This is an archive of past discussions with User:Pgallert. 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.
DYK for Froebel star
On 24 December 2011, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article Froebel star, which you created or substantially expanded. The fact was ... that the Froebel star(pictured), a common Christmas decoration in Germany, is created by folding and weaving four identical strips of paper? The nomination discussion and review may be seen at Template:Did you know nominations/Froebel star.You are welcome to check how many hits the article got while on the front page (here's how, quick check) and add it to DYKSTATS if it got over 5,000. If you know of another interesting fact from a recently created article, then please suggest it on the Did you know? talk page.
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I want to use this image from German Wikipedia. It has a suitable license. Can anyone please direct me to a "howto" or "best practice" description on what details I need to adhere to? Thanks, Pgallert (talk) 20:56, 30 January 2012 (UTC)
Hello! I hope you're enjoying 2012. User:Tim riley and I just worked on a new article for Alice Delysia, an actress. Would you mind nominating it for DYK? A hook might be:
... that French actress-singer Alice Delysia made her career on the London stage, giving each English line "a sparkle seven times its own".
All the best! -- Ssilvers (talk) 17:15, 5 February 2012 (UTC)
On 11 February 2012, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article Alice Delysia, which you recently nominated. The fact was ... that French actress-singer Alice Delysia made her career on the London stage, giving each English line "a sparkle seven times its own"? The nomination discussion and review may be seen at Template:Did you know nominations/Alice Delysia. If you know of an interesting fact from another recently created article, then please suggest it on the Did you know? talk page.
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I see you have been working on "bastard studies" recently. Can you have a look at its talk page because I found an article in the internet with the exact wording of the lemma "bastard studies" in our wiki. What do you think about that? Please tell me.--Dudy001 (talk) 21:17, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
Indeed, the article in its entirety, including quotes and footnotes, is copied from the source you found. Good catch, Dudy. I have tagged the article for Speedy deletion, and I shall have to check other contributions of User:Virago250. This does not look good at all, and might well result in a Contributor copyright investigations. Thanks for letting us know. In the mean time, you might want to use this source to write a short abstract for the German WP, Translating is not a good way to incorporate this into WP. Pgallert (talk) 16:45, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
A kitten for you!
For the good work you did on the GA nomination for God. Fascinating read. Comments seemed to points of Good Article criteria really well in a neutral fashion. Hard to do given the topic.
Thanks Laura. I gave my best and tried not to put off contributing parties while still keeping up standards for this assessment class. I must admit that I am a bit disappointed that nobody actually started improving the article--I would have loved to work with a few people to actually get it to GA. I feel that many of our most important articles are being neglected due to (perceived or real) difficulty to holistically cover them. Cheers, Pgallert (talk) 17:43, 15 March 2012 (UTC)
Hi Ssilvers, I'm sorry I'm too late for that one. Was out for a long weekend and forgot to leave a notice here. Next time I'll be glad to assist again. --Pgallert (talk) 19:21, 26 March 2012 (UTC)
OK, thanks. I'll let you know when I've got one. :-)
Leuren K Moret
I just read your comments to PRONIZ on his Talk Page about Moret's interviews with people. Genuine biographies are cross checked and verified. You do not just write down what the person tells you that they are. Moret is a master of self-promotion, she is not a whistleblower, she was not the Berkeley Environmental Commissioner (she was one of nine citizen members of the Community Environmental Advisory Commission and I am glad to see that minutes of that Commission have now been posted in the bio, she is not a Geoscientist (she was the President of the fledgling Association of Women Geoscientist, which has formally cautioned her to not use their name as an endorsement of Moret's false claims about depleted uranium and atmospheric nuclear testing ( I expect that they would also demand no association with the false claims about High Frequency Active Auroral Research Program (HAARP) [www.haarp.alaska.edu], tectonic warfare, Fukushima, etc. Moret has had a tendency to use "me too" and follow claims made by Rosalie Bertell or Christopher Busby and then add embellishments. Her claim about the late Nobel Laureate Dr Glenn T. Seaborg having been so obsessed with the discovery of Plutonium (she adds by his assistants and his just taking the credit) that he carried a piece of Plutonium in his pocket and constantly fingered it turning his hands to claws should all by itself be grounds for Moret to be consigned to the conspiracy nut file. She has co-authorship of three geologic research papers, all of whom were derived from the doctoral research of colleagues. She was given the co-authorship because her skilled used of the new Differential Scanning Calorimeter instrument was critical to their research. She has not authored any scientific papers herself and only has one actual published paper in World Affairs, The Journal of International Issues, an obscure Indian journal that is carried in a number of college libraries. It is quite clear that the article, Depleted Uranium: The Trojan Horse of Nuclear War”, July 1, 2004, never was critically reviewed by anyone with any scientific knowledge. I invite you to watch the video of her presentation at the 9/11 Truth Conference in Vancouver, British Columbia. She claims that a worldwide epidemic of diabetes is caused by the depleted uranium cloud that comes from the DU use in the Gulf War and in Iraq and Afghanistan (DU was most likely never used in Afghanistan, that atmospheric testing caused reduced SAT scores, and later on has the claim about Dr Glenn T Seaborg (she starts with a news clip that is totally false) http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-5145492019596709070#Rhotel1 (talk) 23:07, 28 March 2012 (UTC)
Dear Roger, I'm not quite sure what the purpose of your message is. You say she is a conspiracy theorist, and the article says that, too. You say that she makes strange claims about many things, and the article says that, too. You say she is not a credible scientist. The article does not say that because Wikipedians take reliable sources for constructing articles, and this claim has never been made in reliable sources. Your inside information cannot be used for the article on Leuren Moret because our original research policy forbids that.
I had taken my eyes off this article last year because I am here to write an encyclopedia, not to endlessly argue about some biography of very little importance and prominence. But now that you pointed me to it again I have reverted your last edit because you removed a statement that was backed by the references. The situation that you use your WP account exclusively for editing this nine-line stub and for contacting its contributors makes me wonder what you are doing here? If you wish to suggest changes to Moret's article please do so on the talk page. Regards, Pgallert (talk) 12:07, 29 March 2012 (UTC)
I responded at the DYK page. I disagree that "controversial" is a pejorative word - it is the most neutral term that anyone has ever ascribed to Krens! But, I added an ALT hook, if the reviewer is afraid to use the word. -- Ssilvers (talk) 15:07, 11 May 2012 (UTC)
Hi. Someone editing from IP 196.44.146.4(talk·contribs·WHOIS) needs some guidance. They have been posting text from the existing article Mumbwenge Combined School all over the place, including to the talk page of non-existent user:Martha Joseph, to Wikipedia:School and university projects/Polytechnic of Namibiahere, to the DAB page Talk three times starting here, and so on. I blocked the IP for 24 hours from 14:11 UTC because this was causing disruption, and left a talk page message inviting them to set up an account and read some introductory pages. If you know who this is, you may be able to help them. Regards, JohnCD (talk) 19:30, 21 May 2012 (UTC)
Hi JohnCD, thanks for letting me know. I noticed the somewhat clueless activity on our project page. Unfortunately these are distance students; they have no WP-literate tutor to guide them. I will relay your concern to the course coordinator User:mgorejena, maybe he can intervene. The IP can remain blocked; students are supposed to create an account anyway. Thanks for helping out, Pgallert (talk) 20:12, 21 May 2012 (UTC)
Hi JohnCD, I contacted the tutor who mentioned that only few of the distance students attended a face-to-face lecture on Saturday. If the IP activity resurfaces it might be best to just block it again---we cannot contact particular students before they managed to leave at least some information on Wikipedia:School and university projects/Polytechnic of Namibia. --Pgallert (talk) 11:52, 23 May 2012 (UTC)
Help needed: Expansion in user space
{{Help me}}
Histmerge for an expansion in user space? I have expanded the existing article Aminuis in my user space here. The original article has not been edited during my expansion. I had a similar situation before and was told by an administrator that HISTMERGE is not the way to go in such situations. Should there not be a way to incorporate the user space history into the new version of the article? Thanks, Pgallert (talk) 10:30, 23 May 2012 (UTC)
As the histories are non-overlapping, I don't see anything against a history merge, so I have done one. The merged article is back at Aminuis. JohnCD (talk) 10:51, 23 May 2012 (UTC)
I was recently looking for a country article to make into a GA, and thought Namibia would be my best choice. I am just asking your opinion, is Namibia ready to be a GA? Oakley77 (talk) 00:11, 30 May 2012 (UTC)
Well, I guess you saw that it has been failed immediately due to unsourced paragraphs. The other issues are:
So, the tasks at hand are actually pretty clear. In the next few weeks I will not be of much help as I go on holiday at the end of the week but if you want I can ping you once I'm back. It is not soo much work towards GA, a lot has already been done. Cheers, Pgallert (talk) 07:39, 30 May 2012 (UTC)
I put up a new article for Connie Ediss. Would you be so kind as to nominate her for DYK? The hook might be something like: "... that Connie Ediss, in a string of popular musicals from 1896, became known for her 'buxom bourgeoise' characters." -- Ssilvers (talk) 04:11, 30 May 2012 (UTC)
Hi Ssilvers, I can certainly nominate it but you would have to have a look at the process. I go on holiday until 20 June and cannot be of much help during that time. --Pgallert (talk) 07:39, 30 May 2012 (UTC)
That's fine - let me have the link, and I'll look in on it and nurture it through. :-) Thanks for your help! -- Ssilvers (talk) 30 May 2012 (UTC)
Template:Did you know nominations/Connie Ediss You're very welcome, nice article. I posted a few questions on the talk page, maybe you can clarify. I added "in London" to the hook. I would still like to see more context in the hook but I don't really have an idea how to word that nicely: That "musical" does not simply link to Musical theatre is probably not easy to see, and that her buxom appearance was in some way, or contributed to her appearing to be, comical, would also be a nice-to-have. Cheers, Pgallert (talk) 08:19, 31 May 2012 (UTC)
On 4 June 2012, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article Epukiro, which you created or substantially expanded. The fact was ... that the Oblates of Mary Immaculate founded missionary stations at Aminuis and Epukiro in rural eastern Namibia at the beginning of the 20th century? You are welcome to check how many hits the article got while on the front page (here's how, quick check) and it will be added to DYKSTATS if it got over 5,000. If you know of another interesting fact from a recently created article, then please suggest it on the Did you know? talk page.
On 4 June 2012, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article Aminuis, which you created or substantially expanded. The fact was ... that the Oblates of Mary Immaculate founded missionary stations at Aminuis and Epukiro in rural eastern Namibia at the beginning of the 20th century? You are welcome to check how many hits the article got while on the front page (here's how, quick check) and it will be added to DYKSTATS if it got over 5,000. If you know of another interesting fact from a recently created article, then please suggest it on the Did you know? talk page.
Hi Pgallert! I have an important message for you regarding Wikimania. Please check your email and respond as soon as possible. Thank you so much! Jwild (talk) 16:35, 21 June 2012 (UTC)
Credo Reference, who generously donated 400 free Credo 250 research accounts to Wikipedia editors over the past two years, has offered to expand the program to include 100 additional reference resources. Credo wants Wikipedia editors to select which resources they want most. So, we put together a quick survey to do that:
It also asks some basic questions about what you like about the Credo program and what you might want to improve.
At this time only the initial 400 editors have accounts, but even if you do not have an account, you still might want to weigh in on which resources would be most valuable for the community (for example, through WikiProject Resource Exchange).
Also, if you have an account but no longer want to use it, please leave me a note so another editor can take your spot.
If you have any other questions or comments, drop by my talk page or email me at wikiocaasi@yahoo.com. Cheers! Ocaasit | c17:28, 11 July 2012 (UTC)
Hi Andy, thanks for the link. In the mean time (after two full days on planes and in airports) I have outlined our needs with regards to a Namibian offline Wikipedia here. Please let me know if you can assist. Thanks --Peter (Pgallert (talk) 11:30, 18 July 2012 (UTC))
Hi Andy, thanks for helping out. I'm not an admin--have tagged the contribution for CSD, also the other one you found. I did not even get to the newest course yet, am still working on already archived courses. Copyvio is one thing that is extremely difficult to get across to students, despite many hours of lecturing and a whole chapter in the course's text book. --Pgallert (talk) 18:45, 23 July 2012 (UTC)
Your free 1-year HighBeam Research account is ready
Good news! You are approved for access to 80 million articles in 6500 publications through HighBeam Research. Check your Wikipedia email:
The 1-year, free period begins when you enter the code.
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. Examples are at WP:HighBeam/Citations.
Sorry, I had no Internet access for the last 3 days. I have commented on the DYK submission page, except the hook everything is fine now. --Pgallert (talk) 08:07, 28 August 2012 (UTC)
Peter, I currently don't have an easy solution for your problem. The only thing I can think of is to reach out to the WikiProjects once you know which topics your students cover. When it comes to creating a special offline Wikipedia, you might want to reach out to my colleague Jessie Wild (jwild[at]wikimedia[dot]org) at the Foundation. She's been active in that area in the past. All the best, --Frank Schulenburg (talk) 00:50, 29 August 2012 (UTC)
Thanks a lot, I wasn't aware of this thread. As the help desk thread is already archived I have answered on the editor's talk page. --Pgallert (talk) 08:07, 4 September 2012 (UTC)
WikiProject Namibia
Thank you for the offer. I've always been an avid scholar on elements of Namibia's rich past; it would be delightful to work with other like-minded editors here. What is the procedure for joining WikiProject Namibia? --Katangais (talk) 18:44, 16 September 2012 (UTC)
Simply go to WikiProject Namibia and add your signature under #Participants. It might be a good idea to put the project page on your watchlist, as on its talk page sometimes things come up that concern the entire project. A useful page to look at is TM's wishlist here: User:Namiba/My wish list. Cheers, Pgallert (talk) 06:41, 17 September 2012 (UTC)
Namibian Wikipedians
Good day Peter, I have recently created the Namibian Wikipedian category...you may want to add yourself and other to the group,Thanks! ---Category:Namibian Wikipedians|Pgallert--- Elianamwiha 13:38, 17 September 2012 (UTC)
Hi Peter. Just wanted to let you know that any of the Namibian students are welcome to come by The Teahouse should they have any questions about article creation, referencing, formatting, or guidelines. We're a friendly bunch, so all questions and confusion is welcome! I, Jethrobotdrop me a line (note: not a bot!) 08:25, 3 October 2012 (UTC)
Hi. I think User talk:Ileka212113275 is one of your flock. Their user page, starting "Namibia economy is the way to go" was tagged as an ad; I moved it to a sandbox but it was deleted by another admin as copyvio. I could not see how to generate the special project welcome that I noticed at User talk:Gmulala, so I have just given a standard {{welcome}} and some advice. Regards, JohnCD (talk) 11:27, 4 October 2012 (UTC)
Hi WikiDan, I have asked the course coordinator to reach out to the tutor, and the student, in question. Cheers, Pgallert (talk) 07:09, 8 October 2012 (UTC)
More polytechnic issues
Hi Peter. I know you're aware of the problems arising from the work of the students at Namibia Poly; I just wanted to alert you to a couple issues that I've run across in the normal course of things, so that you know of them. First up there are a couple of copyright problems addressed on Cartel82's talk page, which you may wish to address with the students concerned. I've also (prior to realising their affiliation with the project) deleted pages created by User:Mmvula, which were unambiguous and unsalvageable promotion. Yunshui雲水08:52, 8 October 2012 (UTC)
Hi Yunshui, thanks for keeping me in the loop, and again sorry for the extra work. I will try to reach the tutor in question. All in all, please do not treat our students different than other new editors, just because they have to hand in an assignment. They have extensive possibilities to get themselves informed, they have online and offline material created for them. If a page gets removed, or even an account blocked, then they have to live with that. Cheers, Pgallert (talk) 08:59, 8 October 2012 (UTC)
That's the sort of attitude I applaud in a project co-ordinator and/or educator; would that there were more like you! Yunshui雲水09:10, 8 October 2012 (UTC)
A very thanks to you Peter for telling me to avoid such articles and I am very thankful for your support , help and suggestions. I also want your help to delete the article ...
I presume, based on what I'm reading in your students' contributions, that you suggested to them to write an article about their own village. Tempting subject, but generally a bad idea. While your students may be very familiar with their own villages, each little village of Namibia is unlikely to be sufficiently notable to merit an article. There will not be sufficient reliable sources on which to draw to build a properly verifiable article that goes beyond the mere location of the village, and possibly its population. The articles I've read so far will not be acceptable as Wikipedia articles (I've already declined one students AFC submission based on a lack of reliable sources. If your exercise is merely for them to create user space articles to practice Wikipedia editing and formatting, that's fine. If your exercise is for them to create meaningful encyclopedia content, you need to reconsider the assignment. WikiDan61ChatMe!ReadMe!!13:00, 5 October 2012 (UTC)
Hi WikiDan, judging from experience, a credible claim of their existence is usually sufficient to have village articles stick around. The question of course is whether such claim can be found. Creating village and school articles is not our main focus, the "official" article ideas are here: Wikipedia talk:School and university projects/Polytechnic of Namibia. However, many of the students are attached to their school, their village, and want to write articles on them.
We have a lot of unreferenced submissions and frankly, I do not know what else to do. In the lecture I point it out, the study guide has a fifteen-page chapter on Wikipedia and what it takes to have own content accepted, the tutors are supposed to address it again. Some students get most things right and deliver work like this, others (example) get just about everything wrong. Thanks for working with our flock, cheers, Pgallert (talk) 07:09, 8 October 2012 (UTC)
One suggestion, though I'm sure it's a far larger issue, is "sources come first". Before you write down a fact in an article, you should have a source for it, otherwise it's no good adding it. I agree populated places are Notable by default if they can be proven to exist, but in many cases we can't prove much at all beyond simple existence, a set of grid coordinates, what district it's in, etc. Though, if folks are insistent on doing their own villages, maybe they can at least add a good photograph of the village itself? But probably best no more than one lest it turn into some odd Facebook page.
I don't know about Namibia, but India has a great gadget in its infobox that automatically makes a map of the location of a town/village if you plug in its coordinates, so even some of the lowest-skill articles have great maps, see for example Nakoda. Just a suggestion, though I do agree that it's hard to stay objective writing about one's own home-town. MatthewVanitas (talk) 22:44, 12 October 2012 (UTC)
My personal minimum is one credible source and some information where exactly it is situated. I do take my own GPS coordinates if I have nothing else, but that is of course Original Research. It is still principally verifiable, that's why I have a clear conscience ;) We do have a push pin map for Namibia, see e.g. Onderombapa for an example. There are always two possible strategies: Wait until you have enough sources to write a decent article, or put something online with the hope that some day, someone comes along to improve it. The latter path is actually not as opportunistic as it sounds: the next source to be published maybe does not say where the settlement is situated, so it cannot really be used stand-alone. However, if there already is a stub containing the exact location, new info can just be added. --Pgallert (talk) 10:30, 13 October 2012 (UTC)
Thanks! I just did an article for Isola Jones (an opera singer), but I work mostly on operetta and musical theatre from 1860 to 1925. But the Jones article is too short for DYK, I think. All the best! -- Ssilvers (talk) 14:34, 8 October 2012 (UTC)
We're getting problems because students are posting stuff that is pure spam in appearance - I left a message on User talk:Rebekka 201005735, and now find User:Teonilla.211046981 is blocked for spam too, and User:Ndafuh was caught in an autoblock and then blocked for spam. The material they are posting looks like straight copies of stuff, which is copyright violation WP:COPYVIO. They probably aren't intending to spam, but they should be told about these problems. I'm going to try to lift the autoblock, but it may be set again if any more of this stuff is found by another admin. Peridon (talk) 15:08, 9 October 2012 (UTC)
Hi Peridon, and thank you for your patience with our students. Things did not go well this year. The course is a lot bigger now, the lecture series on Wikipedia had to be shortened due to time constraints, and not even half of the tutors attended the compulsory workshop.
The Dean has just informed me that next year's course delivery will not contain a compulsory Wikipedia assignment anymore. For now we consider blocking Wikipedia access on our side until (almost) every student understands what it takes to contribute. Cheers, Pgallert (talk) 15:43, 9 October 2012 (UTC)
I've looked at the work of some of them (trying to assess the extent of the problem), and I was really quite impressed with what I saw. It seems to have been only a very small number that got it wrong (either by misunderstanding, being misled, or just taking a short cut...). You can pass that on to whomever it may concern. The autoblock should have been lifted now by Acroterion, too. Peridon (talk) 16:27, 9 October 2012 (UTC)
See User talk:Hax-Tulipo and User talk:Ambango. Your tutors seriously need to work on getting this information across to their charges. I and presumably other editors are having to spend excessive amounts of time clearing up after students who are, in effect, breaking the law, and given the hundreds of students and thousands of contributions involved, this is no easy task. I've now looked at the contributions of perhaps twenty to thirty of these students - not once have I encountered anything that would make a noteable improvement to Wikipedia, and in most the cases I've seen, they have violated either at least one of the core content policies or the site's copyright terms. I'm not trying to lay blame at your door, just expressing my frustration at the fact that so much time is being invested (by the students and by Wikipedia editors and administrators) for so very negligable a result.
In other news, I've not found a better way of dealing with content copying than that outlined in the discussion we had on my talkpage recently; if students attribute content with their first edit summary, that will suffice - just - to skirt the copyright issue. However, I don't believe I've yet seen a single one who has done this. Yunshui雲水12:42, 11 October 2012 (UTC)
Hi Yunshui, thank you for that message, seriously. It helped me to get the issue across to the course coordinators and department managers who have now agreed to:
postpone the deadline of the assignment to get the students out of panic mode
have two more compulsory sessions with the tutors next week.
Grand news. Those sound like sensible measures to start addressing the problem. If there's anything I can do to help, just let me know. Yunshui雲水06:57, 12 October 2012 (UTC)
Seeing several good Namibia articles at AFC
Greetings Pgallert, though I'm sure organising student new-editors is the proverbial "herding cats", just wanted to say that I have seen several pretty decent articles come out of this project so far. I noted the huge influx of Namibia articles so figured there must be an outreach there, and tracked down your project and page. Of the AFC submissions, I've approved a good 10 or so Namibia articles that were at least "minimal threshold" for publication as-is, and hopefully those students will continue to improve them in their coursework. I've found a few that simply weren't sourced well, or were opinion pieces vice informative articles, but seeing the frustrations on your talk page I just wanted to note that some of your students are doing a really proper job.
I don't recall exactly which ones I've approved (Caves of Namibia is a great first try), but if you like I can drop you a running tally as I run across more publish-worthy (though all still requiring further improvement) Namibia articles. MatthewVanitas (talk) 16:03, 12 October 2012 (UTC)
This is great advice. One of the toughest topics to get through to my students is WP:ENC. Believe it or not, if I ask a class of 380 who ever has seen or touched or used an encyclopedia, or knows someone who owns one (including Encarta), zero hands go up, unless I happen to have an exchange student from America or Europe. Most students do not even know the word. It is difficult for them to understand why Pastor rapes three children is unencyclopedic while 2012 Namibia church scandal is not. I'm still looking fo a clever way to introduce this topic. --Pgallert (talk) 10:43, 13 October 2012 (UTC)
Topic choices
I'll do some pondering on it, but for future iterations it may really help to make topic proposal and approval a significant phase, with tutors willing to make a clear call as to suitability. I'm seeing some of the following:
Topics that already exist: if it's a world-famous celebrity, car, tourist site in France, etc. there's probably already an article about it
Redundant student topics: there appear to be five or more students trying to write on Olufuko festival, about as many trying some version of "Baby dumping in Namibia" with varying levels of success, and a few duplicates for various schools and villages, where there is no Wikipedia article yet, but the way things are heading one student article will pass AFC and the others will end up being declined as "already exists" if they aren't the first one.
Some opinion pieces of basically blog entries: several articles about "how I feel about being a twin", "whether compulsory voting is a good idea", etc.
So as you note, some clarity on WP:EC and WP:NOT might be a good initial focus, lest students waste weeks trying to develop something that can never be an article, that already exists, or fighting with other students for who gets published first on the same topic. MatthewVanitas (talk) 23:09, 13 October 2012 (UTC)
Prevention of duplications is not really feasible, I fear. It is not just the task of coordinating 900 student submissions across 40 different groups, but also the 2000-odd already existing articles, just about Namibian topics.
But that might not be necessary at all. The minimum requirement for the assignment, as it is now, is the addition of one statement in proper English and encyclopedic tone, neutrally worded, formatted according to Wikipedia's custom, and backed by one reliable, independent source. Article creation is thus not necessary, and if I have 5 submissions on Olukonda, then their combined content and sourcing will perhaps give the material for a decent stub on it.
All those essay-type submissions stem from the situation that their course, Information Competence, starts off with an essay. Students want to re-use it. In future, we will have to stress more clearly that no essay from assignment 1 can ever be used for assignment 3 (WP). --Pgallert (talk) 08:34, 14 October 2012 (UTC)
Hello, from another ambassador
Hi there!
It looks like you've got a lot of work in your in-tray at the moment. Is there anything I can do to help? If you need a hand with anything, just shout... bobrayner (talk) 17:27, 12 October 2012 (UTC)
Hi bobrayner, I must admit that I am not too shy to take help that is offered. At the moment, I have all those subpages linked from Wikipedia:School and university projects/Polytechnic of Namibia (below the welcome template), and there is indeed still some work to do:
Some user entries still have red talk links and need to be welcomed---I have used so far {{Wikipedia:School and university projects/Polytechnic of Namibia/WelcomePoN}}, this template contains some specific information.
Some user entries have blue talk page links, but they put their assignment on their talk pages (no idea why), and have no welcome template.
If it is impossible to figure out what the account name of the student is, it would be good to tag the entry with something like:
? No valid user account information supplied --~~~~
Some users created and linked talk pages that do not belong to their accounts. If the original account can be found, the page should be moved there, the user notified, and the User talk: artefact should be tagged with {{db-u2}}.
So---plenty of work ;P The real whopper will come in roughly two weeks, when students submit their final assignments. That is the time for a copyvio-tagging spree, and there will then be much more to do, details here: User:Pgallert/You can help!. Thanks in advance for any help that you can provide, or mobilise. Cheers, Pgallert (talk) 20:21, 12 October 2012 (UTC)
A thought
How about getting new course members (and possibly the tutors too...) to sit for a time looking through the random pages you can get via that little button? A ten minute or quarter hour session flicking through there might give them a better idea of what an encyclopaedia is. At CSD we get a lot of people who, I'm quite sure, don't know what an encyclopaedia is (but who can find their way round Facebook and Twitter far better than I could). I might write a little essay about what an encyclopaedia is and does. In the meantime, have you seen WP:PRIMER? This was set up as an intro for beginners, and is excellent. There again, it may not be so for students who have never seen an encyclopaedia. I've worked with kids of assorted abilities, including an eight year old cousin who was delighted to receive a grown-up dictionary for her birthday ("It's got a THEEZ-orus in it! I NEED one of them!") and a fourteen year old inner city kid who had to do something to a fairy tale for English homework, and who didn't know any fairy tales (and she and her two street-wise mates were crying at my sad telling of The Ugly Duckling). Let me know what you think - and what sort of approach might work best. Peridon (talk) 15:25, 14 October 2012 (UTC)
That's an interesting idea. I tend to get articles at Special:Random that I wasn't looking for. If I want to show how much can still be improved at Wikipedia, I get five MILHIST A-class warships in a row, if I want to show what a range of topics WP covers I get one Indian village after another. But that's maybe Murphy's Law.
The gist of all WP introduction is to spend considerable time reading before submitting articles. That is unfortunately something most students cannot, or do not want to, do. They have other assignments, and once the Wikipedia stuff is coming their way, they look for an easy way to get it off their list. If I knew how to change this, I could solve quite a variety of other educational problems. --Pgallert (talk) 13:08, 15 October 2012 (UTC)
Slow connections
I sympathise with your problems of slow connections as described on your user page. Even in the world of fast internet, one can still have problems. I have more than once taken steps to archive user talk pages because they are too big to edit on my tablet PC (typically greater than 100k bytes, in case you are worried I might attack this page).
Hi Richard, en.m is not really my favourite. It doesn't work at all in Iceweasel, and I'm missing the edit button :) The problem is responsiveness rather than speed; I often lose session data when saving, the mouseover-previev works only on sunny days, and some things I have to submit multiple times. Certain pages are really problematic, for instance T:TDYK. It takes ages to load, and sometimes the browser crashes.
At home, where my Internet is fast but I have to pay per volume, it sometimes annoys me if I get pages over a MB where I could not really expect them to be so large. 7 MB equals 1 US$ for me, so my productivity at home is somewhat limited. Cheers, --Pgallert (talk) 12:50, 15 October 2012 (UTC)
Trouble at t'mill
I'm having a problem with Sylvia Kwenani User talk:Sylvia Kwenani 201035383. She keeps posting an article from The Namibian, and doesn't seem to take any notice of what I'm telling her (and she's even posted it on her talk page, so she does know where that is!). Perhaps you might be able to get through where I'm not. I don't want to really block her, but someone else might do it. Cheers Peridon (talk) 21:02, 17 October 2012 (UTC)
Hi Peridon, I have contacted Ms Mbango. Let's hope she reaches the student soon. OTOH, students getting themselves indeffed have earned their assignment mark of zero, that's not the end of the world. --Pgallert (talk) 06:47, 18 October 2012 (UTC)
Presumably this is the same person as User:Kwenani.201035383, whom I have also had to to warn for repeatedly posting an article from The Namibian. Students need to be aware that multiple accounts are not allowed. Based on the comments above, I'm going to indef-block the new account as a sockpuppet and issue a 24hr block to Ms Kwenani's other account. Yunshui雲水06:52, 18 October 2012 (UTC)
Wanted to give you a heads up, I dont see a mention of the non-public data policy in your statement, your required to "confirm that the candidate will fully comply with the criteria for access to non-public data" in your WP:ACE candidate statement, its a formality but you should add something about it. It doesn't count against the word limit. Monty84523:00, 14 November 2012 (UTC)
I just wanted to mention that I liked your footnote at the bottom of your questions page. Nicely phrased response. - jc3718:34, 22 November 2012 (UTC)
A barnstar for you!
The Real Life Barnstar
For patience in dealing with admins on one side, lecturers on another, and students in a panic on the third front. Peridon (talk) 19:44, 11 October 2012 (UTC)
Strongly seconded. What you're doing is a huge, difficult and largely thankless task, and you deserve a whole barnful of barnstars for tackling it with calm, level-headed professionalism. Yunshui雲水06:55, 12 October 2012 (UTC)
Thanks a lot to both of you. This year I really started to feel guilty towards the Wikipedia community, and particularly towards admins, new page patrollers, and teahouse staff. There is a lot of work caused by us that carries very limited immediate return. My belief is that there are long-term advantages in our program: editors that stick around, other project leaders that can learn a lesson, and a bit of an insight into what it really means to recruit new editors from developing countries. See it that way: Our students have introductory lectures, tutorials, and study material. Imagine how much harder it is for someone who innocently clicks the edit button for the first time, without all those resources! --Pgallert (talk) 13:15, 12 October 2012 (UTC)
We need to get in touch with you about using your photo and appeal for this year's fundraiser, please contact me as soon as you can at vgrigas@wikimedia.org, or on my talk page. Thanks! Victor Grigas (talk) 23:03, 17 December 2012 (UTC)
Those are both very new, will nominate them tomorrow. Today I'm dead tired after 13 hours of building a playground---not used to manual labour anymore :( --Pgallert (talk) 19:37, 18 December 2012 (UTC)
Thanks, but note that Jack1956 already nominated Dandy Dick Whittington. See if you like his hook as much as the one above. BTW, building a playground? Sounds like good old "get all dirty" fun! :-) Happy holidays! -- Ssilvers (talk) 20:19, 18 December 2012 (UTC)
Thanks for running for ArbCom, Pgallert. I'm a bit disapointed that the fact that you aren't an administrator (yet – hint, hint) factored so strongly in the votes, but I'm sure that you'll get the opportunity to contribute to the Committee in the years to come. — Coren(talk)22:24, 18 December 2012 (UTC)
Thanks, Coren, and congrats on winning a seat--although, if you hadn't run I had had one more voters' guide in my favour ;) Not sure if I should be sad or happy. I'm generally a bit disappointed about the shootings from the hip by voters' guide's writers. One had his entire argument refuted by me, statement by statement, yet he didn't change his recommendation or even his wording. Another one had three words to say in motivation of her oppose, despite the fact that I spent some 30K of virtual ink on explaining why "not an administrator" can actually be a feature rather than a bug.
Wikipedia isn't ready yet for a non-admin in ArbCom. That is a bit sad, too, as it reinforces the uber-editor position of administrators, with all its negative byproducts like a hostile RfA atmosphere, cabal and caste accusations. There are by far not enough protest voters, which I consider the only vehicle to make this happen one day. Alas, I left a number of respected administrators behind me, I got a few encouraging comments, and I will contribute as I have before. I never really expected to become elected, and Wikipedia:WikiProject Namibia will be better off with me as editor. --Pgallert (talk) 14:08, 19 December 2012 (UTC)
I don't think that's entirely fair: the guide writers tend to mirror the community rather than influence them, I think, and I'm sure that "not an admin" is viewed as an unsurmountable hurdle by most. The problem is that — despite all of RFA's flaws — the process is a reasonably accurate assessment of "has been around a while, understands policy, and isn't obviously batshit insane". It may not be the only way to demonstrate those qualities (or even the best), but it's one most people recognize and agree upon. — Coren(talk)17:17, 19 December 2012 (UTC)
Page view statistics show that voters' guides have double the readership than candidate question pages. This does suggest to me that voters rely more on secondary sources than candidates' own statements, and that puts quite some responsibility on the writers of such guides. I don't bemoan my also-ran result. I might be happier without that burden. But I wish that AGF were applied more generally, and that editors with 10K contributions, no blocks, no warnings, and 4.5 years' tenure, shouldn't need to prove that they are sane.
There is one aspect in which guide writers represent the community rather well: That is the paradoxical situation that the majority of them wishes for a revolution but at the same time make recommendations that at best represent evolution. How often did I read "ArbCom had it all wrong in 20XX", and yet the same editors, or at least the same types of editors, long-serving, non-controversial admins, get support recommendations all the time, and get the popular vote. Had I understood this earlier, I would not have bothered to run. It is quite clear that I am not as well established. But again, it is not sour grapes at all, and I have to thank new and "old" sitting Arbs for their dedication to the project. --Pgallert (talk) 11:53, 20 December 2012 (UTC)
I think the driving sentiment here is "the evil you know"; you see the same thing in (Western world) real world elections time and time again: people gripe and moan, but they see the system as working mostly right and fear that in upsetting it too much they'd end up with something worse. — Coren(talk)13:05, 20 December 2012 (UTC)
And please don't regret running. Your participation was valuable even if you didn't win; and that amount of willingness to take crap for the project's sake is laudable in itself. I was sincere when I thanked you above. — Coren(talk)13:08, 20 December 2012 (UTC)
