User talk:Tony Sidaway

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Transclusions in userspace cause widespread liveware compatibility problems; massive noise issue. Recommend disabling entirely.

-A bug report I considered filing on Mediawiki's Bugzilla

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Help me to reduce the disfiguring effect of jargon on Wikipedia discourse. Whenever you are tempted to use POV as a word, consider using one of these alternatives: biased, slanted, subjective, tendentious, opinionated, one-sided, non-neutral, partisan, unfair, poorly framed, unbalanced, partial, ill-conceived, promotional, polemical, distorted, advocating, prejudicial, skewed, unrepresentative, imbalanced, apologetic, inequitable, weighted (please add to this list)

This is both my user page and my talk page. To find out more about me and what I do, click on the icons in the amazingly cool navigation bar above. Click here to leave a new message.' Please contact me by email if you are blocked from editing: minorityreport@bluebottle.com

Statements and evidence in Aucaman RFAR

When you opened the Aucaman RfAr on 29 March, you left out several statements previously made on the WP:RFAR page, including my own ( [1]) and Zora's ([2]) defending statements, and several of those made against Aucaman. Is there any special meaning attached to this? Will it be okay for the authors to re-instate these on the new page? I myself plan to re-submit a new version on the evidence page anyway, but I'd very much like to have Zora's statement preserved for the Arbcom's consideration too. Also, in my earlier statement, I had argued for widening the case to a larger group of participants, on the grounds that Zmmz' role is that of a spokesperson of a whole group acting in concert against Aucaman. Can this still be done, will it be okay if I include evidence to that effect too? Thanks for your advice. Lukas ^(T.|@) 07:23, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

From memory, I think I was following the new practice of moving to the case page only statements that appeared to have been made by people listed as parties to the case. However there is no hard-and-fast rule about this, it's just a rule of thumb that we use to try to keep the case page relatively uncluttered. Zora's statement is on the talk page and will almost cetainly have been read by arbitrators, especially as he's a well known, experienced editor whose judgement is generally trustworthy. But I'll move your statement and Zora's to the main case page just in case. --Tony Sidaway 08:42, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. Sorry, I hadn't actually seen our statements had been on the talk page all along. Lukas ^(T.|@) 17:04, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

And to answer your other question, if you include sufficient evidence on the evidence page the arbitrators may decide to widen the case. You can also put proposed findings of fact based on that evidence on the workshop page. --Tony Sidaway 20:38, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

Email

I sent you one...--MONGO 09:42, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. I read it and replied. Meanwhile I see that someone has posted about this on wikien-l. --Tony Sidaway 10:17, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

Basij again

ArmanJan deleted well sourced info on human rights issues at Basij twice [3], [4] and vandalized the talk page. You told him to stop on Talk:Basij and on his talk page, which he deleted, as he did with other complaints.

Now he removed a photo claiming it to be a "well known" forgery, giving no evidence or source - the photo's authenticity has been falsely denied before [5], [6]. As the article is on attack by others too (e.g Databot) I checked ArmanJan contrib's: He put wrong PD related tags to several imgs [7], [8], [9]. He vandalized Talk:Military_of_Iran (a reasonable post by an anon) and Talk:Islamic_Revolutionary_Guards_Corps. As far as I can tell, his img uploads mostly have misleading licensing infos. Some others noted this on his talk page too. All in all he should get a stern warning. It's tedious to watch after that article. --tickle me 06:02, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

What Do you Advise on this?

What would you think about the wisdom of posting a discrete link to this notice at the very page top Wikipedia:WikiProject_Stub_sorting/Proposals, and how do you like the concept? Something in a box saying See this New Notice (Flashing lights and sirens wouldn't be enough as far as I can see!)

• what other actions might be in order- RFC, VP, Adds at head ends of CAT:CAT. The utility and desirablily seems self-evident.

Sigh! Back to content edits! Best regards, FrankB 20:48, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

In the skin that I use, Cologneblue, the categories of a page are listed at the top right hand side of the page--this applies both to articles and to subcategories. If you check a category page in the skin that you use, you will probably find that the parent category is listed somewhere. --Tony Sidaway 01:20, 13 April 2006 (UTC)

• Thanks. Yeah, I've been using the default (name unknown), which buries them way down the bottom. I'd never even noticed them in wikiP outside an edit screen until I got back last month, so browsing with them couldn't happen. Makes me wonder how many users ('customers'? i.e. not editors) are missing the same thing. Perhaps the default ought to be 'Cologneblue'.
• Sorry for getting excited and reinventing a wheel I'd not seen. Probably part of hitting the 50's--my eyes have been a real pain for all close work until Friday when I got a computer prescription bifocal, so I can even read hardcopy and work on the screen w/o switching between glasses. It's been a trial this past two years. I've lost track of how many complaints I've made to webpages for using such small fonts when they didn't scale up font sizes using IE6. At least our software works for all browsers that way.
• I think I'll try out the skin! Sorry to have bothered you, though someone did note that listing the Main article or articles would be useful thing, and in fact seeing some Cats like that was what inspired the idea when looking for a way up the tree. I've annoted that below the original post with 'Egg on Face' subsection reflecting the point, especially for long Cat pages, the explicit note up high also makes some sense. I'll have to explore the presentation of all the skins.

Best regards, FrankB 04:54, 13 April 2006 (UTC)

On the Above again, More Egg

Oops: I apparently didn't save the edit to the Category page... Here's the current note just posted:

I apparently never saved out on the edit I was recommending. It should have looked like This example or when polished for presentation and organization, the current: Category:History of Canada . Apparently too many open browser windows, or the like. Apologies (again) FrankB 21:36, 13 April 2006 (UTC)

For Fuddyduddies

Hi Tony. Recall when I originally joined wikipedia and I created the Seven Samurai 20XX article as my first contribution...? I've gotten around to creating its subpages and expansion, and I'd be feel quite gay if you could take a look at it and provide some feedback on how far its come. -Zero^Talk 01:11, 13 April 2006 (UTC)

Seems good. --Tony Sidaway 01:20, 13 April 2006 (UTC)

Well I spied your comment on the talkpage, and I decided to go back and finish what I started. I think its lovely I did, too. Could you leave an update of any other qualms you would prefer ammended on the talkpage...? I feel the combined editting skills of you and I could really make something. And why is that surprising...? Its a wiki. Please feel welcome to assist. -Zero^Talk 01:25, 13 April 2006 (UTC)

east sea

hi, would you mind taking a look at East Sea? thanks. Appleby 01:34, 13 April 2006 (UTC)

Chavez boxes

Why did you delete the userbox on Chavez? Politics in Venezuela are polarized along pro- and anti-Chavez lines, so they were no different from any other userbox expressing an opinion. Tjss 15:44, 13 April 2006 (UTC)

In general I think the expression of such opinions constitutes an unsuitable use of the transclusion mechanism and particularly of the Template namespace. I deleted a pro- and anti-Chavez userbox because they happened to catch my attention and they clearly fall under the "divisive" criterion of the T1 CSD. You should feel free to describe your opinion of Chavez on your userpage if you think this will help other editors to understand your edits, but it would probably be better if you simply strove to avoid importing your personal opinions into Wikipedia in any form. --Tony Sidaway 16:04, 14 April 2006 (UTC)

That's ridiculous when you're talking about a user page. Most of the userboxes available express opinions, including everything from the Basque seperatist movement to being a Vegan to being an Athiest. If you don't believe me look at the userboxes under "Regional politics" or some other category. I am recreating the boxes. If you disagree, start a VfD or bring it to the arbitration committee. You don't get to unilaterally delete things; THAT is Wikipedian policy. Tjss 02:25, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

An opinion please.

If you have a moment, could you take a peek here? My instinct is to revert it as unfounded opinion (NOR?), but I want to seek a more experienced opinion before acting. Thanks. --InkSplotch^(talk) 03:42, 14 April 2006 (UTC)

I'd suggest that you copy those words to the talk page and query them. There may be a source for this--Pratchett or Gaiman may at some point have acknowledged drawing directly on The Omen. I don't see it myself but it's about fifteen years since I read the book--which is not one of my favorites. If nothing is forthcoming by the end of the Easter weekend, remove the words from the article until someone can source the statement. The copy on the talk page will still be available for editors to work on. --Tony Sidaway 16:08, 14 April 2006 (UTC)

On the above, I'm familiar with Practchett, and it seems likely owning about half his works— pretty good at comedy though. I'd advise searching some of the web forums specific to sci-fi community, or perhaps start in B&N and Amazon reviews of books (this will likely turn up immediately if reviewed there). I think he's in Baen's Bar, or would hope other discussions in online communities would lead you to right place. OTHO, why not just use {{fact}} and {{disputed}} and post a note on both the (users) talks that the statement needs supported. Ahhhh Two edits total, I see now!

(This co-posted to user talk:InkSplotch before closing this edit) FrankB

Thanks for the advice, from both parties. It appears someone beat me to it anyhow, but I think I'd have gone for Tony's suggestion. Using {{fact}} and {{disputed}} seems a bit cold before I've made any attempts at direct communication. I'd rather drop a note on the article talk page, or that user's talk page, first.

For my own research, I find lspace.org a good resource, and of course the author interviews linked from there or neilgaiman.com. Terry Pratchett doesn't contribute to Baen's Bar, only because (so far as I know) he's never been published through Baen. I'm not as certain about Gaiman. I think the confusion lies in a few homages to The Omen found in their book, but then it's full of homages to many sources, books, movies, and more.

Anyhoo, enough babbling here. I wanted to post to say thank you (and because this is where I started the conversation, I tend to keep editing in the same spot - tho I appreciate the cross-posting).

--InkSplotch^(talk) 22:08, 18 April 2006 (UTC)

If I can trouble you for a little feedback

You are cordially invited to pick on Frank:
(Beats handling problems!<G>)
re: Request some 'peer review' (Talkpage sections detailing concerns)] on new article: Arsenal of Democracy This post is being made Friday 14 April 2006 to a double handful (spam?) of admins & editors for some reactions, and advice (Peer Review) on this article, and it's remaining development, as I'd like to put it to bed ASAP. (Drop in's welcome too!) Your advice would be valuable and appreciated. Replies on talk link (above) indicated. Thanks! FrankB 18:53, 14 April 2006 (UTC)

Chap rape

According to our rape article, Eurpoean rape of a male subject from a female is apparently acceptable:

Under the Sexual Offences Act 2003, which came into force on May 1, 2004, rape in England and Wales was redefined from non-consensual vaginal or anal intercourse, and is now defined as non-consensual penis penetration of the vagina, anus or mouth of another person. The changes also made rape punishable with a maximum sentence of life imprisonment.

Although a woman who forces a man to have sex cannot be prosecuted for rape under English law, if she helps a man commit a rape she can be prosecuted for the crime. A woman can also be prosecuted for causing a man to engage in sexual activity without his consent, a crime which also carries a maximum life sentence if it involves penetration of the mouth, anus or vagina. The statute also includes a new sexual crime, called "assault by penetration", which also has the same punishment as rape, and is committed when someone sexually penetrates the anus or vagina with a part of his or her body, or with an object, without that person's consent.

I cannot possibly comprehend the European concensus for the inclusion of that law. Anyone should be charged with rape for not following the obvious morality issue of violating another's body. Apparently European law confroms itself differently than the rest of the world's common sense. That is so far over the mark that I had difficulty believing it when I first read about it. I regard the actions of the prosecutors in this case as quite inhuman. It certainly should not happen in UK law, which treats other cases of direct infanticide altogether more sensibly in my opinion.

In the common American courts, (such as the case of 1998), almost all courts and of the world's majority thought this unlawful.

Glad I live my safe Japanese home. -Zero^Talk 12:54, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

Our articles on this subject aren't very good. The Sexual Offences Act, 2003 provides for up to ten years imprisonment on conviction following indictment for sexual assault (touching an unwilling person in a sexual manner when one doesn't reasonably believe that he or she consents). The Act also makes the defendant liable to life imprisonment if the assault is penetrative (in the case of a man, this would involve penetration of the anus with any object or part of the body).

The act also extends the meaning of rape to include penetration of the mouth with the penis without consent. In the Sexual Offences Act 1976, the law of rape only applied to vaginal or anal penetration. --Tony Sidaway 13:57, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

That's good to hear. If you look at the recent acts of rape, Male rape has risen, and while its still in the lower percentage in respective comparison to male on female, its some cause for concern. I suppose in 1976, the English merely made an assumption of only the female sex being rape victims. However, a bit of time passage, and lots of goodwill, and the law has become more respectible in this regard. Thanks for putting my qualm to rest. I was fully knackered after my late-night essay construction last night. Seeing this piece of information sent me into full rant mood today.

When I recover some free time, I'll do more research on this subsection, and we can put our heads together again. -Zero^Talk 19:39, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

Happy Spring celebration / Easter (as your preferences and beliefs dictate)

Here's hoping that if the bunny leaves you any beans they're this kind! ++Lar: t/c 15:36, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

Top of the page/jargon

Given that your second statement refers to a reduction of jargon, I was wondering if you realised how jargony the first statement on your page is? I have no idea what it says. The juxtaposition is actually quite funny; it certainly does strengthen the second statement. Guettarda 19:54, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

Yes, the first statement is an in-joke, so it's a bit exclusive. Fortunately it's of no great consequence to the running of Wikipedia. --Tony Sidaway 23:28, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

RFC against Messhermit

Hello there! Due to College, I'm being a little bit busy with some other topics besides Wikipedia. My question is: I have a RFC against my person, and I want to know if there is some sort of time limit to present my other side of the story. Thanks! and I'm really waiting for the answer. Messhermit 14:54, 17 April 2006 (UTC)

You mean the arbitration case Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Messhermit? No, it's okay. I suggest that you leave a message on the talk page of one of the more active arbitrators, say User talk:Dmcdevit, explaining that you'll be too busy to contribute properly. They can, and would probably be willing to, shelve the case until your return. If you're not going to be editing Wikipedia for a while, then there is no urgency, and there are other cases they can get on with in the meantime. If you don't get a positive response, come back here and I'll see if I can help. --Tony Sidaway 18:25, 17 April 2006 (UTC)

Hello Tony. I find Messhermit's request very strange. Please consider the following points:

• This Arbitration concerns Messhermit's behavior toward me, as you can read on the Request for Arbitration page and the Evidence page.
• The Arbitration Committee considered the evidence and opened the case on April 7.
• From April 7 to April 17, Messhermit has been very active on Wikipedia, as you can see on his public User contributions page.
• During all these days, Messhermit has been particularly active in the article about the Cenepa War. Please see the History Page, where he proceeded to add a {{NPOV}} tag (and be rude to others who wanted to remove it) [10], [11], [12], [13], to remove entire sections of it (including links to references) [14], [15], sometimes replacing it with new data [16], sometimes not. [17]. Some of Messhermit's comments toward me and other in the Talk Page have been very rude and uncalled for [18], [19]. Interestingly, this article (which was mostly written by me) was quite stable until I requested the Arbitration.
• All of a sudden, Messhermit says he is busy.
• Messhermit has had enough time to put into question the validity of this Arbitration (a "political trial" based on conveniently presented evidence, as he calls it), and to ask for support from third parties [20], [21].
• I have my daytime job, so I am busy too. Still, I found the time to present my evidence in detail. That is because I sincerely believe that Wikipedia has rules and procedures to deal with these problems.
• It looks like I have had to undergo all this without responding in kind, and then see how Messhermit asks for a postponement of the Arbitration (whatever the results are).

Like I said, I find all this very strange. In view of the evidence presented here, I would like to ask you to please let this Arbitration to continue as normal. I think this issue between Messhemit and myself cannot go on indefinitely. Best Regards -- Andrés 03:53, 18 April 2006 (UTC)

I think I have valid reasons to doubt that Messhermit is being sincere on this request. As you can see, he is quite active on Wikipedia: [22]. I don't know what's going on here. Andrés 04:02, 18 April 2006 (UTC)

Bgully

well, Adam88 (talk · contribs) is the only sock I can think of right now; of course he'll create others. I didn't want to block him myself, since 'legally' he more or less sat out his year's ban, and would be an editor in good standing if he actually did edit articles; as it is, he's reduced to bitching about me and my "clique" in irregular intervals, so yes, I think you can block him on grounds of that; he is not as great a nuisance as other trolls I could mention, but there seems to be no reason why he should stick around just to add to the noise ratio around here. regards, dab (ᛏ) 08:11, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

lying to protect wikipedia

You realise that I don't see anything wrong with doing this? In some ways I would be rather dissapointed if people didn't at least lie by omission (much better to say we have a load of effective anti vandalism measures in place rather than outlineing the ways around these). In fact that is pretty much the intention behind WP:BEANS. The probablem is aside from any issues of people steping outside their powers or whatever we have an inconsistancy. WP:OFFICE powers are not needed to block vandles. Admins have delibertately blocked the whole of AOL before now so it isn't needed for range blocks etheir. That is why I was considering the posibilty that the vandalism was to a degree at least a cover story.Geni 19:12, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

Jeff Merkey at it again

Removing sockpuppet banners from proven sockpuppet accounts. [[23]]

And he's removing comments informing him he shouldn't be removing sockpuppet tags from his own page, claiming harrasing dialogue. And yes, I left the comment, but other than that, haven't touched his pages --Jerry (Talk) 22:49, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

Danny and Eloquence

You say that I adopted a dictatorial tone towards Danny, which is quite true. To my mind that reflects the seriousness of what is going on here. Erik followed Wikipedia policy. For doing that he got banned and desysoped. There are few more serious things that can be done within a community like this. The creation of the Dannyisme account is a positive step towards making sure this does not happen again, but it is not enough so far as I am concerned. I see no reason why Danny's ordinary account should have access to any powers of those above a normal user after this incident. If anyone else had done something like this they would have been permanently banned but we do need Danny in his Foundation capacity.

I see from previous parts of Danny's talk page that similar concerns have been raised in the past so this is not exactly unprecedented in subject area. What is unprecedented is the incredible abuse of power that has taken place. David Newton 20:59, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

Danny

Nor is this the treatment we, and particularly Eloquence, deserve. Danny is more than welcome to quit if he can't handle the stress of people wondering why he is randomly protecting pages on gimped versions without citing the Office Action policy. Or maybe he could simply say it's an Office Action, and remove all doubt and concern. --Golbez 22:13, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

A Thoughful Request

Dear Tony,

Thank you for removing the stalkers from WP. It's been relaxing to work on Cherokee and Native American articles without the harassment. However, four of the users are still here and their conduct is not going to stop. If they come near my talk page or engage in any more harrassment, I would appreciate them being warned and if this fails, handled appropriately. One of the users still has a banner on their user page they are here for stalking and harassment and this is MediaMangler (talk · contribs · logs).

The users are:

• MediaMangler (talk · contribs · logs)
• Vigilant (talk · contribs · logs)
• Jerryg (talk · contribs · logs)
• Friendly Neighbour (talk · contribs · logs)

I know who all these people are and their identities, and I can tell you three of them work for competitors of my business interests and one of them appears to simply tag along with the others.

I would like these users to be banned from my talk page since all they do is post flame bait and harassment.

All of these accounts are SCOX members who came to the site originally for the sole purpose of stalking and libeling me. They are simply not going to stop until someone stops them. I have discussed the postings of these users with Danny and he has requested I send me a complete listing in writing of the materials I feel are inappropriate. My response was to have Fred Bauder review the article in question and make edits perhaps with assistance from other ARBCOM folks. I am going to stay away from my bio and after doing a lot of soul searching about myself, I can clearly see why WP:AUTO exists. It's just not possible to be neutral about your own autobiography. I did communicate to Danny if there were items in the article I objected to, I would use the same approach Jimbo uses which is to post clarification to the talk page. However, I consider myself under a self imposed ban on any edits to the article in question. I noted Nicholas Turnbull is walking away. I have mixed feelings about it, and I also am not neutral on this topic, so I have no comment to make that would be helpful there. Thank you for your help in making WP a better place for everyone to contribute. Sincerely, Sint Holo 22:55, 19 April 2006 (UTC)