This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.
Thank you for your kind offer. However, it seems a bit odd to accept money from someone I don't know, so I'm going to decline. I do appreciate it though. – GorillaWarfare(talk)19:05, 2 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Hi there. When you get a second, can you look at the edits recently done by 173.81.190.232, on the article WTEN.
He/She is changing one line in the info box to be improper english. This IP user has been blocked several times in the past for disruptive editing, and most recently, by yourself. I reverted their edit a 2nd time but I will not anymore, as I do not wish to get into an edit war with them. I warned them of disruptive editing, but I would like your take on the matter.
Thank you very much for your time and input. NECRATSpeak to me21:40, 3 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I would suggest bringing this up at WP:AIV. I don't really have enough time at the current moment to look into it thoroughly enough—there appears to be a long history of abuse and sockpuppetry. – GorillaWarfare(talk)22:08, 3 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Of the 70 people who signed up for this drive, 40 copy-edited at least one article. Thanks to all who participated! Special acknowledgement goes out to Lfstevens, who did over 200 articles, most of them in the last third of the drive, and topped all three leaderboard categories. You're a superstar! Stfg and others have been pre-checking the articles for quality and conformance to Wikipedia guidelines; some have been nominated for deletion or had some preliminary clean-up done to help make the copy-edit process more fun and appealing. Thanks to all who helped get those nasty last few articles out of the target months.
Progress report
During this drive we were successful in eliminating our target months—October, November, and December 2010—from the queue, and have now eliminated all the 2010 articles from our list. We were able to complete 500 articles this month! End-of-drive results and barnstar information can be found here.
When working on the backlog, please keep in mind that there are options other than copy-editing available; some articles may be candidates for deletion, or may not be suitable for copy-editing at this time for other reasons. The {{GOCEreviewed}} tag can be placed on any article you find to be totally uneditable, and you can nominate for deletion any that you discover to be copyright violations or completely unintelligible. If you need help deciding what to do, please contact any of the coordinators.
Thank you for participating in the March 2012 drive! All contributions are appreciated. Our next copy-edit drive will be in May.
Hi! You are mentioned in a post that will run on the Wikimedia Foundation blog this week describing some of the editors who signed up for HighBeam accounts and their motivations for doing so. I just wanted to let you know. If you'd rather not be mentioned, please respond below or on my talk page. Cheers, Ocaasit | c18:41, 9 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
The New England Wikimedia General Meeting will be a large-scale meetup of all Wikimedians (and friends) from the New England area in order to discuss regional coordination and possible formalization of our community (i.e., a chapter). Come hang out with other Wikimedians, learn more about ongoing activities, and help plan for the future!
Good news! You now have access to 80 million articles in 6500 publications through HighBeam Research. Here's what you need to know:
Your account activation code has been emailed to your Wikipedia email address.
Only 407 of 444 codes were successfully delivered; most failed because email was simply not set up (You can set it in Special:Preferences).
If you did not receive a code but were on the approved list, add your name to this section and we'll try again.
The 1-year, free period begins when you enter the code.
To activate your account: 1) Go to http://www.highbeam.com/prof1; 2) You’ll see the first page of a two-page registration. 3) Put in an email address and set up a password. (Use a different email address if you signed up for a free trial previously); 4) Click “Continue” to reach the second page of registration; 5) Input your basic information; 6) Input the activation code; 7) Click “Finish”. Note that the activation codes are one-time use only and are case-sensitive.
If you need assistance, email "help at highbeam dot com", and include "HighBeam/Wikipedia" in the subject line. Or go to WP:HighBeam/Support, or ask User:Ocaasi. Please, per HighBeam's request, do not call the toll-free number for assistance with registration.
A quick reminder about using the account: 1) try it out; 2) provide original citation information, in addition to linking to a HighBeam article; 3) avoid bare links to non-free HighBeam pages; 4) note "(subscription required)" in the citation, where appropriate
The Guild of Copy Editors invites you to participate in their May 2012 Backlog elimination drive, a month-long effort to reduce the size of the copy edit backlog. The drive begins on May 1 at 00:00 (UTC) and ends on May 31 at 23:59 (UTC). Our goal for the drive will be to eliminate January, February, and March 2011 from the queue. Barnstars will be awarded to anyone who copy edits more than 4,000 words, and special awards will be given to the top 5 in the following categories: "Number of articles", "Number of words", and "Number of articles of over 5,000 words". We hope to see you there! – Your drive coordinators: Dank, Diannaa, and Stfg.
Hi, I was just wondering: What was the rationale for deleting the article on the "Collusion" software/script?
Other than http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:CSD#A7
Which I don't really see how applies sufficiently as the criterion section referenced to itself clearly states:
This criterion applies only to articles about web content and to articles about people, organizations, and individual animals themselves, not to articles about their books, albums, software, or other creative works. This criterion does not apply to species of animals, only to individual animal(s). The criterion does not apply to any article that makes any credible claim of significance or importance even if the claim is not supported by a reliable source or does not qualify on Wikipedia's notability guidelines.[6] The criterion does apply if the claim of significance or importance given is not credible. If the claim's credibility is unclear, you can improve the article yourself, propose deletion, or list the article at articles for deletion.
{db-a7}}, {db-person}} – for people, {db-band}} – for bands, {db-club}} – for clubs, societies, groups, and organizations, {db-inc}} – for companies and corporations, {db-web}} – for websites, {db-animal}} – for individual animals
I'm not sure which part of the rationale you're finding insufficient. I would say it falls under "web content", as it displays content that is pulled from a web browser. It made no claim of significance or importance, and it doesn't appear to meet any of Wikipedia's notability criteria.
Okay. Thanks. I just did not know how to find out, and had of course no idea that it was just some text copied off the web from some other article or something. I just thought it was/seemed an interesting piece of software / script/ programming, and with the privacy/tracking issues being very much in the public interest these days I was hoping there were people around who had collected some basic information on various parts of the tech phenomena (not only in general but this one in particular), as there are it seems already a vast range of articles on almost all new types of software and the development is moving pretty rapidly in this field. Which was of course why I went to Wikipedia again to see if there was any information/interest on this particular piece of software / script programming. But from what you note here it seems it was just shoddily done work and bad article editing then, with obviously little to no documentation or "justification" then. A bit of a pity though, since the topic and the techniques involved etc. really are important to us all. Thanks all the same for the info and feedback. All the best. Cheers. Nunamiut (talk) 20:51, 27 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
GorillaWarfare, I present thee with the "For Science!" Barnstar for your awesome hand-coding work as part of WP:AFT5. At 291 items, you beat out literally everyone else for highest number of items coded. Now's the time to sit back, relax, and stare at the shit-cool microscope User:EpochFail built in! Thanks for your hard work :). Okeyes (WMF) (talk) 11:27, 27 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
It was a really dumb move deleting the collusion tracking monitoring software article. I watched a TED talk on this came to search on wikipedia and found you'd deleted the article.
If it's important enough for a TED talk then it sure as heck is important enough for a wikipedia article.
Hi GorillaWarfare. I've just reviewed the Terry Fulmer DYK, and as far as I can see (though I might be being blind), the DYK fact isn't mentioned in the article - and certainly not cited there. Otherwise it looks good to go. WormTT· (talk) 14:18, 5 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Eep, you're right! The editor I was working with made some changes to the article after I nommed, and it looks like he may have accidentally removed it. I re-added; it should be all set now. – GorillaWarfare(talk)20:50, 5 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Participation: Out of 49 people signed up for this drive so far, 26 have copy-edited at least one article. It's a smaller group than last drive, but we're making good progress. If you've signed up but haven't yet copy-edited any articles, please consider doing so. Every bit helps! If you haven't signed up yet, it's not too late. Join us!
Progress report: We're on track to meet our targets for the drive, largely due to the efforts of Lfstevens and the others on the leaderboard. Thanks to all. We have reduced our target group of articles—January, February, and March 2011—by over half, and it looks like we will achieve that goal. Good progress is being made on the overall backlog as well, with over 500 articles copy-edited during the drive so far. The total backlog currently sits at around 3200 articles.
Hall of Fame: GOCE coordinator Diannaa was awarded a spot in the GOCE Hall of Fame this month! She has copy-edited over 1567 articles during these drives, and surpassed the 1,000,000-word mark on May 5. On to the second million! – Your drive coordinators: Dank, Diannaa and Stfg
The Second Annual Great American Wiknic will be an opportunity for Wikipedians across the Greater Boston area to meet for an afternoon of Food, Fun, and Fellowship. Come hang out with other Wikimedians, learn more about upcoming activities, and just enjoy a day at the park!
Participation: Out of 54 people who signed up this drive, 32 copy-edited at least one article. Last drive's superstar, Lfstevens, again stood out, topping the leader board in all three categories and copy-editing over 700 articles. Thanks to all who participated! Final results, including barnstars awarded, are available here.
Progress report: We were once again successful in our primary goal—removing the oldest three months from the backlog—while removing 1166 articles from the queue, the second-most in our history. The total backlog currently sits at around 2600 articles, down from 8323 when we started out just over two years ago.
Coodinator election: The six-month term for our third tranche of Guild coordinators will be expiring at the end of June. We will be accepting nominations for the fourth tranche of coordinators, who will also serve a six-month term. Nominations will open starting on June 5. For complete information, please have a look at the election page. – Your drive coordinators: Dank, Diannaa, and Stfg
I contacted an oversighter who suppressed the edit. I also blocked the account. In the future, this sort of defamatory material should probably be referred directly to them, preferably privately to avoid the Streisand effect. Thank you for letting me know! – GorillaWarfare(talk)22:02, 3 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Hey Gorilla! Can you figure out what's going on here? I was going to tag this but I don't want to accidentally hose your file. Thanks! :) -- WikHead (talk) 00:53, 8 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
You're most certainly welcome. The revision history on that was a bit confusing... but I knew you would figure it out. ;) Have yourself a great day, stay well, and happy editing! :) -- WikHead (talk) 02:07, 8 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Adoption from you!
Hi GorillaWarfare! i hope your'e doing great :) I am looking for adoption from an experienced administrator. As i was searching and examining the full adopter's list, i have checked it out and have found out that you would be my one of the best and most suitable adopter and mentor :). Don't worry as i want to be up for adoption by at least 2 users, and i am just in the process of finding the other most suitable mentor for me. I am not really new here and not a new user as i have been quite active here for many months now, it's just that i'm starting to gain more and more experience for improving Wikipedia. GorillaWarfare, you have a wide experience in many areas of the project and that's what makes you one of the best . I really hope that this adoption process will help me become a far more better and experienced editor and you my friend can help me do it. I will be really glad, happy and thankful to have a mentor like you :) and i'm sure one day you will also be glad, happy and thankful to have an adoptee like me! I'm looking forward to hear from you. Best regards. TheGeneralUser (talk) 18:11, 8 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I'm actually not currently taking adoptees--I believe I'm listed as unavailable on that page. Sorry! I hope you find someone who can help you out. – GorillaWarfare(talk)18:20, 8 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I know, i saw you listed as unavailable on the adopter's page. But nonetheless from checking out your stats and contributions i thought that you would be a really great mentor for me. I really thought that if you could become my co-adopter that would have been really good, now what should i do . TheGeneralUser (talk) 18:35, 8 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Hi there, GorillaWarfare! Thought you might be interested in Motto of the Day, a collaborative (and totally voluntary) effort by a group of Wikipedians to create original, inspirational mottoes. Have a good motto idea? Share it here, comment on some of the mottoes there or just pass this message onto your friends.
The Guild of Copy Editors invites you to participate in their July 2012 Backlog elimination drive, a month-long effort to reduce the size of the copy edit backlog. The drive begins on July 1 at 00:00 (UTC) and ends on July 31 at 23:59 (UTC). Our goals are to eliminate the articles tagged in April, May and June 2011 from the queue and to complete all requests placed before the end of June. Barnstars will be awarded to anyone who copy edits more than 4,000 words, and special awards will be given to the top 6 in the following categories: "Number of articles", "Number of words", "Number of articles of over 5,000 words", "Number of articles tagged in April–June 2011", and "Longest article". We hope to see you there! – Your drive coordinators: Dank, Diannaa and Stfg.
I noticed that you had previously worked extensively on EnerNOC. It was featured on Bloomberg TV two days ago. After visiting the page I decided to add some info. I may add a rebuild sign, but much of the work is done. Thought you might like to do a quick audit and/or help me out with it. I might pick up another project for a bit just to take a break from it. I'll try to take care of the logo issue if it is possible. I'm worried about my mistakes and any issues with exiting segments.
I started on infoboxes for ships so putting a business portal article together is a bit new to me. any advice would be great.
AH-64 Longbow (talk) 08:52, 27 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Edit: Logo must have been an article I referenced, You apparently added the loge for EnerNOC long ago, and correctly as far as I have looked. Very sorry. — Preceding unsigned comment added by AH-64 Longbow (talk • contribs) 08:58, 27 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I've given it a quick look, and it looks pretty good. I'd watch the wording though—some of it sounds a little promotional. I don't really have the time or energy right now to do a full rewrite or anything. – GorillaWarfare(talk)20:31, 27 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks. I very much agree with you. I may try a rewrite to improve the wording. I have already started removing the word appliance as it is vague and more of a buzz word than anything. Sadly, even their corporate fillings to the government are filled with promotional jargon. Also there is buzz from all the news companies about it because it is a so called green energy company. Basically everything has to to be translated from BS back into English. I'll be working on it though. Thanks for the quick look, and the feedback. All the best to you AH-64 Longbow (talk) 06:38, 3 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
WikiWomen's Luncheon at Wikimania - You are invited!
Are you a woman attending Wikimania 2012?If so, join us on Saturday, July 14, for the annual WikiWomen's Luncheon (fka WikiChix Lunch) This event is for any women attending Wikimania. Pick up your lunch, compliments of Wikimania, and join us at 1:30pm in the Grand Ballroom for a lively facilitated discussion hosted by Sue Gardner. We look forward to seeing you there. Please sign up here. Sarah (talk) 13:00, 4 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Participation: Out of 37 people signed up for this drive so far, 25 have copy-edited at least one article. It's a smaller group than last drive, but we're making good progress. If you've signed up but haven't yet copy-edited any articles, every bit helps; if you haven't signed up yet, it's not too late. Join us!
Progress report: We're almost on track to meet our targets for the drive. Great work, guys. We have reduced our target group of articles—May, June, and July 2011—by about 40%, and the overall backlog has been reduced by 264 articles so far, to around 2500 articles.
Copy Edit of the Month: Starting in August, your best copy-editing work of the month will be eligible for fabulous prizes! See here for details. – Your drive coordinators: Stfg, Allens, and Torchiest.
It was nice meeting you! It was funny, I knew you and Brandon looked vaguely familiar at the start of the convention, I just couldn't quite place you. Then I finally figured it out. Oh, and you should check out Django (web framework) (which I think I mentioned at one point). --Cyde Weys22:57, 21 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I had begun to crete an article on the Secretary of the Interior's Standards which you deleted for unambiguous copyright infringement :
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Articles_for_creation/Secretary_of_the_Interior%27s_Standards
I am a photographer and very aware of copyrights and understand the infringement concept and I made certain none existed in my article. Could you please tell me which part is infringement?
I can't seem to get to the article in question to see what that may have been or delete the offending passage, it seems to be inaccessible to me, but I'm not a Wikipedia wiz, just a photographer with an interest in preservation. The Secretary of the Interior's Standards (SIS) is of interest to many people, they are a set of guidelines that are used in historic preservation (a public benefit). It has similar programs in other countries that can be compared and contrasted through the Wikipedia interface. Examples can be shown of the evolution of how practitioners of historic preservation have used the guidelines with good and bad examples. Seminars and workshops are taught on the SIS to practitioners and laypeople who have been told by their local government that they should use the SIS to repair or renovate their homes. These people can go to the National Park Service(NPS) site and download the numbered guidelines but the understanding of them, their history and how they have been changed based on our culture's attitudes to historic preservation are never included in the guidelines. This important context is where a Wikipedia article could offer croud-sourced background and examples and the comparison to similar programs in other countries (something the NPS does not and will not discuss). The Secretary of the Interior's Standards are interesting, relevant to many people, evolving, and referred to in other Wikipedia articles. I'll admit I took out the most relevant part of the article (the actual guidelines) after the first editor stated that they were laws. A version including those guidelines and my most recent in-line citations and references would be the best version for inclusion in Wikipedia. I'm dealing with you as the third editor and never got further responses from the first two as the practice seems to be for editors to move on. I hope you can finally tell me how to get this article published to Wikipedia standards in a way I can follow.
I'll admit I'm frustrated by the difficulty of starting an article today on Wikipedia, stemming, no doubt, from the myriad political and fan motivated articles often submitted, but this is neither and not my first contribution.
The reasons for not publishing & deleting the article have seemed to me to be cursory blow-offs to someone trying to make a sincere attempt to add relevant content that is not copyrighted, not the text of a law verifiable and universally relevant. Schafphoto (talk) 18:16, 17 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
The article is inaccessible to you because it has been deleted; once an article has been deleted, it is not accessible to anyone without the administrator userright. The text, however, was a direct copy-and-paste of the legal text in question, from sources such as [2] and [3]. The entire thing was copied; removing a section or two would not have adequately fixed this problem.
To write an article on the Standards, you need to write about them, not just copy them into the encyclopedia. Notice, for example, how the article on Alien and Sedition Acts is not the text of the alien and sedition acts themselves, but rather information about them. From WP:NOTREPOSITORY: "Wikipedia is not mere collections of public domain or other source material such as entire books or source code, original historical documents, letters, laws, proclamations, and other source material that are only useful when presented with their original, unmodified wording." – GorillaWarfare(talk)20:11, 17 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
OK, it was a misunderstanding on my part about what kind of content to put on Wikipedia since I thought that the text of the guidelines would give the "about" context. In order for the about to be clear I would then propose to put a list of the categories of the guidelines, like Rehabilitation, restoration, and recreation, etc. Though it was not copyrighted text it was cut and pasted and I see that is not allowed. So how do I get to the parts of "about" text that I contributed to remove the cut and paste parts and expand on my about text that I don't want to recreate?Schafphoto (talk) 20:35, 17 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Hi GorillaWarfare! Thank you for signing up to be a future host at the Teahouse. Well, great news - the future is here: we'd love you to be a Teahouse host! Teahouse hosts do more than just answer questions. A few things we'd love to see you do as a Teahouse host:
First, declare your Hostness! Add yourself to the Host page! This page is where new editors and your fellow hosts can learn about you and get in touch with you easily if needed. By signing up here you declare that you know how to serve up a great cup of tea. Add yourself here.
Invite new users with our invite guide. Please invite new users to the Teahouse! At that guide you'll find some tips on how to invite. It's super important; we have plenty of Wikipedians answering questions, but not enough asking the questions!
Visit the tips page. The tips page provides you some basic tips on how to engage with visitors at the Teahouse. We have a special way of doing things - unlike other areas of Wikipedia! (Such as greeting new editors with a simple "Hi!" and being as easy to understand and friendly as possible.)
Join the conversation by participating on the host lounge talk pages. We also have an IRC channel now for hosts to get to know one another, develop your skills, and eventually the channel will serve as an additional help space for new editors!
To visit the IRC channel: #wikipedia-teahouseconnect (Feel free to ask me for help if you're having trouble connecting!)
Participate in developing the Teahouse further by getting involved in phase two. Learn more here.
I'm so happy that you volunteered to lend a hand at the Teahouse. I look forward to following your contributions and invitations, and your assistance in making the Teahouse a great and warm place for new Wikipedians. See you there :) Sarah (talk) 18:03, 19 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
AFT5 allows everyone to post feedback without proving that they are human. This gives a possibility of mass bot feedback cheats. Could you consider adding a CAPTCHA check, at least for IPs? Could you also think about blocking blank feedback comments? --Николай95 (talk) 06:50, 21 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I had already contested the deletion of <redacted> when you entered the scene and deleted it without making a single argument. In fact, you deleted my arguments, which you labeled "Housekeeping and routine (non-controversial) cleanup". In fact, deleting the arguments for a contested deletion is very controversial. Please reverse your actions and reinstate that article immediately, which was not an attack, as I pointed out in the Talk-portion which you did not read (because you have deleted it). You may be an administrator, but that does not mean that you are above the rules, or that you are entitled to whimsically delete articles whose deletion has credibly been contested. --SpiritOfBanquo (talk) 17:00, 24 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Biographies of living people are subject to stricter requirements for reliable sourcing than most articles because of the defamation they can cause. The BLP policy states: "Biographies of living persons ("BLP"s) must be written conservatively and with regard for the subject's privacy. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, not a tabloid: it is not Wikipedia's job to be sensationalist, or to be the primary vehicle for the spread of titillating claims about people's lives: the possibility of harm to living subjects must always be considered when exercising editorial judgment." The article you wrote was so heavily biased and disparaging against its subject that it was an attack page.
Furthermore, this article is sort of a special case because of its subject. The subject is underage, and his name has not been released by the courts or by reliable media. Posting the name is of questionable legality, and it could actually cause legal issues for the Wikimedia Foundation itself.
I'd like to quickly address two points you made, as well. In regards to your argument that the deletion of the talk page wasn't valid: that was partially a mistake on my part. I accidentally selected G6: Housekeeping and routine (non-controversial) cleanup when I meant to select G8: Pages dependent on a non-existent or deleted page. I did read your message, but deleted the talk page after deleting the article. The argument you made did not change that the page was an attack page, and deletion of talk pages of deleted articles falls under Wikipedia's speedy deletion criteria. I apologize for selecting the wrong deletion explanation; I see how that could have been confusing.
Secondly, I am allowed to delete articles whose deletion has been contested. If the speedy deletion criterion has been met, the article can be deleted, regardless of whether someone has argued against the deletion. – GorillaWarfare(talk)19:58, 24 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
First of all, the idea that the article was biased in any way is completely and demonstrably false. In no way was my article biased (let alone heavily so) or disparaging. The facts were unpleasant, but the clinical writing style did not reflect that. Unless you have writing-meaning synesthesia, I see no excuse for this claim - and if you do, you should go delete Videla's article, because it mentions some unpleasant things. Unsurprising. He was an unpleasant man.
The name of the subject has been released by a very reliable source: his victim. And it has been confirmed by his own attorneys - else they would not have made a stir about it. If I have 10 pots, 9 filled with lead and 1 filled with gold, will I panic if you try to steal a pot filled with lead? So we have two sources for their names: the victims, and the attorneys. Seems pretty good to me.
And before I address your other claim, can you tell me the following: if these three issues you have raised were to be resolved to your satisfaction, will you restore the article, or will another excuse magically appear out of thin air? --SpiritOfBanquo (talk) 23:40, 24 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]
EduWiki Conference 5-6 September in Leicester, UK
I am writing to you as you have signed up to the Education Meetup at Wikimania 2012 and perhaps are interested in how Wikipedia links to education. Wikimedia UK is now running a education related event that may be of interest to you: the EduWiki Conference on 5-6 September in Leicester. This event will be looking at Wikipedia and related charitable projects in terms of educational practice, including good faith collaboration, open review, and global participation. It's a chance to talk about innovative work in your institution or online community, and shape the future of Wikimedia UK's work in this area!
The conference will be of interest to educators, scholarly societies members, contributors to Wikipedia and other open education projects, and students.
Participation: Out of 45 people who signed up this drive, 31 have copy-edited at least one article. Lfstevens continues to carry most of the weight, having edited 360 articles and over a quarter of a million words already. Thanks to all who have participated! Final results, including barnstars awarded, will be available early in August here.
Progress report: We are once again very close to achieving in our primary goal—removing the oldest three months from the backlog. Only 35 such articles remain at press time. The total backlog currently sits at under 2400 articles, down from 8323 when we started out over two years ago. We are just two articles away from completing all requests made before July 2012 (both are in progress).
Copy Edit of the Month: Starting in August, you'll be able to submit your best copy-editing work for palaver, praise, and prizes. See here for details. – Your drive coordinators: Stfg, Allens, and Torchiest.
New designs for tutorial pages have been proposed, comment from project members is welcome.
From the editor
Welcome to the (slightly delayed) third issue of the Help Project newsletter.
The past month has once again been a busy one for my fellowship. The full results and conclusions from the extensive user survey on help pages are now available, and make interesting reading. These do confirm a number of our suspicions about Wikipedia help, and suggest that the current plan for the remainder of the fellowship is a sound approach.
Also last month I was fortunate enough to attend Wikimania 2012 in Washington DC, where I gave a presentation about help pages and the aforementioned survey results. You can find the slides from this on Commons. Wikimania was also a great opportunity for many discussions with staff and community members, and these brought up some interesting ideas which I hope to follow up on.
One of the things much discussed was the planned tutorial pages. I've been working on a new design for them which can be seen at User:The wub/sandbox/1, please let me know what you think (especially if you spot any bugs!).
Any comments or suggestions for future issues are welcome at Wikipedia:Help Project/Newsletter. If you don't wish to receive this newsletter on your talk page in future then just edit the participants page and add "no newsletter" next to your name.
Stop by for a tasty glass of wiki-iced tea at the Teahouse, today!
Hi! Welcome to the fifth edition of The Tea Leaf, the official newsletter of the Teahouse!
Guest activity increased in July. Questions are up from an average of 36 per week in June to 43 per week in July, and guest profile creation has also increased. This is likely a result of the automatic invite experiments we started near the end of month, which seeks to lessen the burden on hosts and other volunteer who manually invite editors. During the last week of July, questions doubled in the Teahouse! (But don't let that deter you from inviting editors to the Teahouse, please, there are still lots of new editors who haven't found Teahouse yet.)
More Teahouse hosts than ever. We had 12 new hosts sign up to participate at the Teahouse! We now have 35 hosts volunteering at the Teahouse. Feel free to stop by and see them all here.
Phase two update: Host sprint. In August, the Teahouse team plans to improve the host experience by developing a simpler new-host creation process, a better way of surfacing active hosts, and a host lounge renovation. Take a look at the plan and weigh in here.
New Teahouse guest barnstar is awarded to first recipient: Charlie Inks. Using the Teahouse barnstar designed by Heatherawalls, hosts hajatvrc and Ryan Vesey created the new Teahouse Guest Barnstar. The first recipient is Charlie Inks, for her boldness in asking questions at the Teahouse. Check out the award in action here.
Teahouse was a hot topic at Wikimania! The Teahouse was a hot topic at Wikimania this past month, where editor retention and interface design was heavily discussed. Sarah and Jonathan presented the Teahouse during the Wikimedia Fellowships panel. Slides can be viewed here. A lunch was also held at Wikimania for Teahouse hosts.
As always, thanks for supporting the Teahouse project! Stop by and visit us today!
You are receiving The Tea Leaf after expressing interest or participating in the Teahouse! To remove yourself from receiving future newsletters, please remove your username here. SarahStierch (talk) 08:27, 4 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Smiles for you!
TheGeneralUser (talk) has smiled at you! Smiles promote WikiLove and hopefully this one has made your day better. Spread the WikiLove by smiling to someone else, whether it be someone you have had disagreements with in the past or a good friend. Smile to others by adding {{subst:User:Cowman109/Smile2}} or {{subst:User:Cowman109/Smile3}} to their talk page with a friendly message. Happy editing!
Hello, GorillaWarfare. You have new messages at Wikipedia_talk:Teahouse/Host_lounge. Message added 23:30, 7 August 2012 (UTC). You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.
Is there any way to earn money through wikipedia too??
Hi Gorilla, I see you are working with wikipedia since 2006. I want to know is there any way to earn money too via wikipedia. Do they pay to editors? thanks in advance. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Nishnkd (talk • contribs) 07:48, 13 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]
When I say I've been working with Wikipedia, I mean that I've been involved with the project since then. I do not get paid for it. Wikipedia does not pay its editors, but there are paid positions for which you can apply. You can see them here. – GorillaWarfare(talk)21:00, 13 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Hi GW! I hope all is well. I wanted to stop by to share a new project with you that I am developing, called the WikiWomen's Collaborative. I would love your input about the project.
On the talk page, you'll find a number of questions I'm seeking input on. I'm especially seeking thoughts about hosting the space off of Wikipedia (in the WordPress section). I hope you will join in on the conversation.
Finally, this project will be developed with volunteers from around the world who want to engage and support bringing new women to Wikipedia. If you think you'd like to be involved in some capacity, that'd be awesome. We're still working on developing roles, but, you can learn more about volunteer opportunities here.
The August 2012 Copy Edit of the Month Contest is currently in the submissions stage. Submit your best August copy edit there before the end of the month. Submissions end, and discussion and voting begin, on September 1 at 00:00 (UTC).
September 2012 Backlog elimination drive is a month-long effort to reduce the size of the copy edit backlog. The drive begins on September 1 at 00:00 (UTC) and ends on September 30 at 23:59 (UTC). Our goals are to copy edit the articles tagged longest ago and to complete all requests placed before the end of August. Barnstars will be awarded to anyone who copy edits at least one article, and special awards will be given to the top six in the following categories: "Number of articles", "Number of words", "Number of articles of over 5,000 words", "Number of articles tagged longest ago", and "Longest article". This drive features a much easier signup process. We hope to see you there! – Your drive coordinators: Stfg, Allens, and Torchiest.
Hi Gorilla, it was very nice to meet you at Wikimania. I was just re-reading your comment at the last RfC about Pending Changes "complicat[ing] Wikipedia even more for new users". I'd appreciate any insights you want to offer on my talk page any time; I've mentioned some of the issues I have with Pending Changes in various posts at WT:PC2012. - Dank (push to talk) 17:25, 22 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Recovery of deleted page
Hi Gorilla. I'd like to recover a page I think was wrongly deleted. It was called Daniel Peters, created by me a few days ago. can you help? Petergionis (talk) 12:32, 23 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]
The article on that subject already exists as Inkey Jones. I don't see how you think it was wrongly deleted—it seems pretty black-and-white to me. I'm also confused as to why you've nominated the other article for deletion, yet want me to restore an article on the same subject. – GorillaWarfare(talk)14:13, 24 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]
The article I've nominated for deletion is about Daniel Peters' activities as a comedian, under the name Inkey Jones, which refers mostly to self-published sources or makes unsubstantiated claims about the subject. The Daniel Peters article I created was to focus purely on his activities as a comedy promoter for which I had several references. Petergionis (talk) 14:35, 24 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Regardless, the article is on the same subject. Wait until the outcome of the deletion debate is decided. If the article is kept, it can be moved to the new title if necessary. – GorillaWarfare(talk)15:25, 24 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Talkback
Hello, GorillaWarfare. You have new messages at Wikipedia_talk:Teahouse/Host_lounge. Message added 06:17, 24 August 2012 (UTC). You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.
The September 2012 Backlog elimination drive is now underway! The event runs until midnight September 30 (UTC). The goal is to copy edit articles with the oldest tags and complete all requests placed before September. Barnstars will be awarded to anyone who participates, with special awards given to the top five in the following categories: "Total articles", "Total words", "Total articles over 5,000 words", "Total articles tagged longest ago", and "Longest article". – Your drive coordinators: Stfg, Allens, and Torchiest.
Strange that you insist on removing my edit. Politico is the most respected media organization to write a news story on Robbins' departure from the New York Times and their account is at this point authoritative. When someone leaves an important post the reasons for the departure are of interest, especially if they are unusual as apparently the case here.
You are unduly concerned that the story is attributed to two anonymous sources. Anonymous sources are not unreliable. Many major news stories are broken every day based on authoritative sources (including in the Times). Politico would risk a libel suit if they could not support their contention in this story, so clearly they have good basis for saying what they did.
Your edit seems to be a disturbing effort to censor. — Preceding unsigned comment added by DCDriver (talk • contribs) 02:40, 4 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I am not trying to censor anything; I am simply trying to avoid defamation of the subject of the article with somewhat shaky sources. No other source that I have found has made any mention of Robbins' negative personality, so in addition to making it difficult to verify this information, it also makes the inclusion thereof look a bit like undue weight. Furthermore, I too question your sudden appearance after Menemenetekel's block, as I've mentioned on your talk page. – GorillaWarfare(talk)18:31, 4 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Hi GorillaWarfare ! I have started my second editor review at Wikipedia:Editor review/TheGeneralUser (2). I will be greatly delighted, thankful and valued to have your review for me regarding my editing and possible candidate for Adminship. As you are a experienced and long term Wikipedian so i have asked for your kind review. Take your time to review my editing and give the best review that you can :). Feel free to ask me any questions you would like to on the review page itself. It will be a great honor to have you review me for which I will truly feel appreciated and helpful! I always work to improve Wikipedia and make it a more better place to be for Everyone :). Regards and Happy Editing! TheGeneralUser (talk) 20:02, 4 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
The Tea Leaf - Issue Six
Hi! Welcome to the sixth edition of The Tea Leaf, the official newsletter of the Teahouse!
Teahouse serves over 700 new editors in six months on Wikipedia! Since February 27, 741 new editors have participated at the Teahouse. The Q&A board and the guest intro pages are more active than ever.
Automatic invites are doing the trick: 50% more new editors visiting each week. Ever since HostBot's automated invite trial phase began we've seen a boost in new editor participation. Automating a baseline set of invitations also allows Teahouse hosts to focus on serving hot cups of help to guests, instead of spending countless hours inviting.
Guests to the Teahouse continue to edit more & interact more with other community members than non-Teahouse guests according to six month metrics. Teahouse guests make more than twice the article edits and edit more talk pages than other new editors.
New host process implemented which encourages anyone to get started as a Teahouse host in a few easy steps. Stop by the hosts page and become a Teahouse host today!
Host lounge renovations nearing completion. Working closely with Teahouse hosts, we've made some major renovations to the Teahouse Host Lounge - the main hangout and resource space for hosts. Learn more about the improvements here.
As always, thanks for supporting the Teahouse project! Stop by and visit us today!
You are receiving The Tea Leaf after expressing interest or participating in the Teahouse! To remove yourself from receiving future newsletters, please remove your username here. EdwardsBot (talk) 00:07, 6 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Talkback
Hello, GorillaWarfare. You have new messages at Wikipedia_talk:Teahouse/Host_lounge. Message added 22:42, 6 September 2012 (UTC). You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.
Hi, and welcome to the fourth issue of the Help Project newsletter.
It's been another busy month in the world of Wikipedia help. The results from the in-person usability tests conducted as part of the help pages fellowship have been released. There are no great surprises here, the tests confirmed that people have trouble with the existing help system, and people looking for help on the same topic often end up at wildly different pages. Editors who experienced a tutorial and/or edited a sandbox as part of their learning were noticeably more confident when editing a real article.
Drawing on that, three new "Introduction to" tutorials for new users have been created: referencing, uploading images and navigating Wikipedia. These join the popular existing introductions to policies and guidelines and talk pages. Feel free to edit them, but please do remember that the idea is to keep them simple and as free from extraneous details as possible. All three have been added to Help:Getting started, which is intended to be the new focal point for new editors, and will also be seeing a redesign soon.
In other news, the Article Feedback Tool (AFT) can now be used to collect feedback on help pages. By default it has been deployed to all pages in the Help: namespace. It can be disabled on any page by adding Category:Article Feedback Blacklist, or enabled for pages in other namespaces by adding Category:Article Feedback 5 Additional Articles. Once a page has AFT applied, you can add feedback using the form which appears at the bottom of it. Feedback can be reviewed by clicking "View feedback" in the sidebar, or the "Feedback from my watched pages" link at the top of your watchlist.
I'm now entering the final month of my fellowship, and will be focusing my efforts on making much needed improvements to Help:Contents, the main entrance point to our help system. It's been a pleasure working as a fellow, and I just want to thank all the people who have helped me or offered advice over the past months. That definitely won't be the end of my involvement in the Help Project though, I'll be sticking around as a volunteer and continuing to write this newsletter.
Any comments or suggestions for future issues are welcome at Wikipedia:Help Project/Newsletter. If you don't wish to receive this newsletter on your talk page in future then just edit the participants page and add "no newsletter" next to your name.
Participation: Out of 37 people signed up for this drive so far, 19 have copy-edited at least one article, about the same as the last drive. If you've signed up but haven't yet copy-edited any articles, every bit helps; if you haven't signed up yet, it's not too late. Join us!
Progress report: We're almost on track to meet our targets for the drive. Great work, guys. We have reduced our target group of articles—August, September, and October 2011—by about 44%, and the overall backlog has been reduced by 58 articles so far, to around 2600 articles. The biggest difference between this drive and the previous one is a stronger focus on large articles, so total word counts are still comparable.
Don't forget about the Copy Edit of the Month contests! Voting for the August contest has been extended through the end of the month. You don't have to make a submission to vote!
Just wanted to know if you have some idea with when the PC will be on trial again.
BTW, I was just going through the Wikipedia:Pending changes/Request for Comment 2012 and saw your support for position #1. You mentioned semi-protection would accomplish the same task w/o adding unnecessary workload on reviewers. -->With semi-protection the IP's aren't allowed to edit and with PC they are allowed to do so (that is, after a minor check by reviewrs). And there aren't many semi-protected pages too. Even if in case it increases task for reviewers, the rollbackers will spend less time in reverting vandal edits.
I know no more than you do about the timeframe for pending changes. As for my opinion on the matter, PC created a massive workload for reviewers that was disproportionate to the work saved by rollbackers. Regarding your comment on the restriction of edits by non-autoconfirmed users, semi-protection is only used in cases where it's absolutely necessary. Although I support new and IP editors having as free reign to edit as possible, I do not support it at the expense of so much time from the rest of the community. – GorillaWarfare(talk)14:24, 18 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Hi. Thank you for your recent edits. Wikipedia appreciates your help. We noticed though that when you edited Alexandre Parodi, you added a link pointing to the disambiguation page French (check to confirm | fix with Dab solver). Such links are almost always unintended, since a disambiguation page is merely a list of "Did you mean..." article titles. Read the FAQ • Join us at the DPL WikiProject.
Dunno if you remember me, but I worked with you to resolve some layout issues on your User and Talk pages some years ago. As a side effect of this, I uploaded an image, which is now being considered for deletion. I mention it in case you'd care to save a copy, as it will likely be deleted. Jouster (whisper) 14:30, 28 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for letting me know! I haven't used that layout in a long time, so I don't mind it being deleted.
Help in finding a mentor for the best newbie editor I've ever seen
I was AFCing today and I found this article which is bar none the best AFC article I've ever encountered. With a bit of polish it can probably make GA status. I want to make sure the editor gets all the help he/she needs to write more articles. I'll keep an eye on this user, but I don't have much experience in newbie mentoring. Would you mind finding somebody to mentor this editor? Thanks. Alanl (talk) 17:25, 2 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Participation: Out of 41 people who signed up this drive, 28 copy-edited at least one article. Thanks to all who participated! Final results, including barnstars awarded, are available here.
Progress report: We achieved our primary goal of clearing July, August, September and October 2011 from the backlog. This means that, for the first time since the drives began, the backlog is less than a year. At least 677 tagged articles were copy edited, although 365 new ones were added during the month. The total backlog at the end of the month was 2341 articles, down from 8323 when we started out over two years ago. We completed all 54 requests outstanding before September 2012 as well as eight of those made in September.
Copy Edit of the Month: Voting is now over for the August 2012 competition, and prizes will be issued soon. The September 2012 contest is closed for submissions and open for voting. The October 2012 contest is now open for submissions. Everyone is welcome to submit entries and to vote.
Hello, GorillaWarfare. You have new messages at Wikipedia_talk:Teahouse/Host_lounge. Message added 00:02, 5 October 2012 (UTC). You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.
You're invited: Ada Lovelace, STEM women edit-a-thon at Harvard
U.S. Ada Lovelace Day 2012 edit-a-thon, Harvard University - You are invited!
Now in its fourth year, Ada Lovelace Day is an international celebration of women in science, technology, engineering, mathematics (STEM), and related fields. Participants from around New England are invited to gather together at Harvard Law School to edit and create Wikipedia entries on women who have made significant contributions to the STEM fields. Register to attend or sign up to participate remotely - visit this page to do either. 00:21, 5 October 2012 (UTC)
Sigma's RfA
Kind of an odd edit summary to say you're moving your vote from Oppose to Support when you actually moved your vote to Neutral. I'm sure people will figure it out (I did :-) ), but I wasn't sure if you were aware of the dissonance.--Bbb23 (talk) 14:33, 5 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Hello, GorillaWarfare. You have new messages at Wikipedia_talk:Teahouse/Host_lounge. Message added 00:36, 18 October 2012 (UTC). You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.
The October 2012 Copy Edit of the Month Contest is currently in the submissions stage. Submit your best October copy edit there before the end of the month. Submissions end, and discussion and voting begin, on November 1 at 00:00 (UTC).
NEW!! In the week from Sunday 21 October to Saturday 27 October, we are holding a Project Blitz, in which we will copy edit articles tagged with {{copyedit}} belonging to selected project(s). For the first blitz, we'll start with WikiProject Olympics and WikiProject Albums and add more Projects to the blitz as we clear them. The blitz works much like our bimonthly drives, but a bit simpler. Everyone is welcome to take part, and barnstars will be awarded.
November 2012 Backlog elimination drive is a month-long effort to reduce the size of the copy edit backlog. The drive begins on November 1 at 00:00 (UTC) and ends on November 30 at 23:59 (UTC). Our goals are to copy edit all articles tagged in 2011 and to complete all requests placed before the end of October. Barnstars will be awarded to anyone who copy edits at least one article, and special awards will be given to the top five in the following categories: "Number of articles", "Number of words", "Number of articles of over 5,000 words", "Number of articles tagged in 2011", and "Longest article". We hope to see you there! – Your drive coordinators: Stfg, Allens, and Torchiest.
Hi GorillaWarfare! You might have seen my question in teahouse. If you have any hint, please tell me if there is any way to read the pages or templates of deleted artcles. I want to read templates of Zee Gold Awards.KRISTEEN65 (talk) 07:05, 24 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Dear GorillaWarfare, I am trying to create an organizational page for the Chesapeake Conservancy, just like the ones for the Chesapeake Bay Foundation and Defenders of Wildlife. I was in the process of adding additional links, references, and information about the large landscape projects the Conservancy works on within the Chesapeake watershed. I received notification that you removed because it was perceived as a promotion, which it is not. Would it be possible for you to reverse the deletion. Or do you have suggestions of how I can create this page without it being perceived as a promotion and, thus, deleted? Thank you very much. Best, Twigatembo (talk) 00:17, 29 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Wording like "a place of natural wonder and discovery, rich in cultural traditions, treasured and conserved for the benefit of future generations" is very promotional and non-encyclopedic. Try to write articles that sound more like encyclopedia articles and less like press releases. WP:NPOV has a lot of good advice. Furthermore, I notice some of the text was copied from another source. This is not acceptable; it is a violation of copyright. – GorillaWarfare(talk)01:24, 29 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.
