User talk:Fram

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User:JohnC

Could you check out the last few edits (especially the last 4) by JohnC? The edits seem incredibly snarky, unhelpful, and almost borderline trolling. - Neutralhomer • Talk • 08:22, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

Far from trolling, but unnecessarily negative about a living person. While it is true that the only erason he gets media attention is because he happens to have been in WWI and have a very long life, this is not his fault or even relevant. I don't like many of the things the media are interested in (and many of the things they ignore), they have their priorities all wrong very often, but we (as a community and encyclopedia) have agreed that they are the only objective (i.e. independent of us) standard we have to determine notability. If he doesn't like it, he can AfD the article (but that won't work), try to get the notability guidelines changed (also hard to do), or just ignore the article. But if it stops with some minor negative comments, and he doesn't do anything else or doesn't go any further, I would just ignore it. Fram (talk) 08:40, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

Yeah, the media annoyed me greatly today. I live quite near where Mr. Buckles did and our local media was focused on Charlie Sheen and the Oscars yesterday morning. Only two local stations said anything about Mr. Buckles and only one newspaper said anything. CNN was the only national network. Sadly, as of right now, you can't find any articles on any US network or affiliate websites...but you can find it, right on the front page...on the BBC's website. Bugs me to no end.

But I reverted the comments as "snarky" and suggested the user post something helpful. They haven't posted anything since, so I am will take your advice. Take Care and Have a Good Day...Neutralhomer • Talk • 08:49, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

Copyright

I am a relatively new editor. (My edit counts are misleading, as they are mostly on a handful of articles done in the past two months or so.) I did not intend to be pointy, in fact, I never heard of the concept before now that I recall. You made a comment about how there is a copyright problem already, and my suggestion only makes it worse. When I made the request for translation at the article talk page you cited, my intent was not to be pointy, but to see what the translations looked like, so I could reswpond to you. I withdrew the request, but I have not responded to your comment. Your comment should be responded to (and not just by a new editor like me), since at least superficially, the article you cite appears to have citations so extensive that one would have to copy the cited foreign language book word for word at the request of another editor. And that is before my proposal, as you pointed out. I am not intending to ignore your comment, as might appear from the discussion. The reason is that I have not yet resonded is that am new to these policies, such as the copyright one, and I have to read them before I can respond... that is, if I can come up with a solution. PPdd (talk) 21:49, 3 March 2011 (UTC)

Aja Beech

Please take a look at Aja Beech and see if this article should be deleted. I have never done an AfD, so I am reluctant to start now. --DThomsen8 (talk) 13:05, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

Recent mass addition of tags

I noticed you added {{unsourced}} tags to about every district/county article of Hebei. While it is true that they are not sourced, most of them are stubs and have no information beyond what is presented on a map. I ask that you self-revert, or I will have to it for you. Thanks --HXL's Roundtable and Record 17:03, 6 March 2011 (UTC)

They are unsourced, and the maps are no evidence of the correctness of the stub information, only other visuatlisations of the same. And a source helps the next editor who wants to expand these stubs, which is the intention after all (otherwise the info would be much better presented as a list of districts and counties). Removing an "unsourced" tag without adding a source is generally frowned upon. Fram (talk) 09:39, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

oh I am sure that on the Shanghai GA review, where my performance was poor because I did not understand the review process then, that the reviewer there viewed the Chinese and basic geographic information as not needing a source, or otherwise he would have raised a concern. I may be wrong, but that is my guess. And yes, as I said, unsourced is unsourced. --HXL's Roundtable and Record 17:19, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

For what its worth here I agree with Fram on this one. Being a stub is a separate matter of wether it is sourced. --Kumioko (talk) 17:56, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. Fram (talk) 19:07, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

It's not clear to me what the GA review of Sjanghai has to do with the addition of "unsourced" tags to articles which have no sources at all. The request is not to add sources for every individual statement, but at least one general source for the subject. Fram (talk) 19:07, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

Nomination of season one episode articles of House for deletion

A discussion is taking place as to whether the articles Paternity (House), Occam's Razor (House), Maternity (House), Damned If You Do, The Socratic Method (House), Fidelity (House), Poison (House), DNR (House), Histories (House), Detox (House), Sports Medicine (House), Cursed (House), Control (House), Mob Rules (House), Heavy (House), Role Model (House), Babies & Bathwater, Kids (House), Love Hurts (House) and Honeymoon (House) are suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The article will be discussed at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Paternity (House) until a consensus is reached, and anyone is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on good quality evidence, and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the article during the discussion, including to improve the article to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the article-for-deletion template from the top of the article. _Xeworlebi ^(talk) 12:46, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

Geoswan discussion

You and one other person need to certify that you tried to resolve a dispute with him or your RFC will be deleted. [1] Thank you.--Yachtsman1 (talk) 21:13, 8 March 2011 (UTC)

We did this long ago. I think you misinterpret the opening lines of the RfC, they remain even after the certification has been done. Fram (talk) 09:37, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

Fukushima I nuclear accidents

Hi, Fram

Need your opinion on what happened at Fukushima I nuclear accidents, article that was redirected after a less than an hour discussion. On Talk:Fukushima I nuclear accidents, Special:Contributions/Rememberway started a new section suggesting merging article into Fukushima I Nuclear Power Plant [2], then only less than an hour and a half later Special:Contributions/184.144.160.156 closed the discussion [3] and User:Rememberway proceeded to redirect the entire Fukushima I nuclear accidents article to Fukushima I Nuclear Power Plant. [4] What should be done here? Reopen the discussion closed by the ip? --John KB (talk) 11:51, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

Perhaps the process wasn't the best, but the result seems to be the best for the moment. When things have settled down, we can recosnider whether a separate article for the incident isn't better. For now, focusing the attention and directing the traffic (readers and editors) to one place is the most sensible solution in my opinion. Fram (talk) 12:52, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

This reminded me of the Jared Lee Loughner and 2011 Tucson shootings situation, when some wanted to redirect Loughner to the other article. Oh, well. --John KB (talk) 12:58, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

John KB also posted a request for an opinion on my talk page, and I am responding here to avoid increasing further the already significant fragmentation of discussion of this issue in various places. I neither endorse nor oppose the view that "the result seems to be the best for the moment". However, there has been extensive discussion of the question involving more than two dozen editors, and there is a clear consensus in favour of a split. To attempt to undermine that consensus on the basis of a very brief discussion among three editors is totally unacceptable. It is a mistake for you, me, or any other individual to give their own opinion as to what is the best outcome priority over the consensus reached in discussion. JamesBWatson (talk) 13:32, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

With the different discussions, I missed the earlier "split" one. I have no objection on anyone undoing the close of the discussion and the merge, but I'ld rather not get involved in it, I'm just catching up on my watchlist and discussions and don't have the time yet to look at such fast-moving discussions in depth. And yes, that means that I shouldn't have responded like I did in the first place. Since the discussion for the merge followed a larger, opposite discussion for the split, and both discussions, when given sufficient time, appear to be in favour of the split, it looks as if the merge shouldn't have been done and the discussion was closed too soon and incorrectly. Fram (talk) 13:55, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

Corrections

Thanks for correcting my recent mistakes! -Uyvsdi (talk) 19:41, 14 March 2011 (UTC)Uyvsdi

No problem! Fram (talk) 08:03, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

Can I speak to Fram?

Hello Fram, I'm a Belgian contributer, may I talk to you — Preceding unsigned comment added by Caring-writer (talk • contribs) 10:25, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, but I prefer to conduct all my Wikipedia business solely on-Wiki, not by mail, phone, or live contact. If you do need to discuss sensitive matters which for some reason you can't or won't publish on Wikipedia, you can send me an email through the Wikipedia email (left side of screen, e-mail this user): otherwise (e.g. if you really believe the article has defamatory contents), you can contact Oversight, which is specialized in this kind of things; Wikipedia:Requests for oversight has more info, you can mail to oversight-en-wp‐at‐wikipedia.org Fram (talk) 10:36, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

Ben Heine article

OK, I understand. Sorry, I'm a "newbie" on Wikipedia, I didn't find the "email this user" button... Caring-writer (talk)

So, please, let me send you my request right here, if you don't mind. I've noticed you deleted the changes I applied on Ben Heine's page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Heine I know it wasn't looking good, but I don't master Wikipedia tools, they are very complicated and not intuitive. Anyway, may be you can help me? Because you seem to master all these editing tools very well. I think you don't like Ben Heine, that's your right. But I've been following his work for many years, he has totally changed and evolved. May I just mention that the current article is a text that appeared on Wikipedia in 2006 and that reflects what he did in that time only. He has made many more things since then. He is a globally appreciated artist praising peace. There aren't so many criticisms about him. The article isn't fair at all. The current article REALLY needs updates and contains strong mistakes and defamation against this artist. Many well known national newspapers and magazines have talked about him and his work recently (see non exhaustive list here below), none of them is even mentioned in the article. He has stopped making political art since more than 2 years.

Please just consider these publications, most of them are a few days/weeks old only... Daily Mail, BBC, El Pais, Repubblica... These AREN'T blogs!!! These are national papers read by millions of people. Please also have a look to the following list of errors in the current article (which I detailed here below, and which I'll mention in the "discussion/talk" page).

List of important errors in the current article about Ben Heine:

1) Ben isn't a political artist anymore, it's true he used to make political art accusing Israel of "crimes against humanity", but he stopped making such illustrations in 2009 and wrote an "[[open letter to the Jewish Community]]" in December 2010 apologizing about his past behavior (saying it was the influences of his studies in Journalism. Parts of his final assignment talked about the "limits of freedom of expression in cartoons"). In this letter, he also firmly condemned the infamous Iranian Holocaust cartoon contest and said he was feeling deeply guilty about it. Here is the letter translated in English (Google translator). Ben doesn't deny the Holocaust, he visited Auschwitz Birkenau and feels sincerely sorry about the past suffering of the Jewish community.

2) Ben doesn't contribute to these websites anymore: DonQuichotte, MWC News, Rebelion, Tlaxcala, Irancartoon, Syriacartoon, Arabcartoon, Persiancartoon, Karikaturevi, Azercartoon, Dessin d'humour, National Caricaturist Network (Ben has explicitly asked these sites to remove all his illustrations from their platforms)

3) Ben doesn't collaborate with "La Libre Belgique" Anymore. Only 4 or 5 of his old cartoons have been published in this newspaper (in 2006 and 2007).

4) Pencil Vs Camera is not just a "little detail" in his biography, it is a creative and original series that has generated some huge reactions on the web and in the written press (see a non exhaustive list below). It is such an innovation that several TV channels around the world have also talked about it: Globo - Brazil, TV Brussel - Belgium, and many others). Same for "Digital Circlism"...

5) "Pere Ubu" (one of the main newspapers that clearly accused Heine in Belgium has removed the accusation from their site

6) Most of the links in the "notes" section (expecially the url's linking to images on Ben's blog) do not work...

7) Ben removed from his sites (blog, flickr, Deviantart and official site) all his cartoons accusing Israel or any Israeli person (Avigdor Lieberman...).

8) He didn't participate "recently" to the Kruger Workshop. This event happened in 2006!

So, I really hope you'll aknowledge that 90% of the article is based on inaccurate facts... I would like to see a real neutral article about that artist.

List of recent notable publications with Ben Heine works and biography:

WEB:

- DAILY MAIL (UK - February 2011) - EL PAIS (Spain - February 2011) - THE TELEGRAPH (UK - February 2011) - NEWSLITE (UK : February 2011) - BBC Brazil (Brazil - February 2011) - LA REPUBBLICA (Italy - February 2011) - TV BRUSSEL (Belgium - January 2011) - CNN Turk (Turkey - February 2011) - POP PHOTOGRAPHY: (USA - January 2011) - SHORT NEWS (Germany - February 2011) - ESTADAO (Brazil - January 2011) - HET NIEUWSBLAD (Belgium - February 2011) - DE STANDAARD (Belgium - February 2011) - OBVIOUS MAG (Spain - January 2011) - WEBOVINY (Slovakia - January 2011) - ARTE SPAIN (Spain - January 2011) - Accessible Art Fair (Belgium - 2010) - TrendsNow (France- February 2011) - CHINA DAILY (China - 2010) - DUSHI (China - january 2011) - ABDUZEEDO (Brazil - 2010) - Other publications in 2010

PRINT:

- Pop Photography (USA - January 2011) - Het Nieuwsblad - 1 (Belgium - 2011) - Het Nieuwsblad - 2 (Belgium - 2010) - Ca m'intéresse (France - 2010) - Daily Mirror (Great Britain - 2010) - Bookedi (South Korea - 2010) - Digital Artist 1 - 2 - 3 (China - 2010) - Belgian Embassy in London (February 2011) - Photoeidolo (Greece - 2011) - Šeimininkė (Lithuania - 2010) - View Mag (Germany - 2010) - Shambala Sun (Canada - 2010) - Imagine Demain le Monde (Belgium - 2009) - La Libre Belgique 1 2 (Belgium - 2009) - Moonwalk Through Art (The Netherlands - 2009) - Rolling Stone (USA - 2008) - 3e Millénaire (France - 2011)

My suggestions for a new neutral article (would be good to add some of the above references, feel free to add more)

Ben Heine (born 12 June 1983 in Abidjan, Ivory coast) is a Belgian multidisciplinary artist. He is internationally known for his original series "Pencil Vs Camera" and "Digital Circlism". Ben has stopped doing political art since 2009.

He has a degree in journalism. He also briefly studied graphic arts and sculpture but considers himself a self-taught artist.

Art

Pencil Vs Camera

This is a concept Heine invented in 2010. Heine says it is the result of a long graphic exploration and a logic consequence of his artistic evolution. "Pencil Vs Camera" mixes drawing and photography, imagination and reality through illusion and surrealism. He usually focuses on architecture, portraits, and animals. Among many others, the main themes approached in "Pencil Vs Camera" are love and friendship.

Digital Circlism

This is a concept Heine invented in 2010. It is a mix between Pop Art and Pointillism. In this series, Heine usually makes portraits of celebrities with digital tools using flat circles on a black background. Each circle has a single color and a single tone.

Influences

Heine says he has been deeply influenced by German Expressionism, Belgian Surrealism, American Pop Art and Social Realism.

Publications

Heine is represented by several established press agencies everywhere in the world. List of publications

interviews

List of interviews

Exhibitions

Heine is represented by several established art galeries in Belgium and abroad (UK and USA) and is sponsored by "Samsung Imaging". So far, He has exhibited his creations in Belgium, Great Britain, Turkey, Romania, France, Canada, USA, Germany, Brazil, South Korea and Spain.

List of exhibitions

Views on Israel

Ben used to make political art accusing Israel of crimes against humanity, he stopped making such illustrations in 2009 and wrote an "[[open letter to the Jewish Community]]" in 2011 apologizing about his past behavior.

Category "Court painters"

Nice work, Fram! Another great category from you, thanks. Jane (talk) 14:05, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

You're welcome :-) There are a few of us now working on pre-modern art, it seems, and the coverage and organisation is getting a lot better and more complete. Still enough work for years to come though... But thanks to you as well for all you have already done, I see your name pop up regularly and it brings improvements to the articles. Fram (talk) 14:24, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

Thx - it's funny, I don't have a lot of buddies in Wikiland, but I have also learned to recognize the names of regular contributors in this area. I agree that it's starting to shape up nicely and it's nice to know someone feels likewise. I really enjoy getting the insights that become possible using the various categories and interwiki links. Jane (talk) 17:01, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

Housekeeping

Fram, Could I ask you to please delete User:Ohconfucius/Common Terms17:36, 15 February 2011.js for me? Thanks. --Ohconfucius ^¡digame! 15:49, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

why aren't you answering?

why aren't you taking my message into account? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Caring-writer (talk • contribs) 21:50, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

Stop deleting Heine's updated page!!

Hello, please, stop deleting the new version of Heine's page.

You say: "The page is up-to-date, may be expanded, but the older sections shouldn't just be removed."

Several people have worked on the new version and it has been submitted in the TalkPage. Please also see in the TalkPage the list of errors that still appeared in the old version.

The new version has been updated and corrected, several notable references have been added. No important, true and accurate elements of the old version have been deleted. Only the structure has changed! It's not forbidden by Wikipedia's policy to change the structure of an article and it is highly recommended to add notable references and information corresponding to an artist's evolution, which is the case here.

Stop deleting this page.

Cute-snoopy (talk) 08:37, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

SPI?

Re:the above user: do you think we need an SPI on User:Cute-snoopy and User:Yellow-necklace, given that Yellow-necklace's first edit was to revert to Cute-snoopy's version, and xyr second (and, so far, only other edit) was to write "hello" on Cute-snoopy's user page? At a minimum, this is obvious meatpuppetry. Qwyrxian (talk) 10:53, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

I beat you by nearly an hour :-) Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Caring-writer. Fram (talk) 11:36, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Leonardo

Fram, the article about research, speculation and attribution AKA "Ridiculous theories", has been deleted, presumably because no-one who thought it ought to be deleted actually bothered to read (or respond) to the stated reasons why it shouldn't.

Did you read my comments?

Did you take a look to see whether the article had developed?

Have you got any idea how huge the main article is? And therefore how inappropriate it would be to add "speculation" to it?

Or thought about whether it is a good thing to pad out the info on unlikely (but persistent) attributions within the list that deals with real works? NOTE: All the bonafide works have their own pages, so padding out the dross within the Main list is really providing an imbalance of information.

Now please tell me how I go about retrieving the content of the article, and putting it into the other articles, where it will sit, uncomfortably confusing the known facts and solid research with the most unlikely and highly imaginative speculation by people who know almost nothing about art, but see Leonardo's face or fingerprint on everything.

The article is warranted because all this nonsense is the result of Leonardo's enormous and continuing fame. But if Leonardo is not your subject, and you personally have never Googled "Leonardo" then you may not be aware of this.

I feel rather put out about the fact that the "Deletes" won the day over argued cases to Keep, simply by dint of number, when most of them provided no case whatsoever, and certainly didn't bother to respond to the case put forward. This might appear a democratic balance, but to me it seems rather as if the uninformed have simply shouted the loudest. I have to ask why, having put it up for deletion, you didn't further respond?

I suggest, that if you know how to retreive it, you take a further look at the areas expanded, and alert me so that I can at least retrieve what has been written.

Amandajm (talk) 07:49, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

The article is now at User:Amandajm/Leonardo da Vinci, investigation, attribution and speculation. As for the AfD: you gave a lnegthy reply, but apparently is was not convincing, not to me, not to those people arguing for deletion after you made your statement, and not to the closing admin. However, you are free to take this to deletion review, but preferably only after having discussed this with the closing admin. Basically, there is still no good reason why these three aspects (identity, attribution, and speculation about paintings) are lumped together in one article, and for at least two of the three (identity and attribution) we have already a better article, while also a lot of the other stuff is already placed in articles better suited for it. The remaining things are for the most part of such a fringe nature that they have no place on Wikipedia. Being discussed on many fora, websites, self-published books, ... is not sufficient to warrant inclusion here. The Da Vinci code stuff of course is notable enough, but has its iwn article, and the speculation about the Mona Lisa has an article as well. There is no need to have a dumping ground for all unscientific stuff related to Da Vinci. Fram (talk) 08:08, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for giving me access to the article. But you are still missing the point.

Who else, in the course of history, has prompted such an extraordinary degree of speculative stuff? Jesus? ... but I can't think of anybody else! The fame, and speculation surrounding this individual is warranted as a subject in itself. This is not just another artist, about whom we do/don't know the facts. This guy is up there in the current popular imagination with Elvis Presley and Harry Potter. There are at least twenty two Harry Potter related articles, (not counting the individual characters like Albus Dumbledore). There are more than ten Elvis Presley articles, not counting individual albums, songs and movies.

I would like the article reinstated so I can keep working on it. Otherwise, the speculation, which needs to be acknowledged, will end up in all the various article, thereby losing the impact that this huge volume of ongoing stuff actually exists.

Moreover, when you have an artwork, like the Last Supper, about which there is a great deal of worthy research and comment, it seems to me to be a mistake to swamp it with the vast amount of speculative and often sensational nonsense. However, the iddle theories are added all the time, because they are more senstational than anything that can be said seriously. It would be nice to have somewhere to dump them, as they arrive on that page.

I might point out that I haven't entered this field casually. The main article Leonardo da Vinci is, for the most part, my writing or rewriting. So is the provision of all the written material in the list of Leonardo's paintings (though someone else set up the format). I also wrote the article on Leonardo's science. My awareness of the "Leonardo culture" is what brought about the creation of this article.

As for the other Nay-sayers disagreeing with my reasons- they simply didn't bother to respond.

Amandajm (talk) 08:39, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

King Arthur? But that's largely missing the point. Yes, there is a lot of speculation related to Da Vinci. But disputes about attribution of certain works is a normal thing which happens with all old masters (The number of paintings once attributed to Holbein and now attributed to others is probably a lot longer than the list for Da Vinci!). Since we have an article on his works and the attribution, such speculation belongs there, if it is notable speculation. Speculation about specific paintings (mona Lisa, Last Supper) on the other hand is unrelated to the attribution disputes, and belongs in specific articles (and much of it is already there). The problem is that the article is duplicating a lot of stuff already present in other articles, expanding on it in some cases beyond the attention it really warrants, and that the article throws stuff together only because it is all somehow related to Da Vinci. We wouldn't have an article about Rowling's private life and about e.g. the sexual orientation of her characters together: such things should generally be kept separate. Fram (talk) 08:51, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

On the contrary, the "scientific investigation": the fingerprint stuff, the desire to exhume the body, the microscopic examination of the eyes, the attempts to reconstruct his face by imaging and so on, all relates directly to theories and attempts to prove them:

that the Mona Lisa is Leonardo

that the Mona Lisa is Salai

that Leonardo is actually his own grandfather

that John the Evangelist is female

that Leonardo painted some ghastly picture that has a fingerprint in the corner

that Leonardo's mother was Arabian and so on and so on.

The introductory sentence of the article explains this. The Biographical details in the article state only what is pertinent to the article itself. The science, the speculation and the attribution are all part of the 21st century hype. But if we call the article Leonardo hype, noone will find it.

As for Holbein, yes there once were a large number of works speculatively attributed, likewise Rembrandt. But definitive studies have sorted a lot of this out. With Leonardo da Vinci, it is ongoing and obsessive. There have been at least eight unlikely attributions in the last five years or so, and they have all received a lot of media attention, and in some cases vociferous and ridiculous statements.

King Arthur certainly survives well in fiction. But it is mainly in fiction that his wonderful story survives. There are probably still theories arising. But... well, the basic difference is that if anyone actually finds a Leonardo, its worth $50million, at the least, so that everyone wants to find one.

Pease call him Leonardo for short, rather than Da Vinci, regardless of Dan Brown. When in Milan, he was referred to as Leonardo da Fiorenza. However, if you Goggle Da Vinci, you will get 67 million response, so there are a lot of people who call him that.

Amandajm (talk) 09:50, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

Since the primary objection seems to be the linking of subject matter that doesn't appear to be linked (possibly because the article is unfinished), then, rethinking this, laterally, I suggest simply renaming the article Speculation about Leonardo da Vinci. That covers all of the three elements. Amandajm (talk) 10:14, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

The introductory sentence now states:

The Renaissance polymath Leonardo da Vinci (April 15, 1452 – May 2, 1519) is subject to ongoing speculation about his personal life, ideals and motives, as well as the content, meaning and scope of his works.[1]

The subject headings have been altered to reflect the fact that the entire subject of the article is "Speculation about Leonardo da Vinci". As such, it now constitutes a new article, and I'm sure that the subject matter will be clear, even to those who didn't understand it before! Amandajm (talk) 10:37, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

It still lumps together speculation about his life, the meaning of his works, and the attribution of some works, in an unnecessary way. I don't believe that we will be able to convince the other of our points of view. I suggest that if you believe that the AfD closure was incorrect, you discuss this with the closing admin and then if necessary take it to Deletion Review; alternatively, you can work on the article in your userspace until it is finished, and only then go to Deletion Review to get the improved article into the mainspace. I can't guarantee you any success with either approach, but they are basically the only venues open to you apart from abandoning this article. Fram (talk) 11:02, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

What do you mean by "an unnecessary way"? That sounds decidedly like "weasel words" to me!

• Keep in mind that you do not yet know the full scope of the article and the way in which its various parts tie up.
• Yes, you are right to say that the article links "speculation about his life, the meaning of his works, and the attribution of some works".

Of course it does! The reason for that is that the speculations (many and various) link his life, the meaning of his works, and the attribution of some works. Can't I make this clearer?

• The wish to exhume him and study his body relates to:

1. Mona Lisa
2. Shroud of Turin
3. Turin portrait
4. Portrait with a White Dog

• His (possible) Jewish or Arabic nature relates to:

1. Meaning of Virgin of the Rocks
2. Meaning of Last Supper
3. Cabalistic Symbolism
4. friendships and influences with a number of scholars
5. Identity of Mona Lisa
6. meaning of Mona Lisa
7. meaning of John the Baptist
8. meaning of Adoration of the Magi
9. presence in Turkey and works there
10. presence in Switzerland and works there
11. presence in Spain and works there
12. his appearance ie bearded when most men were not

• Possible Cathar heretic relates to:

1. All his major paintings
2. vegetarianism
3. cleanliness
4. appearance
5. Voynich Manuscript

• His fingerprints relate to

1. Every one of those newly ascribed works
2. the authenticity of London Virgin of the Rocks
3. Ginevra
4. Lady with Ermine

All the major recent attempts at scientific study have cross-referenced with aspects of life, works and attribution. You refer to them being "lumped together" in this article, but what I am telling you is that in the minds of the people who produce the theories, these matters are inseparable.

However, there is no point in my continuing to write an article on a subject that requires a lot of reading and referencing (which is why, as you might have observed, I have dumped most of the pertinent refs that I am going to use into the article already) if you are absolutely determined to maintain it as deleted.

Basically, you have absolutely nothing to loose by reinstating it, (except perhaps "face" if you are the sort of person who is concerned about that). On the other hand, Wikipedia may stand to gain a worthwhile article. Given the amount of nonsense that some articles contain, the poor quality of writing, the inadequate research, the absolute waffle and the tiny stubs that I find every time I click "random article" (which I do fairly often as a break from serious editting) I find it almost incomprehensible that you are standing in the way of a fairly major subject that someone is working on.

Here are my major articles: Leonardo da Vinci, Romanesque architecture, Gothic architecture, Renaissance architecture, Italian Renaissance painting, Architecture of the medieval cathedrals of England, Architecture of cathedrals, basilicas and abbey churches, Sistine Chapel ceiling. I reorganised and maintain Cathedral, Architecture, Stained glass and so on. I do write small ones sometimes, but I prefer to draw together the information for really large generic articles that no-one else is prepared to tackle.

I find this sort of argument ridiculous because it is a denial of my judgement, the quality of the work I produce and my forty-odd years in art and education. We have, at Wikipedia, a unique opportunity to provide a broad view of the current theories associated with one of History's most fascinating people, and here I am, wasting my time putting forward a case in order to present it, to one administrator to fails to see the point, and three people who to vote delete and leave a two-word comment!

Makes me wonder why I bother!

Amandajm (talk) 15:27, 1 April 2011 (UTC)

Language+Style

A Belgian as an admin in the english wp - you must be experienced in language issues. You had contributed at this article, and my question is, whether you have an idea what I can do to get the article onto a good native speakers level. I placed boxes at the beginning of the article, asking for help, but there is no reaction. Thanks, --fluss (talk) 13:17, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

You can try at the arts wikiproject, to see if they are interested in helping out. My English, while good enough to write articles and be an admin, is not good enough to really polish an article. Fram (talk) 14:37, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

Good idea, the WikiProject Visual arts! Recently I saw a flag with a black and a red half, but inbetween there was a yellow heart ;-) --fluss (talk) 14:52, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

FL question

I've actually found the FLC community to be forgiving with lists that can't reasonably be completed. Looking at the featured lists, the health and medicine section in particular has several lists that passed with the dynamic list template. List of human characters in Sesame Street is currently at FLC, and no one has brought up any completeness concerns at all. The important thing is defining the scope, and both of the lists you work on do that. While it wouldn't be easy to get either of these lists to featured standards (it's a large topic for a list article), I do think it's possible. Giants2008 (27 and counting) 16:35, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

Re: April 1 in mainspace

My sincerest apologies, I didn't think that it'd count as vandalism. Earlier that day I saw it posted on Earth, being the idiot I am, I didn't think to re-check the page and see if it had been removed. I was only trying to get into the April Fools' Day spirit. Furries Talk 18:09, 2 April 2011 (UTC)

Mormon articles

Bgwhite has gone behind on every article I marked as not being notable and removed the tags. I was hoping the conversation would draw attention to Johnpacklambert's continuing problem of recklessly sourced articles about non notable people. I hoped he would try to fix some of his sources and be a bit more discriminating when it comes to topics. Oh well, I give up. It would appear if you have enough allies, policies be damned. Thanks anyways for chiming in on the discussion. Aquabanianskakid (talk) 13:26, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

I spoke too soon, Bgwhite jumped in and helped mediate a bit. He's going to see if he can't help Johnpacklambert find some better sources. Hopefully that will solve some of the problem. Aquabanianskakid (talk) 00:46, 6 April 2011 (UTC)

Great! It's good to see that despite a difference of opinion, people are actually trying to find a solution that may please everyone (or at least give everyone the feeling that it is a step in the right direction). Fram (talk) 06:45, 6 April 2011 (UTC)

Infant Oral Mutilation

You have deleted this page as it appears to be a copyright infringment of Dentaid. Dentaid is an oral health charity and I am a member of its Action Group against Infant Oral Mutilation (IOM) and am joint author of the Overview document which is linked from this article. I was asked by the Action Group to put this article forward for Wikipedia as there is no reference to IOM on it as yet. This article is therefore submitted on behalf of Dentaid. I can arrange for its CEO, Andy Jong, to confirm this if necessary. We are very anxious to make this dangerous, and often fatal, traditional malpractice known more widely to prevent its occurrence. Hildarene (talk) 10:00, 7 April 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for contacting me about this. You can give permission to Wikipedia, but the method to do this is explained at Wikipedia:Donating copyrighted materials. That page explains what you chould do much better than I could ever do. Thanks for wanting to help Wikipedia and for sharing your knowledge. Fram (talk) 10:04, 7 April 2011 (UTC)

I have now submitted a new page on Infant Oral Mutilation. It now has a box saying "This page is a new unreviewed article. This template should be removed". The page has been edited by somebody putting in helpful links to other articles. What do I have to do to have it reviewed? Also a colleague at a Ugandan university tried to access the page and received the following message: Access to the page:

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special%3ASearch&search=infant+oral+mutilation&button=

... has been denied for the following reason: Banned Regular Expression URL found. Categories: Banned Regular Expression URLs You are seeing this error because what you attempted to access appears to contain, or is labeled as containing, material that has been deemed inappropriate."

Can you explain this and what can be done about it? Thank you Hildarene (talk) 09:50, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

The reader who cannot access the page has a problem with restrictions on his side: the page is not allowed by his firewall, ISP, institution, filter, ... because it contains a "bare url", the link to http.www.dentaid etcetera. This is not an error of the Wikipedia page, but a user-based problem.

As for the "new unreviewed article" box, normally some other editor will come along, review the article, and remove the box. I have no real idea how long this takes usually. Fram (talk) 10:02, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

My page now has a template of "multiple issues", but I have put in several references, and there are links to other pages. What more should I do? Hildarene (talk) 16:20, 25 April 2011 (UTC)

The references are plenty, but people often like to have some online sources (although these are not a requirement by any means), or links to an online version or abstract of the given sources. Articles are also considered "orphan" as long as they don't have some incoming links from other articles (e.g. a link from infant mutilation or oral mutilation or some other related article). For the third problem, copyediting, it may be best if you ask that from the editor that put the tag there, as he or she will know best what he thinks is lacking and how to improve it. Fram (talk) 06:39, 26 April 2011 (UTC)

M.Hugo Windisch-Graetz (talk · contribs)

A week ago you warned this user that he would be blocked if he introduced any more promotional articles about his family. Yesterday he did, and I have blocked him. I have reported my block for review at WP:ANI#Block of M.Hugo Windisch-Graetz; you may like to comment there. Regards, JohnCD (talk) 21:38, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the block and the notification, I'll keep an eye on it. Fram (talk) 06:54, 11 April 2011 (UTC)

User:Cuddlyable3/English

Thread moved from my Talk page. Cuddlyable3 (talk) 08:12, 13 April 2011 (UTC) I don't think you understand me. I am not asking for ways to be disqualified from the list. I am asking that a) you remove my name, and all quotes from me, from that page and b) that you desist from adding future quotes from me, or any other mention of me, from that list. I am not here to play your little grammar game. Perhaps the friendliness of my last request caused ambiguity. I am now being unambiguous. Remove my name and all of my quotes, and make no further attempt to compile a list of my grammar errors. I don't care what you do or don't do with other people's grammar errors. I do not wish to be part of it. --Jayron32 20:30, 12 April 2011 (UTC)

Page deleted, problem solved. Per WP:UP#POLEMIC: "Material that can be viewed as attacking other editors, including the recording of perceived flaws." You have been blocked repeatedly for disruptive editing. Please be more cautious and courteous in the future. Fram (talk) 06:57, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

Fram you have deleted[5] my Talk page. It contained extracts from the reference desk archive which is all publically presented material. That is made explicit by the presentation repeated at each ref desk[6][7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12] which says:

Yes you can search first. Please do this....(button for search engine) Search archives.. It is fruitless to suppress this material that anyone can access and I intend to use Wikipedia and its ref. desk archives as long as they remain uncensored. I would not like to be the first one to attack anyone's freedom to quote from Wikipedia, nor to boast of having thereby done a quick problem fix. Cuddlyable3 (talk) 08:12, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

You are free to search from whatever you like. You are not free to store a selection of whatever you like on your talk pages, no matter how freely available the material is. The user page policy is quite clear on this. Fram (talk) 08:17, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

The compilation of factual evidence (diffs) in user subpages, for purposes such as preparing for a dispute resolution process, is permitted provided it will be used in a timely manner. Cuddlyable3 (talk) 11:11, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

Yes, and? Which dispute resolution process did you intend to use this for? And what timeframe? The page was over a month old, and gave no indication at all of being used for any dispute resolution process (starting with the title, "Notable English Utterances in Wikipedia"). Fram (talk) 11:15, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

Give me back my page that you deleted while it was in preparation and you will be answered in the fullness of time. Don't be impatient because there is no rush about archives and "a month" is as nothing. Cuddlyable3 (talk) 11:28, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

No. If you want it back, you can always try WP:DRV, or giving a convincing reason. Fram (talk) 11:30, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

I never asked for this Fram, but thank you for resolving this. It is unfortunate that this private dispute between myself and Cuddlyable3 atracted the attention of others. I tried to handle this as a private matter between the two of us, it seems that he didn't wish to handle it that way, and while this is far above and beyond what I ever asked for from him directly, and though your involvement was through no effort of mine (not sure how you tripped upon this issue), I do thank you after the fact for resolving this. Again, this isn't what I asked for, but this solves the problem. Thank you. --Jayron32 12:25, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

No problem. I have his or her talk page on my watchlist (I have blocked him or her in the past, and usually I keep the talk page of users I block on my watchlist). That's the reasion why I noticed this discussion and the offending page (and lack of willingness to do something about it). Fram (talk) 12:29, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

It looks like it's back again, this time as User talk:Cuddlyable3/English (note change of namespace). TenOfAllTrades(talk) 13:27, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

No, I think that's the exisitng talk page of the previously deleted page. I could have deleted it as a G8, but thought it would be better to leave it alone as a part of the user talk space and part of the discussion about this page. Fram (talk) 13:29, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

Ah, gotcha. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 15:00, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

omg they used to tell me that wikipedia arabic!! they have been faking rules all that time to size my existing out there. i'm so sorry and thanks for letting me know.--أبرهة العصبي (talk) 14:07, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

Good job!

Hello Fram, I wanted to commend you for your work here on the List of cats article. Wow! Thanks for undertaking that project. --Tea with toast _(talk) 18:53, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

Thanks! It was badly needed... 06:45, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

Multidimensional_family_therapy

You are involved in a recently filed request for arbitration. Please review the request at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests#Multidimensional_family_therapy and, if you wish to do so, enter your statement and any other material you wish to submit to the Arbitration Committee. Additionally, the following resources may be of use—

• Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests#Requests for Arbitration;
• Wikipedia:Arbitration guide.

Thanks, -- Hpvpp (talk) 11:56, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

Double runs with AWB

Hi! Since you take some time checking Yobot's edits I may could use some of your help. I have a list User:Magioladitis#Do_all_in_one_run_project where I report all weird cases that AWB failed to fix everything in one run and I hope at some point I will be able to fix at one run. I report the common cases in WP:AWB/B and the rare there. So, please if you find any double runs (the diff will show Yobot editing after Yobot) please inform me in my talk page or, better, add the case immediately there. Thanks! -- Magioladitis (talk) 08:09, 22 April 2011 (UTC)

No problem. I don't check all Yobots edits though, for the current discussion I take a number of consecutive ones (10 or 20) and try to see what happens, what goes wrong (if anything), and so on. If in such a run I come across a yobot-yobot sequence, I'll try to remember to add them to that page. Fram (talk) 08:12, 22 April 2011 (UTC)

Just to clarify: I am OK if you check my edits :) I wish I had someone to report bugs. Most of the bugs I find them alone right now. And one more thing: Edits with edit summary "WP:CHECKWIKI error 61 fixes" really do what they say. for the rest of the errors I usually load all the lists together. Otherwise I'll lose my mind having to load short lists of max. 10 items every day. Thanks again. -- Magioladitis (talk) 08:18, 22 April 2011 (UTC)

Geoswan again

Wikipedia:Biographies_of_living_persons/Noticeboard#Abdul_Rauf_Omar_Mohammed_Abu_Al_Qusin Just wonder did he actually agree to some kind of mentor-ship regarding the RFCU Geo Swan? Did he even answer all the good faith attempts (e.g. on his talk page) regarding these issues? IQinn (talk) 00:23, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

He did not agree to any mentorship, I don't believe he agreed that there were any problems from his side at all. And he didn't reply to any attempts at his talk page, probably not believing that most (or any) of them were actually "good faith attempts". All he did was post a lengthy reply with very, very few diffs in it hours before the 30day RfC was about to end... Fram (talk) 06:28, 26 April 2011 (UTC)

Moderated nuclear explosion -- sorry for the mess

I attempted to complete the AfD nom for this, getting to step two before seeing that it had gone to deletion on your judgment some years ago, and forging onward anyway. I'm not exactly adept at AfD nominations, and I should have stopped and figured out something more sensible. Maybe somebody else will get to this. Anyway, I don't think the case against notability has gotten any weaker in the intervening years, at best there's some material that might be merged into prompt critical or supercriticality. If you could help this article move on to a speedy delete process, I'd be much obliged. Yakushima (talk) 14:30, 27 April 2011 (UTC)

I have changed the AfD header so it now points to Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Moderated nuclear explosion (2nd nomination). It is probably best if you just proceed with this AfD, getting this looked at again four years after the previous discussion is probably the best solution. I hadn't noticed that it was recreated... Fram (talk) 14:44, 27 April 2011 (UTC)

WP:ANI Dr. Blofeld

Thank you for your help on this. I hope I didn't do any wrong by reporting him. Whilst I'm happy to VAND and CSD the obvious, I'm just never too sure how to handle establised users :\ •martyx• tkctgy 14:10, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

Well, the usual thing is to first discuss it with them, and then, if necessary, to report it to WP:ANI or to use another means of WP:DR. Regarding the speed of creation of these pages, WP:ANI was probably the best location. You should have notified him, but that's not really a problem wince usually other peoople will do this if you forget it. And the generally accepted position is that every named village (if verifiable) is considered notable, although redirecting it to a larger entity (municipality, county, ...) until more info is available is often the best solution. Fram (talk) 14:18, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

Please DO NOT redirect Dara-I-Pech. It is clearly a settlement. If you have a problem with its existence as a village take it to AFD.♦ Dr. Blofeld 14:49, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

Comic Strip & Comic Book

I'm not going to undo the reversion, but I thought I'd point out that "comic strip" is in fact used to refer to comic books occasionally—for instance, check out Louis Riel: A Comic-Strip Biography, first published in 20-page installments and then as a 200+ page graphic novel, and never in anything resembling a newspaper strip form. Acidtoyman (talk) 07:28, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

Lucky Luke - “Collected editions”

I know this isn't a good section heading (though at least some of the albums I've seen have more than one story), and I'd be happy to find a better one. I just used this as a “quick fix” for this stupid revert war - when I first undid BBia's edit I didn't know he had been reverted twice before, but after realising this I had not much hope he'd stop removing the section as long as it is called bibliography. --Six words (talk) 13:43, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

Oh, I have no problem with your actions, I just didn't want people at the Comics project to get the wrong impression about the books. Yes, a select few are collections of shorter stories, but the majority are single stories. There are also a number of "integrales", collections of (usually) three albums into one book, but these are not the regular series, but special reprints, often with additional info. Anyway, the major point is that we agree on the principle, that the bibliography shouldn't be simply removed (I would live with it being moved to a separate page linked from the main article). Fram (talk) 13:48, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

Smaller Wikipedias

Hi Fram. As you've played kamikaze in 2009 about redirecting some smaller Wikipedias to the general link of wikipedias, and with this removed quite full articles, I will do some actions to resurrect article about the Slovene Wikipedia. For instance it came into existence only 2 years after English Wikipedia, and ever since it is very active and grows fine. I may also say it is a vivid part of the whole set of Wikimedia projects. Do you have any objections regarding this? We will also complete article with some reliable sources to meet general gudidelines like WP:N/WP:WEB. Best regards. --xJaM (talk) 21:15, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

I redirected all articles which had no claim to notability, per WP:N. If you can now provide sources establishing notability for e.g. the Slovene Wikipedia, I obviously have no objection against anyone undoing the redirect and adding those sources to the article. Note however that they need to be reliable, independent sources, and note also thatlongevity, activity, size, ... are in itself not indicators of notability. Fram (talk) 07:38, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

On your last suggestions

Thanks. I do the changes manually by editing in the edit box. AWB doesn't have an automatic feature to add infoboxes. I'll hope we 'll have one as soon as we standardise the infoboxes. Please, if there are more suggestions use my talk page because there it will be impossible to find in the future and also may give the impression that these edits are related to Yobot or AWB's general fixes which they don't. Thanks for the continuous feedback. -- Magioladitis (talk) 13:58, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

Fair enough, such remarks which are not really about the bot/awb issue I'll post to your talk page. It's just that I noticed them when further researching the issues from that ANI discussion... Fram (talk) 14:01, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

The bug you reported is now fixed in rev 7697. -- Magioladitis (talk) 19:38, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

Khvoshi

Provide proof that this name never existed. Because the exact coordinates are those of Bala Deh. ♦ Dr. Blofeld 14:03, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

Um, you have to provide proof for your statement. The only source you have for Khvoshi is "geographic.org", which isn't reliable. There is evidence that Khoshi is a part of or another name of Bala Deh, which is after all in the Khoshi District, not in the Khvoshi dostrict. And you have absolutely no proof that it is an earlier name, that is pure guesswork from your part. Please don't engage in WP:OR. Fram (talk) 14:05, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

You have a real attitude problem you know that?♦ Dr. Blofeld 14:12, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

So you don't like people pointing out the errors you make? Or do you have any actual arguments to counter my post? Fram (talk) 14:19, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

You know I cannot completely verify virtually anything related to Afghanistan with confidence, its a minefield of possible errors. Every article has the possibility for errors. I just find it odd that they would call the exact satellite location Khvoshi, given that their coordinates have almost always been shown to be along the right lines, even if they need tweaking at times with more detailed coordinates. Anyway I think its probably a good idea to ban the mass creation of articles using just a computer generated database. Believe it or not I prefer creating articles like Gwebin by copiling snippets into something useful much more than sub stubs. But the amount missing at times greatly frustrates me, which is why I sometimes go into sub stub mode. The best way would be to build it piece by piece with a few lines of sourced text to books but even then accuracy and possible villages elsewhere of the same name is a problem, given that many old gazetteers are now out of date, but much better than using computer generated databases from 1995... If you are seirous about banning geographic.org/geonames database to be used to create articles as a sole source then I suggest you create a list of these sorts of websites and make a formal blacklisting proposal and get it written into the guidelines. They are always accurate/near accurate for coordinates, little else. Hell I would personally thank you if you successfully got fallingrain blacklisted... ♦ Dr. Blofeld 14:40, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

I understand your frustration, but you shouldn't have acted upon it (even though it was with the best intentions). If we had a source that could be used for bot-created articles with e.g. 95% accuracy, I may be convinced that the result is worth the occasional error. But here, I'ld rather have no articles at all than what we have now, where half the articles may be right, but a reader can't trust them. If the AfD ends as a "delete" (or incubate or similar result), I'll see whether a blacklisting of these sources is possible. If we don't want articles based on them, it is a bit useless to accept them as sources... Fram (talk) 14:48, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

Trust me on this I only started those articles in the belief that they were accurate. If I'd known geographic had cocked up many of the provinces I'd most certainly not have used it for a start. The idea was at least they are there to be expanded, but who exactly is going to expand them huh except myself? I know its not good enough to drill sub stubs, I wish I had the time to create every article on a village in the world with decent sources without errors. But its when you view google maps and see all these villages and search on wikipedia and there is nothing it gets frustrating that a website like wikipedia is not working on them when we have an extreme coverage of cruft on here. We ought to have half decent articles on settlements and I think we should be working towards covering every country as fully as possible but sub stubs from old databases are not the solution, I agree.♦ Dr. Blofeld 15:03, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

Can you go through Category:Populated places in Tibet and do the same?♦ Dr. Blofeld 18:22, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

What do you want me to do with those? Delete as db-author? Mass-nominate in an AfD? Spotcheck for problems? Fram (talk) 06:44, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

This really makes it awkward now, I wish you;d have discussed it with me maturely first before starting this mass AFD it now puts unnecessary pressure on me when we could have discussed problematic content and I could have db authored those which were bad and improved some others. Too late now but I do hope to get OMan sorted out before the end of the AFD. I've filtered down Ad Dhahirah Region, I've expanded the ones I could, removed the ones not in the region any longer and either redirected what were nearby hamlets or db authored them. One or two I kept a not mentioned in reliable sources but are most certainly notable settlements on google maps. Most which I couldn't find info for though and only looked smallish villages I've deleted..♦ Dr. Blofeld 21:15, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

Well, the first few problems I mentioned didn't really get the response from you I hoped for (Dara-I-Pech and so on), so I decided to try a different approach. 06:44, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

And there was me thinking extortion was SPECTRE's business!! This is going to be rather gruelling, but they do need to be sorted at one point...♦ Dr. Blofeld 09:13, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

Can you please allow me some room to breathe with the expansion work? Given that you know book and web coverage of Asian villages at present is very poor... ♦ Dr. Blofeld 10:51, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

Expand an article (with reliable sources, not what you produced in Abud, Oman), and then remove the problem tags. The reverse is not productive, and you often abandon articles, so I am not to know where you are actually working on, and where you are just leaving unsourced or badly sourced articles. Fram (talk) 10:55, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

I acknowledge that articles require reliable sources but they are exceptionally difficult to find for most Asian settlements, you know this. Expecting Abud, Oman to have masses of content online is just wrong. There might be something online in Arabic perhaps, if I could access the Arabic name. But expecting wide coverage in english sources for rural Oman!!!.. A google map view is by far the best way to assess a settlement and zooming in on the village shows it to be a notable settlement. I've deleted those which I couldn't find info for and only looked a small village but I think settlements which are clearly substantial but at present a lacking web sources should be kept, and looking at most places those type of articles are few and far between. It is far more productive to tag those particular articles with a reliable sources/ref improve tag rather than reverting back to the version with the wrong governorate and no map. ♦ Dr. Blofeld 11:07, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

Going off on a tangent (hopefully a more positive one)

First things first. Sadly, AfD inevitably causes friction - and we're not going to overcome that with snarky comments. Please try to bear in mind that people all seem to have the same destination - a better, higher-quality encyclopædia - even if we can't always agree on the best route to that destination. Could I suggest some points where we might be able to agree, and maybe find a better way of working in the future? Although I have disagreed with the good Doctor on the AfD page, I think this is a very good point:

• I acknowledge that articles require reliable sources but they are exceptionally difficult to find for most Asian settlements, you know this. Expecting Abud, Oman to have masses of content online is just wrong. There might be something online in Arabic perhaps, if I could access the Arabic name. But expecting wide coverage in english sources for rural Oman!!!.

But here I would disagree:

• A google map view is by far the best way to assess a settlement and zooming in on the village shows it to be a notable settlement.

A google map view shows that there are some buildings at certain coordinates. However, the map overlay (drawn from some database) may not be reliable enough for us to have confidence in the name; and it doesn't really answer notability questions. If settlements were covered in other sources, that would kill two birds with one stone; it helps underline notability, and it helps us imrpove the article's depth (and accuracy) beyond just the coordinates and the probable name.
So: Other sources. Could we perhaps agree that future efforts would be a lot less stressful, and produce better results, if there were some better sourcing? There are obviously limits to how well documented any settlement might be, if it's in a remote area of a failed state, but there are a couple of assumed obstacles that we can sweep away:

1. English-language sources. They are not compulsory for verification or for notability purposes. There may be a much better chance of finding a source written in local language; as long as you (or another helpful wikipedian) can read it, and others can verify it, it's a goldmine - and you would be bringing information to the en.wikipedia readership which they would not have seen on other english-language sites (including mapping websites).
2. Free sources. Again, they are not compulsory. If you want to gain access to some amazing gazetteer or geodatabase but can't afford it, ask me, and I'll put my money where my mouth is (within reason). withdrawn; a productive collaboration seems unlikely. If anybody else needs some great source but can't afford it, give me a shout.

Broadly speaking, I have agreed with Fram for much of the current AfD; but in future wikipedia does need better coverage of places outside the anglosphere. bobrayner (talk) 12:18, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

Afghan article validation

Hello! I've offered some help at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Geographic.org on analyzing the Afghan place articles by comparing them with UNOCHA data, and potentially correcting any errors found, where possible, and building a list of the remaining unverifiable articles. Would you be interested in collaborating with me on this? -- The Anome (talk) 08:27, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

I'm busy for the moment checking the "corrections" other people like Dr. Blofeld have so far made to avoid deletion of these articles. I'll try to lend a hand if there is some time afterwards. Fram (talk) 08:31, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

O look, Dar-e-Pech as a settlement does exist... ♦ Dr. Blofeld 12:34, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

No, it doesn't. Pēch Darah is given as a locality (aprks, areas, ...), and Darah-ye Pēch as a second order administrative division, i.e. a district. Fram (talk) 12:37, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

Ah yes "second-order administrative division". The 2008 entry though claimed it was a village as it was downloaded as being a settlement ♦ Dr. Blofeld 12:54, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

Hey

Could you enforce the consensus at Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Incidents#User_Maheshkumaryadav_creating_a_slew_of_poor_articles that Maheshkumaryadav (talk · contribs) be blocked from creating new articles? See his contributions and the rediculous amount of crap we have been going through on User talk:Maheshkumaryadav. Thanks, Sadads (talk)08:50, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, I think we were only looking for article creation block,not a full block on edits (we would like to give him the opportunity to fix what he has already made), Sadads (talk) 08:54, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

I'm not so sure now. I'm happy to see him gone because the situation has progressed. He continued to ignore consensus and has clearly stated on numerous occasions that he has no intention of fixing the articles he had created. What we now need is a way to mass delete approx 600 articles! - Sitush (talk) 08:57, 12 May 2011 (UTC)