debatable. And that debate is unresolved. Speaking of forgetting things, did that "Mass killing" article we were going to work on slip your mind again? To be honest, I have no enthusiasm for it anyway. Why don't we just call it off. AmateurEditor (talk) 04:33, 5 June 2011 (UTC)

• It is reasonable to disagree over the background of Courtois' normative morality (Catholic or Liberal Democratic). However, I would posit that attempting to produce a theory of causation from a normative basis is a major pseudohistorical failing of pre-modern Catholic historiography, "Whig history," Stalinist history, etc. Positing a norm without demonstrating a causative process is pseudohistory.
• In relation to Courtois' claims that "Thus in the name of an ideological belief system were [mass killings conducted]" is not, to my mind, a causative assertion. It fails to cover, for example, the post 1956 repressive apparatus in Hungary and Poland which were based on manufactured consent, the absence of mass killing motivated by ideology between 1921 and 1929 in the RSFSR, or the complete absence of mass killing in Vietnam (where state repression was highly selective). It is a "power corrupts" fallacy which is unexplored and facile. I'm left sitting there looking at his lengthy quotation of Catholic normative morality as the fullest exploration of his normative morality; and, this conditions my reading of his text completely.
• (I went out for the weekend, and having seen the number of page revisions, I'm loathe to go back at read T:MKuCR, ah well) Fifelfoo (talk) 04:19, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the response. Honestly, I haven't read the whole book. Perhaps the causes are explained better elsewhere. And maybe I shouldn't have taken you so literally when you seemed to dismiss Courtois for his "fringe non-catholicism thesis". It just struck me as a misreading. I do make them myself from time to time. AmateurEditor (talk) 20:50, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

Review?

Hi Fifel, given your recent posts on WT:MILHIST (and the helpful comments you've given in the past), I'd really appreciate it if you could give my new article, South American dreadnought race, a good review for its ACR. There is some copied text from other articles I wrote, but it should be fine otherwise. Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 09:57, 1 June 2011 (UTC)

Given that I've seen some of the other South American dreadnoughts come forward, I'd be pleased to! Fifelfoo (talk) 10:22, 1 June 2011 (UTC)

Thanks very much, as always. :-) Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 20:19, 1 June 2011 (UTC)

Spotchecking sourcing writeup

Feeding off comments in discussion at WT:MILHIST, I'm wondering if you might write up (say, for the Bugle or the Signpost) what you do when spotchecking for use of sources and copyright violation in articles. This might help others see how easy (or hard, or tedious) it is to do. (Oh, and thanks for doing such reviews.) Magic♪piano 18:24, 1 June 2011 (UTC)

I reviewed South American dreadnought race for MILHIST A Class. To check copyvios first I determined how I should approach the issue

1. Automated testing and individual source manual verification
2. Full text reading for plagiarism through analysis of style changes, exceptional turns of phrase, etc. and individual source manual verification

revision reviewed

Firstly, in either technique, read the article history and look at the change logs. It is mostly one editor's work (unlikely to be adhoc plagiarism then), so then I look at the first version of the page.

• Good sign: the editor knows how to cite in general, and the works are predominantly scholarly. Citations like "Scheina, Naval History, 45–49, 297–298, 347." are great, because they indicate that the data is a result of WP:Close paraphrase's suggestions: to read broadly, internalise, and then write. Single page citations are much more likely to be paraphrase or plagiarism.
• Mixed sign: ""Minas Geraes I," Serviço de Documentação da Marinha - Histórico de Navios." Citations from sources other than English may involve translated plagiarism or close paraphrase. Or they could mean that the author has fundamentally changed the method of expression entirely due to the need to internalise the non-English facts, and then present them in high quality written encyclopaedic English.
• Danger sign: ""Brazil," Naval Engineers, 883." A single page from a single specialised chapter in a specialised work. While most editors use these well, some accidentally or due to bad encyclopaedic editing, lift clauses, phrases and sentences entire; or closely paraphrase already terse technical expressions. Check the final version, and examine that.

The revision history shows the article grew at a steady pace in byte count for 14 days, then levelled off (obviously undergoing copyediting!). This is a good sign. Steady growth indicates normal authorial work. As does sudden spurts of growth, each spurt being the same. Sudden increases in size which are out of pattern can indicate things being lifted whole.

Finally, glancing over the final revision for review:

• The Endnotes are full """The Brazilian Battleship "Minas Geraes"," Scientific American, 241." and give appropriate page references—I can spot check these!
• The Bibliography is full ""Brazil." Journal of the American Society of Naval Engineers 20, no. 3 (1909): 833–836. ISSN 0099-7056. OCLC 3227025." and shows a clear use of scholarly sources—plagiarism is likely to sound "scholarly" for this article, or "military technical", rather than "encyclopaedic" or "journalistic". Plus, knowing that scholarly sources have been used deeply, this article is probably written by a well developed editor—either the editor is a habitual plagiarist, or the editor may make the occasional mistakes we all do when writing up a fact, or the editor is an excellent editor who internalises and writes fresh excellent prose. There would be no problem with clear copyright violations of online blogs, journalism, or scholarly papers (and this is demonstrated below with the tools).

To conduct automated testing I used http://toolserver.org/~earwig/cgi-bin/copyvio.py and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:CorenSearchBot/manual on the article. Earwig showed clear. CorenBot showed clear. This is only the start, however, as close paraphrase and "do the sources support their conclusions" need to be checked using this method. As Full text reading proceeds to individual source checking, I'll deal with Full text reading next.

Full text reading is the process of closely reading the style and expression of a work, to look for jarring changes in style, very unusual verbs verbal clauses or adjectival constructions, material worded far poorer than average, material worded much better than average, and styles which appear to have a academic or journalistic (etc.) rather than encyclopaedic style. So I started at the top of SAdr. For example:

• jarring changes
• unusual expressions:
  • "A South American dreadnought arms race between the countries of Argentina, Brazil, and Chile was kindled in 1907." => Google: ""dreadnought race" "was kindled" -wikipedia" => no hits, probably clear
  • "After canceling a naval-limiting pact between them" unusual tense => Google "naval-limiting pact" -wikipedia => clear, with wikipedia, ah, the article was started on wikipedia in a sandbox, check the sandbox history "The deletion and move log for the page are provided below for reference.", no worries, we can use the history check above.
  • "warships seized merchant ships which had been licensed to operate" => Google as a phrase => Ah, this article includes wikipedia material that has been previously published in other featured articles. A good sign, multiple reviews are better (but notice that FAC has had some rather upsetting incidents, for a "full" review like MILHIST A or FAC, spotchecks must be done)
• Identifying the author's own style: "By this time, however, the First World War had broken out in Europe, so dreadnoughts for foreign countries were suspended while the shipbuilders assisted the war effort. " ah, the author brackets clauses too much, and speaks in a particular kind of tense "so…were suspended while" while writing history... I can use this to identify unusual tenses.
• There's a block quote in the article, cited thus, "(John H. Biles, "Argentina," Navy (Washington) 4, no. 7 (1910): 30, quoted in Scheina, Naval History, 84)." the author knows how to cite, they're less likely to copyright violate, or plagiarise; but close paraphrasing by habit or accident could still exist.

By this stage I've determined the editor's own prose style, and have read the rest of the article, not noticing any sudden stylistic changes. Thus I need to move to spot checking.

Spot checking relies on picking sources, footnotes, or sentences which are likely to be close paraphrase:

• The smaller the page range cited, the more likely paraphrase
• The smaller the content cited to the source (ie: a single clause, phrase or sentence) the more likely a paraphrase
• The fewer sources cited to a fact, the more likely a paraphrase
• The more unique the fact, the more likely a paraphrase
• The more often a single source is relied upon, particularly in the manner above, the more likely that plagiarism has occurred.

Now saying this doesn't mean that editors acting in such ways are plagiarising; but these are the signs which I have found when dealing with Humanities encyclopaedia articles. When I see these signs, I concentrate spot checking on sources and sentences which display this behaviour. If a source is particularly relied upon in this way I check every useage of that source.

Consider, "The United States' Fore River Shipbuilding Company tendered the lowest bid—in part due to the high availability of cheap steel—and was awarded the contract.[32]" Endnote 32: "Livermore, "Battleship Diplomacy," 39." Bibliography: "Livermore, Seward W. "Battleship Diplomacy in South America: 1905–1925." The Journal of Modern History 16: no. 1 (1944), 31–44. JSTOR 1870986. ISSN 0022-2801. OCLC 62219150."

• This is an excellent example. A short sentence with a unique fact, unusual expression, cited to a single page, in a source which is available online (JSTOR).
• I opened the JSTOR link (blessed my access) and proceeded to page 39.
• I need to check that the source
  1. Supports the claim
     • To support the claim the text must support "Fore River's lowest tender" and "due to cheap steel" and "awarded contract"
     • It does: over a long paragraph! The source supports the claims, all of them. Though I have to read "lowest cost result" and "Power of the US Steel Trust" "successful vendor Fore River"—the editor has distilled the encyclopaedic facts from the more expansive scholarly discussion.
  2. Is not copyvio, plagiarism, or close paraphrase.
     • Does the source use the exact order "Fore lowest bid—cheap steel—awarded contract"? Does the source use the same expressions, or precise turns of phrase? I this a sentence lifted from the source with merely new adjectives, "high availability" instead of "cheaply available"? If this three sentences presented in another order, with very similar language, and the order of the material simply reversed?
     • It does not: In the long paragraph the unique terms "lowest bid" "high availability" "cheap steel" "awarded contract" do not appear.
     • The source uses completely different turns of phrase, and orders of presentation, and spreads them out over the entire page. The article condenses these, uses a different order, a different tense and style of expression entirely.

I then repeat this for every citation of Livermore.

• For example, "Chile's naval tonnage was 36,896 long tons (37,488 t), Argentina's 34,425 long tons (34,977 t), and Brazil's 27,661 long tons (28,105 t)." is risky, as it is technical. I check the source. The source reads instead, "The tonnage of the Chilean navy was...; of the Argentine,…; of the Brazilian….". This clearly isn't close paraphrase. The editor provides converted values. The editor's sentence follows the presentation order (Chile, Argentina, Brazil) but this is clearly a natural order of simple fact being a list by size. Additionally the editor expressed themself with the nations as possessive singulars (Brazil's as if Brazil were a person), whereas the source expresses using adjectival national descriptions of the navies, then contracting the navy out in the last two examples of the clause. This isn't close paraphrase because it is obviously a unique re-expression of the fact in a manner I know to be the editor's prose style (a modern contemporary casual yet encyclopaedic style, which often uses direct expressions grounded in colloquial ways of behaving with abstract nouns).
• [8d], population size, for example, is a combination of the source indicating that population size is relevant in economic production by comparing Brazil to both rivals together; whereas our editor uses the source's own figures to trivially calculate this in terms of Brazil compared to each in turn. It substantiates and it is in no way plagiarised.
• [17b]
  • Article: "The Argentine government made a last-ditch attempt to preclude an arms race by offering to purchase one of the Brazilian ships, but when this was rebuffed, they sent a naval delegation to Europe to solicit tenders from armament companies to build warships for Argentina."
  • Source: "Argentina made a final effort to secure naval parity with Brazil by offering to purchase one of the dreadnoughts; when this proposal was rejected, an Argentine naval commission sailed for Europe to receive tenders for the construction of two dreadnoughts and a number of destroyers."
  • So phrase ordering is the same, "Argentina" "avoid" "ship buy" "refusal" "naval" "to Europe" "build" "plural vessels" but is this close paraphrase?
  • Unfortunately it appears to be so. The main point of difference is that preclusion of an arms race is a fundamentally different meaning to security naval parity. However, in all other aspects the expression follows that of the original. How close is close? I'm particularly concerned by the similarity of clause "by offering to purchase one of the"
  • Phrase searching on Google Scholar like so indicates the worrying similarity.

So I reported it in my review:

• • Spotcheck for copyvio, plagiarism, close paraphrase and citations supporting facts: issues, close paraphrase
    • Earwig copyvio: clear
    • CorenBot: clear
    • Sudden stylistic changes and random unique turns of phrase manually checked: clear
    • Spotchecked as Livermore; issues
      • • Endnote [17b] Article: "The Argentine government made a last-ditch attempt to preclude an arms race by offering to purchase one of the Brazilian ships, but when this was rebuffed, they sent a naval delegation to Europe to solicit tenders from armament companies to build warships for Argentina." ; Source: "Argentina made a final effort to secure naval parity with Brazil by offering to purchase one of the dreadnoughts; when this proposal was rejected, an Argentine naval commission sailed for Europe to receive tenders for the construction of two dreadnoughts and a number of destroyers." ; phrase ordering is the same, "Argentina" "avoid" "ship buy" "refusal" "naval" "to Europe" "build" "plural vessels" ; this appears as close paraphrase: The main point of difference is that preclusion of an arms race is a fundamentally different meaning to security naval parity. However, in all other aspects the expression follows that of the original. How close is close? I'm particularly concerned by the similarity of clause "by offering to purchase one of the"

• So why didn't the bots pick this up? Who knows.
• So why didn't I pick it up in a style review? Because the source author's style on this paragraph was very close to the editor's style.

Now that I've found close paraphrase I need to overcome my sadness and run a detailed check of Livermore, thorough and suspicious.

• Oh no! The article and the source present the same material at:
  • [84b]
    • Article: "In the end, Chile only bought Canada and four destroyers in April 1920, all of which had been ordered by Chile prior to the war's outbreak and requisitioned by the British for the war.[84]"
    • Source: "The Chileans, however, contented themselves with the purchase of a single dreadnought and a few destroyers, all of which had been ordered before the war and had been taken over by the British Navy in 1914"
    • Again, the verb clause, "all of which had been ordered" and the common presentation order.
• So I reported it again, similarly.

Livermore was cited 20 times. On two occasions close paraphrase occurred. In both cases it was where a single sentence in the text displayed the same information that a single sentence in the source displayed. In both cases the verb clause remained identical. In both cases the order of presentation was sufficiently similar. This appears to be accidental close paraphrase, and not a matter of style or habit for the editor. The editor's work is fantastic, but they need to hede WP:Close paraphrase on internalisation and re-expression.

The first close paraphrase appeared in the initial article version, the second must have appeared later. This clearly indicates that these were natural slip ups and not an matter of fundamentally bad habits.

I then repeat this for two or three other sources. I chose to check the "weakest" sources, because looking through Livermore exhausted me; and, the style review passed clearly.

• "British and Foreign News," Evening Post, 12 September 1908, 13. A web available source, with a single cite to a single page, from a journalistic source.
• "Acorazado Almirante Latorre," Armada de Chile, archived 8 June 2008. A modern web source, with a single cite, in a foreign language I can dog translate, from a non-scholarly source.

I saved my report, and let the author know that they need to watch when they write single article sentences from single source sentences.

It is also obvious that we need automated tools which identify verb clauses and extensively search Google Scholar. Fifelfoo (talk) 02:32, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

It took me (while writing this up) 90 minutes to automatically, style read, search google / scholar for style turns of phrase, and close read Livermore and two web citations. I estimate that the cost of documenting the process was about 25-50% of the time. I estimate I spent 60 minutes reading Livermore closely. Thus, I'd estimate the cost of spotchecking a FACable article to be approximately 60 minutes.

Thanks for doing this, it was quite informative. Magic♪piano 12:23, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

This is obviously a first draft. Where do you think this should go (other than an essay)? Bugle, or Signpost? Fifelfoo (talk) 00:49, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

I think either would be fine, since it's not strictly a milhist thing. Perhaps whichever's editors are looking for material? Magic♪piano 03:36, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

Wow, that was fantastically detailed and wonderfully informative, though I must say it was a rather weird feeling to remember you were commenting on me...! Two questions:

• You say "... ah, the author brackets clauses too much, and speaks in a particular kind of tense "so…were suspended while" while writing history... I can use this to identify unusual tenses." Do you have any advice on how to improve this part of my writing?
• You also say "... (a modern contemporary casual yet encyclopaedic style, which often uses direct expressions grounded in colloquial ways of behaving with abstract nouns)." I consider myself somewhat well-educated, but the meaning of the second part confuses me, which in turn makes me more curious. Could you possibly restate it in plainer English for me? :-)

Just to be clear, I don't have any problems with you placing something like this in the Bugle or Signpost. As to where you could run it, I think reviving the old Dispatch section of the Signpost would be an ideal place. As one of the editors of the Bugle, I'd love to have it as an editorial, but the Signpost offers a much larger reader base. Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 04:54, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

• Getting back to Ed. Complex bracketted clauses can be hard to read. Single idea per sentence. I like your contemporary casual style, it means your stuff is readable for the average wikipedian! Fifelfoo (talk) 10:41, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

So I should try to avoid " , however,"? :p Let me know if you want to run this in the next month's Bugle – otherwise please talk to the Signpost! :-) Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 08:13, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

Why are you so angry?

I was trying to improve Wikipedia by decreasing the chances that Nazi sympathizers would interpret the article as being only about German victims and use it as a way to publish their propaganda.

--Anonymiss Madchen 02:13, 6 June 2011 (UTC)

Please read WP:V WP:CONSENSUS and most particularly WP:SOAPBOX. I am not angry; your editing has displayed signs of WP:OWN. You may also need to familiarise yourself with the Arbitration Committee's very firm restrictions on editing in Eastern European topics; urgently. Fifelfoo (talk) 02:18, 6 June 2011 (UTC)

Jesus buildings

After my Inflation query, above, I've now nominated Buildings of Jesus College, Oxford at TFA requests for 27th June, the 440th anniversary of the college's foundation. My instinct at present is to remove all the {{inflation}} templates from the article rather than face the wrath of those who excoriate its misuse, but if (before or after 27th June) you have an alternative suggestion, I'm all ears, as they say. Regards, Bencherlite^Talk 22:47, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

• Sorry, I get taken up with work elsewhere. As you note, inflation is a wrought field. Did you find a capital expenditure inflation for Nuffield that you are happy with defending? Regarding Jesus… Measuring Worth offers two measures for inflations prior to 1830. Purchasing Power and Average Earnings. I suggest that you use "Average Earnings" as a better proxy of the fundamental cost of labour. Even though we moderns consider workers in a fundamentally different aspect (we consider them human beings and individuals, rather than as lesser beings with emotions, like a horse, and part of a mob)…Average Earnings is a better indicator than purchasing power; as, we are interested in the social cost of mobilisation when comparing capital works over time. As these are university figures, we can defend the reliance on southern wage labour data. For example: £1500 in 1574 in 2009 was worth "£3,710,000.00 using average earnings". This is radically different to your PPP figure of £271,900. Why not use PPP? Because all commodities apart from labour have changed radically and fundamentally, because we don't purchase large stone buildings anymore, but we do purchase wage labour at a socially average skill level (see Marx on complex labour). Further, for figures in Jesus after 1830 you may with to use a more regular capital expense index as for Nuffield. Does this help? Of course you need to cite Measuring Worth properly (it has an author, subsections, titles, publisher, etc), and you need to indicate the method of computation in the citation (by Purchasing Power Parity, by Average Earnings)... Fifelfoo (talk) 00:49, 8 June 2011 (UTC)
  • You've reminded me that I really ought to say that despite our occasional disagreements over these conversions I think that you've really been very helpful. A footnote explaining the basis for the conversion makes it more transparent, and easier to challenge if necessary, something I've always done since you mentioned it. Malleus Fatuorum 01:30, 8 June 2011 (UTC)
    • Over the last two or three years the biggest task I've been working on has been civil disagreement, and collegiality when there are disagreements. I think it's been paying off for me. I think it has benefitted the encyclopaedia and my fellow editors. I quite like seeing people's notes on the method of calculation, it often shows if they know why they're using a particular inflation. (I think the inflation template is a horrible horrible thing, and the maintainer still hasn't gotten back to me about how his figures accord with measuring worth's). Fifelfoo (talk) 22:59, 9 June 2011 (UTC)
      • I've come round completely to your point of view on this; explain in a note what the basis of the conversion is, and it can then be argued whether it's the best calculation if others disagree. The inflation template hides that subtlety. Malleus Fatuorum 23:15, 9 June 2011 (UTC)
        • I also think you are wise in doing those things, Fifelfoo. I'm doing much the same, ignoring the goings on at noticeboards (except where I can be helpful to the novice or not so novice editor) and just trying to keep my own little front yard neat. Also avoiding inflation templates, but if I did want to use one, what do you recommend for the fine that Kenesaw Mountain Landis tried to impose on Standard Oil in 1907, $29.4 million?--Wehwalt (talk) 23:27, 9 June 2011 (UTC)
          • Oh god. Court fines are arbitrary assignments by a legislature and judiciary that are significantly independent of the market form (even when hegemonised by a capitalist or aristocratic class, or their culture). Standard Oil is a corporation, a large economic actor with capital. So I'm expecting a capital measure unless $29.4 million was more than 1% of the economy? My instinct is towards nominal GDP/capita. (Share of GDP shows that it would only be $12.7bn, so I'm figuring it isn't a share GDP issue). Nominal GDP/capita relates productivity, volume of economic activity, etc. A good proxy for capital. Fifelfoo (talk) 00:16, 10 June 2011 (UTC)
            • Landis made inquiries about the parent company's assets, in what seems to have been an unsuccessful attempt to make his fine stand up in the Court of Appeals (who reversed him). But he basically just imposed the maximum fine he could.--Wehwalt (talk) 00:23, 10 June 2011 (UTC)
              • Measuring Worth offers nominal GDP/capita which should suit. It measures the average relative productivity per capita, an excellent proxy for Capital earnings (and Government instrumentality earnings) and thus the rest of the productive economy in a society dominated by capital. While Standard Oil may have been more mechanised than normal for its era (ie: more productive) and thus require a different specific internal measure to reflect changes in Standard Oil earnings; when we relate to fining a corporation, we're interested in the overall impact on a capitalist enterprise, so proxying via social average capital ought to be fine. It gives us an idea about the fine's impact on agricorps, or Microsoft, or McDonalds to measure against nominal GDP/capita. (I remember vaguely reading about this kind of stuff in the failure of Trust busting, and the use of anti-trust legislation against trades and industrial unions from reading Dubofsky etc on the IWW). Fifelfoo (talk) 00:42, 10 June 2011 (UTC)
  • Thanks for your suggestion and explanation. I've made a start on updating the pre-1830 figures (at user:Bencherlite/sandbox#Notes and references but – excuse the simple question – why is it advisable to switch to another method of inflation calculation post-1830? Why not just stick with AE throughout? Bencherlite^Talk 20:54, 9 June 2011 (UTC)
    • The average earnings set is acting as a proxy for the capital costs. After 1830 the British economy is clearly and decisively dominated by capitalism, and has excellent economic data. Measuring Worth provides capital specific measures (ie: those you used at Nuffield). You no longer need to use the proxy of the social cost of labour from 1830, because you have measures that are more specific to the cost of capital over time. (I want to find out how many Valencia oranges I can buy for $20, but they only have California oranges at the moment, so I use the California orange cost as a "proxy". It is likely to be out, but to be in a very similar ball park). Fifelfoo (talk) 22:55, 9 June 2011 (UTC)
      • I think I follow (my Economics A-level was a long time ago...!) - may I ask what you think of the explanatory introduction and note text at user:Bencherlite/sandbox#Notes and references now? Thanks again. Bencherlite^Talk 22:58, 9 June 2011 (UTC)
        • I've written a blurb into your sandbox, I hope it helps? It may be unclear, or poor writing, so feel free to make sense of what I've written and express it over again. The core point to make out is that GDP / average wage labour, are inflations which illustrate the "social opportunity cost" not the private opportunity cost for a worker. It isn't like I'm buying glasses or an iPod. It is that society is buying a University or a war. :) Fifelfoo (talk) 00:16, 10 June 2011 (UTC)
          • Yes, indeed. Diff of changes, now out of the sandbox. I'll sort out Nuffield once I've recovered from the excitement! Many thanks for your help and patience. Bencherlite^Talk 00:51, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Peer Review

Hi, thanks for your very informative feedback on the Wellington Battle Record article I created. I have left a few queries which I would appreciate feedback on in the ACR page, mainly to help me get a more sound understanding of citation methods — I gather you use APA method rather than MLA from your examples. I have used citations in college/university previously, but they did not appear to require me to be as thorough, hence why I am not quite up to scratch with a couple of minor points — perhaps UK methods in Oxford & Cambridge, or whoever sets the standard here, is not as demanding. Once Wellington's record is finished to the best of my ability — A-class for the time being, I may return to FL it later — I have already begun to develop Napoleon's battle record too in my Sandbox; although what with Napoleon being more of a warmonger^{[understatement]} it is a lot more extensive and in depth; perhaps 60–80 entries to complete and then source. Hopefully your feedback will help me get Wellington's to A-class quality soon, and then I can aim to prepare the Napoleon record article for immediate ACR, bypassing the need for an interim PR/BCR. Thanks again! Regards, Ma®©usBritish (talk) 10:23, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, I'll get back to you there too. I recommend you look at Chicago and Turabian. I recommend these as historian's citation formats. They're useful because they tell you a lot about the work cited, and its quality. Yes, they're both from a US university, but, they are very complete and aimed at discursive fields where text identity is central. It matters because Military History on wikipedia is a form of history. And Napoleon is going to be harder because he was an imperialist war monger (though Wellington was a conservative arse in government). If you internalise stuff from the Wellington process, you'll be able to skip PR/BCR more readily, at least for the sourcing and citation stuff, because you'll be doing it at an expert level. Fifelfoo (talk) 10:39, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Cheers. I've taken a look at Turabian's method. I don't see a great deal of difference between it and APA method. I few discrepancies, perhaps. The only thing I don't particular like, or see need for in any method, is giving the Chapter Title *AND* page number (I only find the Chapter Number is useful in multi-Volume texts, eg Vol. IV, Ch. iii, p. 1250, at it is more directive - especially if you're looking at OCR scans of old texts and the Volumes have been separated for whatever reason). Seems to me that your average book reader is going to go directly to the page number given, and barely acknowledge the chapter title. Apart from their Index value, as a very short descriptor, its rare that I consider a chapter title as important once the pages are known. I've covered that concern in my reply to your ACR, however. Looking forward to your explanations. Thanks, Ma®©usBritish (talk) 11:33, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Chapter titles are given for chapters authored by one author in a work edited (or authored) by a second. "James Bloggs, "Love" in Susan Susanson Emotions, pp. 113-190 at p. 23". You give the chapter title because it is the name of Bloggs'. In Turabian you give the page range for the cited work when it isn't a separate object to limit the bounds. Then (as always) you need to give the page reference for the fact or opinion you're supporting. Fifelfoo (talk) 00:49, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

Yes, I follow how you cite a chapter. Like I say, I just don't see the point. Regardless of the chapter's name, if you cite "Love" in Emotions pp. 113-190 - most people will go to page 113, regardless of the chapter name - it just doesn't seem a purposeful identifier to me, unless you intend to cite a whole chapter; even then page numbers are still clearer. Not sure what you mean by "pp. 113-190 at p. 23" though - I've had a look at APA examples of citing, they all mention "In" to identify it's a chapter, but nothing about any "at" usage. Although I'm not sure why there would be 2 sets of page numbers in any book to begin with. I'll have to assume that you're using another citing method for that practice. From what I can tell though, there are a lot of websites giving examples of APA methods, and there appear to be differences - I imagine it's one of those things that has "evolved" and some people using APA methods from maybe 5 years ago, some 3, some current, etc - just a wild guess. Does the APA tend to "update" writing methods, like that for modern use?

Did you get chance to see my queries in your ACR? Once I get some answers to those, I can complete your remaining review comments and update my citations there, if necessary. Despite the fact another reviewer "disagrees" with my use of footnotes, I consider it very near completion.

Thanks. Ma®©usBritish (talk) 19:02, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

—— Hi, I'm looking to conclude the ACR of Wikipedia:WikiProject_Military_history/Assessment/Battle_record_of_Arthur_Wellesley,_1st_Duke_of_Wellington asap, but I am informed I require 3 reviewers who Support that the article meets A-class requirements. Could you please consult your review, and reassess whether you are satisfied that the article now meets the criteria. Thank you. Ma®©usBritish (talk) 17:12, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

Talkback

Hello, Fifelfoo. You have new messages at Talk:Troughman/GA1.
Message added 09:57, 14 June 2011 (UTC). You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

Sorry to only have informed you now. I thought I already did inform you. Moray An Par (talk) 09:57, 14 June 2011 (UTC)

Juno Beach

Hey, I think I've addressed all your comments on the Juno Beach ACR. Cam ^(Chat)(Prof) 06:07, 16 June 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Vidkun Quisling/archive1

Hey Fifelfoo. Did you ever do your spotcheck of Quisling in the end? I realise there's not really enough Fifelfoo spot-checking ability to go round, but when you do get a chance, it'd be great to have you comments, which I think are the last part of the jigsaw here. Regards, - Jarry1250 ^{[Weasel? Discuss.]} 16:21, 16 June 2011 (UTC)

Could I give you a gently prod on this one? I'm away from the 27th onwards. Thanks, - Jarry1250 ^{[Weasel? Discuss.]} 14:56, 22 June 2011 (UTC)

A request

Hi, Fifelfoo! I have recently nominated a new article to FAC: Afonso, Prince Imperial of Brazil. Unlike others I nominated before, this one is very short. This, I don't believe it will be a tiresome read. Anyway, I'd very glad if you could take some time to read it and share your thoughts about it. In case you're willing, please go to Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Afonso, Prince Imperial of Brazil/archive1. Kind regards, --Lecen (talk) 22:10, 19 June 2011 (UTC)

Reviewing for A-class

Hi Fifelfoo:

You upgraded the rating of Economy of England in the Middle Ages from GA class to A class.

How does such upgrading happen?

The Shapley–Folkman lemma is listed in economics and mathematics. I believe that the Shapley–Folkman lemma meets the criteria for A class in economics, and would like a review.

Best regards,  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 18:22, 24 June 2011 (UTC)

Clarification

Good day, Arequest for clarification has been filed with Arbcom relative to a case in which you participated or might be affected by. Communikat (talk) 17:53, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

I'd like to start over, I'm sorry about stirring stuff up, and I'll listen to advice.

Anonymiss Madchen has given you a cookie! Cookies promote WikiLove and hopefully this one has made your day better. You can Spread the "WikiLove" by giving someone else a cookie, whether it be someone you have had disagreements with in the past or a good friend.

To spread the goodness of cookies, you can add {{subst:Cookie}} to someone's talk page with a friendly message, or eat this cookie on the giver's talk page with {{subst:munch}}!

Talk page subpages

I deleted them.

--Anonymiss Madchen 06:11, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

Katyn massacre FAR

Hi Fifelfoo - Just dropping by to see if you would have a few minutes to check back in on the Katyn massacre FAR (FAR page at WP:Featured article review/Katyn massacre/archive1). I see that you haven't commented since the FARC portion began. There's been some discussion and votes either way (keep or delist), and your opinion at FAR nominator would be appreciated. Thanks, Dana boomer (talk) 14:51, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

Sadly I won't be able to get to this in a reasonable time frame due to off wiki commitments. Fifelfoo (talk) 08:14, 4 July 2011 (UTC)

Editorial?

Hey Fifel, would you be interested in adapting your thorough plagiarism check of South American dreadnought race for The Bugle? We're still in need of an editorial this month. :| If you can, please add it here. Thanks very much! Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 07:49, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

Feel free to write it into a fit order. The FA crew's dispatches are in a down cycle, so they're unlikely to work it up. Unfortunately, I'm completely down cycle right now, I have writing tasks to get through. Fifelfoo (talk) 08:14, 4 July 2011 (UTC)

Okay thanks, I got WereSpielChequers to write one, but I'll write it up for next month. Have a good break from WP and I hope to see you back ASAP! Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 09:17, 4 July 2011 (UTC)

James B. McCreary

Thanks for your comments during the recent WP:MILHIST A-class review of James B. McCreary. If you are interested, I've now listed the article at WP:FAC. Your comments and suggestions for further improvement would again be welcome. Thanks again. Acdixon ^{(talk • contribs • count)} 13:17, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

I know you're on break, but...

... your assessment at WP:RSN#Softonic.com would be appreciated, either way. --Lexein (talk) 23:23, 14 July 2011 (UTC)

Milhist FA, A-Class and Peer Reviews Apr–Jun 2011

		The WikiChevrons
		By order of the Military history WikiProject coordinators, for your devoted contributions to the WikiProject's Peer, A-Class and Featured Article reviews for the period Apr–Jun 2011, I am delighted to award you the WikiChevrons. AustralianRupert (talk) 08:35, 16 July 2011 (UTC)

Neo-Marxism

I have nominated Neo-marxism for deletion, Please see: [6]. Given your knowledge of Marxism, i think your views night be constructive (on the AfD page or on the article talk page)Slrubenstein | Talk 11:27, 17 July 2011 (UTC)

Citation help

I'm using the book The Reader's Companion to Military History in an article I'm writing, Military history of the Russian Empire. The book is a thick one, and is edited by two historians, Cowley and Parker. However, individual sections are written by other historians; for instance, the section I am citing right now is for the Seven Years' War, pp. 422-423, and its author is Jeremy Black. I've cited the editors, but it seems more appropriate to cite the particular authors; how do I cite the book so that it is clear what reference I am referring too, but also clear who wrote that particular section? The references are in Harvard format, by the way. Much obliged, ResMar 17:25, 27 July 2011 (UTC)

http://www.lib.monash.edu.au/tutorials/citing/harvard-chapters.html

In text Statement requiring proof (Author1Last 2003 p. 74)

Ie: AuthorLast, F & Author2Last, F 1990, 'Chapter Title', in F EditorLast & F Editor2Last (eds.), in Title, Publisher, Place, page numbers for chapter.

Except you don't seem to be citing in Harvard style, you're using wikipedia's cite book type style set

So Bibliography: {{cite book|author=Jeremy Black|chapter=Title of the actual chapter you cite|pages=page range of the chapter you cited (the entire chapter's pages)|title=The Reader's Companion to Military History|editor=[[Robert Cowley]] and [[Geoffrey Parker (historian)|Geoffrey Parker]]|publisher=[[Houghton Mifflin Company]]|year=2001|isbn=0-395-66969-3}}Jeremy Black (2001). "Title of the actual chapter you cite". In Robert Cowley and Geoffrey Parker (ed.). The Reader's Companion to Military History. Houghton Mifflin Company. pp. page range of the chapter you cited (the entire chapter's pages). ISBN 0-395-66969-3. {{cite book}}: |pages= has extra text (help)

And footnote: Black, 31–40.

Fifelfoo (talk) 01:19, 28 July 2011 (UTC)

Ok, but the thing is, I will definitely need to cite additional sections in the book written, again, by different authors. Is it possible to create a sublist and list the subsections and their authors in it? ResMar 23:26, 28 July 2011 (UTC)

No, you cite each chapter separately and in full. Each is a separate research object. Fifelfoo (talk) 23:38, 28 July 2011 (UTC)

Ay, I hear ya

[7] "I've realised the volume of work I was doing here ought to be going into producing original research for publication in high quality reliable sources ". It's a very good thing to keep in mind - that your (our) contributions to Wikipedia, at the end of the day, ARE volunteer/charity work (ones which you often have to put up with a lot of crap just to be able to make) so you should allocate your scarce time accordingly. Personally I appreciate having other serious people around but at the same time I recognize that given the nature of the project it's often too much to ask for. Volunteer Marek  04:09, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

• The day when I discover how to engage in reviews and/or contributions to discussions on the history of actually existing socialism without becoming overly involved emotionally or by time spent, I'll share the discovery with everyone. (Speaking of which, despite the highly contested nature of 20th century central european and eastern european history; I think that our editors are very professional and friendly with each other. Certainly in comparison to the areas of editing in climate change or religions newly developed in the 20th century, etc. —and we seem to argue about what constitutes HQRS, not about the principle of using the best sources! It is like an overly intensive history tutorial.) Fifelfoo (talk) 04:17, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

Heh, in regard to the editors in the 20th central european and eastern european history being friendly, this is actually my impression too, though there are some exceptions. Many, most, of the exceptions are fly-by-night-I'm-just-here-to-cause-trouble accounts (and "by-night" can mean anywhere from a couple months to a year and a half). The way it works in my experience is that "temporary" accounts (some of them long banned editors) are the folks which come in and kick over the anthills and cause trouble and then that draws in the regulars. Unfortunately these kinds of people can be hugggge time sinks and I, and other people, get frustrated with the experience.

I've also seen outsiders who come into this area comment along the ways that "you think this is bad? You should see how bad Palestinian-Israel topics, or British-Irish, or Indian-Pakistani, or Obama, or climate change, or race-intelligence, or 9/11, or Scientology etc. topics are". Which makes me think that this is actually a relatively decent - though of course contentious - area that has a bit of an undeserved reputation. I certainly learn a lot just from interacting with people I disagree with. Anyway, it feels like for the past year or so it has been relatively quiet in terms of unnecessary drama which is what allows people to get down to the actually useful work of working on articles.

The key is to be able to limit your participation in Wikipedia to the things that you actually enjoy/learn from. Let it work for you rather than just working for it all the time. I usually do my edits when I'm waiting for some program to finish converging or when I've gotten stuck in my own work and need some kind of a break. Volunteer Marek  01:37, 27 September 2011 (UTC)

MKuCR

I proposed the alternative version of the lede. Your comment and contribution is appreciated in advance.--Paul Siebert (talk) 04:44, 27 September 2011 (UTC)

Fifelfoo, please, be realistic. Some authors do discuss MKuCR in connection to each other (although single society studies are much more numerous). Therefore, the article has a right to exist, and the only thing we can do is to make it more reasonable and neutral. Therefore, I expect to get some productive criticism from you, with concrete proposals on what should be added/changed/removed from one or another lede draft.--Paul Siebert (talk) 01:59, 6 October 2011 (UTC)

Talkback

Hello, Fifelfoo. You have new messages at BlueMoonlet's talk page.
You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

Tipping

This is something I guess I will just never understand. Pleasantness, courtesy and speed would certainly be considered necessary attributes of a competent waiter or waitress in the U.S., and I can't understand why anyone would think they had some kind of right to hold such a job without doing that. And any American waiter or waitress would laugh at the suggestion that he or she is somehow being exploited by holding a job in which most of the pay comes from tips. (Compare that to working at Wal-Mart, where your pay is guaranteed, but it's only half as much. At least, "guaranteed" until they choose to fire you for any ridiculous reason they can think of.) I suppose neither the American nor the system used elsewhere is any "better," but I'm sure it has something to do with the common complaint of Americans traveling abroad that the service staff are mean or rude in the destination. I've never been to Australia, but I was shocked at the attitude of waiters and other service people in the UK, which ranged from disinterested to hostile. Then I got to Eastern Europe and it made the UK feel like Alabama in terms of hospitality. -- Mwalcoff (talk) 02:16, 30 September 2011 (UTC)

Milhist FA, A-Class and Peer Reviews Jul-Sep 2011

		The Content Review Medal of Merit
		By order of the Military history WikiProject coordinators, for your devoted work on the WikiProject's Peer, A-Class and Featured Article reviews for the period Jul-Sept 2011, I am delighted to award you this Content Review Medal. Buggie111 (talk) 17:33, 1 October 2011 (UTC)

Copyvio on Fordism

Thanks for identifying this. Let me know if you have any preference for a solution. Perhaps the previous USA section could be used. But actually the article doesn't need a history of the USA in the Fordist period because that should be covered elsewhere. Itsmejudith (talk) 07:52, 5 October 2011 (UTC)

One of the problems is that principle analyses of society as Fordism have been national case studies, for example, the work of the Johnston-Forrest tendency on precisely the US. I suspect that case study sections need to reflect the scholarship of the principle analyses, rather than simply being national histories in the light of a Fordist analysis. I'd nuke the section and rewrite—but after a considered review of the article. The problem I foresee is that there's a complex revdel issue: we can't have copyvios in the histories of our pages, but we can't nuke the contributions of authors that were reasonable. Fifelfoo (talk) 02:29, 6 October 2011 (UTC)

Regarding the Technocracy's "Precursor" section

The "Precursor" section of the Technocracy article advances a position that is not supported by the sources that are cited. This is in violation of WP:ORIGINALSYN. The content qualifies as WP:NOR, and must be removed per Wikipedia's guidelines.

Secondly, you repeatedly accusse other editors of being sock puppets of user FidelDrumbo without any basis in fact. If this behavior continues, I will call for outside mediation on this issue. Thank you. Malik047 (talk) 10:30, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

• Michael G. Smith "Marx, technocracy, and the corporatist ethos" Studies in East European Thought 36:4 233–250 DOI: 10.1007/BF02342284, 233–235ff.
• WP:MEAT "For the purposes of dispute resolution, the Arbitration Committee issued a decision in 2005 stating "whether a party is one user with sockpuppets or several users with similar editing habits they may be treated as one user with sockpuppets."[4]" Fifelfoo (talk) 10:34, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

Please see the discussion page of the Technocracy article for further details. Also, in light of your tendency to repeatedly revert edits of other users without providing a rationale, of randomly accusing them of being sock puppets without any basis in fact, and, most importantly, of attempting to settle disputes by initiating page protections rather than reaching consensus through discussion and argumentation, I recommend that you carefully review the guidelines that are stipulated in WP:GAME. Malik047 (talk) 11:51, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

I bet Crom would like your opinion.

Thank you for your comments on Conan the Barbarian (1982 film). I hope you might find the time/energy within these few weeks to review it, but your encouragement is most appreciated regardless. Jappalang (talk) 05:14, 10 October 2011 (UTC)

Gay and Gay, Encyclopedia of political anarchy, ABC-CLIO 1999 article spanning pp61-2

Your request on WP:RX has received a reply. JanetteDoe (talk) 16:32, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

Appreciation

It's nice to see another Marxian on the RefDesks. I've gotten rusty since my exposure to Marxian/Marxist thought during the 90s. I appreciate your contributions and have been learning from them. Marco polo (talk) 14:48, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

No worries! Many social science and humanities questions require a variety of theoretical perspectives forming answers to fully answer the question given the current state of knowledge. I like to contribute in my area of theoretical investigation. Fifelfoo (talk) 11:10, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

"Please never edit my signed comments"

I'm sorry, I was only trying to be helpful. Feel free to undo my edit if it's upsetting you. Alansplodge (talk) 09:24, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

No worries. Fifelfoo (talk) 09:33, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

commodity fetishism

I am glad you continue to tke an interest in that article.

FYI I left a note here.

I wish other editors cared about this. Attention to WP articles is very lopsided. Slrubenstein | Talk 20:12, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Why the warning?

Jurrian: your constant soapboxing and original research amounts to a continuous campaign of disruption of the article process. Consider this a formal warning that future article disruption on articles related to Marx and his work will be treated as attacks on the encyclopaedia. I have warned your current IP and your user account. You are more than welcome to contribute content, and make cogent arguments regarding content for the purpose of improving the encyclopaedia, within the policies and processes of the encyclopaedia. This would mean relying on secondary sources.

What exactly do you mean by "constant soapboxing"? I haven't edited anything on wikipedia in like 4 years. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jurrian (talk • contribs) 16:13, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

I strongly object to Fifelfoo's allegations and accusations. There is no evidence that I have disrupted anything. I have merely committed the sin of referencing some ideas by Karl Marx to Karl Marx's own text, whereas Fifelfoo feels that only a secondary source interpreting Karl Marx would be authoritative on Karl Marx. Actually, I am not interested in contributing my time to improving the article on commodity fetishism or anything else, if I get falsely accused of disruption. I have cited the IP numbers on my user page specifically so that my edits can be verified, it is not a big secret. I have no idea what your "megaphoneduck" or "soapboxing" is about. In general, my editing activities are nowadays restricted to articles which I piloted myself. User:Jurriaan 3 Nov 2011 20:49 (UTC) ¬¬¬¬ — Preceding unsigned comment added by 212.64.48.162 (talk)

You obviously had the wrong person, Fifelfoo. "Jurrian" and "Jurriaan" are two different users. Also, in the event "Jurriaan" reads this, please refrain from signing your articles under the name "Jurrian". Jurrian (talk) 11:34, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Removal of info at 2011 Qantas industrial disputes

May I ask why you removed the second paragraph (which I added), at 2011 Qantas industrial disputes? Have you noticed that all the info in the para was sourced? The first para was added by another editor after my edits. 09:33, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

"Alan Joyce 'Termination of Qantas strikes only option'". The Sunday Telegraph. 30 October 201. Retrieved 30 October 2011. does not substantiate "In early 2011, Qantas again started to experience disruptions to its operations. In the nine months leading up to October, 200 meetings related to labor conditions were held, during which a group of employees demanded that the airline guarantee further improvements in working conditions, costing the airline A$68 million according to its chief executive officer (CEO) Alan Joyce." Joyce makes no connection between costs and "further improvements in working conditions," the subject of the meeting isn't mentioned, and nothing is mentioned about disruption to operations in early 2011.

"Qantas pilots strike for long-haul jobs". Perth Now. 11 July 2011. Retrieved 29 October 2011. does not substantiate "On 11 July 2011, long-haul pilots registered with the Australian and International Pilots Association (AIPA) voted to take protected industrial action against the airline, for the first time since 1981. The president of AIPA, Barry Jackson, said the aim of the action was to discourage the airline from hiring foreign pilots." Jackson doesn't attack foreign pilots. Fifelfoo (talk) 09:47, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Well, I think a better thing to do is to remove the unsourced information from the article, and search for new references. Anyway, I've partially reverted your edit and cleaned up the section. --Sp33dyphil © • © 22:56, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Citations

That would be at Japanese aircraft carrier Amagi. Also, see [8]. Frankly, I think there is no consensus on the required density of references, but it has been my understanding that the usual procedure when somebody requests them it is to provide them, not to remove the cite requests. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 02:24, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the input. Could I also canvass you for Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Assessment/Battle of Radzymin (1920)? --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 17:42, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for your suggestions. You might want to know that I replied to your lengthy comment there and also fixed (hopefully) all issues you reported. I would really like to know what you think. //Halibutt 19:04, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

reliable source notice board

I asked another question in the sequel. Would appreciate it if you respond. All the Best.--69.232.73.16 (talk) 06:10, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

Mediation Cabal: Request for participation

Dear Fifelfoo: Hello. This is just to let you know that you've been mentioned in the following request at the Mediation Cabal, which is a Wikipedia dispute resolution initiative that resolves disputes by informal mediation.

The request can be found at Wikipedia:Mediation Cabal/Cases/02 October 2011/Holodomor.

Just so you know, it is entirely your choice whether or not you participate. If you wish to do so, and we'll see what we can do about getting this sorted out. At MedCab we aim to help all involved parties reach a solution and hope you will join in this effort.

If you have any questions relating to this or any other issue needing mediation, you can ask on the case talk page, the MedCab talk page, or you can ask the mediator, Steven Zhang, at their talk page. MedcabBot (talk) 14:26, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

Delegate notified

I notified an FA delegate, Ucucha, of your question on the FAC for the 1689 Boston revolt. DCItalk 02:04, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

Welcome back

It's good to see your name poking around Milhist ACRs and FAC again. Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 10:37, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

I guess I am back for doing some reviewing. Fifelfoo (talk) 10:41, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

Thank you

Thanks for taking the time to spotcheck the 1689 Boston revolt article. DCI2026 (talk) 01:19, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

Speedy deletion nomination of Manager's right to manage

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You may want to consider using the Article Wizard to help you create articles.

A tag has been placed on Manager's right to manage requesting that it be speedily deleted from Wikipedia. This has been done under section A1 of the criteria for speedy deletion, because it is a very short article providing little or no context to the reader. Please see Wikipedia:Stub for our minimum information standards for short articles. Also please note that articles must be on notable subjects and should provide references to reliable sources that verify their content.

If you think that this notice was placed here in error, contest the deletion by clicking on the button labelled "Click here to contest this speedy deletion". Doing so will take you to the talk page where you will find a pre-formatted place for you to explain why you believe the page should not be deleted. You can also visit the page's talk page directly to give your reasons, but be aware that once tagged for speedy deletion, if the page meets the criterion, it may be deleted without delay. Please do not remove the speedy deletion tag yourself, but don't hesitate to add information to the page that would render it more in conformance with Wikipedia's policies and guidelines. If the page is deleted, you can contact one of these administrators to request that the administrator userfy the page or email a copy to you. Greenmaven (talk) 05:23, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

Talkback

Hello, Fifelfoo. You have new messages at Mr. Vernon's talk page.
Message added 03:42, 19 November 2011 (UTC). You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

Mr. Vernon (talk) 03:42, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

Advice...

Hi! Hope all's well.

I was after a spot of advice. I've been doing some work on the Klondike Gold Rush article, mainly from the social history side of it. On the talk page, you'll see that one of the other editors, Jeff Smith/Bunco man, has suggested some alterations to a small part of the article - the problem is that he needs to cite himself, from a book he wrote that was published from a very small publishing house (it has only published two volumes, one of which was this). To make it more awkward, he's arguing against some of the established positions in the existing literature. I'm convinced he's acting in good faith (and he may perfectly well be correct - this point isn't my specialist area), but I'm not sure how to deal with the problem of assessing his claims within our wiki policies. If it had been published by a major academic press, it would be an easy call, but - regardless of whether he's right or wrong in his research - this feels perilously close to OR via a (nearly) self-published source. Equally, I don't want to snub a keen editor who's certainly got a lot to offer the article and the wiki. Any thoughts? Hchc2009 (talk) 18:33, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

It may help to suggest that the author submit a free copy to an appropriately interested academic, scholarly, or high quality local history journal (if they, or their publisher have not done so already). Checking library holdings may be another way forward, but libraries tend to have slow buying habits, and often buy based off book reviews. Positive citation in the works of a recognised historian is also a way forward, but given the publication cycles in local history, this is unlikely. I'd suggest that if the book posits a controversial view, and if the publisher is amenable, that the author pressure the publisher to go get the book reviewed.

One of the problem is that SPS that are actually worthy are only worth citing for their unique and controversial claims.

One of the problems with SPS that are unworthy is that their authors seek to be cited for their unique and controversial claims.

Commonly held claims are readily citable from the common literature, and so, we're forced to rely upon other's opinion of the worthiness of the SPS, because if we make judgements, we become historians instead of encyclopaedists. I'd try to keep the editor on the project as much as possible, and sound their views, and their knowledge, of reviews of other works. I'd even suggest asking after the main unique claims of the book, storing citations to these in the Talk: or Talk: archives, while awaiting reviews of the work, citation, or wide collection in scholarly libraries. (Its a shame to disappoint SPS authors when they've been forced into SPS because of their local interest, rather than due to the poor quality of their work; and, I prefer to assume good faith, particularly when local history is indicated). Fifelfoo (talk) 11:51, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

Cheers - advice much appreciated. The article is now at up for GA, courtesy of Soerfm - I think it stands a good chance. Hchc2009 (talk) 19:51, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

Help with citation formatting

Hi Fifelfoo, sorry to bother. There's some discussion going on here about the citations for Hurricane Gert (1993), which is currently a FAC. You were mentioned as being proficient at solving these kinds of things, so I was hoping you'd have some time to spare and help us out. Much appreciated, Auree ★ 20:33, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

I hope I wasn't too brusque, I've just returned from travelling and did a surface scan of the first 29 items. Your citation problems are especially complex due to the publication modes for meteorological science. Fifelfoo (talk) 11:44, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for taking the time to help. I replied to your comments, and don't worry, you weren't brusque. Cheers, Auree ★ 18:53, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

I hope you're able to dig in there, Fifelfoo; I'm afraid my attempts to correct (long-standing) citation issues in hurricane FACs wasn't very helpful, and if you could spend some time in there helping them understand how to better cite their articles more professionally, it would pay off in future hurricane FACs. Regards, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:47, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

I don't mean to seem pushy, but it would be great if you could reply on the FAC talk page asap. It's just that the issue has been ongoing for quite some while now... and it'd help the article a lot to have it resolved. Auree ★ 22:09, 24 November 2011 (UTC)

I'm not abandoning the article, but I have to go do something rather centrally important in my life this weekend and will be unavailable. I am taking on the citation quality, and sourcing issues, as a contribution to helping your article attain FAC quality. Fifelfoo (talk) 02:37, 25 November 2011 (UTC)

As of today Gert is only 2.4 in the older articles section. It isn't going to fall off the bottom of the list soon—but I understand the desire and need to be sure of your sourcing and citations, so I'll act on this after I get back. Fifelfoo (talk) 02:41, 25 November 2011 (UTC)

That's okay, I hope it all works out for you. Again, I didn't mean to seem pushy, I just wasn't sure what was going on (I'm pretty new at this, heh). Thanks, I really appreciate your time Auree ★ 02:42, 25 November 2011 (UTC)

No worries, I'll try to pull some "examples" out on the Talk: page of the FAC to help you see how to work through sourcing / citing issues in future :). The personal stuff is important-good, and I have great hopes and expectations that it will work out. Fifelfoo (talk) 02:45, 25 November 2011 (UTC)

Hey Fifelfoo! I know that you're busy, and cleaning up citations takes up a lot of time. You've already done so much, so I'm going to try to tackle some of the most evident issues myself for an overall better standard of citation formatting. Once I'm done, do you mind giving it one last look-through to point out any glaring remaining issues? Again, much appreciated, and sorry for all the trouble. Auree ★ 00:44, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

No worries, I will double check everything and sign off if you feel confident (helping you be confident is the point!) Fifelfoo (talk) 03:23, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

I'm afraid I have a question. Would this be a book? This is what I'm using to cite in the article. How would I format this? The publisher is CENAPRED, correct? cite book template and then link to the separate document within the page number? Auree ★ 18:19, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

• Wow. That is a tough one. Document 15060 DES is a two page pamphlet issued by a reliable source. It doesn't contain proper bibliographic information. We know from IAH who its authors are (Gutiérrez Hernández, Prisciliano ; Jiménez Macías, Elias ; de la Fuente Morón, Rigoberto ; Mendiola Solano, Rubén Dario). We can see from the document itself that its publishers are: "El Sistema Nacional de Proteccion Civil" and "Secretaria de Gobernation" in that order, and that SdG controled eSNdPC, so: "El Sistema Nacional de Proteccion Civil, Secretaria de Gobernation; archived by CENAPRED." Wikipedia doesn't actually have a Cite pamphlet, yet. Plus it is a rare condition that a pamphlet is reliable (as yours is) so as you observed for cite book {{Cite book|authors=Gutiérrez Hernández, Prisciliano ; Jiménez Macías, Elias ; de la Fuente Morón, Rigoberto ; Mendiola Solano, Rubén Dario|title=Las inundaciones causadas por el huracán "Gert" sus efectos en Hidalgo, San Luis Potosi, Tamaulipas y Veracruz|trans_title=Flooding caused by Hurricane "Gert" its effects in Hidalgo, San Luis Potosi, Tamaulipas and Veracruz|date=1993-12|publisher=El Sistema Nacional de Proteccion Civil, Secretaria de Gobernation; archived by CENAPRED|type=Pamphlet|url=http://www.crid.or.cr/digitalizacion/pdf/spa/doc15060/doc15060-1.pdf}} Las inundaciones causadas por el huracán "Gert" sus efectos en Hidalgo, San Luis Potosi, Tamaulipas y Veracruz (PDF) (Pamphlet). El Sistema Nacional de Proteccion Civil, Secretaria de Gobernation; archived by CENAPRED. 1993-12. {{cite book}}: Check date values in: |date= (help); Cite uses deprecated parameter |authors= (help); Unknown parameter |trans_title= ignored (|trans-title= suggested) (help). You need to set the place to either the CENAPRED archive or the eSNdPC head office for 1993 :) Fifelfoo (talk) 19:04, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

• Thank you! I gave all the refs a thorough look-through and made what I believed to be appropriate changes, except for ref 36, which is giving me a lot of trouble. Could you check to see if my revisions here are correct? Auree ★ 21:16, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

Off topic, but how did that personal stuff go for you, by the way? I hope it worked out! Auree ★ 21:41, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

Citation 36 was a bloody killer. It is a short run journal, in a covering title section, of an archive, with its own title. As far as personal stuff, she said yes [!!!!! :)], and has moved in. From Now + 6 hours I'll be unavailable for 3 days due to work, I'll try and look it over during lunch break to sign off. If you could post a before and after of citation 36 to the FAC's talk page, I would appreciate it. That FAC talk page will be very useful for hurricane editors :). Also maybe the CENAPRED archived pamphlet issue. Fifelfoo (talk) 21:55, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

Haha, great news! Congrats! As for the citations, thanks for helping out with 36. Sure, I'll post what you've done on the FAC talk page. Cheers, Auree ★ 22:15, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

It was great working with you! I hope we have more pleasant encounters in the future. Regards, Auree ★ 02:00, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

A request

Hi, Fifelfoo. Sometime ago you helped me a lot by reviewing and later by giving your support to the FAC of Empire of Brazil. I plan to nominate Luís Alves de Lima e Silva, Duke of Caxias but I want to be sure that it's just perfect before I do it. Two different editors have already copy-edited the article but a third pair of eyes would be equally helpful. If you're interested on doing it, please tak a look at the peer review request. Kind regards, --Lecen (talk) 20:42, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for your kind invitation, I will try to get to this before taking on any additional reviewing work. Fifelfoo (talk) 11:43, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the reply. I'll wait. Regards, --Lecen (talk) 16:26, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

I have fixed almost everything you talked about, with the sole exception of one broken reference. Since I'm not being able to fix it myself, I asked Astynax for help. Please continue with your review. Regards, --Lecen (talk) 18:30, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

All the issues you mentioned in the article were fixed. Regards, --Lecen (talk) 12:26, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

Overlapping tags

Fifelfoo, I'm sure you know that WP:TC discourages redundant tags. That's why I deleted some of the full tags when combined with page needed tags. "The goal is an improved article, not a tagged article." (My emphasis.) My first edit on the article fixed the citation problem, which I did by hitting the Easy button. I'm sure that the other cites can be fixed quite as easily. But I wonder, are you pushing POV with these overlapping cites? Also, I wonder why simple banners such as ref improve wouldn't be more appropriate. (I will be coming back to the article, but it's getting late.) Happy editing.--S. Rich (talk) 07:08, 21 November 2011 (UTC) PS: Nice Dashiki. The one I wore, some time ago, had red Embroidery.07:11, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

If full and pn are present, which do you think is the "overlapping" tag? pn which requests one missing citation element, or full that requests a full appropriate citation? One problem with the article is that POV pushing individuals insert low quality sources supporting OR, many of which fail reliability, without providing a full citation—and then depart believing that a primary source is adequate. The alternative to deleting their content, which may be verifiable from scholarly sources, and may present part of the appropriate narrative contained in the HQRS, is to tag the citations requesting the material before moving onto examining reliability. Mises published by Yale, and Mises published by John's Crazy Self-Publication is a very different thing. Fifelfoo (talk) 07:22, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

Your response baffles me. Full citations normally include page numbers when available and appropriate. So why tag full and page number? A "full" tag is all that is needed. But you tagged citations that had urls that lead directly to the on-line quoted material, in which case the "pn" tag was not appropriate. (E.g., readers did not need a page number to find and verify the quotation.) You tag the NY Sun as an inadequate source -- perhaps so. Well here is a "direct from the horse's mouth" source: [9]. (Oh, if this is posted will you tag it as ?)

You tagged a "Consequentialist" sentence as dubious, but at the same time you tagged it as needing a page. That implies that you could not and did not read the material on "Consequentialist" supporting material. If that is the case, how can you say the citation or material is dubious? Even so, is the dubious tag needed? I see a discussion going on about the distinctions, but the discussion does not address the tagged statement "Consequentialist libertarians defend liberty on the grounds its consequences are better than those of the lack of it." As you are participating in the discussion, you must actually understand "Consequentialist" stuff (I confess I don't). If that is so, then you should re-write the sentence to make is clear or less-dubious. Instead, I think you have tagged that sentence because you want to bolster your POV.

And where has "John's Crazy SPS" been cited? Perhaps you are referring to the Mises Institute? If so, please consider this write up from the editor of the WSJ Business Europe column: [10]. Specifically, he describes the Mises Institute as "a world class think tank . . .." --S. Rich (talk) 21:38, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

Mises publishes peer reviewed journals. It also publishes populist screeds. Mises publishes accepted scholars. It also publishes works by professionals who have no expertise in social science or economics. It reminds me very strongly of other semi-credible movements: I'd take Ian Turner's Sydney's Burning on the IWW without a problem, similarly I'd take Mises' appreciation of Bastiat instantly. But I wouldn't take Laurence Sharkey on Australian class structure any more than I'd take Mises himself on Mises. Even further, I'd not trust a CPA paper for sociological theory any more than a non-peer reviewed blog on Mises. Regarding the dubious: after a five plus years on this article I've come across many of the scholarly sources worth citing. Strangely Libertarianism Today hasn't been cited; and, the author who cited it gestured quite broadly at a number of sources of mixed quality. Seeing the UP who published it, and the professional credentials of the author I'm not concerned. The main reason for the dubious was WEIGHTing issues as this is a top level article. Fifelfoo (talk) 00:07, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

Bundling cites

May I suggest User:Citation bot/use. I just loaded it as a widget and it works great. It seeks out and combines duplicate citations.--S. Rich (talk) 01:57, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

Red Holocaust

There are articles about many of this books in this servies (see List of Deathlands novels. I might be better to submit them all to AfD. TFD (talk) 18:52, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

• I commend to other editors, Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Deathlands Fifelfoo (talk) 08:37, 24 November 2011 (UTC)

pre and post-Ranke classification of history sources

Hi, in here you mention:

((If the pre-modern source—of any pre-modern literary tradition—meets the standards of post-Ranke historiography then the source should be considered a secondary source. If it doesn't, then it ought to be treated as a primary source if credible or notable for its incredibility))

I wonder if you know a book that confirms this classification.--Kazemita1 (talk) 18:57, 25 November 2011 (UTC)

History is the discipline defined by the methodology of historiography. Historiography textbooks are available for Masters by Research and PhD students (also for Australian Honours students, a kind of one year gut busting miniature Masters by Research). These historiography textbooks draw a bright bright line at Ranke. To determine this for a particular work, you'd need to look for reviews and appreciations-but remember, even though Ranke is the Bright Line, in most areas of history the methodology and theory has moved on since Ranke. Consult reviews and appreciations in field reviews. Fifelfoo (talk) 22:37, 25 November 2011 (UTC)

I am away from my library but you may also be interested in WP:HISTRS which is a beta essay aiming to become a guideline codifying history's reliable source criteria. Fifelfoo (talk) 01:57, 26 November 2011 (UTC)

Thank you very much. --Kazemita1 (talk) 15:16, 26 November 2011 (UTC)

You did the right thing on "Brain"

Sad that both it and "Fluorine" failed. But we can't pass things that are not well cited. I was about to tell you to change hats to helper because I thought you were nitting format, but no way you can check long books on neuro for cites (and are they even in there?)I basically killed my own child with Fluorine, because I was being a hardass that we need to factcheck every ref, after finding a couple wrong (there may be 0-3 more wrong ones, it is mostly right...still we know it needs checking).

Appreciate the thougtful engagement and numbered points on presentation as well. TCO (talk) 20:55, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

I was most shocked with Brain by the use of a pathology text to explain normal function, the lazy 400 page "passim." style references to medical assertions, and most strongly of all by the citation of a paper on bats which said exactly the opposite of what the article said. Fifelfoo (talk) 21:20, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

Blocking of editor done way too quickly

As per Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Incidents#Sneaky_vandalism_campaign_involving_fake_references there appears to be information that editors did not take into account in their rush to indef an editor based upon one-sided information. Whilst that information may have been presented in good faith, it would be pertinent to wait for the editor in question to comment. They have now done so on their talk page, and their comments have merit. You are getting this message as you have supported their block on the thread in question, and I think you should go back and read their comments and reconsider your position. It is disappointing that too many people jumped the gun on this occasion in condemning the editor in question. Russavia ^{Let's dialogue} 05:57, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

Thank you. I continue to support the block. Fifelfoo (talk) 06:08, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

A beer for you!

For "Bloody Strong oppose this will shit up the encyclopaedic process due to the imposition of fucking stupid cultural norms derived from versions English produced by puritan wankers onto users of other version of English that, for example, regularly use cunt as the generic noun." Brilliant, laughed out loud and fell off the fraking chair. I think it's the juxtaposition of encyclopaedic and puritan wankers. --Nuujinn (talk) 01:45, 29 November 2011 (UTC)

Thank you, I'm glad you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. Fifelfoo (talk) 01:48, 29 November 2011 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

	The Technical Barnstar
	Thanks for your work on Template:Inflation. You SOFIXITed it :) Disavian (talk) 05:10, 29 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks

Thanks for responding to my question in the citation discussion section. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Norlns22 (talk • contribs) 01:23, 30 November 2011 (UTC)

• No worries! Fifelfoo (talk) 01:26, 30 November 2011 (UTC)

MkuCr sources

Fifelfoo, I have not been posting on the article's talk page and I don't intend to for the time being due to time constraints (I barely have time to even keep current with the discussion), but I wanted to give you the following link to four sources which I believe by themselves justify the topic of mass killing by Communist regimes alone: the "Sources and excerpts" section of this subpage. I also think your characterizations of Watson and Coutois are very unfair, but I believe we have discussed this in the past. AmateurEditor (talk) 05:33, 30 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, this is remarkably helpful and I'll give this a very deep read when I'm infront of a computer with library access this evening. Fifelfoo (talk) 05:43, 30 November 2011 (UTC)

Ta, here's an annotation:

• Valentino's theoretical category is dispossessive mass killing 70ff, of which Communist mass killing is a descriptive example. A failure to read work for theory leads to a conclusion Valentino could be useful.
• Mann's theoretical category is Modernity (ix). See especially 2ff for Thesis 1: Its modernity as tyranny of the majority in democracy, 1a of the demos becoming the ethnoi; [My response is limited until I get to see pages 4-5]; Theses 3-6 and 8 aren't useful. Theses 7abc indicate that Communist mass killing is a descriptive subset, and evidentiary point for his grand theory in thesis 1a. p320 perhaps makes the strongest case that this is a distinct form; I am not convinced by an argument grounded in 320 that he has a distinct theoretical category.
• The Semelin quote is far superior, it is theoretical. Semelin hypothesises politicide and crimes against humanity, both of which aren't communist specific, in your quote. Again, this is a superset with a descriptive example. 3-7 explains this adequately, his category is a comparative theory of genocide using the structure "purification through destruction".
• Chirot again is comparative, 19 indicates the terms of their comparisons, their theoretical category, doesn't include a communist element. As you yourself quote them, "The modern search for a perfect, utopian society, whether racially or ideologically pure is very similar to the much older striving for a religiously pure society free of all polluting elements, and these are, in turn, similar to that other modern utopian notion - class purity." purity is their theoretical category.

Your sources aren't convincing that MKuCR should exist. But Mass killing certainly should, and these make a great contribution. Fifelfoo (talk) 06:58, 30 November 2011 (UTC)

Honestly, I don't know what you would need to see in order to change your mind.

I think the hangup is your focus on theoretical communism as the object of study here. (It isn't: this is about real-world, big "C" Communism. Also known as "Communist states" or, more popular in these sources, "communist regimes". Theoretical communism, of course, is related.) I agreed with you, if you recall, that Watson's focus on theoretical communism and killing is WP:FRINGE here, and I thought we had long agreed that his place in the article should be given the lowest weight, but that the article itself should exist.

The sources and quotes provided demonstrate that the topic exceeds the minimum standard required by Wikipedia for there to be an article: notability demonstrated by non-trivial mention in reliable secondary sources independent of the topic. The current consensus on Wikipedia agrees with me here, and these are the same quotes I provided at the AfD which showed that consensus.

Thus, regarding Valentino, I don't see the relevance of your first sentence to the issue of article topic notability (his grouping of the regimes together and discussion of them in those terms is the relevant thing) and I don't understand your second sentence (are you saying I have failed to read him correctly, or that the source could be useful only if read in a certain way?). Similarly with your comments on the other sources, the key point here is their discussion of the killing by the "communist regimes" as a group, which proves that the topic exists in reliable sources sufficient to have an article. If I recall correctly, the controversy sparked by the Black Book of Communism, after all, was not about the topic per se, it was about the shocking total numbers provided and the issue of moral comparisons with the Holocaust.

I don't want to get into a long debate here (if you don't think the article should exist despite the "Keeps" at the last two AfDs, then I suppose we can do that at the next one). I thought I was just doing a time-saving favor for one of the few skeptical editors involved who I am confident is acting in good faith. AmateurEditor (talk) 00:10, 1 December 2011 (UTC)

I am trying in good faith—and I'm stirred by what you wrote above—help me with this train of thought because I am stirred on it.

"Is there a thing?" is the question here.

A descriptive category, "Blue things in the 1980s" oughtn't exist; but, in comparison, "Theory of the Blueness of the 1980s" should exist. I we analyse as Mann, Semelin and Chirot do, "Mass kilings occur due to modernism," and happen to describe regularly and together the Western Democracies and the Soviet Union, does that mean we need "Mass killings in modernity" or does that mean we need "Mass killings in the Western Democracies and the Soviet Union."?

A classic problem of encyclopaedic taxonomy is given in Michel Foucault's the order of things. I'm going to quote a historian I normally do not esteem, Keith Windschuttle, who characterises this in an attack on post-modernism:

Foucault describes a passage from "a certain Chinese encyclopedia" that, he claims, breaks up all the ordered surfaces of our thoughts. By "our" thoughts, he means Western thought in the modern era. The encyclopedia divides animals into the following categories: "a) belonging to the Emperor, b) embalmed, c) tame, d) sucking pigs, e) sirens, f) fabulous, g) stray dogs, h) included in the present classification, i) frenzied, j) innumerable, k) drawn with a very fine camelhair brush, l) et cetera, m) having just broken the water pitcher, n) that from a long way off look like flies." Foucault writes that, thanks to "the wonderment of this taxonomy," we can apprehend not only "the exotic charm of another system of thought" but also "the limitation of our own." What the taxonomy or form of classification reveals, says Foucault, is that "there would appear to be, then, at the other extremity of the earth we inhabit, a culture . . . that does not distribute the multiplicity of existing things into any of the categories that make it possible for us to name, speak and think." The stark impossibility of our thinking in this way, Foucault says, demonstrates the existence of an entirely different system of rationality.Keith Windschuttle (1997), "Absolutely Relative,"

I have believed, and am trying to give up my belief, that our assemblage of sources at MKuCR is a "Chinese encyclopedia." Is MKuCR a "Chinese encyclopedia"? I have believed MKuCR was a Chinese encyclopaedia because there was to my mind no rationality lying behind it—there was no theoretical association specific to the article, only a descriptive association. If MKuCR isn't a "Chinese encyclopedia", then this implies the rather shocking result, that we could (ought?) to have encyclopaedia article for every major collation of evidence points recurring in history/social-science texts. But as you note, "The current consensus on Wikipedia agrees with me here" via the AFD debates in particular. In addition this observation about popular reception, "If I recall correctly, the controversy sparked by the Black Book of Communism, after all, was not about the topic per se," is highly persuasive to me. Your statement above regarding minimum notability moves me; but I'm not moved yet, like I said, help me with this train of thought. (It would mean that I would support a very different article to the one we currently have.) Fifelfoo (talk) 00:40, 1 December 2011 (UTC)

Yes, it is Wikipedia policy that if several reliable independent secondary sources sufficiently discuss any "major collation of evidence points recurring in history/social-science", then an article about that topic can be written (in a neutral, verifiable, etc. way). In practice, of course, this is less wide open than it appears. While, in theory, an article for Wikipedia certainly could be written about either "Blue things in the 1980s" or "Theory of the Blueness of the 1980s" (significantly different topics, although perhaps related), in practice I'm quite sure there are no sources meeting the criteria for either articles (although if someone could prove me wrong by producing such sources, I would have to accept them).

MkuCr is just a tad less incoherent than the Chinese encyclopedia above, but the diversity of terms is due primarily to there being no consensus term used for mass killing generally (the contentious history of the term "genocide" is the root of all this) and secondarily to there being controversy about certain famines (and thus about the total numbers killed). The diversity of explanatory theories used to describe or explain the killing of communist regimes as a group, even if a particular theory relegates killing by communist regimes to being a subgroup of some larger group, only reinforces that the grouping of communist regimes itself is notable in the context of the killing. Why sources choose to group the communist regimes together when discussing the killing that occurred is not relevant to whether or not they do so. So it isn't relevant to whether or not the article exists. It certainly is relevant, of course, to what the article says within it.

We are going to have to live with the discussion between sources on this topic being somewhat unsettled. Each source might offer a completely unique take on why these events occurred. The article must certainly reflect the differences but be agnostic between them. Nevertheless, it seems obvious to me that these sources are discussing the same basic topic (the killing that occurred under communist regimes) and, regardless of the term we chose in the title for the sake of our own convenience and Wikipedia's neutrality, the article can be allowed to exist. AmateurEditor (talk) 03:00, 1 December 2011 (UTC)

AmateurEditor has presented several sources that appear to talk about the same topic, that link mass killings under various Communist regimes. But what is missing is a source that draws the connection between the various writings, explains how they are similar and differ and discuss the degree of acceptance the various views have. All of these sources are primary sources for the views they present and our linking them is synthesis. That we do not have sources that explain the degree of acceptance of the theories means that our article will be inherently POV. TFD (talk) 05:40, 1 December 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, I find the "descriptive" argument to be compelling—I think it is retarded policy, but Wikipedia is retarded by consensus, or excellent by consensus on policy. The argument that "the connection is not discussed" challenges the mobility in my position. TFD, could I ask you to recollect the Swedish review article published by a genuinely politically unaligned NGO in Genocide studies? I forget what the opinion of editors was regarding the quality of that article as a "secondary for theory" source. I guess I might have to go get an alerts subscription to Genocide Studies' table of contents so I can keep an eye for review articles.

TFD could I beg something more. Three of AmateurEditor's sources make explict theory claims in the beginning of their texts that all modern societies commit mass killings (to varying degrees) due to modernity—while the terms used vary slightly, the theoretical components are largely homologous. Would this justify Mass killings in modern societies or Mass killing (the second is currently a disambiguation stub) in your view, based on these sources? I am aware that I do put emphasis on the central theoretical claim of a text. I believe you have more experience editing in areas of pure social science theory than I do.

Here is a link to the Swedish paper. I do not know how helpful it is because "Each country [the Soviet Union, China and Cambodia] and each criminal history is discussed individually". I suppose we could have an article about mass killings, although there would be problems of terminology, definition, etc. TFD (talk) 04:32, 2 December 2011 (UTC)

• • Thank you both for your time and editorial experience helping me think these things through. I know it is hard to evidence the internal change in my opinion about correct editing, as it doesn't directly correlate to byte-count added or article-quality ranking increase; but, I do feel that I've benefited in a way that will help improve the encyclopaedia. Fifelfoo (talk) 05:49, 1 December 2011 (UTC)

Mediation Cabal: Case update

Dear Fifelfoo/Archive2011: Hello, this is to let you know that a Mediation Cabal case that you are involved in, or have some connection with:

Wikipedia:Mediation Cabal/Cases/02 October 2011/Holodomor

is currently inactive as it has not been edited in at least a week. If the issues in the case have been resolved, please let us know on our talk page so we can close the case. If there are still issues that need to be addressed, let us know. If your mediator has become inactive, also let us know. The case will be closed in one month if it remains inactive. You can let us know what's going on by sending a message through to your mediator, Steven Zhang, on their talk page. Thanks! MedcabBot (talk) 12:17, 2 December 2011 (UTC)

ArbCom request for clarification

You have been named an interested party at a request for clarification, at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Clarification - Smerdis of Tlön - killing the human spirit since 2003! 20:46, 2 December 2011 (UTC)

Specialist-baiting

You are an experienced editor. I am assuming you got interrupted and saved this substub as an exception? I hope you'll wikify it at the very least, currently it is in danger of being prodded. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 23:06, 2 December 2011 (UTC)

Engineer's trial

That see also is a red link. Correct me if I am wrong, but I think it should be Engineers' trial, and it should redirect to Industrial Party Trial. What do you think? --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 04:19, 4 December 2011 (UTC)

Thanks! Edited it thusly. Fifelfoo (talk) 04:29, 4 December 2011 (UTC)

I had meant Shakhty Trial actually. I've made Engineers' trial a dab. Fifelfoo (talk) 05:12, 4 December 2011 (UTC)

Citations in Tetrabiblos

Hi. I don't know how to handle the kind of template used there. Zac complained because I used non template refs so I could have the chapter author as the inline short ref. Could you look over when you have a minute, or if not, tell me how I use the template when it's a book chapter. Many thanks. Itsmejudith (talk) 12:58, 5 December 2011 (UTC)

Fix it in the bibliography first, then add the reference into the text. This template is stupidly named HTML anchors.

footnotes: <ref>[[#Reference-ID CODE|LAST (YEAR)]]</ref> ie: [[#Reference-Burnett|Burnett and Greenbaum (2007)]]

bibliography: {{Wikicite | id= ID CODE| reference= FREE TEXT, style follows Author, YEAR. Title. Place: Publisher, (complex _ideosyncratic_ rules for other data)}} ie: <nowikii>Burnett, Charles and Greenbaum, Dorian Gieseler, (eds.) 2007. The Winding Courses of the Stars: Essays in Ancient Astrology. Bristol, UK: Culture and Cosmos, Vol.11 no 1 and 2, spring/summer and autumn/winter. ISSN 1368-6534.</nowiki>

I would suggest adding chapters based on Riley 1988 etc which are part of proceedings. Please let me know if you have any other problems.Fifelfoo (talk) 20:38, 5 December 2011 (UTC)

I've changed the format in line with your suggestions, and also set out a statement of the articles style, so future changes won't affect the internal consistency of the article's format (hopefully). Since this was one of the straightforward criticsms of your review opposition - would you mind casting your eye over the formatting of the references again? I would like to be able to tick this one off the list of concerns before the article is proposed for review again.

I'll spend some time working on the other point you made about wanting to see the discussion of the book content being driven more heavily by secondary source reports. In your review you specified "the discussion of chapter 13 and 14 at footnote 96 where no secondary appreciation is relied upon for weighting, significance or interpretation." (The first ref for this section is now #102). Just to let you know I've added secondary source commentary on that and will be looking at the discussion of the books content critically with that point in mind, before bring it back for review. Cheers, -- Zac Δ ^talk! 14:36, 8 December 2011 (UTC)

Removal of RFC

You removed the RFC [11] Reason given "Malformed RFC: unintelligible, not neutral, lacking consultation on the composition of the RFC"

There may be some misunderstanding of the issue, (quite common to any RFC) but they can be and have been addressed in discussion

Clearly stated in the RFC. It applies to any topic, any POV. The examples are only examples and not for use. It is neutral.

There is no WP:policy requiring prior consultation on Talk before posting an RFC. The policy you claim exists, says "Before asking outside opinion here, it generally helps to simply discuss the matter on the talk page first". The record shows we discussed "the matter" in Talk. It does not say discuss the RFC in Talk.

Revert or further action will be taken thx ... talknic (talk) 01:45, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

I refer you to the previously and clearly stated discussion, we did not discuss your unintelligible "matter" on talk, and your RFC was worded in a clearly non-neutral manner. Your constant attempts to rule lawyer break basic community functions and are highly disruptive. You have failed to address the issue of "neutrality" and "intelligibility" in your post on this page of 01:45, 6 December 2011 UTC. Fifelfoo (talk) 03:25, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

Fifelfoo .. What does "any POV, any subject" mean? What does "I have no intention of using the example anywhere BTW" So what if the examples came from a familiar topic? It's irrelevant. There are thousands of words discussing 'the matter' on the previous discussion, none about the RFC. False claims are not welcome in Wikipedia or anywhere else for that matter. "Your constant attempts to rule lawyer break basic community functions and are highly disruptive" Uh? Disruptive to what? The particular Talk page is where changes to policy are discussed. The removal of the RFC prevents other editors from finding the discussion. I can only presume that was your reason for removing it. This is the last time I will ask, revert or further action will be taken. ... talknic (talk) 00:11, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

Your use of that phrase "any POV, any subject" lacks adequate context for me to be able to read what you have written. To quote you in full, "Using a QTR : is not about finding information in order to first make an edit, but proving the existence of an "exact quotation/text/statement". In effect putting the onus on an editor to first have "the exact quotation/text/statement" in order to get a QTR. It is applicable to any POV and any subject, affording readers easy, immediate access to verification of existence where the edit fulfills the other editorial criteria, context, RS, NPOV etc, without the reader (or an editor checking content) having to source hard copy." In the second sentence, what is "it"? I assume "it" is one of the nouns from the last sentence. The nouns from the previous sentences are: "a QTR;" the noun form of the verb phrase, "finding information in order to first make an edit"; the noun of the verb phrase, "proving the existence of an 'exact quotation/text/statement'"; the "effect of putting the onus on an editor"; "'the exact quotation/text/statement'" and again "a QTR." It isn't possible from what you have written to determine what applies to "any POV, any subject." If you rephrase your RFC for clarity, and invite other editors in, then you might actually be able to solicit broad comment. Thank you for confirming that you failed to discuss the RFC before launching it. As repeatedly noted to you by multiple editors, your current proposed RFC is incomprehensible and not neutrally phrased. Fifelfoo (talk) 00:19, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

Fifelfoo - 'it' is in a paragraph talking about the QTR. Usually obvious to anyone with a minimum grasp of the English language that it is a continuation of that particular point until another point is brought into play. None was in that paragraph

"not neutrally phrased" what do you think is meant by it can apply to any POV and any subject/topic?.

There is no requirement under WP:policy requiring one to discuss an RFC in Talk before calling for an RFC

"and invite other editors in" Uh? You removed the RFC invite ... talknic (talk) 04:10, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

• Please note that I will be unavailable to respond to editorial or administrative queries for the next 96 hours or so due to work responsibilities. Fifelfoo (talk) 01:53, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

Odd ... [12] [13] ... talknic (talk) 04:10, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

• I'm sitting in a bus shelter with the last of my network access. Be seeing you. Fifelfoo (talk) 04:12, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

Hi Fifelfoo. I'm thinking of user RFC re talknic. I feel sorry for the guy, but he is just taking up far too much of people's time. Any talk page he comes near is bogged down with his attention-seeking. It needs two to certify the request, would you come in on that? Or anything else that can be done to get him to work collaboratively, but honestly I think his language comprehension isn't up to it. I posted on his talk page a long time ago, no joy. Itsmejudith (talk) 16:31, 12 December 2011 (UTC)

I'm willing to certify an RFC/U. I rather wish that it didn't require this; but the IDHT behaviour is disruptive of the encyclopaedia. Fifelfoo (talk) 20:05, 12 December 2011 (UTC)

MKuCR 2

Sorry, by I sometimes cannot understand the course of your thought. Do you sincerely believe the article has no major neutrality issues?--Paul Siebert (talk) 20:33, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

Tagging is a request for help resolving an issue. The talk page is already well aware of the issue and discusses it constantly. There's no encyclopaedic benefit given that the article is locked and we can talk the POV issues out until there's a consensus edit request to resolve them. Fifelfoo (talk) 20:41, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

In other words, you believe no additional input is needed? Do you really believe in that? By the way, do you know that local consensus do not have precedence over NPOV policy, so we do not need to have local consensus to request to fix obvious POV?--Paul Siebert (talk) 21:48, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

No additional input from wandering editors is needed. Taking issues outside of the article in a structured, discussed way to create binding consensus is needed for the core policy issues. Then it can go noticeboard by noticeboard for point by point. Fifelfoo (talk) 21:52, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

Well, do you agree to participate in this work? In addition, your opinion about the discussion between AmateurEditor and me on my talk page is welcome.--Paul Siebert (talk) 00:54, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

I had a delightful editorial discussion with AmateurEditor recently on this talk page (above) which has shifted me from deletionism to ambivalence depending on policy outcomes. I've also got a massive review workload here atm, and real life. I can't make a commitment due to these factors, which I am sorry about. Fifelfoo (talk) 00:57, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

Didn't understand you. Do you imply that the article doesn't need in external input and simultaneously refuse to participate in the work on the article improvement? Such a position is somewhat illogical...--Paul Siebert (talk) 01:46, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

The article needs external input in external forums: noticeboards, dispute resolution, and policy clarification without specific reference to the article. It needs this first. My wikipedia availability is dictated by where I believe that I'll make the greatest positive impact with the least amount of effort and personal frustration. MKuCR isn't making progress, and doesn't look like it can. My impact on MKuCR is neutral as it isn't making progress. I find the effort to keep a current competency with theory of genocide studies as specific to soviet-style societies to be a high effort form of editing. I find editing MKuCR to be a highly frustrating form of editing, (though many editors I have found emotionally frustrating in the past, I no longer find so—I suspect we've all grown as encyclopaedists). In contrast doing FAC / MILHIST-A reviews and RS/N editing are easy, low stress and benefit the encyclopaedia greatly. I need to both clarify my position on community policy on notability; and, overcome the feelings that MKuCR will waste my and other editors time, before I can seriously read chapters and summarise them to improve the article. Fifelfoo (talk) 02:00, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

What about calling it "Victims of Communism" (Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL)? At least we could find sources. TFD (talk) 03:28, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

The plagiarism question

Re the new question you made today, about whether one of the sentences could be plagiarism because the wording is quite similar to the attributed author - is there a 'plagiarism noticeboard' where issues like that can be decided upon? I don't want to focus on one specified comment but get clarity over the policy. The article concerns a controversial subject and I am feeling the pressure of having to balance a very fine line - not using enough references to secondary sources (raising concerns over synth), not sticking closely to the wording used (raising concerns over possible misinterpretation), and sticking closely to the wording of attributed sources, (raising concerns over possible plagiarism). Setting aside the other issues you raised, to me there is no question of plagiarism in that attributed sentence. However (though I know there's no hope for the FA review now) I do want to get this article free of criticisms and work systematically through all the concerns raised against it. -- Zac Δ ^talk! 00:23, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

I'm not aware. Generally it helps to avoid the central noun-phrases and verb-phrases to avoid plagiarism by close paraphrase (there are other forms of plagiarism you noted, such as non-attribution). FAC involves a plagiarism, close paraphrase and "does the source actually support the statement in the article" check, called a "spotcheck." As I noted, because the sentence is very short, you might just quote it! No plagiarism in directly quoting someone's words where they're apt (as long as we don't do it continuously or in long quotes where we're using quotes to write the article). We aren't trying to raise concerns against the article itself at FAC, but raise concerns that prevent its promotion to a FA article. There are copyvio noticeboards, but this isn't a copyvio as such. The copyright problems noticeboard seems to claim ownership, but I doubt that they're editing at your standard of high quality :(. You could read Wikipedia:Close_paraphrasing and try to internalise some of the tips? FAC will eventually read your article for close paraphrase in the spotcheck; but I agree with you, I'd rather pass it cleanly. You could also try asking for peer review, and notifying editors who seem to "spot check" articles at FAC to look at your peer review and do detailed close paraphrase checks? Peer reviews are much more freeform than FAC, and don't have the time/space/resource pressure with reviewers that FAC does (Yes I did just suggest you ask me to look at close paraphrase before you go to FAC next time :) I think you know that I'm not bigoted against your topic. Fifelfoo (talk) 00:36, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for the reassurance of your last remark. I am finding it surprising to come across the arguments being presented ...but I know that some of these things require acclimatisation because WP appears to have an editing ethos which is unrelated to anything I've encountered elsewhere. Mainly, what I would term 'fringe paranoia' - some of the background grunts connected to that create a very uneasy environment for anyone who edits on this type of topic. I wanted to take this article to peer-review but I have witnessed a situation where a review editor with a very anti-topic view, who clearly knew little about the subject, used the opportunity to get involved in the editing and rip the article to shreds. I wanted its exposure to criticism to take place in a rational environment, so that any issues could be addressed calmly and given the time they need to get resolved. I am dissapointed that there is not more input from editors from the classical history project; but maybe that will happen yet.

Anyway, I wanted to let you know that I raised the plagiarism concern for broader discussion here. I hope you approve of the way I set out the concern. I have a feeling that it won't result in anything with firm boundaries attached to it, but it seems a worthwhile issue to raise for broader acknowledgement anyway. -- Zac Δ ^talk! 18:51, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

Nomination for deletion of Template:Notability-inline

Template:Notability-inline has been nominated for deletion. You are invited to comment on the discussion at the template's entry on the Templates for discussion page. Bulwersator (talk) 05:47, 8 December 2011 (UTC)

Tree shaping refs

If I was trying to establish the definition of tree shaping I agree with you, it would need an established expert in this field or related fields published in an establishment with good editorial practices. But I'm not trying to do that. :WP:NDESC Descriptive titles may therefore incorporate names and terms that are commonly used by sources. Tree shaping is a descriptive title and what I'm trying to find are refs using tree shaping (or variations example- shaping trees or shaped tree) as a descriptive term for this field. So in my view it doesn't really matter who the writers or reporters are, more important is the editorial side. ?oygul (talk) 06:35, 8 December 2011 (UTC)

Reliability is reliability is reliability. Please do not engage in special pleading with me when I have clearly, adequately, and deeply explained myself in another forum. If you don't like it, I suggest you take an advanced degree in art history or criticism and publish in the peer reviewed mode. Fifelfoo (talk) 10:31, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

Basically, you are saying that only someone who is a fine art historian, fine art critic, or fine art taxonomist can be used as example of using tree shaping as a descriptive term for this art form. Is that correct? ?oygul (talk) 13:29, 12 December 2011 (UTC)

The newspaper you brought to RS/N explains that one particular artist uses "tree shaping" to describe their own artistic output. To describe the form itself as practiced by all artists who brutalise plants, yes, I'd really rather we rely on the Oxford English Dictionary, or an Encyclopaedia of Sculpture written by art historians/taxonomers/critics, or a bunch of articles in art review magazines by different critics in different magazines. A major exhibition is another kind of publication I'd esteem. Major exhibitions that are curated attempt to make an argument regarding what is happening. The programme book of a multiple artist exhibition in plant brutalising would have the capacity to say how things are. Fifelfoo (talk) 20:33, 12 December 2011 (UTC)

Speedy deletion nomination of Template:Notability-inline

A tag has been placed on Template:Notability-inline requesting that it be speedily deleted from Wikipedia. This has been done under section T2 of the criteria for speedy deletion, because it is an unambiguous misrepresentation of established policy.

If you think that this notice was placed here in error, contest the deletion by clicking on the button labelled "Click here to contest this speedy deletion". Doing so will take you to the talk page where you will find a pre-formatted place for you to explain why you believe the page should not be deleted. You can also visit the page's talk page directly to give your reasons, but be aware that once tagged for speedy deletion, if the page meets the criterion, it may be deleted without delay. Please do not remove the speedy deletion tag yourself, but don't hesitate to add information to the page that would render it more in conformance with Wikipedia's policies and guidelines. If the page is deleted, you can contact one of these administrators to request that the administrator userfy the page or email a copy to you. Bulwersator (talk) 13:04, 8 December 2011 (UTC)

Removing the TfD because of a (questionable) speedy nomination is almost as bad as nominating the template for speedy deletion while the TfD is in effect.... — Arthur Rubin (talk) 10:56, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

I'm sorry if I got the TfD when I got the Speedy, and would self-revert if the revert hadn't already occurred, I'm checking now as I'm apologising. Fifelfoo (talk) 21:38, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

FAC Blonde on Blonde

Fifelfoo, thanks for comments. I've attempted to respond to your points. Mick gold (talk) 12:14, 12 December 2011 (UTC)

Fifelfoo, I've gone through BoB text again, scrutinising every ref which I can access, and amending anything that looked sloppy. If you would like me to email scan of any text, eg Wilentz, I will try to oblige. Mick gold (talk) 00:47, 20 December 2011 (UTC)

I'm going to take a bash at Amazon previewing in about 4 hours. If you click the "Email this user" link we can privately exchange email addresses so you can send me a scan of Wilentz. (I'm sorry about the delays, but some things slip, especially when I'm at a computer where I can use my Amazon login). I look forward (and expect to) pass the spotcheck clear within 4-6 hours. Fifelfoo (talk) 00:54, 20 December 2011 (UTC)

A response to something you wrote on my talk page

You wrote:

Many users who do not esteem or possess the (irrationally?) accorded rights to play around with process and consensus that Jimbo possess; like myself, might float the idea of an economic boycott action or symbolic protest on their talk page, form a cohesive body of editors interested in presenting a proposal, workshop a proposal on the Village pump page for workshopping (including workshopping the case against), then bring a proposal to pump and formally notify a bunch of other projects and wikipedians. This user could have easily noted on their well-watched talk: I'm going to workshop proposals around a wikipedian strike at this or that village pump to present in a few days. There is a little bit of a behavioural problem where this user perceives their own involvement in running a straw poll to be more decisive than developing community consensus around putting a proposal and then putting it. Process does matter as well; process especially matters where some people believe that a user ought to have the capacity to act outside of process. Fifelfoo (talk) 02:12, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

I don't know who you have been talking to (or listening to) about me and my views, but you've really got it dead wrong, and I think it would be useful for you to have a conversation with me about it. I very much do not believe that my own involvement in running a straw poll to be more decisive than developing community consensus around putting a proposal and then putting it. Process does matter, it really matters quite a bit. I do not think I have the right to act outside of process here, nor do I know of any identifiable group of editors who would argue that I should do so. This is just a straw man argument.

If you think it is wrong of me to ask people's opinions on my talk page, then I must beg to differ.

Will you retract your statement now?--Jimbo Wales (talk) 10:12, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for your considered response. It seems to me that any disagreement may arise from a disagreement over the construction of an understanding of process. I'd like to note that your construction of process is formalistic, " I very much do not believe that my own involvement in running a straw poll to be more decisive than developing community consensus around putting a proposal and then putting it." There's nothing wrong with a formalistic construction of understanding process, it lies behind the principles of equality of access, and conceptions of individuals having equal standing before process. These are very popular principles. They're not the only principles regarding process. Another major stream of opinion on process emphasises the role of power and status disparities. In particular, your role as a admin, celebrity, founder, and emeritus chairman of an associated organisation mean that you have an incredible amount of influence—arguments from you can often be appreciated not on the merits of your argument, but on the status of your person. This kind of power construction of understanding process is also quite common. The standard of conduct I expect out of people who benefit from a power disparity is a higher level of circumspection—for example, in the manner in which the progressive stack style of speaking in meetings claims to reduce gender and racial power disparities. I broadly agree with your suggestion of taking action, we probably disagree over the optimum action to currently take. However, there's a moderate threat of stewing the process of proposing an action to take by it being strongly (4:1 range) supported on your talk page. The action has by the community currently associated with your person, and the power attached by the community to your person despite your own humility. If a proposal becomes associated with you, rather than your arguments, it will run hot with wide attention. I feel like I could walk into the village pump with the current straw poll response (with the attention drawn from your on wiki celebrity) and use this as a "stack" or "line-drive" to push through a proposal for action far more radical than the one that would have emerged from a community focused pre-discussion.

Additionally, you appear to be accorded reserve powers; and, the community associates these with your person rather than your position in relation to wikimedia.

If in the light of the above, I will if you feel that I ought to, refactor my comments of 02:12 14 December 2012 if they do not make sense, constitute an attack or falsehood, or if I may have impugned an intention relating to process onto you personally, that I believe exists structurally due to the role of defacto royalty that many editors in the community have forced upon you. I will also apologise if one of these is the case as I intended to make sense, to not attack you, to not speak false, and to describe the structural result of the way the community deals with you—not to describe any intention of yours. Fifelfoo (talk) 10:59, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

First, the formulation that you quote is me echoing you, not my own words. So if there is something "formalistic" about it, that's coming from you, not me. :) Anyway, it's fine, I just wanted to have this conversation. Often people have a knee-jerk tendency to accuse me of acting unilaterally even when I haven't done anything or suggested that I will do anything. I am aware that my words have more influence than others, and I do take some steps to ameliorate that, although I should add that I also think that it is useful to us, even as it puts some heavy responsibilities on me.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 13:30, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

I've tried to correct myself on your talk page at this diff. As an Australian I have reasonable cause to suspect all reserved powers; and, in addition to this my politics are generally critical of the accumulation and concentration of power. I am aware that you're highly circumspect in your conduct, it is good. You have a role within the media as a public figure that seem to accord and relate to your conduct and successes in life—this is good and you perform admirably in this role. My concern is with the position the community on en.wikipedia has forced you into. The community has forced you into the role of a figurehead on en.wikipedia. Thankfully due to your circumspect and good conduct, you play a constitutional role more like Queen Victoria, than like Oliver Cromwell. However, even the relatively constitutionally inert Elizabeth II's political position disturbs me. I believe that I will always doubt anyone in the role forced by the community upon you, regardless of who holds the position, regardless of whether she is elected, regardless of his conduct, because of the potential inherent within the role. In future I will ensure that when I comment about the role you have been placed in, I will be much much clearer in indicating if the role, or the immediate conduct is concerning. I don't suspect I will ever need to comment on the latter while you're the person en.wikipedia tries to force to become a leader.

I do agree that there is a level of usefulness to the unusual status people have placed upon you. In particular, the potential threat to the encyclopaedic process of this law exceeds the usual round of Australian, New Zealand, Canadian or United Kingdom information law insanity; it affects the state where our servers are; and the affect directly impinges on the encyclopaedia. These are the circumstances where wikipedians may reasonably believe that the neutral point of view encyclopaedia ought to take a public sphere action to protect itself. Your comments drew the community's attention to this. I don't think I could have floated that en.wikipedia could choose to take industrial action if it meant saving my life. Part of your ability to float the idea is your normal capacity as an editor that differs from mine in your greater individual abilities to build consensus around quality ideas. And even though I agree with the necessity of putting this matter firmly before the community and the kinds of action proposed, I still feel a sympathy for editors who disagree with you and I and face the double hurdle of the arguments and the unusual community esteem for your role when making their case against.

It is a good conversation, it has caused me to reflect on my conduct and expression, and will help me think better ideas in future. Fifelfoo (talk) 21:15, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

MedCab Holodomor mediation

Hi Fifelfoo, this is Mr. Stradivarius from the MedCab Holodomor mediation. I noticed that you added yourself to the mediation a few weeks ago, and agreed to the ground rules. Sorry that it has taken so long to get back to you. I saw your opening statement, and I can understand your concern - this mediation is big, may take some time, and could well have important ramifications for the article. Could you let me know how much you want to get involved? Are you content to take a supporting role, or would you like to be involved in the details of the negotiations? Would you be willing to nominate a spokesperson, as in this section? Please let me know what you think. All the best — Mr. Stradivarius ^♫ 08:39, 15 December 2011 (UTC)

Ah, it appears that you are a quicker typer than me! Thanks for the comment over at the mediation page. — Mr. Stradivarius ^♫ 08:45, 15 December 2011 (UTC)

While there are users with whom I share a common content orientation involved in the mediation, I have found over time that despite the shared article direction we have different "editorial" conceptions of the application of policy. My contributions are likely to be very, very similar to the contribution I just made on the mediation page: restatements of high level policy with specific applications to 20th century history. I primarily wish to be involved by saying my piece early, and allowing other editors to incorporate arguments in detailed negotiation. I have a deep suspicion that the article Holodomor in English is best used to discuss the emergence of a nationalist popular historiography in Ukraine and Western right wing accounts: an issue of remembrance and politicisation. In contrast I believe most of the historical content needs to be addressed at appropriate Ukraine and Soviet famine articles. I am aware that my reading of the key scholarly reviews differs from many editors, and don't wish to force them to revisit this; but, I have sourcing concerns. Many editors wish to introduce a high component of popular and state remembrance in order to analyse and characterise the events, and this is grossly inappropriate where scholarly analyses exist. In a nutshell: I want to contribute to the discussion, but do not need to negotiate a consensus as I believe all other editors will negotiate appropriately, and that I will honour the consensus they generate. Fifelfoo (talk) 08:56, 15 December 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for clarifying your position. I'm sure your statement will be food for thought for the other editors involved in the mediation, and I look forward to having you as a participant. If you ever do feel like commenting on the nitty-gritty of the negotiations, you are quite welcome, by the way. — Mr. Stradivarius ^♫ 10:24, 15 December 2011 (UTC)

Comment Refactoring

I just came across your comment on my talk page. I need to explain. I have a greasemonkey script that replaces certain words (profanity) with ****. I forgot I had it active, and it must have saved it when I added my comment. It was completely unintentional, and I apologize if I caused any trouble. In the future, I will disable the script when I edit. Cypher3c (talk) 06:01, 16 December 2011 (UTC)

no worries! Thanks for explaining! :) Fifelfoo (talk) 06:15, 16 December 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard#Richard Arthur Norton: Revisiting topic ban; Should it be removed or made indefinite?

Hi Fifelfoo. You participated in Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive228#Richard Arthur Norton copyright violations, in which a one-month topic ban on creating new articles and making page moves was imposed on Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk · contribs). The closing admin has asked for community input about whether to remove the topic ban or make it indefinite at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard#Richard Arthur Norton: Revisiting topic ban; Should it be removed or made indefinite?. Cunard (talk) 08:58, 16 December 2011 (UTC)

May Revolution

A pair of months ago, I nominated the article May Revolution for A-Class, and you made a review, pointing some things to fix. I made some fixes and nominated it again, here. As you are already a little familiar with the article, it would be helpful if you check it again and see if the problems have been fixed as desired. Your old review is archived here Cambalachero (talk) 16:58, 17 December 2011 (UTC)

Deletion?

Was there a reason for this edit? Or was it an accident? APL (talk) 06:59, 18 December 2011 (UTC)

It was very much an accident! Fat fingers and a mobile device, I am very sorry. Fifelfoo (talk) 07:11, 18 December 2011 (UTC)

New DYK hook

added there. See if you like it better. Regards, Cinosaur (talk) 03:29, 21 December 2011 (UTC)

Thank you

		The Tireless Contributor Barnstar
		Thank you for your above and beyond assistance with locating The Times articles related to the South American dreadnought race. I really appreciate it. Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 08:50, 21 December 2011 (UTC)

Spotcheck request

Hi Fifelfoo. I know that you are very busy, but if you have time would you be willing to do a spotcheck for Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/One Tree Hill (song)/archive1? I'd really appreciate it if you are able to give it a quick look if you are able. Cheers, Melicans (talk, contributions) 17:26, 21 December 2011 (UTC)

Hi again Fifelfoo. Thank you very much for doing a spotcheck of the sources. Very weird about the conflicting page numbers, eh? I've left a couple of responses regarding that (and a query about WP:PRIMARY) on the FAC page. I hope you will be able to revisit it shortly; would be nice if we could figure out what is causing the massive page number discrepency! Melicans (talk, contributions) 03:43, 22 December 2011 (UTC)

Stanley Holloway

Hi and thanks for the spot check. I' m sorry, maybe it's just me but I'm not sure what you are asking me to do?

You say "This sentence also needs to cite A Wee bit, read the ODNB again, you'll see why. "Looking back in 2004, Holloway's biographer Eric Midwinter wrote"

I think I have answered this by adding the autobiog ref as given in the ODNB.

You then say "Please explain: Source: " was awarded the Variety Club of Great Britain special award in 1978" Wiki: " was awarded the Variety Club of Great Britain special award in 1978."

The above claim has been referenced using a RS. So therefore, your asking me to explain what exactly? I'm sorry I'm confused --- Cassianto (talk) 00:08, 22 December 2011 (UTC)

Sorry for being cryptic. The sentence "Looking back in 2004, Holloway's biographer Eric Midwinter wrote..." goes on to quote from A Wee bit. You need to cite that contained quote as well for good form. use the quote data from Midwinter's own footnote if it exists, ie "Blah Blah Blah as cited in Midwinter (YYYY) p." ontop of the existing Midwinter page citation. Fifelfoo (talk) 00:19, 22 December 2011 (UTC)

Spotchecking is a process of making sure that sources support claims in wikipedia; of making sure that plagiarism by copying text, plagiarism by close paraphrase, and plagiarism by not citing ideas taken from other texts has not occurred.

When I ask you to please explain, I'm making an accusation of plagiarism due to stealing the method of expression from a source. Wikipedia's text is identical to the text found in the source. I'm asking you to explain: why it happened here in particular, could it have happened elsewhere, how you wrote the article in terms of sourcing such that it lead to this plagiarism occurring here (and to what extent it could lead to plagiarism occurring elsewhere from other sources). It is the start of a process where I may need to rather thoroughly spot check the article before saying that the spot clear is clear. Fifelfoo (talk) 00:19, 22 December 2011 (UTC)