User talk:Chicheley

Welcome!

Hello, Chicheley, and welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for your contributions. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are a few good links for newcomers:

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Thomas Hardy

Hello

In reverting some recent vandalism to Thomas Hardy --- why does it get mauled so much? --- I think I have also reverted your recent recats. I did not mean to do this, but I can't quite see what to put back. Can you have a look and redo your changes? Apologies for wasting your time, I have just started using the pop up tool and clicked one line too far in the history.

best wishes Thruston 16:51, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

Why Thomas Hardy? Because he's assigned in high school. Septentrionalis 20:15, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

Category Atheist

I see you've been redoing the Atheist category. Please note the caution on the main cat page:

This category contains Atheists,

• that have expressed being an atheist,
• and of whom is known how they defined their atheism.

In addition, Wikipedia:Categories requires that the reason for any cat should be obvious to anyone going from the cat to the article.

These are peculiarly likely to abuse; as well as good-faith misuse by those who cannot distinguish between infidel, freethinker, Deist, rationalist, agnostic and atheist. Please check before adjusting these. Septentrionalis 20:15, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

I'm not taking anyone out of the category or adding anyone to it, just moving them into national categories. Chicheley 20:16, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

I did not mean to imply that this was your doing. But please check that they comply with policy, as long as you're looking at them anyway. It would be a service to Wikipedia. Septentrionalis 22:03, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

The American Baptist category

Did you mean for the category to be "Baptists from the United States"? American Baptist implies that they are members of the specific American Baptist denomination, as opposed top the Southern Baptist denomination. youngamerican (talk) 21:01, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

Actually, I see that you are making alot of new categories along the lines of "Russian socialists," "American Baptists," etc. They are going to be useful, but the current naming convention on wikipedia is "Socialists from Russia", "Baptists from the United States" (not America). You might want to consider using such naming conventions for future categories and proposing the ones uder the other format for renaming. Cheers. youngamerican (talk) 21:07, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

On second thought, those seem to be ok. But I would consider doing something about the Baptist cats, as many Southern Baptists would not be thrilled at being labled American Baptists. Cheers. youngamerican (talk) 21:15, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

I've nominated it for renaming. Your first comment about naming conventions in general was wrong, but I think you realised that. Chicheley 21:46, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

You are correct, I had noticed that what I was thinking of categories related to objects, not people. If you need any help in this mass undertaking, just let me know. Cheers. youngamerican (talk) 22:01, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

Freemasons category

Wow - you've been busy with subcategories for Freemasons! I tried to help out a bit with some recats for you. I picked this up from my watchlist of American Civil war articles I had written. In the future, I will try to use the American Freemasons category for future Civil War bios. Scott Mingus 23:09, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

Thank you. Chicheley 23:11, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

Freemason recats

I'll see if I can knock that one out tonight. There seems to be another guy working on it, too. Cheers. youngamerican (talk) 23:26, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

Good luck. I was doing educationists, but I got distracted and moved to atheists, then I was distracted from that to Freemasons. Right now I've moved back to the educationists. Chicheley 23:28, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

Not fun, but its gotta be done I suppose. Gotta love the Anglo-Irish and the post-Act of Union Royalty ambiguity. I've been avoiding any controversy and just putting them in the "British Freemasons" cat. youngamerican (talk) 23:34, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

Year categories

I noticed that on several articles, you've moved the year-of-birth and year-of-death/living-people categories from the beginning of the list (where, in my experience, they typically are) to the end. Are you are aware of any policy that specifies this positioning, or are you doing it for another reason? --zenohockey 00:44, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

I'm doing it because I think it makes sense. The most relevant categories should go first, that is just commonsense. The year categories are almost completely useless and should probably just be deleted. Chicheley 00:48, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

On the contrary, the usual practice here is to place the categories in alphabetical order with the year of birth and death first. Doc 00:57, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

What you call the "usual practice" is totally misguided and it is not an official policy. If you look at the relevant discussion page you will find that this practice has caused howls of protest. Also is not really that widespread; according to what I have read the date categories were mostly inserted by one user with a bot and I have seen for myself that only a fraction of articles have all their categories in alphabetical order (mostly it's just a mess). I decided to start working on this because huge numbers of articles are not in any defining categories, or have some of the most important ones missing (eg a Nobel Prize winner for Chemistry who was, yes, categorised by year of birth and death, but not as a chemist!). There seem to have been a lot of very strange priorities in past categorization efforts. I am not going to change my mind on this matter, and there is no policy against what I am doing. On the contrary, I think I am doing valuable work, and this is the first complaint I have had. Chicheley 01:03, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

If you can point me to a link on the discussion your mention as to order, I would appreciate it. I did post to a meta page, as I recall. While there is not 'official' guideline, the closest I have found on on references and other things with several practices is to follow the pattern, if there is one, of the originator of the article. I do agree that having an order, and having the important categories is primary. In my opinion, any order other than alphabetical is POV. The dates of birth and death are the first thing after the name in the opening paragraph by WP:MOS. Doc 01:21, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

It's Wikipedia talk:Categorization of people. You will also see that much of the alphabeticization was done by semi-bots, but this practice has now been banned. The suggestion that other orders are POV is a total red herring in my opinion. In the vast majority of cases there is little potential for controversy and adjustments can always be made in the minority of cases where there is, just as with an article. In my opinion it makes just as much sense to argue that it is POV not to put the subsections of an article in alphabetical order, but I don't think anyone is going to do that. Chicheley 01:36, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the link. I do agree that there needs to be a guideline and we need to find consensus. I have my point of view, you have your's but I will follow what becomes the guideline Doc 01:56, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

Category:Presidents of Mongolia

Hi, are you sure this category is necessary? President of Mongolia already contains a list of all candidates, with much more information. --Latebird 21:14, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

Absolutely. It's necessary if is ever to be complete. Many countries have such a category already. Chicheley 21:16, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

Can you explain the reasons in a bit more detail? Do those other countries also have a list that makes the category redundant? --Latebird 09:16, 21 June 2006 (UTC)

Removal of {{NPOV}}

At the very least you need to attempt to address the issues before you remove a tag. Guettarda 23:43, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

I endorsed a thorough explanation on the talk page, where it is commented that you are in a minority of one. Chicheley 23:51, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

An explanation? You have a strange definition of "explanation" - when someone makes a whole set of ad hom attacks, which happen to be both false and irrelevant red herrings - that's a thorough explanation? And you endorse it? Please show me where I have endorsed a German system of titles. Please do. Not that Necro's accusations are at all meaningful - total red herring - but if you say that yes, I have expressed such an opinion, I would like you to provide a diff supporting the accusation you endorsed...or withdraw your accusation. It is not acceptable for you to make false claims about me. Please desist.

As for the tags - do you thus think that it is acceptable for a Wikipedia article to endorse one country's system of honours and not those of any other country or religion? There's a good reason why we don't endorse these systems - because they are inherently POV. Address the issues, don't endorse false claims. Guettarda 04:50, 21 June 2006 (UTC)

I came to this dispute at random, and it's pretty clear cut that it is you that is in the wrong, not your much maligned opponent. You are the one who is abusive and you are waging a pointless one person campaign against a practice that is used consistently in hundreds, probably thousands, of articles. You are wasting everyone's time. Chicheley 16:00, 21 June 2006 (UTC)

J. R. Ackerley

I moved your point about Ackerley's schools to the talk page for the article, where it seems more appropriate to me, although I can see an argument for making such comments in the text of the aricle. I'm getting a copy of Parker's autobiography to check out some other points, so I'll clarify this one as well. Thanks for the observation. John FitzGerald 15:50, 21 June 2006 (UTC)

Turns out Ackerley's prep and public school were the same school, so I've noted it with links to Public school and to Preparatory school (UK). John FitzGerald 13:00, 23 June 2006 (UTC)

Re Category:Street Names List

You may not have been aware that we already have Category:Streets and squares by city...

Thanks for your message; I wasn't aware of this category, so have now amended my vote accordingly. Best wishes, David Kernow 23:50, 23 June 2006 (UTC)

Same here, I will ammend my vote - tnx.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus ^Talk 00:39, 24 June 2006 (UTC)

Cricket categories

Are you actually interested in cricket and are you a member of WikiProject Cricket?

If not, then I fail to understand your involvement in the discussions about improving the cricket categories for the benefit of users, especially in the light of adverse feedback that I have received from people who are interested and involved about the lack of structure in WP. One of the subjects of complaint has been categories like cricket teams that are "out on a limb" and where the handful of articles are more usefully employed elsewhere, which is why I have confirmed that they are relevantly placed in other categories and then removed them from the unused one.

As for saying that I have not advised the cricket project membership about my intentions, I suggest you see the main cricket category, the Wikiproject and the portal discussion pages.

You may think you are doing a great service by opposing everything that I and a few others are trying to achieve for the benefit of the readers but it seems to me you are merely interfering in a subject you have no interest in or knowledge of. --Jack 11:21, 24 June 2006 (UTC)

You are spouting about breach of etiquette on the deletion page but it is you who are in breach. You are not a member of the WikiProject for cricket so who are you to start undoing useful work that a knowledgable and well-intentioned member has performed? Who do you think you are? If you are interested in cricket, join the project. If not, mind your own business and leave the cricket project to its members. --GeorgeWilliams 12:08, 24 June 2006 (UTC)

No one in the cricket project has objected to what I am doing with the categories and some have given support. Therefore, if I choose in good faith to recategorise articles for the benefit of the project and the readership, who the Hell are you to come along and undo it? What you are doing is VANDALISM. Mind your own business in future. --Jack 13:56, 24 June 2006 (UTC)

I'm a county member and I've been to at least one day of live test cricket every summer for the last 25 years. Chicheley 16:25, 24 June 2006 (UTC)

You say: "Jack breached etiquette by emptying a category in advance in support of a deletion nomination he planned to make". I am telling you that he did not breach etiquette because I know what he is planning to do and how he is going about it. He did not plan to make any nomination to delete; he was looking to relocate the categories in question as sub-categories elsewhere but he found that the categories were superfluous and serving no good purpose, so he ensured that the articles were all stored in relevant and appropriate categories and thereby emptied the categories. He was then advised by Sam Vimes that he should nominate these categories for deletion by the conventional process because he had previously been given to understand that a redundant (i.e., empty) category is disposed of by a Wiki-bot housekeeping procedure. It was only then that he decided to find out how to use this Cfr process. He has not acted in breach of anything. He has acted completely in good faith because he wants to improve the project structure having had some adverse feedback from people he is trying to interest in using WP. Jack is incapable of acting in bad faith: he is the most honest man I know. I'm sorry I lost my cool earlier and I will withdraw a couple of comments I made. All the best. --GeorgeWilliams 17:07, 24 June 2006 (UTC)

Good. Since then he has accused me of vandalism for repopulating a category and some of the comments made about me have been vicious. Perhaps you will encourage him to offer an apology as well? Chicheley 17:09, 24 June 2006 (UTC)

I apologise for use of the word "vandalism" but I have had to put up with doing so much reversion on here because of real vandals that it tends to be used instinctively. Can I please ask you not to undo another person's recent work without writing to them first, unless you are certain that it has been done maliciously? I wish George would not sing my praises but it is true that I would never intentionally act in bad faith; and I am trying very hard to improve the structure of the cricket project, especially after I have contributed so much to it in the way of historical material. Best wishes. --Jack 17:41, 24 June 2006 (UTC) I have withdrawn the above because I have been advised that you accused me of acting in bad faith re the cricket teams category proposal. I had not noticed that before, only your stupid comment about etiquette based on strict observance of that ludicrous, convoluted deletion procedure you are so dedicated to. To accuse me of acting in bad faith when it is patently clear that I am trying to improve the project for the benefit of all concerned is downright insulting. I await YOUR apology. --Jack 04:53, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

You will see that I too have withdrawn my apology because you are unworthy of it. It has been pointed out to me that you accused Jack of bad faith right at the outset of all this argument despite the facts that (a) Sam had pointed out that a procedural error had occurred; (b) Jack apologised for his oversight and explained what he was doing; (c) Jack had made known same day or earlier to the cricket project that he was undertaking various reviews of the structure with a view to improving things for the readers. Your gripe is based on literal application of these horrendous deletion policy procedurals and the fact that Jack could not be bothered to waste his time getting involved in something which is, to use his word, convoluted. I have seen comments by other contributors that these procedures work against Wikipedia and that is true. They obstruct progress, such as Jack was trying to achieve, and they enable disinterested, negative individuals to try and delete perfectly good articles. For example, there is one character who frequents the deletion section who is in the habit of marking for Afd anything he personally dislikes on the grounds that it is "cruft"; but of course his own stuff is anything but "cruft" (what an inane word that is). I know Jack has had some horrendous problems of this sort and that is why he has a short fuse when he has to deal with people who are not members of the cricket project. I am also aware of even worse problems suffered by numerous other cricket contributors, especially around articles covering the 2005 season. I have re-read the deletions page re those cricket articles again and there is no doubt that the argument or row or whatever you call it was initiated by you accusing Jack at the outset of breaching both etiquette and good faith. He may have inadvertently breached a procedure but that is all. I suggest you have a look at Jack's massive contributions to the site and then tell me if he is a person who does not act in the best interests of the site? I also suggest you apologise to him for accusing him of acting in bad faith because even if he did make a mistake and do things in the wrong order, he absolutely did not act outside good faith. I also suggest that, if you are interested in cricket and you wish to help the cricket project, you enrol as a member. --GeorgeWilliams 08:18, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia is not a set of private clubs in which one has to "enrol as a member". I hope never to encounter you again and will certainly not take the risk of editing an area of Wikipedia where you regard yourself as one of the bosses. I think that is is highly likely that you and Jack are the same person, and each time you duplicate one another's behaviour that impression grows stronger. You agree about everything, you share a level of temper and erratic behaviour which I have not seen from anyone else on Wikipedia, and it isn't possible to tell a post written by one of you from a post written by the other. If my suspicion is incorrect I apologise, but if you are two separate people, and friends, you are welcome to continue with your friendship without my participation. I certainly won't be joining any project to which either of you belong. Chicheley 20:10, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

To set the record straight, George and I are not the same person. We are indeed close friends but we do not always agree with each other as discussions on the talk pages often reveal. I am sorry that matters have reached shouting point but I will not accept being told that I have acted in bad faith. I may have omitted part of a procedure because I don't have time to mess about with misleading procedures but that is not acting in bad faith. I won't bother you again. --Jack 06:46, 29 June 2006 (UTC)

RE: Alphabeticization by bot is not appropriate

Firstly, if you have a problem with AWB sorting categories alphabetically then you need to talk to that bot's programmer and not me. Secondly, if articles don't have categories you'd like to see them in, then that's your problem so add them yourself - I use AWB replace categories due to name changes and not to add them. Craigy (talk) 17:27, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

If you had been using it in that way, of course it would have been appropriate to talk to you. Chicheley 18:35, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

Edit Summaries

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