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the "hiring" process for new wikipedians aka editors

There's a rumour on the internet, that the best thing to do when hiring somebody, when you want to minimize WP:BURO, is this:

1. publicize complex full-page job-description (doing this properly requires effort by the employer... but it is a one-time sunk cost for getting the right kind of hires)
2. ask for CV, sent as email attachment, require CV-contents be specifically tailored to said job-description (negligible employer-effort)
3. for all submissions, ignore, except for sending a bot-automated-reply, directing candidate to answer several very hard questions (negligible employer-effort)
4. ideally, create an online quiz-slash-survey form, which can be computer-analyzed, auto-grading multiple-choice questions, grammar-check plagiarism-check grade-level-rank essay questions, etc (one time sunk cost... and online-pre-interviewing app can be re-used on future job-openings and thus the cost is amortized)
5. apply the same automated-analysis-checks to the CV contents (grammar/plagiarism/gradeLevel), plus keyword analysis (one-time amortized cost)
6. finally, now that the computers have done most of the work, and the obstacles have filtered out the weak, the hiring-manager can sit down with a *prioritized* list of candidates, for human review

The overall goal here, is to put together some infrastructure up front, and then end up with a very short list of excellent candidates at the end, for the human-effort-required CV-by-CV stage#6. The follow-on stages, where you phone-screen and then do in-person (or in-video-chat) interviewing, are then dramatically more efficient, because almost no Bad Eggs will even make it over the obstacles. Reminiscent of the plot for Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. See also, Philip Greenspun who insisted that all employees be able to install and configure a multiboot Linux flavor, install and configure Oracle, solve several challenging MIT-undergrad-level programming problems in SQL and Tcl, and submit the answers to an automated quiz-grading-website. *Before* submitting a resume. I think this test was applied to secretaries and janitors, not just sales and marketing folks. (As for programmers and sysadmins... *of course* they had to pass with flying colours!  :-)

  Two questions arise, here. First, I've had folks tell me with a straight face, that the hostile wikiCulture which drives most new contributors away (and burns out many old-school ones into retirement) is actually a necessary evil. Learning wiki-markup to perfection, memorizing the five bazillion WP:PG, spending a few hours to grok talkpage-etiquette (and our bizarre unique communications-forest-fire namespace-proliferation), and providing cites for every *new* sentence ever added... despite millions of sentences from 2006 which have no cites but have WP:CONSENSUS to stay... those are the obstacles that filter the truly Good Eggs, from the timesinks. Do you agree that we ought to "hire" new wikipedians this way? Or are we doing it wrong?

  Second question, WMF is currently hiring a new ExecDir, and (per "X is an organisational problem" perhaps) failing to actually get the hire accomplished in timely fashion. I've got some scheme that may be useful... or at least, diverting as a thought experiment... have you any interest in the new ExecDir, and more generally, in whether or not the wider volunteer community should help with slash have input into the hire? Thanks for reading, apologies for the wall-o-text, it is my disease. Or, if you like, consider it a preliminary obstacle, to see whether you can handle my style of collaboration.  ;-)   — 74.192.84.101 (talk) 15:10, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

I think I pass this obstacle ;). On the general example: I actually had to hire four people about seven months ago in my official capacity (the new Community Liaisons!) and I found myself pretty much reversing the traditional process. If I get 40 candidates and spend an entire hour evaluating the C.V. of each one, checking it for stupid, comparing it to the other C.V.s in an attempt to narrow down the pool, so on and so forth, I've used up an entire week of formal work-hours...and I do have other work to do. So my trick was that when people applied I'd ignore their cover letters and C.V.s entirely, because having a pretty C.V. is actually a really small barrier to cross, and send them a series of problem questions. If their answers were good, I'd read the C.V. and/or set up a screening interview.

Thinking about it, this is probably a good illustration of the tendency we have as Wikipedians to stick a load of high barriers up in front of new contributors; it makes sense, if you're looking at it from the perspective of someone inside the system, because you want the "candidate" to have to do all of the heavy lifting - all of us are editors, but not all of us enjoy painstakingly tutoring newcomers through the many minutae of Wikipedia's rules (and by gods is there a lot of it). So I think the status quo is understandable.

As to whether I think it's necessary - again, it has some advantages, most prominently minimising the work on the part of the current community. But I don't think it aligns with how people work and learn. Wikipedians don't come here as Wikipedians, they come here as people interested in fixing a typo or adding a reference or including something they heard the subject of an article say about themselves on the Daily Show. They have very little attachment to the site as editors when they first join, which means a very small incentive to learn a ton of stuff about it - why do I need to know how to cite sources? I was fixing a typo! So I think this approach is probably driving away a lot of people, not because they're bad lessons - they're good ones! - but because they come at a time when people don't necessarily consider themselves Wikipedians and so have no particular motivation to learn as a result. The lessons have to be learnt, but spreading it out so that people have to deal with a thousand small things in sequence instead of ten big things at once would probably work better.

On the new ED; anything you want to do or help with would be most appreciated :). The hiring committee is comprised of good people - I'd suggest you email Gayle (gyoung at wikimedia dot org) or Kat (kat at...you get the picture) with it, since those are both the people I know are involved and the people I force to listen to me ;). I can't peer into why the hiring hasn't been done yet, but I suspect it's just down to probability: whenever you hire a new ED you end up looking for someone who is as good at the existing person in all their strong areas (or better), and also good in all their weaker areas. That's easy when you're replacing someone poor at the job, but Sue isn't - luckily for us, and evidently unluckily for the hiring committee ;p. 19:32, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

Congratulations, you pass! That said.... <evil grin> Dear $reader, thank you for taking the time to answer. I have not yet looked at your reply sent on $date ((kidding!)), but if you will consent to look over these[1] hard questions ((ctrl+f "perhaps we should open an RfC")), please send me your solutions, and I'll review your full record later.  :-)   And yes, I knew about the four new hires, that's where my internet rumours came from, of course.

  Enough about ExecDir stuff. As for the subject of enticing *new* editors to join, I think the solution is pretty simple — we need to make wikipedia fun for the first 99 edits, and friendly generally. Low learning curve, low frustration curve. People that make it past their first 100 edits will be nearly WP:ADDICTED... *then* we can force them to memorize WP:PG, cite their own damn sources, sign their own damn posts, and all the usual editor-abuse.  :-)   Fixing a typo is less common nowadays; too many wiki-tools and autobohts. Most folks come here to create an article, on their friend's band or their boss's company most commonly, anecdotally speaking. But yes, agree that the timing of the lessons is critical... we need to spread out the pain, rather than template-spamming beginning editors as soon as they arrive. That means that WP:BURDEN will have to be revised, to defer a bit more to WP:BITE.

  My question is, what key criteria do we want to seek-slash-encourage? Thick-skinned yet polite (pillar four), freedom-loving (pillar three) && anti-bureaucracy (pillar five), intelligent (fluent is gravy) && cares about quality (pillar one), pro-fairness (pillar two) && anti-cheating (anti-bad-guy), persistent (mandatory) && beboldo (mission). Is my list incomplete? p.s. Jon Stewart is pretty awesome, I must admit. Did you see when 5'8" Stewart debated 6'3" Bill OReilly, and Stewart had rigged up a motorized-height-enhancer under his own side of the stage? Classic. 74.192.84.101 (talk) 21:54, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

I did; it was pretty good, although I remember walking away slightly disappointed that it wasn't a more substantive debate - I'm used to him being a bit more debate-y than comedic. I agree it'd be nice to give some freedom before we turn the screws: recently I've been playing Wurm Online in my limitless hahahahahahahahaha spare time. One of the features that stuck in the mind, and something a lot of games have, is a special area where you can safely learn the basics of the game, one by one, before being released into the wild, without experienced users showing up and bashing your head in with a mace. Wikipedia isn't a game, and it's not something we can just apply here without any thought given the public nature of most of our actions, but like games editing is meant to be enjoyable. Might want to be the sort of thing we investigate.

From my POV those criteria look quite good, although I'm not sure I'd rate thick-skinned as necessary (depending on the nature of thick-skinned). If we mean "able to distinguish criticisms of a work from criticisms of the author", absolutely, that's a necessary thing. If we mean "able to deal with incredibly rude or grumpy users without batting an eyelid, it'd help in the current environment, but in some ways it'd help perpetuate the current environment.

Sorry for taking so long to respond - I got distracted by data visualisation. Bah. Ironholds (talk) 00:38, 31 December 2013 (UTC)

Yeaaaaah, whatever... nice try, but WurmOnline != DataVisualization. <heh>  :-)   Agree that listing thick-skinned helps ... I would say 100% necessary ... in our current wikiCulture, but I also agree that requiring thick-skin-ed-ness would tend to make non-friendly-by-default a permanent "feature" since there would be little impetus to solve a not-really-a-problem-thing. So maybe it should be, basically-nice-and-able-to-stay-polite-while-dealing-with-rudeness-but-deeply-hates-institutionalized-unfriendliness? It's a bit of a mouthful, but thick-skinned-yet-polite isn't quite what we should summarize that as. "Dealing-with" is intended to mean sincere forgiveness of minor etiquette breaches, gentle calming reminder of first major offenses, immediate brief-and-non-punitive-block for second and all subsequent offenses. (I would support one hour as the first block, mandatory doubling the duration for each additional block... half-a-dozen blocks in a strict-pillar-four-enforcement wikiCulture is a 32-hour warning... a dozen blocks means a three-month-wikiBreak... two dozen blocks means perma-banned.) Anyhoo, I'm trying to write up a one-page WikiJungle Survival Manual, when I get a rough draft I'll ping you, if you like.

  As for taking too long to respond, WP:DEADLINE applies as always; I do greatly appreciate your help, and I'm totally okay with it needing chronological gaps. There is one thing that I'm trying to get WP:TIAD activity on, which is the ExecDir scheme... but rather than email Kat and Gayle my personal recommendations, I'd like to open up the nomination-process on-wiki. Ahnoneemoos and I are planning to propose a bangvote-for-your-favorite-new-ExecDir-nominees, probably on the enWiki VillagePump. I agree that the committee is mostly failing to find a chop-chop replacement, due to probability-of-well-matched-candidate-that-is-actually-available... I see the on-wiki open-nom as purely advisory, a way to increase the nominee-slash-nominator-sample-size... to help the committee if they want it, or for them to ignore it entirely if that's Doing The Right Thing.

  The committee is good people, but even counting unofficial help from Jimbo and SJ, and direct person-to-person advice from the other folks like yourself, we're still talking a dozen core contributors and a few hundred advisors... whereas enWiki has 30k active contributors, and methinks at least a few thousand of those would be interested in throwing a name into the on-wiki hat (even if just a snarky self-nom :-)     Which leads to a couple questions: one, is open-nom actually a Good Idea do you think, and two, if so, are you interested in helping me hammer out my modified approval voting scheme and/or helping data-process the vote-counts each weekend? If not, no prob, of course. HTH. p.s. Happy proleptic gregorian increment. 74.192.84.101 (talk) 13:33, 31 December 2013 (UTC)

And a happy proleptic gregorian increment to you! Mine hasn't yet started (the wonders of moving to the West Coast - I get a shock when checking the BBC website at bleary o'clock, to be informed that new years eve has already happened). I agree with you on the thick-skinned part; maybe it's just basic self-awareness we're looking for - the ability to go "I have to tolerate this, because it's how things work, but I shouldn't have to tolerate it".

Re the ED search; I don't actually have any involvement in it (well, other than submitting a note in...March? Explaining what I personally thought we should look for); I'd really advocate reaching out to Kat or Gayle to have a conversation about any kind of on-wiki !vote or advisory process or whatever - I don't want to fool people into putting a lot of effort into something when the formal decision-makers are utterly oblivious that it's going on ;p.

Truthfully speaking, I kinda expect the formal decision-makers will want plausible deniability, just in case the on-wiki open-nom comes up with TOTALLY STUPID answers, so that the cmte can ignore the whole thing and later say we-never-knew.  :-)   They don't need plausible deniability, they have WP:IAR, of course. Anyhoo, I'll zip them an email as you suggest, my friend and I have not posted anything to VillagePump yet, but there is a rough draft of sorts.

  I don't expect the on-wiki bangvotes to be binding on the WMF cmte's decision, and I don't even really expect they ought pay it much heed, unless the results of the on-wiki open-nom turned out to be useful. Lots of factors indicate that the on-wiki thing must necessarily be purely advisory, though, most important one being candidate-availability-slash-willingness. We can *nominate* somebody like Linus Torvalds to be the new ExecDir, but maybe he has some other stuff to work on, Finnux or something, rumour has it.  ;-)   p.s. Yes exactly, the I-can-tolerate-hostility-for-now-without-getting-grumpy-but-I-will-work-to-fix-it-so-wikipedia-is-truly-friendly-someday, that's the attitude/capacity I think we want to encourage. WP:ICTHFNWOGGBIWWTFISWPITFS, for short. 74.192.84.101 (talk) 18:03, 31 December 2013 (UTC)

Dmitri Jurowski

Can you be of any help here, regarding the above mentioned article. I think the bot might got misinformation. I don't want my auto-patrol rights to be revoked again simply because of a bot accusation of copy right infringement. Many thanks, for any help.--Mishae (talk) 19:38, 28 December 2013 (UTC)

The bot was correct, and that article is an obvious copyright violation. This version of the article, which was the version tagged, is a blatant sentence-for-sentence close paraphrase of this website. The bot was correct in flagging it, unless you're making the unlikely claim that the Bolshoi's official website is actually ripping off Wikipedia. Mogism (talk) 20:55, 28 December 2013 (UTC)

Hold on, here. In Mishae's defence I wouldn't describe it as close; if you actually read the duplication detector report it's clear there's a lot of rewording, albeit on a sentence-by-sentence basis. Ironholds (talk) 21:02, 28 December 2013 (UTC)

Really? I'd consider this a textbook piece of Wikipedia:Close paraphrasing, and at a minimum is obvious plagiarism and almost certainly close enough to constitute a copyright violation, since Wikipedia operates under US law and US copyright law is based on the doctrine of Substantial similarity. Mogism (talk) 21:07, 28 December 2013 (UTC)

Let's see if MRG has thoughts on this; she's better in the field than I am. Ironholds (talk) 21:30, 28 December 2013 (UTC)

I think user Mogism have never seen a defective bot, therefore I will forgive him. I, however, need to mention that his last sentence borders with legal threat, just because you are clean as a feather, doesn't mean that you can accuse people of plagiarism. What Mogism need to learn, is that Wikipedia does allow certain copyrighted material under certain condition. For example, copying facts, will not be considered copyright violation. Like, you can't paraphrase the name of the institution, right? I wont point out where I read, since its obvious. Furhermore, if a bot is so correct, then why he mentioned that I copied it from one site not from two? Aha! The bot is WRONG.--Mishae (talk) 02:08, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

Er. What? Mishae, you don't seem to understand what a legal threat is. Saying 'it's a copyright violation' is not a legal threat; 'it's a copyright violation, and if you don't remove it I'll sue you' is. Facts cannot be copyrighted, no - the way in which facts are presented can be, assuming it passes the test of originality. As said, I've reached out to Moonriddengirl (our local copyright expert) for her advice on this. In the meantime, there's no need to patronise Mogism (particularly when they don't deserve it), and no particular need to argue. Ironholds (talk) 02:29, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

Mentioning of substantial similarity sounded a bit like a legal threat, but please except my apologies if it sounded differently in everyone's ears.--Mishae (talk) 06:09, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

FWIW I've come to agree with Moogism, here; the sentence structure is very, very close. Ironholds (talk) 19:31, 29 December 2013 (UTC)

Don't know what does the first 4 capital letters of your post mean, but someone have edited the article and now it looks a hair bit different. Feel free to edit or comment on it.--Mishae (talk) 03:57, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

"For What It's Worth". It does now look different, but I agree with Mogism that the initial version, at least, was a problem (I haven't the time to review the current version in-depth right now). Do you understand what was wrong with it? Ironholds (talk) 06:38, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

I've made a few changes as well, but I admit that copyright isn't my specialism. Doesn't the bot compare the version that was current at the time the Duplicate Detector Report was created? Would we be able to get around the problem by deleting the first version in retrospect, or is that not allowed? Deb (talk) 12:10, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

Mishae has asked for my input in this conversation. First, Mishae, if somebody says your content seems substantially similar, that doesn't mean they plan to sue you or even have rights to do so. Only the copyright owner has the right to pursue infringement. :) Phrases like "substantial similarity" are useful in evaluating content to ensure it is compliant with our own policies, as well. We need to make absolutely sure that we do not infringe on copyrighted work, which has the potential to do a lot of damage to copyright owners and our reusers.

(Beyond that, I want to be sure we're clear that copyright issues and plagiarism are different things. If you're interested in knowing the distinction between them, I wrote a bit about that in 2010 at Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/News/August 2010/Editorials.)

In terms of the specific article, I've looked at the earlier version and the source, and I think what you've run up against here is a common and good-faith issue in paraphrase - you've clearly put an effort into the rewrite, but you are working sentence by sentence which means that you will retain much of the structure. Creativity in writing does not rest solely in the words used to convey information, but also in the facts chosen and in the order they are presented. When you're working with a biography, a degree of similarity is certainly to be expected, since you're dealing with biographical information in chronological order, but when you follow so obviously closely on one source, you can run into problems, particularly where the information you choose to spotlight is content they have subjectively spotlighted as well.

Wikipedia:Close paraphrasing discusses some ways for avoiding structural similarity, generally by blending together information from multiple sources on the same subject. Adding information that is not available in the major source you are using is one way to avoid structural similarity - the more the better. :)

User:Deb, we can delete the first version, but I don't think it's necessary. I agree that there is some close paraphrasing, but I don't think it's so egregious as to require revision deletion. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 13:51, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for your input. Deb (talk) 14:04, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

Thanks everyone for your efforts to edit the article and bring it to a much better version. As far as copyright stuff goes, one thing still lingers my mind: I know that threatening to sue someone here is against Wikipedia policies, but at the same time our Wikipedia:No legal threats policy says something that rather confusing:

If you make legal threats or take legal action over a Wikipedia dispute, you may be blocked from editing so that the matter is not exacerbated through other channels. Users who make legal threats will typically be blocked from editing while legal threats are outstanding.

So it sounds like that people can get blocked for legal threats but if it will actually happen, Wikipedia will just shush the user with a block and in the mean time continue to operate even if there will be some serious violations (that's how I paraphrased so that the matter is not exacerbated through other channels in my head). Mean time, the term outstanding implies that Wikimedia Foundation will cover any legal dispute if it will happen, and at the same time might maintain an unfree material. If I am misinterpreted something, please let me know, I am just a bit confused right now, and only guess what it means. And yes, Ironholds, besides the above questions, I pretty much got what was the issue. However if you will be kind to explain to me the above guesses of mine, I might even get the full picture. Regards,--Mishae (talk) 00:54, 31 December 2013 (UTC)

"Outstanding" just means "going on". It's actually far more simple than it sounds; editors who sue other editors or threaten to do so are regularly blocked to avoid the threatened (or actual) lawsuit having a chilling effect and allowing people to get their way just by threatening a lawsuit. This block will last until the legal case is closed or dismissed, or until the threat is withdrawn. Ironholds (talk) 01:40, 31 December 2013 (UTC)

Maybe people need to rephrase it just like you said, "going on", instead, "Outstanding", (I think I might not be the only editor that get confused by it). It will maybe safe on the headaches and useless guesses (like in my case). By the way, happy New Year, year of the Horse, may this year bring you less disputes and more articles!--Mishae (talk) 18:32, 31 December 2013 (UTC)

((edit conflict)) Mishae, here is what I grok of the full picture. Agree that rephrasing to say "outstanding/ongoing" would prolly be an improvement.

1. "people can get blocked for legal threats" ... yes, with the caveat that "A polite report of a legal problem such as defamation or copyright infringement is not a threat"
2. "if it will actually happen," ... to be concrete, say User:OwnerOfSomePublishedManuscript shows up and says "74 you must immediately delete SomePublishedManuscript or I'll sue WMF and yourself and your little dog too"
3. "Wikipedia will just shush the user with a block" ... that was a crystal clear legal threat, so User:OwnerOfSomePublishedManuscript would be blocked from further posting on-wiki (the person behind User:OwnerOfSomePublishedManuscript is blocked from on-wiki posting... but can still contact the WMF via the official channels of email/IRC/telephone/snailmail/etc)
4. "and in the mean time continue to operate" ... correct, the on-wiki world would continue as if nothing happened, in theory. In practice, the blocking-admin (or somebody) would go ahead and check SomePublishedManuscript for COPYVIO... but the check, and the possible subsequent CSD/AfD/etc, would proceed *quietly* and without anybody making legal threats on-wiki
5. "even if there will be some serious violations" ... there are a few possibilities here. Let's make a new list for them.

Legal threats were made, ohnohz, and UserOOSPM did not back down, ohnohz, so an NLT-block was put in place, ohnohz. What happens now?

1. Scenario: SPM-article *actually* doesn't infringe. WP:NLT-block was thus proper. UserOOSPM can request an unblock, if they realize their error.
2. Scenario: SPM-article actually *does* infringe, but quickly got deleted. Again, WP:NLT-block was still proper: UserOOSPM should have POLITELY REPORTED the problem, but instead they decided to make DIRECT LEGAL threats, and then refuse to back down when warned. As above, once UserOOSPM understands their procedural mistake, they can request an unblock, of course.
3. Scenario: this is the scenario you are worried about, where SPM-article actually *does* infringe, and nobody deletes the SPM-article, because they mistakenly believe it doesn't infringe (but in this scenario that is presumed to be wrong). What happens? Well, simple: UserOOSPM contacts the WMF via email/IRC/phone/snail/etc, complains to people that are getting paid to handle exactly that sort of complaint (many of them lawyers), and the WMF takes action. WMF can delete SPM-article, by fiat, per the "Foundation actions" policy/TOS. UserOOSPM can then request an unblock.
4. Scenario: so what about scenario four, where the blocking-admin doesn't delete SPM-article, and the WMF-contact *also* doesn't delete the SPM-article? Well, in that case the human behind UserOOSPM really will have to take the WMF to court, or at least, really will have to serve the WMF with paperwork about intent. Only once the lawsuit is *permanently* settled (i.e. nothing "outstanding" aka ongoing), can UserOOSPM then request an unblock.

In the meanwhile, on-wiki everything goes on as usual... but for it to get all the way to an actual scenario-four-lawsuit, there are a *lot* of people that have to screw up: 74 the accusee, $admin who blocked, the bangvoters at the AfD for the SPM-article, the OTRS-contact that fielded the email, the WMF lawyer who analyzed the complaint, and the Great Jimbo who can at any time swoop in and exercise founder syndrome and delete the SPM-article persoally.  :-)   The whole NLT thing *is* confusing, but the key is to see the distinction between politely reporting a potential problem (which is encouraged) versus wildly throwing around hostile accusations (which is preventatively-not-punitively blocked). Hope this helps. 74.192.84.101 (talk) 18:55, 31 December 2013 (UTC)

Another question, it might sound dumb, but I never heard of Wikipedia actually getting sued? Well, maybe besides that case where they shut down the whole service in Bahrain (I think), where someone tried to push some POV, and it turned out that the whole Bahrain had only one IP address and Wikipedia needed to compensate the damages of that either 2007 or 2011 miss treatment of the case, from admin side. Personally, I couldn't find the link, therefore, I can't confirm any legal cases, but maybe someone is knowing about it. By the way, happy New Year, year of the Horse, may this year bring you less disputes and more articles!--Mishae (talk) 19:57, 31 December 2013 (UTC)

I forgot to thank the anonymous user for explanation, less worries now. So, what you are saying is that Wikipedia have their own lawyers, but I never heard of a company that actually have their own lawyers, I wont say its illegal though. However, we have guidelines on Paid editing and yet at the same time Wikimedia Foundation can hire lawyers and (ofcourse) pay them? I know that maybe they don't go hand-in-hand but you probably getting the line between the two. Last question, about scenario #4, you see, in most cases, articles get deleted at the AfD not due to copyvio but mostly because they don't meet certain criteria, such as notability for example, could it take months years or decades for a copyvio article to be deleted if it will infringe anything?--Mishae (talk) 20:07, 31 December 2013 (UTC)

In order, the Wikimedia Foundation has their own lawyers, which is perfectly legal. They don't edit Wikipedia, they represent us in court if we're sued, which does happen. They don't represent individual editors, however. If an article is a copyright violation it's normally speedily deleted, which is very quick. Ironholds (talk) 20:33, 31 December 2013 (UTC)

O.K. Problem solved, thank you all and happy New Year to you and other fellow Wikipedians, new and old alike!--Mishae (talk) 22:32, 31 December 2013 (UTC)

New year, new questions

O.K. So, I decided to see what's going on with other musicians, and found out that Leon Bates article have a suspicious tag. It says that its require cleanup (as of February 2012), but no reason have been specified (which means that the article doesn't require clean up). The question is: If there is no need for clean up, then should I remove the tag, per confusion, so that other editors wont stumble on the same what's this thing?--Mishae (talk) 04:56, 1 January 2014 (UTC)

A lack of specification does not mean it doesn't need cleanup; it just means the editor who left the tag didn't necessarily put all the effort in they should've ;p. Reading it, I can see quite a few issues. Off the top of my head:

1. The lead is a colossal puff piece.
2. "the heart of philadelphia" is a meaningless cliche;
3. The article is filled with peacock words, editorialising and biased content. Ironholds (talk) 05:10, 1 January 2014 (UTC)

O.K. I cleaned up the article a hair bit, and put the orange tag, both POV and OR. I hope I chose the right ones?--Mishae (talk) 08:06, 1 January 2014 (UTC)

Those seem fine. What made you think the original tag was 'suspicious', exactly? Ironholds (talk) 08:42, 1 January 2014 (UTC)

Because it had far more issues than cleanup, and to be even more precise, such cleanup tags are used grammar issues, too short or too long leads. But this one had non of those, other than biased content (which puts it into more POV/Original Research range). If its necessary, I can introduce the cleanup tag too, only it will be merged with the other one. Why use multiple tags if you can summarize the article issues in one big one? Another thing to mention. after my cleanup, I decided that the cleanup tag might be unnecessary. It still needs POV/Original Research clean up, but I don't have time now. Maybe by February I will be free from writing articles on Russian classical musicians and singers, (might get bored), and I will be happy to run through that and maybe other orange tagged articles. :)--Mishae (talk) 14:50, 1 January 2014 (UTC)

No, they're not; cleanup covers any non-deletion-worthy problem where there isn't an existing tag (or where the user simply wants to note that there are problems, and specify them in text rather than in a mass of tags). Ironholds (talk) 02:10, 2 January 2014 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Sex and Crime: Oliver's Strange Journey

Apparently, this is a book about an immigrant to the United States. A cautionary tale, perhaps? Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 05:05, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

I've never been convicted of a thi- I mean, ah, yes. More seriously, if DGG of all people wants to delete it, it's probably going to go ;p. Ironholds (talk) 05:16, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

If DGG says a book isn't notable, chances are about 99.99% that the article is gone. The dude is like, robo-librarian. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 05:42, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

Is there something here that I have failed to realize? DGG ( talk ) 19:16, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

Not to my knowledge? I'm immigrating, my name is "Oliver", and Jim has a terrible sense of humour ;p. Past that, merely a reflection that you and I come from different philosophical backgrounds when it comes to content, and so in a situation where we both agree, it's likely that it represents a fairly wide swathe of people. Ironholds (talk) 19:43, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

Speedy deletion nomination of Mohammed Khadeer Babu

Hello Ironholds, I dont know why you think "Mohammed Khadeer Babu" is a Promotional Article. He is a reknowned writer in Telugu Language, which is largely spoken in Part of India. you can find some of his books Here. More of his details are available in Telugu Wikipedia Here. He doesn't belong to any promotional event. I Request you to withdraw your deletion proposal of this article and give some more time to add more details of him.--సుల్తాన్ ఖాదర్ (talk) 14:09, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

I appreciate he's renowned and notable, but his article was also filled with WP:SPAM. The tone taken was completely inappropriate, and it came off as an attempt to promote him rather than write neutrally about him. User:Jimfbleak is the admin who deleted the article; I can't actually un-delete it, so you may have to ask him. Ironholds (talk) 19:45, 5 January 2014 (UTC)

stats

Hello Ironholds, Kudpung recommended me to you over at WT:PERM, and you said you might have a chance to do some stat-gathering-work the weekend of the 4th/5th in your volunteer persona. If you will have a look at WP:DEADLINE and also WP:REQUIRED, methinks they will say, at least, judging by the names they will say, that making me wait until next year is very very naughty on your part!  :-)

  Oh wait... uhhh... hmmmm. They don't say that at all. So nevermind, sorry, ignore that previous paragraph. Anyhoo, I'm really more interested in learning how to gather stats myself, if that is possible; I don't know R, but I'm handy in other languages. I'm not sure I have the access needed, but it seems plausible that some API calls for this sort of thing may exist. Do you know who is behind reportcard.wmflabs.org ? That is why I picked 5/mo and 100/mo in my question, because somebody already wrote something similar. Thanks for your help, and thanks for improving wikipedia. 74.192.84.101 (talk) 13:28, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

No problem! So, the reportcard is the WMF Analytics team's responsibility - using metrics that match theirs is probably A Good Thing. I can think of a couple of ways for you to do it at your end. The first is API calls, as you say; you can experiment around with Special:ApiSandbox until you get something likely lookin'. While I haven't used it for this purpose myself, I suspect you'd be looking for something like retrieving the recentchanges feed, crunching it and calling each user who has more than 5/100 edits back to the API to check their user rights - not particularly pretty, even if it's possible (and I can't confirm it is). Alternately you could request access to Tool Labs, which has copies of the production database all set up for queryin' (minus the sensitive data, of course). That's probably faster to do once you've got access, and more useful for future thoughts or work, but it might take some time for them to set up (again, not done it - I've got access to the production slaves, so haven't needed to - and so I don't know their setup times). Ironholds (talk) 19:37, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

Okay, for starters I will try and play around with the API calls, and see whether I can create some answers myself. There is a page which lists all ~6000 reviewers already, so I can pull those in bulk without using the API. Scarfing through the past thirty days of recent-changes may outstrip my 500-API-calls-per-day limitation as an anon, but we'll see... perhaps the API calls can return 500 records in a bunch, like the edit-history. Where can I ask programming-the-API-questions, informally, if I get stuck? There is WP:VPT, but it does not seem geared toward that kind of thing. Also, is there any point in learning R for the API calls, if not this week, then some week? I know it is possible to download enWiki dumpfiles, and if I get curious enough, I might try to set up my own s1-analytic-slave locally. Danke. 74.192.84.101 (talk) 22:02, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

The dumpfiles could work, but they're rather outdated and I don't know what data they contain (db tables or text dumps, for example?). I'd recommend #wikimedia-tech or #mediawiki if you use IRC - I confess to not being familiar with too many on-wiki venues for code, although the API documentation at mediawiki.org is pretty good. Ironholds (talk) 22:59, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

The dumpfiles are mostly meant for setting up local wikipedia-content-caches, methinks; not sure if they contain SQL-friendly db-tables. I've downloaded a current-dump before (i.e. the most-recent-revision of every mainspace article ... but no talkpages or edit-histories). It is also possible to download the full-dump-sans-images, and I *believe* there is a meta-only-dump which contains *just* edit-histories... that would prolly be what I need. As for the other thing, I believe that there *is* no on-wiki place for discussion of API stuff, prolly per WP:BEANS. I'll try the IRC thing, thanks. 74.192.84.101 (talk) 12:51, 31 December 2013 (UTC)

Well, my progress has been negligible. Stuck in a maze of twisty little passages, all alike.  :-)   Did you happen to mess with anything this past weekend? Danke. 74.192.84.101 (talk) 07:44, 6 January 2014 (UTC)

Only this, which is interesting but not really Wikipedia related. I'm hoping to do some blocking-related stuff next weekend. Ironholds (talk) 08:02, 6 January 2014 (UTC)

Blocking related stuff, eh? That must be some kind of codename for your strange journey not-at-all-interesting, straight-and-narrow-in-every-way, boring venture into banality. Yes certainly, yea verily, glad we got that cleared up. <grin>   — 74.192.84.101 (talk) 11:32, 6 January 2014 (UTC)

Hey, it answers the question "what do users get blocked for". That's kinda interesting, if only to me ;p. Ironholds (talk) 18:21, 6 January 2014 (UTC)

Proposed deletion of OjAlgo

Thanks for taking the time to review that page. I removed the tag and added comments to the discussion page. It would be helpful to have a bit more of a discussion about what merits notable for niche scientific subjects. Depending on the results of that I might modify some other pages. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Pabeles (talk • contribs) 00:46, 6 January 2014 (UTC)

@Pabeles:Actually, notability is nothing to do with google hits; it's to do with coverage in reliable, third-party sources (books, journals, that sort of thing). Has OjAlgo been substantively discussed in such works, to your knowledge? Ironholds (talk) 00:48, 6 January 2014 (UTC)

@Ironholds:Was just using Google as easy way to get hard numbers. At the same time I am trying to come up with an impartial metric for substantive discussion. In a small field its not so clear. There are about 10 (legitimate) citations that I can find for OjAlgo over the past 14 years. A few of those are just passing mentions. In a highly active field like object recognition in computer vision that wouldn't be significant. In this field that's a decent number and probably puts it somewhere in the top 10. Part of the reason for the lack of citations in general is that people consider linear algebra libraries to be a common tool now and don't bother citing them. Pabeles (talk) 06:01, 6 January 2014 (UTC)

Yeah, I know the feeling; there are a lot of libraries I use that simply aren't 'notable' - because they're just assumed. I need to write an article on Rcpp one of these days. Can you provide any links to the substantive discussions? We only actually require two ;p. Ironholds (talk) 06:41, 6 January 2014 (UTC)

I've added a couple of citations to the page from a journal article and conference paper.Pabeles (talk) 20:36, 13 January 2014 (UTC)

Cyrus Shahabi

Can you be so kind to help me with copyediting of this article?--Mishae (talk) 18:46, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

Now done. The research section felt like you'd just found all of his journal articles and noted what each of them were about; it's best to keep things broad unless there are specific things a researcher is highly-renowned for. Ironholds (talk) 19:56, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Thanks.--Mishae (talk) 01:31, 14 January 2014 (UTC)

Question regarding "page written like an advert"

Responding to your tag on Social Media Examiner, would you be so kind as to let me know if it's the overall tone, or specific sections / statements that seem promotional in nature? I will then make the necessary corrections. Thank you. Djhuff (talk) 10:58, 8 January 2014 (UTC)Djhuff

I've made substantial edits to the page with regard to neutrality / promotional content. Would you please check it and if it meets with Wikipedia guidelines, please remove the flag? Thank you Djhuff (talk) 13:04, 9 January 2014 (UTC)Djhuff

Sure! I'll review it now. Ironholds (talk) 17:21, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

@Djhuff: Okay, some things to change, off the top of my head:

1. "MyKidsAdventures.com helps busy parents find creative activities to do with their kids" feels...pretty unencyclopedic, as a statement.
2. Remove the "About Michael Stelzner" section; this is an article about the company, not an about page.

Other than that, much improved :). Ironholds (talk) 19:46, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Thank you. I've made the changes: changed the description regarding My Kids Adventures; removed information about Michael Stelzner. Djhuff (talk) 23:40, 12 January 2014 (UTC)Djhuff

Checking back to see if you can remove the "written like an advert" flag now that I've made the changes to the page. Thank you! Djhuff (talk) 19:53, 14 January 2014 (UTC)Djhuff

Descender album tagged

Going to sort this out as soon as I have a moment. — Preceding unsigned comment added by AmbroseCadwell (talk • contribs) 16:58, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Cool; thanks! Ironholds (talk) 01:21, 15 January 2014 (UTC)

your tag on page:Hasle Hills

Hello. Please be specific and I will look into it.

RhinoMind (talk) 08:00, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Well, there's a limit to how specific it can be and be useful, in this case ;). You have entire paragraphs without an inline citation. Essentially, if there are statements (other than obvious things - "the sky is blue") that don't have inline citations, they need them. Ironholds (talk) 18:26, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Hi. I dont understand your first statement. Anyway: The references and the external link is also sources in this case. Listing them as sources too, could solve the "problem". What do you think? When writing an article/page from sources, you dont need in-line citations on every turn. Another solution is to cite the same references over and over, at the end of each paragraph (or sentence if needed). In my view that would indeed be overkill, but it could also solve the problem. RhinoMind (talk) 19:24, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

Actually, unless your article exclusively contains stuff that nobody could question, yes, you do. The actual solution is that if a particular sentence comes from a particular source and isn't...incredibly obvious ("the sky is blue", again, would be an example of a reference that does not require verification), cite the source at the end of the sentence. Ironholds (talk) 00:16, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Ok, I will put up a solution later when I find the time and then return here. I am writing quite a lot of English articles based on Danish sources and its important for me to know how to ref and source properly (but not excessively). RhinoMind (talk) 11:40, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

PS. You didn't answer my question about listing the references and external links as sources. Could this solve the problem? I dont see why not. RhinoMind (talk) 11:47, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

Well, I'm not sure what you mean. Do you mean just putting all the external links in a references section, or turning all of them into inline citations, or...? Ironholds (talk) 19:09, 12 January 2014 (UTC)

I have made the changes I suggested. Please take a look at the page and then post comments here RhinoMind (talk) 14:37, 15 January 2014 (UTC)

You...added sources at the end, that don't link to any specific statements? As I've said, repeatedly, the problem is not a lack of references but a lack of inline references. Ironholds (talk) 17:52, 15 January 2014 (UTC)

Question

Wondering if I should rename [Category:21st-century conductors (music)] into just 21st-century conductors, since all of them are music conductors either way. Just renamed this and realized that. Maybe its time to ask a consensus for a revote on this conductors business? Like, I agree on the main category, but when it comes to [Conductors by nationality] non of them is actually a train conductor. I'm wondering where can I propose a new approach to it?--Mishae (talk) 01:34, 14 January 2014 (UTC)

Try Wikipedia:Categories for discussion :). Ironholds (talk) 01:21, 15 January 2014 (UTC)

Thanks for the suggestion and also that's for reminding me about Anastasia Taylor-Lind. Her link died, but I recovered it and added another reliable source. Hope its safe now. :)--Mishae (talk) 00:22, 17 January 2014 (UTC)

Iyanya vs. Desire

Greetings Ironholds, thanks for reviewing the Iyanya vs Desire article using page curation. I was wondering why you left the "more footnotes" tag to the article. The article itself is 13, 595 in bytes and there are references at the end of almost every sentence. Is there a section in the article you feel needs more citation? Do the references don't reflect the article's content? I really need you input because I feel that the article and its references are one in the same. versace1608 (talk) 01:19, 17 January 2014 (UTC)

@Versace1608: mostly it comes down to the lack of citations in the 'background' section. Other than that, the article looks excellent :). Ironholds (talk) 02:08, 17 January 2014 (UTC)

I just added two sources. One is a newspaper source and the other is an interview whose video clip is on YouTube. Can you please take a look at it and remove the tag if possible. Thanks. versace1608 (talk) 06:28, 17 January 2014 (UTC)

Now done; thanks for responding to the concerns so promptly! :). Ironholds (talk) 06:30, 17 January 2014 (UTC)

Thanks, I appreciate the feedback and many thanks for your contributions to the article. versace1608 (talk) 06:33, 17 January 2014 (UTC)

Proposed deletion of Charbel Dagher

In response to your message "Proposed deletion of Charbel Dagher", please note that the article has a section "References" that has three entries. Please explain why you think it doen't have references. I'll be willing to add further entries if required.

Thank you Walidkaram (talk) 09:17, 20 January 2014 (UTC)

@Walidkaram: yes, another user added them ;). You'll note the tag has now been removed. The article as you wrote it had no references whatsoever. Ironholds (talk) 18:32, 20 January 2014 (UTC)

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Your edit on Guy Olivier Faure

Hi Ironholds. Thanks for your edit, much appreciated. Can you please provide a link to en example of standard citation so I can follow that? Also If you could clarify your issue with the grammar, I don't understand what you are referring to? Thanks Olafgustavsson (talk) 21:37, 22 January 2014 (UTC)

Sure! So, on the citations; you'll note (I think) a little button with a two pairs of curly braces ({{ }}) on your toolbar. If you click on that it contains the standardised citation templates for books, websites, journal articles, you name it. On the grammar front; mostly it's small things, albeit a lot of small things. So, for example: "a program on international negotiation processes that link together 5000 people involved in the domain" - link would be "links". It's a lot of things like that. I'm happy to go through this evening and try to tweak it, if that would help? Ironholds (talk) 21:46, 22 January 2014 (UTC)

Ok thank you that was very helpful. I'll try and correct these things myself and hopefully I'll learn something from my mistakes. Thanks again and sorry about the undo, I misunderstood. Cheers! Olafgustavsson (talk) 22:38, 22 January 2014 (UTC)

Please check my article

Hello, here it is: Breath of the Gods. Thanks. NordhornerII (talk)I am not a number! I am a Nordhorner. 16:56, 25 January 2014 (UTC)

Not sure how reviews work

I got a notification that you reviewed the Pollard, Washington article. How can I see this review (or any article's review, for that matter)? Thanks GPS Pilot (talk) 15:50, 25 January 2014 (UTC)

@GPS Pilot: it just means that a new page patroller checked the article. It's not a review as in a film review, it just means that something was examined and ticked off. Ironholds (talk) 01:11, 26 January 2014 (UTC)

KGB

I updated the above article, because I want it to become a featured article but user Wikipeterproject removed the vital information to the article, without explaining anything other then the sources are dubious (although I cited a book). I reinstate them back so that you can go over them and tell me if he was right or not. Keep in mind that this article was a featured one in 2006, but it had no mentioning of KGB operations in other countries other then the 1991 coup which was in Russia. I added info on operations in Afghanistan, Bangladesh, India and the Middle East. Can you copy edit them since the previous editor didn't even bothered to do it and just deleted all of it. Many thanks in advance. P.S. Ping me when you will be done.--Mishae (talk) 20:52, 26 January 2014 (UTC)

It needs a lot more footnotes, but the additions don't seem too poor. Have you considered actually talking to the other user? Ironholds (talk) 21:30, 26 January 2014 (UTC)

Well, I have dropped him a note, but his talkpage is busy, so I guess he is on lunch or something. Either way, thanks for approving my edit. You see, this month is a bit hack tick for me because I am trying to bring 2 articles to the featured status (that and Euromaidan), at the same time I am in a heated debate over the notability of Lisa Nakamichi who have won certain competitions as the primary source suggests but user @Michitaro: proposed deletion, on which I found two other musicians that used only external links and proded them. And last but not least, I have realized that Wikipedia news section lacks any info on this attack and decided to write about it as a part of Terrorism in Pakistan. Although whether or not its notable, I don't know.--Mishae (talk) 21:53, 26 January 2014 (UTC)