User talk:A Man In Black

Hello there. If you're going to leave me a comment (or yell at me, which is seeming increasingly common lately), please start a new header at the bottom of the page (or add to an old one), and sign your comments by adding ~~~~ to the end of them.

If you're here about a specific page, be it an article, talk page, user talk page, AFD page, or whatever, PLEASE LINK THAT PAGE. Odds are I'm going to have to check back to it anyway to reply, and more than once someone has left a comment about an unspecified page and gotten no help from me because I had no idea what they were talking about. LINK THE PAGE YOU'RE TALKING ABOUT.

IF YOU'RE COMING HERE TO REPLY TO A COMMENT I MADE ON ANOTHER PAGE, STOP, GO BACK TO THAT PAGE, AND REPLY THERE. For example, if I made a comment on your talk page and expect a reply, your talk page is on my watchlist. I'm not interested in starting parallel discussions on my talk page.

Archives: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12

• Miscellanous archive
• Random awards and other crap left on my talk page

File:Nixon.jpg

A Dick on my talk page

Infobox CVG syntax guide

I began drafting a syntax guide to go along with aforementioned infobox and I'm inquiring if there's any interest in one being made. I suppose the reason is mainly to clarify certain fields and bring it closer in line with other projects such as films and books etc. Anyway, you'll find it at User:Combination/Sandbox. Thanks for your time. Combination 18:50, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

Atomic Fire images

Hi. I just closed Wikipedia:Images and media for deletion/2006 July 19. While removing the images you nominated from articles, I noticed a number of other images from the same source. I did not include them as part of your deletion request, but I'm not sure if it makes sense for us to be republishing them. Thoughts? Jkelly 23:28, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Anything from Atomic-Fire not attributed to a specific primary source is copyvio, and the only user who could have sourced most of it recently left Wikipedia, so I think they all need to go. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 23:33, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Are you able to identify them all? Jkelly 00:46, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

Identify them how? List the images from AF, or identify where they came from? - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 00:47, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

I meant list the images from this website so that there is a list one could go through for deletion. Jkelly 01:05, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

I've been tagging them with {{nsd}} whenever I see them, but I don't know any good way to list them other than going through Category:Mega Man media one by one (a laborious task on dial-up). - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 03:03, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

I see. That's not ideal. The thought of going through that cat is intimidating. By the way, given your comment here, would you mind repeating it? This is still going on, even after both of our comments on AN/I and a comment I made at the user in question's talkpage. Jkelly 19:01, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

While you're doing fair use stuff...

would you mind taking a look at Johnny Depp? That many images seem excessive to me, but I'd like your thoughts on it. CovenantD 04:00, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

All of those images need to go. Promo photos of a movie are not acceptable save to illustrate an article on that movie, and we shouldn't illustrate articles about living public figures with fair-use images. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 04:05, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

Question regarding personal attacks

Despite that fact that his overall goal of achieving a consensus of moving the FS content to FS/ALLTP was achieved, ALLTP keeps re-inserting a sickening personal attack about me wanting to "kill all the jews". It's irrelevant to the discussion and based on absolutely nothing. My suspicions regarding his motivation about the page move are, on the other hand, directly correlated to his past attempt at deleting the page and his subsequent statements detailing his motivations. I earlier stated that I entirely objected to the move, but I have compromised and agreed to the move, so long as sourced, un-fan-cruft data doesn't get deleted. I don't believe that I deserve to be compared to Hitler by any means, especially when he uses me being suspicious of his motivations as an excuse to do so. The two aren't comparable by any means whatsoever. Can I get a hand here? Ex-Nintendo Employee 00:24, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

Diffs? I'd like to see the comments in context. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 01:57, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

Minomadam

Note to self: hack {{Pokémon species}} to make Minomadam work. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 16:08, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

Also, make {{Infobox Air character}} and {{Tenchi Muyo Character Infobox}} not suck. Plus any other template still using {{Oh My Goddess Infobox-Generic/Text}}. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 01:03, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

Oh, and credit Mark Newland (ahuxley in #alephone) for the M1 scan. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 07:26, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

Superman/Batman Edit

Please list your reasoning for deletion in the edit page. Thank you. --71.227.245.113 20:31, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

Deletion of what? - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 21:52, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

He means your revert of that link from Batman-On-Film. --71.112.65.153 19:16, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Organic growth

Did I miss some memo or something? What's with this organic growth thing going on in AfD lately? I can't figure out how a bunch of electrons can grow organically. *shrugs* Whispering 21:37, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sure what it means, frankly. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 21:51, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

Pokémon images

Should [Category:Pokémon images] be sorted into: anime, game (generation I-IV), character, cards, region etc... i find it hard to locate images. thx.Ragnaroknike 14:16, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

Um. If you want, I guess. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 05:05, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Iron Fist Image

Why do you keep deleting this image? The image was sourced as coming from a comic book and had a rational. What are you looking for specifically???? Do you want the exact issue?? It was also be nice if rather than just deleing peoples work you contact them with whatever issue you may have an fix it. I am seriously questioning your Admin credentials. FrankWilliams 21:22, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

The exact issues, yes. I even said as much when I tagged it the first two times. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 21:24, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

I agree with removing fair use images where possible, but you should always contact the uploader of images before deleting them. If you don't then you are likely going to cause more problems than necessary. Cheers, Localzuk^(talk) 21:29, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

I tagged it with {{nsd}} the first two times, and OrphanBot should've notified the uploader. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 21:30, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

Oh My Goddess! images

Here is what I hoped to do... This is somewhat a little history lesson. When I started writing about the series I wasn't even aware of the OVA, mini and manga series. I later realised that the series is too vast for a single person to write about. I simply didn't have the time to expand all AMG serries related articles. I have a mental idea on how I want to use each and every image. On occasions I "update" this when better images become avalible.

Let me explain, for instance Image:Keiichi Morisato (Oh My Goddess! Manga).png is very important to explain keiichi's extraordinary personality and extraordinary situation. Angels are the "other self" of the host. If you look at Urd, her angel has a black and a white wing representing her true nature. I can give more examples but dont want to spoil it :P

It is an excellent series, I highly reccomend it btw.

--Cat out 09:33, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

I am under the assumption that you are trying to work cooperatively. Is my approach flawed? Why wont you respond? Time is running out and a large number of images are going to be deleted for being orphans because of your actions. --Cat out 15:51, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

I understand the importance of the angels, and I'm not ignorant of OMG/AMG. Where were you planning to put the Keiichi/angel image in the article? I offered to undelete it for you on ANI. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 18:23, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

The thing is you caught me at a bad time. I am overloaded in real life so this decreases my productivity. I am also overwhelmed with the wikipedia panel I am working on. Furthermore, this entier issue had been most displeasant for me even though I know that was not your intention. All I ask is for you to understand this.

• What I planed on doing is explaining Keiichi's involvement on the Angle Eater arc and the later Demon-angel arc. These two after all are probably the most signigicant events through out the manga. The manga image would approporately go aroud there. I was hoping someone would write about all that as I do not want to do all thw work. Infact if you know the series you can do this. :)
• I have seen your ANB/I post. I'd rather handle the issue on your/my talk page. Both of us are aiming the guns at each other (metaphoricaly speaking), I'll be the first to put my hand off the trigger.
• Another issue is the existing orphaned fair use images which will be deleted very soon as a result of your modification to the template. I'd recomend restoring the multi-imaged version temporarily and going through the images one by one on my userspace since some of the images are used for material not yet covered such as keiichi and angel image above. It would be counter-productive to rush this issue or for the images to be deleted.

--Cat out 20:02, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

The problem is that fair-use images can't sit around until they're placed somewhere relevant. They need to be removed until they're made relevant and useful. While I can sympathize with real life intervening, the problem is that Wikipedia can't be an archive of fair-use images that might someday be used. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 20:05, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

The images are all relevant, I didn't randomly uploaded them. As for Keiichi's case, the image is approporate for being the manga version alone. I merely expressed my long term "plans" as you inquired, do not misinterprete my comments.

There is absolutely no reason why images cant be investigated on a case by case basis. Please take the necesary mesures to prevent their deletion. I do not have the time to mass write articles and I do not see the reason for the rush. Is wikipedia under attack?

So far you have comprimised nothing and to be blunt you have enforced your stance with the admin privilages you were given. All that makes it really frustrating for a seasoned editor as myself. I sincerely hope to see a cooperative enviorment, please pull your finger off the trigger unless you intend to fire.

--Cat out 04:35, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

You skipped the "placed somewhere" in the sentence above. Cramming four images into the infobox is not placing them somewhere relevant.

Yes, the images need to be investigated on a case-by-case basis. Get cracking! All you need to do is put the images somewhere relevant in the articles and we'll get started talking about individual cases.

There's no compromise here. All I'm asking of you is the bare minimum; these images can't be in the infobox, feel free to put them anywhere else. I haven't deleted any images save for one image that was unusuable and one image that I've offered to undelete for you if you tell me where you're going to put it. If you can't - or don't, or won't - do that, then the images will be and should be deleted, but I've done nothing to accelerate that deletion save remove some ridiculous galleries crammed into the infobox. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 04:41, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Can you offer a solution to the edit link problem? (weather its using divs and etc or not). That is why the images were inside the infobox. I can easly put the deleted image to the article but it causes technical issues.

One way to do it is to let the images be passed to the infobox yet place them outside of the actual infobox template. But I havent got the slightest idea how. Since you seem to be talented on dealing with templates, I am open to suggestions.

--Cat out 04:50, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Um. The only thing I can suggest is that you not use gigantor images in tiny section headings. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 04:54, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Done. As you can see, the edit link is broken. There is an easy fix for it, I can simply move the image down a bit but that isnt really a fix method I like. on different larger resolutions the edit link still will be misaligned and that bothers me like hell. --Cat out 04:59, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

You didn't put the image somewhere relevant; you just placed it beneath the infobox. This is not acceptable. You need to place the image alongside relevant commentary on that image. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 05:03, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Do you see the misaligned edit link? Forget about copyright issues for a minute. --Cat out 05:06, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Yes. The infobox is causing that. Nothing can be done about it. I'm fully aware that it can cause edit links to get pushed all over the place, but the fact remains that images go in the relevant parts of the body of the article and not crammed into galleries at the beginning or end of the article. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 05:08, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Since the probelm is identified I have moved the image to where it always appeared weather or not if it was inside or outside the infobox. It always appeared under Keiichi_Morisato#Personality as the angel is more than relevant to his personality.

You basicaly are complaining about where the image's wikicode appears, is that correct?

--Cat out 05:11, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

If that's where you want the image, it's staying deleted. The personality section doesn't say anything at all about the angel, let alone anything that needs to be illustrated. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 05:13, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

I expanded the section further using the material that was already on the article. That info was originaly with the "personality" section IIRC. Dont exactly know what happened there. As it stands I am not happy with that article and feel it needs work. --Cat out 05:25, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

It's less than ideal, but if you're planning to work on the article, I'll restore the image. At least it's somewhere relevant now. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 05:27, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

I intend to expand it. Please understand the amount of info I need to process is a manga that has been around since 1988. So this may take some time. --Cat out 05:47, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Arbitrary edit point

Now how do you suggest we tackle the edit link problem? --Cat out 05:49, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

We...don't? I don't see that it's in dire need of fixing. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 05:53, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

On the subject of primary source sourcing...

I'm aware of your (imo extreme) pickiness about sourcing, and wondered your opinion on the Final Fantasy VII featured article and it's use of sources. They do include gaming magazine references and an undergrad paper from Stanford, but the plot, setting, characters, and story are all referenced to the game itself. (A few references also apparently are derived from official databooks.) Further, as the game cutscenes are not a printed medium, they are actually referenced to notes in the article which give the quotations from the script used to back the article's description. (Bear in mind, this is a Featured Article.) Is this, in your opinion, an acceptable system of reference and verification? If not, would the sections be better left unverified? --tjstrf 02:09, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

I have a philosophy about primary sources. They're empty calories. They can be useful to flavor the staples (secondary sources), but you shouldn't be sucking them up when you can have something healthier (so, to use the video game example, if you can describe the gameplay using reviews or other similar secondary sources, do so), and they can't sustain anyone (an article that is sourced only to primary sources is probably describing a non-notable topic).

Does that make sense? - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 02:17, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

For notability, of course. For verifiability? No. From this example for instance, a magazine saying that Cloud was ranked as a first-class SOLDIER member is inherently less reliable than the game itself saying he was. The magazine authors just played the game after all, their memory is not certified as being better than the wikipedia author's is, and the wiki author could very well have typed the quotations while looking at the game window. (and no, that's not original research any more than typing the quotes in from a book would be)

The purpose of WP:RS is to ensure the accuracy of articles. In the case of real-life subjects, saying that scholarly secondary sources are the best is a perfectly good standard. We wish to strive for objectivity and neutrality and avoid subjectivity, so we attempt to avoid non-neutral sources like hate blogs or self-published information, and we wish to ensure that the people we cite know what they are talking about, so we cite scientists and governments rather than the National Enquirer. In the case of a fictional subject though, the fictional universe is not subjective, rather being objectively determined by the author.

In Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, for instance, mock turtle soup is made from Mock Turtle. Now, you could find a published cookbook, a chef, or some other citeable professional expert and discover that mock turtle soup is most definitively NOT made from mock turtle. But would it even make sense to cite that in the article on the Mock Turtle? Of course not. Instead you cite the book, which verifies quite nicely that within Wonderland, Mock Turtles are the basis for Mock Turtle soup. In an article on Wonderland, the professional chef is not an expert, instead, it's the Queen of Hearts. Or to be more precise, it's Lewis Carroll, speaking through the persona of the Queen of Hearts.

Basically, when it comes to establishing the real-world notability of a fictional article, I believe we should obviously stick to real world reliable sources. But when it comes to verifying the accuracy of a fictional article, I'll take the primary source over a 3rd party commentary anyday. The only thing I can think of that would be more reliable than the primary source for accurate information on a fictional universe would be a published interview with the author in which he explicitly stated a correction to the primary source. --tjstrf 02:56, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

However, you (accidently, I'm sure) ignored my second question. Which was whether or not using direct quotations from the game in reference tags was stylisticly acceptable, and if not what should be done with them. --tjstrf 02:56, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

I favor secondary quotes to avoid the inevitable evaluations that people end up making, where it goes from "Cloud is a member of SOLDIER" to "Cloud is an atypical member of SOLDIER". I'd rather cite secondary sources to avoid doing OR-ish editorializing, and this doubles as a hedge against speculation, OR literary analysis, and similar essay material. What using secondary sources instead of primary sources does is that encourages us to write summaries, because what is written about FFVII or any other fictional work is more likely to be a summary. That way we don't get undue weight on unimportant details, we don't push interpretive theories, and we just generally don't end up with all the problems you tend to see when personal observation is used as a source.

Part of this is an explicit rejection of "fictional universes." Not every work of fiction makes a "fictional universe," and exceedingly few works of fiction have aspects that are significant artefacts in the real world, independent of the works in which they appear. Superman has a life separate from the work in which he appears. He's appeared in many works in many different forms and media, he's a symbol of America and of DC Comics and of comic books and of superheroes, and there's a great deal said about Superman that is not description of the works in which he appears.

Contrast this with Disgaea characters#Laharl, the protagonist of Disgaea, a video game (and its spinoff anime and manga). Laharl, too, has appeared in a several games a manga, and an anime. However, the first game, manga, and anime are all telling different versions of the same story, and in the games after the first Laharl is merely appearing as a mascot of or reference to that first game. Laharl is a part of the first game; you can't talk about him without talking about that first game, and anything that is said about Laharl is talking about that first game. Most fictional characters (and nearly all fictional places and things) have no role, place, or being in the real world save as parts of the works in which they appear.

Once you start accepting "fictional universes," there's the natural desire to describe those universes as though they were...well, universes. People want to fill in all the corners, mistaking fictional stories for descriptions of a world. Disgaea (using my example from before) isn't a history, it's a story, and it's not a source for anything. Any summary of events, descriptions, settings, objects, that's all plot summary, even if it isn't in the traditional this happened then that happened then the other thing happened form. It shouldn't be mistaken for description of any thing.

As for Alice in Wonderland, my question would be, why are we noting the mock turtle soup pun if no reliable source has ever mentioned it? If a reliable source has mentioned it, iour business is to reflect what has been written about Alice in Wonderland instead of writing our own (however inane) personal observations. If no reliable source has ever mentioned it, then clearly it's a trivial detail that doesn't bear mention in an encyclopedia, which should be synthesizing secondary sources.

As for the Final Fantasy VII styling, I don't think it's ideal, but I also don't feel like it's a fight worth fighting. Final Fantasy VII is clearly a subject with a great deal of commentary in secondary sources, and I'm not going to fight with users doing a lot of good work synthesizing those secondary sources over the plot summary section.

Sorry that this is so scattered and rambly. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 03:22, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

On the subject of including fictional universe stuff as a whole, I might be inclined to agree with you if it weren't for the fact that the articles already exist, those that aren't are being written as we speak, and will presumeably continue to be written at an ever-faster pace. At some point down the road, we might decide to create some sort of official wikimedia project for covering fiction, or at an even more extreme junction we might even decide to speedy delete all unreferenced articles older than x days and deal with them that way. But until then, they exist, and they are in tremendously widespread use online. If you've ever looked at the top 1000 pages, you'll notice that there are at least a dozen character articles right there on the list.

You are never going to be able to afd everything, and doing it sporadically just annoys people. Especially in cases where the article that was deleted was well-written, informative on the subject, etc. The attempt at merging the information is often far worse than the previous article. As a particularly heinous example, the recently deleted List of attacks in One Piece was partially replaced by the god-awful Franky Schematics, for instance. Where the previous article was merely badly written and not referenced to an outside source, the new one is even more in-universe, speculative, far worse in its style, and equally ill-referenced. So while I support deleting some cruft articles, I only support deleting those cruft articles which are badly written, as deleting well-written cruft seems to me to be utterly counter-productive to actually improving the encyclopedia. --tjstrf 05:12, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Vandalism, hoaxes, vanity, ads, lists of quotations, directories, and image galleries are also being added all the time. No, I'm not going to be able to clean up everything, but that's not any reason not to keep trying. (I do have a windmill on User:A Man In Black/Cruft for a reason.) I convinced Deckiller (talk · contribs) that merging such articles is a good idea; from there he merged a great deal of Xenosaga cruft, and then went on to help found one of the most strongly mergist (and productive) fiction Wikiprojects around. Even if everything I've done with WP:PCP or in helping with WP:WAF or many other less-important cleanup and merge tasks didn't count for anything, then at least something good has come of trying to clean things up.

Usually I don't bother well-written cruft save to merge it up. There's always a worse case to deal with. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 05:30, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Source for image

I got the image as a screenshot from a video I had. I'm not sure how to write a source for that. Gdo01 02:33, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Today, I tagged several hundred images as unsourced. Which one is yours? - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 02:36, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Well I'm just asking a general question. The picture is a screenshot from a video file of an anime. Anyway the link is here Image:Chad arm2.JPG. I'm not sure how to source it. Gdo01 02:48, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

We need to know where the image was first published, in general. In the case of a screenshot of a TV series, we need to know what series, what episode, and who took the screenshot. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 02:52, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Well I know the series and episode and the screenshot taker was me. Do I just put that under ==Source== Gdo01 02:55, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

You got it. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 03:23, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

David King

Here's an idea. Instead of tagging and deleting the trivia, why don't you add it to the main article yourself? You appear to know you're way around Wikipedia, so what's your malfunction when it comes to actually doing the things you want done? Gamer Junkie 05:28, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Because if I were to dig into those RE articles, you'd see a bunch of those articles turn into redirects pointing to summary prose describing the cast of playable characters in Resident Evil: Outbreak. I'd really rather not get into another huge project before finishing some of the current ones; I've only been aggressively tagging stuff with TMT since a discussion on excess trivia in WP:CVG. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 05:31, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Excess trivia? Four points? Not exactly a "huge project". The reason they are trivia points is because they are relevant to the character, but don't fit anywhere into the main article. Trivia is hardly frowned upon by all Wikipedians, and those who have proposed its removal could be considered as doing little more than adding unnecessary "information creep". The anti-trivia article has only existed since May, and appears to have garnered very little from actual Wikipedia editors. Leave trivia alone, AMIB, it's about time commonsense prevailed over bureaucratic nonsense. Gamer Junkie 05:53, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Cleaning up the hojillion articles for every minor RE character, object, creature, place, and concept would be a huge project, though, and I haven't even finished with Mega Man X characters (let alone the Pokemon character merges I keep putting off).

Trust me, trivia sections have been discouraged for a good long time; just go ask on FAC about that. Read WP:AVTRIV; it's not about bureaucratic nonsense, but logical organization. It's not useful or attractive or desirable or encyclopedic style to have generic catchall sections; put the info that is worth having somewhere relevant. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 05:59, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

It is entirely irrational. Not to mention that this comes from your anti-triva page itself: "This guideline does not suggest deletion of trivia sections. Instead, consider it a list of "facts pending integration" or "facts lacking sufficient context for integration". Seek to minimize it, but meanwhile leave it in place as a raw store of facts for both readers and editors to work with." - Wikipedia: Avoid trivia sections in articles Not only has it been minimized to almost nothing, what is left can only be described as "facts lacking sufficient context for integration". The trivia section passes every stipulation for remaining in the article. Not only this, but if you are unprepared to add the information yourself, it should be left as a raw store of information for other editors to work with, just as the guideline proposes. Now that you have a guideline expressly suggesting that it remain, that's eight less articles you need to worry about. You can thank me later. Gamer Junkie 06:16, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

So minimize the rest of it. Either add the context to integrate them or remove the subtrivial bits. If you spent as much time cleaning up those pages as yelling at me they wouldn't look as awful as they do. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 06:19, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

That's rich, coming from you. Have you looked at the history, Just what the hell do you think I've been doing? Sure as shit not proposing deletions and mergers like some people around here. I cut half-a-dozen points just last week in several Outbreak articles and still I see "too much trivia" tags uglying them up. I already told you, it's not subtrivial and this is obvious. If you're going to be completely belligerent about this, I'll change the damn section name to "miscellanea", as this is perfectly acceptable and does not classify as trivia. I wasn't expecting you to compromise on this issue, anyway, as you don't seem to understand the meaning of the word. Gamer Junkie 06:31, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

This is time you could be spending working on articles, instead of distracting me from same. If you'd like me to better explain the logic behind WP:AVTRIV or the common practice that led to its creation (which I didn't have a hand in; I don't usually fiddle with policy pages), I'd love to. If you're here to needle me, I don't need that kind of headache, thanks. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 06:33, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

By the way, changing the name of the section from "Trivia" to "Miscellanea" doesn't really solve the problem. The problem is that there's a section of random facts, arranged in no particular logical way and offering little value to the reader without being placed in context. Renaming the header doesn't really fix this problem, unless you rename the header to something narrower in scope. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 06:37, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Fine, you don't want to discuss this, I'll say it straight up.

Policy suggests that it remain, it's a raw store of information. You don't like it, and you're not prepared to accept that this trivia is acceptable, that's your problem. Leave it alone so that I can get back to cleaning up the remaining Outbreak articles. Gamer Junkie 06:43, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Policy suggests that it remains until it can be added to the article. No harm in leaving it for the time being, but don't plan on leaving ugly trivia sections behind indefinitely, please, and don't remove the tags as they do need to be integrated at some point. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 06:46, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

No, they don't. I'll leave your tags alone, but the points do not need to be added to the bulk of the article. I see why you hate them so much, you've got some sort of obsessive-compulsive neatness disorder, don't you? I specifically messed up my last post to see if you would correct it, even though this action would serve absolutely no purpose whatsoever. You did. Don't let your personal issues with neatness and order obstruct the construction of articles and information that will benefit Wikipedian readers. Gamer Junkie 06:56, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

*sigh* You realize that "I hate cruft" thing was added as joking revenge vandalism by someone else when I put a picture of a bear on someone's userpage, right? (Before that it was "It's all a bunch of hippy tree-hugging crap!") There's no hatred here, just some basic editorial standards. I'm not sure what you're reading into this, here; I clean up my talk page all the time so I can read it.

I assume you want to make well-referenced, informative articles. 99% of the policy and guidelines are merely advice from experienced users on how to do that. (The other 1% is the foundation covering its ass or basic protections for users or republishers.) WP:AVTRIV is a recent creation, but it's a good idea from long-standing practice at WP:FAC.

One problem with having a trivia header is that it attracts crap. We differ on what's useful to an article, but we both agree that speculation, rumor, personal analysis, coincidence - that sort of nonsense doesn't belong here. Unfortunately, trivia headers often attract that sort of garbage.

Another problem is that it's usually the worst place to have a given fact. Take, for example, "David has no known friends or relatives in Raccoon City. True to his reputation as a "lone wolf", besides his interaction with Linda and Carter, he has no relationship with any other character throughout the series." Why wouldn't that go under #Background? It's certainly part of his background. More-relevant places could likely be found for all of the bullet points in all of the articles, unless they're garbage (like all the "such-and-such character might be based on such-and-such celebrity!" speculation).

If it would help, I'd be happy to do this work on an existing article to give examples, explaining in detail in edit summaries or on talk where I moved each thing and why. I just haven't really fiddled with those articles because I'm working on something else, I have a whole list of things to do when I'm done with this, and to really do those articles right I'd have to replay RE: Outbreak and I'd rather gargle thumbtacks. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 07:10, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

??? I have no idea what this "I hate cruft" stuff is that you mentioned. Regarding articles, I wish to make articles which serve an informative purpose, regardless of guidelines, stipulations, policies and other garbage obstructing the creation of a truly informative article. The fact of the matter is that you are telling people what's informative and what isn't. Yes, trivia can accumulate lots of rubbish, as can just about any article, but I have "David King" on my watchlist, and speculative rubbish that is added is always removed by myself or one of several others who watch said article. I didn't re-write the whole thing just to have it ruined by vandals and original researchers. The lone-wolf point I left out because it would be exactly as it was in trivia, no more, no less, and I couldn't think of any better way to put that point across than the one that already existed. Obviously, you think this is wrong, wheras, I don't see a problem with trivia at all, hence the reason it was still there. Like I said, you wish to add the points to the main article, go right ahead, I won't stop you at all. Simply removing the information serves no purpose. Trivia may attract rubbish, but that should be expected on a site that anybody can edit, it doesn't mean the truly factual points should be removed, especially because one person decides that this would be best for all, that is no way to conduct a free contribution site. As for explaining your decisions, there is no need. I understand what you are saying, I just can't understand why you are tagging these articles if you are already working another project. Perhaps you should have another administrator appointed who can focus on the project in question or simply trust those who are already working it to make the proper additions. Gamer Junkie 07:35, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Well, the speculative rubbish about the celebrities lasted a long time, as well as some speculative rubbish about his comments being a hint about RE4, so I still have some reservations. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 07:39, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

I did not remove either because I couldn't prove the information right or wrong in either direction. King does look like Til Lindemann or whatever his name is, and I didn't know if he was actually based on him or not. The RE4 point is entirely true, not referenced, but was apparently mentioned in a limited bonus DVD created during RE4's production. I do not know the name of this DVD, nor have I heard it mentioned regarding this specific point, although I have heard it mentioned (in regards to overall gameplay) by members of the team on blogs and other visual material, so I didn't touch, due to the fact that I figured somebody would come along who would own the DVD in question or have seen it. They did the same thing with another game, asked for a reference to a specific point which contained none. Just so happened that I could reference the point in question and did so. We shouldn't immediately assume that things that sound credible are not just because they have no reference YET. Especially when I know that they are true, but cannot reference the point. Gamer Junkie 07:55, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

If you can't source a claim but suspect it's true, tag it with {{fact}}. If you can't source aclaim and don't know if it's true or not or suspect it isn't, just remove it. A relevant quote from Jimbo:

I can NOT emphasize this enough. There seems to be a terrible bias among some editors that some sort of random speculative 'I heard it somewhere' pseudo information is to be tagged with a 'needs a cite' tag. Wrong. It should be removed, aggressively, unless it can be sourced.

Sources are of utmost importance; an unsourced claim on Wikipedia is of no more value than something scribbled in permanent marker on a bathroom stall door. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 07:59, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Very well, I could do that. But the question remains. Do you intend to entrust the maintenence of these articles to myself and Alexlayer, appoint a new administrator to monitor the RE section, or do you still intend to delete the factual trivia points? Gamer Junkie 08:05, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Um. Being an administrator isn't like that. I wasn't planning to do anything to those articles any time soon, and, well, administrators don't "oversee" articles other than the same way everyone puts articles on their watchlist and does their best to make them not suck. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 08:08, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Anytime soon... decidedly ominous. I'll handle it, you stick to your X-Men articles or whatever. Gamer Junkie 08:18, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

DUN DUN DUN

I was fiddling with one of Capcom's other exceedingly long-live franchises, actually. Funny timing; I was merging stubby/crufty articles on minor characters in a Capcom franchise just as you brought up RE: Outbreak articles. Funny timing, no? - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 08:21, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Are you a sadist by any chance? You seem to get some sort of perverted pleasure from the torment of others. Gamer Junkie 08:27, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Ah say, ah say, that was a joke, son, a joke, yah heah? - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 08:31, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Humour is difficult to interpret in text form. But yes, hilarious. Gamer Junkie 08:34, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Canadian or English? - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 08:36, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Australian, actually. Gamer Junkie 08:37, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Huh. Oh well. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 08:42, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Hi

How do you become a admin- I wanna be one- at me school!

By first becoming a well-respected and established editor. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 22:47, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Batman template

You're right. Removing the dog makes more sense than adding Spoiler. Doczilla 00:16, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

Heh. Actually, when I was fooling with {{The Batman}}, I added both of those for, like, five minutes myself; I understand the temptation, but they just don't belong. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 00:19, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

Andrew Jackson Jihad

Please review this newest AfD, your opinion would be appreciated. PT ^(s-s-s-s) 00:42, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

Plot summaries

Your analogy does tend to work; FFX, X-2 and FFVIII were the first to really attempt to strike a balance, and they have reasonable plot sections for the level of detail in those games. Even FF6, FF7, and FF4 have decent lengths, considering what they are. Chrono Trigger, however, is only half as long as most final fantasies; thus, its plot summary shouldn't suffer much with a 400-500 word reduction (or at least to the length of FF8 and FF10). Nevertheless, my major problem is when people are ignorant either way; as editors, we should go by what is generally accepted in the community (and what's best for the readers); if it changes a lot (like with plot summaries), that is when balance kicks in, and that is why Ryu and myself had a great system going. What are your more detailed and general thoughts on the "length" situation (Ex's comments aside, as I found his arguement to be more on citations, and the fact that he missed the whole point of those citations). — Deckiller 03:21, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

Well, right now, they're poorly formed. I know these plot summaries are too long; it's the details of how to shorten them and to some extent when is too short are still vaguely defined. The last time I did a plot summary I just punted; I didn't do any point-by-point rundown, just a vague overview of the main plot elements. I think that might be the ideal style, but I have no idea how to do it many articles nor any idea how to source it. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 03:30, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

I disagree that Final Fantasy 8 and Final Fantasy 10 and X-2's plot summaries are too long; as an editor and a person who experiences the pulls of "too long" and "too short" in the trenches, I can safely say those are an ideal balance. But Chrono Trigger/Cross, FF6, probably FF7, and maybe FF4 are all a bit long for a compromise. 20 percent reduction on all that should calm most people at least enough. Punting as you said it is a good idea, but it seems to never stay (I used to "punt" a lot as well, and look where it got me on my quest to make numerous featured articles). In using your analogy, I'd say the ideal style to follow is a 10 minute summary of a football game; it's not documentary length, nor is it highlight reel length; it's just right. — Deckiller 03:40, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

"They" is the articles I've looked at. I haven't looked at VIII or X or X2 lately. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 03:45, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

Those articles were the first of the bunch to be featured, and they all have plot summaries roughly 60-70 percent of Chrono Trigger's. — Deckiller 03:49, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

• I've been looking at the FAC pages, and honestly, I think what we ultimately need to do is to let things run a natural course and forget superficial things like length; people have complemented all these articles, and I've had people in real life enjoy the articles, so perhaps we are overanalyzing this issue (as editors tend to do). — Deckiller 03:55, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

  It's not something I'm massively worried about at the moment, granted. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 09:41, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

• Quite honestly, the length of our article plot summaries could be worse - some inclusionists want to see seperate subpages for plot synopses! It's only really a small group of people who obsess over the length. I think the concern at hand is taking care of the cruft articles; length is a superficial element, especially when we argue about those which were featured and critiqued by Wikipedia's elite. — Deckiller 11:38, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

MJ-12 Document Removal

Dude, you might find yourself getting increasingly 'yelled' at because you rampage articles without first contributing to an existing discussion on those articles. Your removal of the MJ-12 documents, which had previously been hosted on the page about them, is fine and good, as that's what three of those of us working on that page had agreed to, but we'd agreed to put them in Wikisource, with a link at the bottom of the page, since clear transcriptions are hard to come by (and some of us had put a lot of time into editing those). Could you kindly revert your change temporarily, copy that text with its formatting, and host them in Wikisource with a link? Or at least explain your oh-so-autonomous decision on the MJ-12 talk page? Thank you. -- Kosmocentric 20:21, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

I would be happy to if it were necessary. However, it's not. Click the "history" link at the top of the page, then click the timestamp of the older version you'd like to view. This lets you see any version of the page that has ever been posted. Now, if you want to see the source wikitext of an older version, do all that then click the "edit this page" link.

As for why I deleted it, well, we don't keep source documents here on Wikipedia. I see, on talk, that this has been pointed out in the past. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 21:32, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

Mediation

The Mediation Committee has received a request for formal mediation of the dispute relating to Example. As an editor concerned in this dispute, you are invited to participate in the mediation. The process of mediation is voluntary and focuses exclusively on the content issues over which there is disagreement. Please review the request page and the guide to formal mediation, and then indicate in the "party agreement" section whether you agree to participate. Discussion relating to the mediation request is welcome at the case talk page. Thank you, [signature]

I urge you to reconsider your rejection of mediation. Otherwise I suspect the edit wars between you, I and others will just get worse. -- Y|yukichigai 02:50, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

You realize this is the second time you've ever commented on my talk page, right? You may want to ask me what I'm doing and why before using a (mostly inactive) dispute resolution page. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 02:51, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

I should point out that the very top of your talk page instructs people to talk to you concerning article edits at the article talk page. I have done this. Repeatedly. I think this last bit of edit wartacularness is evidence that the discussion has gone nowhere. Hence the mediation request. -- Y|yukichigai 02:55, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

Additionally, what do you have to lose by agreeing? -- Y|yukichigai 02:57, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

Let's talk here, then, since this isn't just about Deus Ex. (RFM is a big pain in the butt, frankly, and it's fairly inactive.)

WP:V is paramount. Our foundation is the sources we use, and articles are only as useful as the sources we use. No amount of being interesting or being useful or being popular or being well-liked or handwaving or vowing to revert until a page goes to AFD can overcome that. You're going to see me removing unsourced claims pretty much on sight, with the notification that the claims are problematic being the removal itself. I will warn you now; if it's not a trivial claim (with trivial claim being interpreted in the narrowest possible fashion) and it doesn't have a ref tag next to it, consider it tagged for removal. While it's reasonable to make a an exception for cases where there's such a massive body of work on the subject that referencing it is superfluous (grass is green, birds have wings, usw.), I don't work with many articles like that and we're not talking about articles like that. I freely acknowledge that I'm not omniscient in this respect; feel free to revert any such thing I remove citing a lack of sources as long as you provide a reliable source to support the assertion.

Similar to this is how I feel about advertising. We're not here to be the first people to report on something. While we may have other lists of mods with nothing but a brief description and a link, that isn't a reason to keep even more advertising links. If a mod is so noteworthy as to be mentioned in reliable sources independent of the mod's makers, then by all means let's write an article or article section based on those sources. If there aren't any sources, why are we allowing the mod's makers or fans to use Wikipedia as a sandbox?

This is only tangentially related to issues of plot summary/setting detail, which is a separate discussion (although expect me to be saying "nontrivial coverage in reliable sources independent of the subject" a lot). - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 03:10, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

Your use of admin rollback on Deus Ex

The use of admin rollback in content disputes is strongly discouraged. Please limit your use of admin rollback to clear-cut vandalism. If my edits were construed as vandalism (which is false, the removal of unsourced information is not to be considered vandalism), a warning must be posted to my talk page, too. If you can't justify posting a warning, you, frankly, cannot justify using admin rollback to revert my changes. 138.130.165.178 09:09, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

Hmmmm. Blanking the plot summary. I dunno, pretty sure there's nothing wrong with using rollback on that. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 09:11, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

Removal of unsourced information is not vandalism. The plot summary was unsourced. Therefore the blanking of the plot summary was not vandalism. I provided appropriate description of the purpose of my edit in the edit summary. 138.130.165.178 09:13, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

Addendum: Checking your edit summary for that edit, I would strongly encourage you to reread your policy on personal attacks. Calling me a troll is un-called-for. You have no evidence to show this. Please show a little decorum in dealing with me. 138.130.165.178 09:14, 19 October 2006 (UTC)