This user may have left Wikipedia. Captain Disdain has not edited Wikipedia for a considerable amount of time. As a result, any requests made here may not receive a response. If you are seeking assistance, you may need to approach someone else.
Please note: As a rule of thumb, messages left for me here will also get a response here, not on the talk page of the person who left the message. I realize that it's a little inconvenient in that anyone who leaves a message doesn't really know when I respond without watching this page and I'm sorry about that, but I find following conversations that happen on two (or more, as it may be) talk pages an absolute pain in the ass -- it just gets way too confusing and disjointed. Similarly, if I leave a message on your talk page, please respond to me there -- I'll keep an eye on it, so I'll see your reply.
My pleasure! I try to resist sniping at spelling mistakes, but clearly, I also have my limits... and I think they were exceeded by several orders of magnitude there. =) -- Captain Disdain (talk) 11:34, 22 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
No problem! Thanks for taking the time to do the research in the first place -- it certainly wasn't your fault that they made a mistake at Allmusic. I only barely noticed it by accident myself. -- Captain Disdain (talk) 10:39, 2 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I really haven't. It doesn't seem that long to me, but then again, I'm used to it (and frankly, the page doesn't get enough traffic for me to look at it all that often). I guess if you're on dial-up, it can take a while... Fair enough, I'll do something about it. -- Captain Disdain (talk) 07:17, 5 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
'xcuse me for butting in but, I don't think that your talk page was so long as to invite criticism as the archive was only 57 kilobytes long and the page prior this section being started was only 61 kilobytes.
Flaming prefers to archive at 40 to 45 kilobytes but that's Flaming. In the interest of full disclosure, my own talk page stands at 54 kilobytes and I'm not ready to archive, it's a personal choice with many users having well over your un-archived page size without criticism. Also, I definitely wouldn't archive my barnstars! BTW, I'm only aware of this section because of your participation as a regular on the RDs. Thanks for your many and thoughtful contributions. Oh, and you may want to work on your summaries ;-) hydnjo (talk) 02:56, 7 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Well, it did seem to me like the page wasn't all that big, but anyway, carrying old crap from 2005 around there probably wasn't doing anybody any good. As for the barnstars, I thought about putting them on my user page, but, eh, it just feels like awkward to me. I mean, I appreciate that people have been nice enough to give them to me, but I don't think I can call attention to them without feeling stupid about it. And I summarize just fine on actual articles. I really don't see the point on talk pages or in discussions in general; it's not like anyone's going to be able to follow a discussion based on those. The point is to make it clear who did what, and on an article it's very important, because everyone is constantly editing the same mass of text. That's not how it works in discussions, though. -- Captain Disdain (talk) 11:25, 7 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah, I know what you mean about the show-offy nature of barnstar displays. On the other hand wanting to retain acknowledgment to the giver, I've settled on a sub-page (see the top of my talk) to deal with the dilemma. Your edit summary philosophy is fine with me, I just didn't want to see it become an issue when you run for admin ;-) -hydnjo (talk) 14:53, 7 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
A sub-page's not a bad idea -- like I said, it's not like I don't appreciate the compliments. Guess I'll think about that. I'm running for admin now? Nobody ever tells me these things! ;) More seriously, the entire process seems a little... frustrating, like much of Wikipedia's internal workings. And I'm not saying I don't understand why it is the way it is, mind you, but, y'know. The headbutting required to get it done may be more than I want to get into... -- Captain Disdain (talk) 18:17, 7 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
wotcha, thanks for your advice, turns out all i needed to do was move the laptop, mustav been picking up sub-space interference or sum'ting. Didn't want you to think i hadn't read your post, thanks again. Beware the flying monkeys! Perry-mankster (talk) 20:34, 15 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Well, I'm glad you got it sorted out. I gotta admit, I haven't heard that one before -- a laptop picking up a radio channel and playing it like that. First time for everything, I guess... -- Captain Disdain (talk) 00:56, 16 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Suicide question
Hi. I am really angered by the actions of the two users who reverted my comment and the way they addressed me (and continue to address my concerns - on my talk page and theirs). Their comments strike me as far too aggressive and dismissive (accussing me of trolling, telling me to get a clue, telling me to "just stop. now" etc), and I have come away from this feeling like I have been spoken to and treated like an idiot, when I just tried to help. Am I being too sensitive, or was I dealt with a little unfairly? Frank Bruno's Laugh (talk) 12:56, 13 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Well, personally, I think the removal of the question on the Ref Desk smacks of hypocrisy and stupidity, and Jehochman's post on the Ref Desk talk page, with its threat of blocking users, pretty much eroded what sympathy I had for him. That kind of heavy-handed approach really rubs me the wrong way. The "suck it up and shut up!" treatment you seem to be getting falls in the same category. I don't think it's particularly fair, and it certainly isn't polite. -- Captain Disdain (talk) 13:10, 13 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I moved your comment and the subsequent discussion on my talk page to User talk:Frank Bruno's Laugh to keep the conversation together. Thanks for assuming bad faith of me. I can only type so fast and the two of you were jumping all over me. without even waiting for a response. Very nice indeed. Next time, ask a question and wait for an answer before you start posting all over the place and hitting the undo button.JehochmanTalk13:14, 13 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I'm sorry, how the hell am I jumping all over you? I noticed that you removed the question, I asked you about that on your talk page -- in what I believe to be perfectly polite manner -- and then I continued the discussion on the Ref Desk talk page after you'd posted there. I did ask a question and I did wait for an answer, and I haven't undone anything. And as for assuming bad faith, well, I believe you were the one who removed the original question from Ref Desk and cited WP:DENY in your edit summary. -- Captain Disdain (talk) 13:21, 13 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]
No, I didn't. I did not. But I admit that I wasn't being very nice, and I apologize for that. However: I do think it's stupid to threaten people on the Ref Desk talk page with blocks (without even explaining your position, no less!). I don't mean to offend, but it's... well... not smart. I don't know how else to put that. And I do think there's an element of hypocrisy at work here (though I realize that it's not an intentional one). I discuss the latter in more detail on the Ref Desk talk page, so I won't repeat myself (but I will point out here that if you assume bad faith from the original poster without any evidence -- and you did, as citing WP:DENY indicates -- and then accuse us of doing that that to you, that is kind of hypocritical). For what it's worth, I'm guilty of both stupidity and hypocrisy myself more often than I care to admit, and yet I don't consider myself stupid or a hypocrite. I try hard not to be either.
The point is: I don't like the way you're dealing with this, and it's making me angry. I think you're pretty quick on the trigger and your frustration is probably making you blunter than you would be if you didn't feel like we were ganging up on you (even though we're not), and that I can sympathize with. But it doesn't help that we feel like you're ignoring the context and arguments to the contrary here, and your willingness to throw your weight around (the block threat, "stop now", all that) doesn't exactly help things any.
To go beyond this a little, another reason I don't like the way you're dealing with this is that what you're doing goes contrary to the whole purpose of Wikipedia and, as its subset, the Ref Desk. (And this part, I should stress, doesn't really have much to do with my reaction to this whole thing -- I'm explaining this in the interests of clarifying my position to you.) We are here to dispense information. We are not here to judge which information is suitable for people and what isn't. That way lies censorship and elitism -- the idea that some people can handle facts, and some people can't. Now, obviously, there are some limits imposed by common sense. We don't include detailed information on how to build bombs, for example, nor do we tell people covered in blood how to leave the country without detection, for example. There's no need to be stupid about it. But we do explain principles of the former and -- under less alarming circumstances -- the latter, if asked. Why? Because honestly: these are not secrets. Generally, it's not the understanding of the principles involved that keeps people from doing this stuff, but the knowledge that it's wrong, or at least the knowledge that you can get in trouble for it. You can find most of this stuff from any decent library, or from Wikipedia itself. It's true that most information can be used for malicious purposes, but it's important to realize that that's got very little to do with the nature of Wikipedia (or libraries, encyclopedias and reference desks in general) and everything to do with the nature of information. I mean, we can make Wikipedia something other than that, but at that point we're building a Disneyland, not an actual "snapshot of human knowledge" or anything else in that vein. -- Captain Disdain (talk) 14:07, 13 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]
If you have uploaded other Non-Free media, consider checking that you have specified the Non-Free rationale on those pages too. You can find a list of 'file' pages you have edited by clicking on the "my contributions" link (it is located at the very top of any Wikipedia page when you are logged in), and then selecting "File" from the dropdown box. Note that any non-free media lacking such an explanation will be deleted one week after they have been tagged, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If the file is already gone, you can still make a request for undeletion and ask for a chance to fix the problem. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you. Sfan00 IMG (talk) 10:52, 29 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
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I'm doing a story for Gizmodo on how editors monitor pronoun changes on Wikipedia. I've noticed you've contributed to a few pages by contributing the correct pronouns for folks who transitioned later in life/were known by their dead names during their professional lives. I'd love to set up a chat if you're interested in speaking. My email is henry.giardina@gmail.com. Please feel free to reach out, and keep up the great work!
Just checking in again: I'm doing a story for Gizmodo on how editors monitor pronoun changes on Wikipedia. I've noticed you've contributed to a few pages by contributing the correct pronouns for folks who transitioned later in life/were known by their dead names during their professional lives. I'd love to set up a chat if you're interested in speaking. My email is henry.giardina@gmail.com. Please feel free to reach out, and keep up the great work!
