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Please take a moment to review the simple guide and join the discussion. Thank you! EarwigBot  09:33, 24 March 2013 (UTC)

Josef van Wissem

Please note that I filed a DR request: Misplaced Pages:Dispute resolution noticeboard#Jozef van Wissem. Please comment there. Thanks.--Ymblanter (talk) 09:34, 24 March 2013 (UTC)

Need a program

I need a java script that would hide on my watchlist any edits related to infoboxs or those involved with them - Is this possible - dont want to end up going crazy like this ..... I am losing it at Talk:Robert Stoepel#Infobox proposal - LOL - ROLF.Moxy (talk) 09:45, 24 March 2013 (UTC)

I'm sorry you're dealing with such a mess. I'm not aware of any such script. You might find it best to just walk away. I suggest taking the main problems off your watchlist and finding something that's actually fun to do. The overall problem can always be resolved some other month. WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:41, 24 March 2013 (UTC)

Motion to close RFC/U

You have previously commented on Misplaced Pages:Requests_for_comment/Niemti.

As an outside editor, I have moved that this RFC/U be closed. If you wish to comment on the Motion to close, please do so here. Fladrif (talk) 14:40, 28 March 2013 (UTC)

A question about some content you added/edited

See Wikipedia_talk:Wikipedians#Maths.3F. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 02:49, 1 April 2013 (UTC)

I didn't add that information. Why are you asking me about some other user's addition? WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:57, 1 April 2013 (UTC)

Help please

Say, could you take a look at the 2012 Delhi gang rape case. India does not allow the name of rape victims to be published however in this case both the victim and her parents said that they did not object. We have a reference for that. Her name is now being used in the UK, US, and elsewhere, except for India. See the talk page, second section re Jyoti's name and to save time scroll down to the April postings.

Not using the name makes the article sound awkward and perhaps even lacking in respect for the victim. Since a decision for the use of her name seemed to be stalled, and thinking that at least some Indian news sources were now using her name, yesterday I did a trial and used her name in the lead. Editor Paris instantly responded and I reverted. S/he seems to be knowledgeable but the other editor, 007, seems to be as well. Would you have any advice here? Gandydancer (talk) 10:59, 5 April 2013 (UTC)

I don't feel strongly about naming the murdered woman either way. You might want to have an RFC. I suggest this format:

You just need to fill in whatever the various points are for the two sides. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:38, 5 April 2013 (UTC)

Thanks. I've been involved in two RFCs and they were both a waste of my time. I just don't have enough energy for it right now. I'll just let the other editors hash it out.Gandydancer (talk) 18:15, 5 April 2013 (UTC)

Move discussion

At Misplaced Pages talk:The answer to life, the universe, and everything#Requested_move. --Lexein (talk) 06:02, 6 April 2013 (UTC)

howto in relation to practical information - amazon topic

Could you please clarify? Howto is explaining or directing of how to do something. And i'm mentioning about including practical information, in which no explaining or directing how to do something is included. Example: very high number of people who has posted feedbacks on amazon has indicated that d-mannose resulted in miracleous cures for bladder infection. In such a case we don't say that it actually provides cure, but we rather state the facts on the ground. Ryanspir (talk) 17:12, 9 April 2013 (UTC)

"Practical information" also includes things like "take this on an empty stomach" or "store this in the refrigerator", which is why I was asking you for more information.

I don't think that "A bunch of users on Amazon, some or all of whom might be sockpuppets for the manufacturer, claim that this works" is necessarily "the facts on the ground", and I am convinced that it is not encyclopedic. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:54, 9 April 2013 (UTC)

Please be advised that i have replied only to your position regarding the issue of howto being identified with practical information. I have no intention to get a broader discussion on this venue regarding amazon reviews. I would like to point your attention, that even if a certain review contains recommendation, such as take it on the empty stomach, it wouldn't make the context that is sourced to that howto, as long as the context itself is not howto. Your other concerns are certainly valid, thats why i have initiated the discussion. Please be advised that amazon is also not the point, it is only an example. Ryanspir (talk) 20:34, 9 April 2013 (UTC)

Apparently talk pages are far more complicated than articles, and the developers are having trouble coping with them.

I still think you need to give an example. Instead of saying "use Amazon reviews", I think you need to say something like "I want to use <these particular Amazon reviews> to add <this exact sentence> to <this named article>." Then people will know what you're talking about instead of guessing. WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:48, 11 April 2013 (UTC)

I'm discussing it in general. But consider this, how about adding "Very high number of people who has posted feedbacks on amazon has indicated that d-mannose resulted in miracleous cures for bladder infection." Ryanspir (talk) 14:16, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

I think that would be an unencyclopedic statement, and I can't imagine any experienced editor agreeing that it was either appropriate or WP:DUE. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:13, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

RS/N Discussion

Hello WhatamIdoing! I started a discussion on Venezuela's most-circulated newspaper and I noticed that you are one of the most active users on RS/N discussion board. I was hoping that you would be able to help out and contribute some of your expertise? :) Thanks for any assistance you can provide! Justiciero1811 (talk) 22:38, 10 April 2013 (UTC)

Breast Cancer content dispute

Jmh649 and I do not agree. He states that I can not use this Cochrane Collaboration (CC) web page ], last updated Oct 20122, as a reference to support the quote "Screening produces patients with breast cancer from among healthy women who would never have developed symptoms of breast cancer. Treatment of these healthy women increases their risk of dying, e.g. from heart disease and cancer. It therefore no longer seems reasonable to attend for breast cancer screening. In fact, by avoiding going to screening, a woman will lower her risk of getting a breast cancer diagnosis. However, despite this, some women might still wish to go to screening." Zad says the pamphlet referred to on that web page (linked) says Draft, but it's not ("Draft") when you print it out. We don't need the pamphlet anyway, given the CC statement on their web page. The difference is huge (look at the current text). Mammography is no not recommended at any age. Heck, that was on the national news several months age, which is why I long ago looked into the supporting facts (CC) and tried to update Misplaced Pages. I worked with Jmh and made corrections / additions. Quickly deleted by another editor, see history. I feel Jmh649 does great harm to Misplaced Pages, smacking of conflict of interest.32cllou (talk) 20:45, 11 April 2013 (UTC)

Mammography is recommended. It is also not recommended, and it is further actively disrecommended. It depends on who is making the recommendations. The American Cancer Society, for example, says "Women age 40 and older should have a mammogram every year and should continue to do so for as long as they are in good health." That's their recommendation, which is pretty different from the Cochrane Collaboration's latest reports. So if you want to say "it's not recommended", you're simply wrong. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:57, 11 April 2013 (UTC)

Would be good to provide links to exactly what I said. I did not say "He states that I can not use this Cochrane Collaboration (CC) web page". What I did say was you cannot call this webpage an update of a 2011 Cochrane review because it isn't. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 15:42, 12 April 2013 (UTC)

It is the latest from CC, which is generally considered better that the Am Cancer Society.32cllou (talk) 22:43, 14 April 2013 (UTC)

We normally prefer the latest peer-reviewed publications, not the latest word from the publicity department. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:28, 14 April 2013 (UTC)

Breastfeeding article

Hi there, would you please have a look at the Breast feeding article's HIV section? It seems to be much too involved for the article and I wonder if it should either have its own article or be moved to the Breastfeeding difficulties article. (I wrote a little on the talk page.) What do you think? I asked Doc James and he agreed split or something. Gandydancer (talk) 16:39, 16 April 2013 (UTC)

It's long enough for its own article, and it's not exactly a difficulty with breastfeeding. I'd have expected that article to contain one short paragraph on the subject: might infect the baby, but in developing countries, the alternative might cause the baby to die from diarrhea. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:12, 16 April 2013 (UTC)

Quick note re: RfC template

Sorry, late reply. WykiP (talk) 11:16, 18 April 2013 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages:Assignments

I would very much appreciate your help (and talk page lurkers too) in drafting a new policy to deal with assignments, particularly student. See Misplaced Pages:Village pump (policy)#Assignments (student editing) and the draft at Misplaced Pages:Assignments. Thanks. Colin° 10:53, 20 April 2013 (UTC)

Hi Colin, I have finally finished reading your essay. I realize that it's a draft proposal, and so it will improve over time, but, to be candid, I don't believe it has any realistic chance of being adopted as an official policy or guideline. (Even if it were adopted, I don't believe it would have much practical effect, because WP:Nobody reads the directions, not even professors.)

It seems to me that it has many similarities with the paid editing controversies, and the diversity of viewpoints that makes it impossible to adopt one of those proposals is likely to doom this one, too. However, I'll think it over for a while, and let you know if I have any ideas about how to improve its chances. WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:13, 22 April 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for looking and thinking about it. There's a problem that the WEP folk don't want to work on it as policy needs to be community-led and the WMF don't want to touch it as they've washed their hands of the education assignment problem they created, and the community aren't really interested until some student shows up on their watchlist. The education programme folk are working to create guidelines and procedures for classes they control (to some degree) but most of the recent disasters have been classes outwith the programme who just haven't understood the issues or taken any responsibility for the consequences. WP has no policy to deal with or advise assignments or teachers -- only at the individual editor level which is ineffective. I wouldn't care if the page got totally rewritten, but am rather down that nobody is interested in tackling these issues. Colin° 06:44, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

That's the fundamental problem: the only thing that we know to do with a group is to call them WP:MEATPUPPETs. We just don't have a process that can support this situation.

Would you be happier if all assignments were handled though the formal program? Because one simple thing that could be done is to declare that unregistered classes were meatpuppets that should be blocked on sight. (Simple ≠ best, but it's within our capacity.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:47, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

Colin, I think we're in this together. I've invested a lot of time into improving the situation, and seeing the results of poor-quality assignments sparked my participation. I just wonder if a policy is the best way to approach things. I attended that, which should have been advertised at WP:ENB, now that I think about it. I got to meet people from WMF and WEF, so if you'd like to talk, let me know. You might be surprised to learn that the education model is being actively supported by WMF in Arabic-speaking countries and in Brazil. (And WAID thank you for all your input over at meta about the existing and developing medicine organization, by the way.) I'd like to see the education model improve and expanded to medical/nursing/pharmacy schools etc. so that we can institutionalize quality content contributions. Biosthmors (talk) 17:04, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

I think that pharma and med students are far more likely to provide useful contributions than first-year students in enormous classes. If I wanted specifically to improve medicine-related content, I'd definitely favor graduate level students (including nurse practitioners and physicians assistants, who often have a good sense of what interests normal people). But we can't really say, "This is the encyclopedia that anyone can edit, but only graduate students are allowed". WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:08, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

See what I wrote about "anyone can edit" here. You are conflating the person with their occupation. Sure John Smith the 1st year undergraduate doing a psychology module is welcome to edit Misplaced Pages as John Smith. He'd probably write about his hobbies, his local area, compile a list of Simpsons episodes and all the other things newbies do to cut their teeth. If he's really nerdy, he might write about one of the subjects he's studying at university. But mainly he'll stay in his comfort zone writing about things he feels confident to tackle (whether he actually is competent is another matter). But the "anyone can edit" says nothing about the person taking their occupation onto Misplaced Pages. Should a student do homework on Misplaced Pages? Should a public relations consultant do PR on Misplaced Pages? Should a doctor give medical advice on Misplaced Pages? Should a teacher set assignments on Misplaced Pages? All these things are potentially troublesome, are not directly aligned with writing an encyclopaedia, and we have to find our way to accommodate conflicts or say no. I keep seeing this "anyone can edit" mantra used to justify allowing behaviour and actions that aren't appropriate. Or here it is used to say "this is too hard to achieve 100% so why bother". Well anyone can write text without citations so why bother with WP:V and anyone can write POV so why bother with WP:NPOV and so on.

I fully agree with you that we should target older students. We have to get those in education thinking "will my assign be likely to improve the WP articles and the student edits remain within the capacity I have to review them and resolve issues" rather than "how can I get Misplaced Pages do the marking of my student assignments for me" or "Misplaced Pages is cool. An assignment on Misplaced Pages should be cool too". Educators currently take no responsibility for student essays -- they just end up in a drawer. But on WP these assignments get published and have consequences. If we can encourage a sense of responsibility, then I think the "do I use a graduate class or a 1st year undergraduate class" decisions will have a more obvious answer. Colin° 07:40, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

To change the teachers' thinking, we need an incentive that promotes what we want and discourages what we don't want. So far, basically the only tool in our toolbox is the block button, and I just don't think that the community is going to block students for editing articles as part of a class.

Put another way: we know how we benefit from teachers doing what we want, but how do the teachers benefit from it? WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:15, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

Carrots and sticks aren't the only way people work. I believe providing information, guidance and support is key. Teachers and profs are intelligent folk. If presented with good advice and the necessary support, they can decide for themselves what the pros and cons might be of doing certain assignments on wp. Those who have run successful classes can give testimony as to what they got out of it, and what they wouldn't do again. At present, we're dealing with the legacy of dreadful advice from the WMF (who have now walked away from the whole thing) and over-promotion of this as a solution to our declining editor base. There's a fundamental lack of resources to ensure these classes are successful and way too much feeling that this is easy and without consequences. Joordens megaclass car crash of an assignment was repeated multiple times partly because they guy just didn't listen but also because he was encouraged by the WMF to go ahead with something the community could clearly see was ill-thought-out, and he wasn't educated enough about Misplaced Pages to appreciate there are only a handful of Psychology wikipedians to review the work of his 1900 students. The APS keep publishing papers using the "reverts correlates with quality" metric that promote how "successful" they have been. Optimism over practicalities. I wouldn't be surprised if Michael Gove decided to incorporate Misplaced Pages article writing into A-levels and the WMF got excited at the thought of a third-of-a-million new editors each year. Colin° 07:17, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

Having information about the harms does not seem to have disuaded Joordens: Didn't we tell him, in detail and at length? And didn't he say that it was his right to set whatever assignments he wanted, without regard for our opinions? We can't magic up the kind of support needed to make that kind of project really work. While good advice would reduce the problem, I don't think that it can actually solve the problem, because there are people who do not want to take the advice. Furthermore, if the Joordens of the world are getting encouragement, then it's not true that "we" are opposed to that kind of project: it is only true that "some of us" are opposed to it. WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:58, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

Talk:Amber Hagerman#Merge to AMBER Alert?

You can vote there. --George Ho (talk) 23:39, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

Thank you

Thank you for looking into my problem on the village pump about my edits on Books LLC. I really couldn't understand why Rklawton was accusing me of being in an edit war and threatening me with banning.

Well, actually I still don't, since I wasn't and haven't ever.

But it was such a relief to hear someone else confirm what I thought had to be so, that this was a damned peculiar definition of edit war and that my edit, which Rklawton reverted, was neither unfactual nor unjustified.

I was particularly impressed at how you found out that Rklawton was in fact a Misplaced Pages Admin (which does nothing to ease my worry, but is useful to know).

I have no idea if there is anything I can do about this. But at least I am over my initial feeling of helpless horror and shock, thanks in large part to your matter-of-fact post.

Thank you.

Artemis-Arethusa (talk) 09:02, 26 April 2013 (UTC)

You're welcome. I've taken it up on the article's talk page, and we will see whether Rklawton (talk · contribs) persists in thinking that controversial is an unfair description of an outfit normally described with words like rip-off, stolen, scam, and the like. WhatamIdoing (talk) 15:25, 26 April 2013 (UTC)

History of syphilis

Hello WhatamIdoing,

I had to remove the statement about "faultless victims" etc in the article since the source you gave did not contain anything about it. --95.118.36.4 (talk) 12:27, 29 April 2013 (UTC)

You're correct in a trivial way: The text does not break Misplaced Pages's policies by violating the author's copyright or plagiarizing her words. But you're wrong in the overall meaning. Think about what this means:

The origin of syphilis has always held an implied accusation: if Europeans brought it to the New World, the disease is one more symbol of Western imperialism run amok, one more grudge to hold against colonialism.

The rest of the New York Times piece is about the now-accepted fact that—just like smallpox came from Europe and devastated the Americans—syphilis came from the Americas and devastated Europe. Why this matters as anything other than an obscure technical fact is because some activists have put forward the (now proven to be erroneous) story that Europeans spread fatal diseases to the Americas, but that the indigenous population of the Americas never gave diseases to the Europeans. That is, some activists have claimed that the scientifically accepted Columbian Exchange was nothing more than a one-way European attack. The science says they're wrong, and we should say so. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:13, 29 April 2013 (UTC)

I'd like to add that the "you owe me reparations because your ancestors gave my ancestors a dreadful disease" has gone both ways for centuries, as you can see from ISBN 9780300080872: "In 1777…the highly respected Scottish historian and British patriot, William Robertson, asserted that by contaminating Europe with syphilis, America had forfeited all benefits which might have resulted from its "discovery" by Europeans."

This book (start with last paragraph on p 288) is a thoughtful exposition of the modern problems for descendants of indigenous peoples with scientific archaeology: First, if someone announces a scientific fact, like syphilis actually did originate as a sexually transmitted disease in the Americas, then they have to deal with ignorant comments from ignorant people. Second, it hurts their sense of self-identity by indicating that scientifically provable facts are more important than the stories told by themselves and to themselves. It is a difference highlighted by the saying, "All stories are true, and some of them even happened": It is true that Native Americans were the victims of Europeans; however, the story that syphilis is one of those instances of victimizing, rather than an instance of revenge against the Europeans, is not a story that actually happened. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:31, 29 April 2013 (UTC)

Talkback

TheOriginalSoni (talk) 21:36, 29 April 2013 (UTC)

bisphenol

There is no way in hell I am going to rewrite the tox section of the article. Gandydancer is very invested in the work she did there and she already thinks I am creepy or something as per discussion between her and others on her Talk page concerning work we were doing on the BP article, from which I have withdrawn (see here and surrounding edits. So I am going to take it very slow on the bisphenol page and deal with content that exists piece by piece. She and I work on overlapping articles so I have no desire to further antagonize her, as I don't like people to be upset because of things I do and because bad relationships make it harder to do work on wikipedia. But the article as it stands is a train wreck (as per comments by other editors on the MEDRS talk page) and I want to fix it. Jytdog (talk) 11:59, 3 May 2013 (UTC)

I did not recommend that you re-write it. I recommended that you read some good sources before doing anything. That is, "Step 1: Go find and read a couple of good sources", not "Step 1: Start with the first fact sourced to a primary source, and see whether your search engine skills happen to show you a better source that says the same thing". See the difference? WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:00, 3 May 2013 (UTC)

of course that is how one works. First text I examined in light of the sources came up with nothing. Had to show the negative somehow, right? Jytdog (talk) 18:19, 3 May 2013 (UTC)

Visual editor

Is this similar to the thing that is deployed at Wikia? And does it function better than the thing at Wikia? -- 65.94.76.126 (talk) 01:34, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

All I know about "the thing" at Wikia is that this one was (supposedly) designed to not be as bad. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:15, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

God, I hope so, the thing on Wikia is absolutely horrid. -- 65.94.76.126 (talk) 04:39, 8 May 2013 (UTC)

This isn't showing up as an option for me with the modern skin setting. Is it only available for the default vector skin? If that's the case, you should probably mention in your notification. —Torchiest _edits 02:04, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

According to WP:VE, it's supposed to work with Monobook and Vector. How many editors do you suppose are actually using another skin? (Do we have stats somewhere?) WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:15, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

I don't know. I've been using Modern for probably three years now. I would guess long term users would be more likely to change the appearance, but I don't know of anywhere that has stats on it. It might be possible to do an informal survey at the village pump to get a very ballpark estimate on percentages of regulars using alternate skins. —Torchiest _edits 02:24, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

The (global) stats from before the switch off say that there were 535 active proper editors with their account switched to Modern; don't have stats from more recently, sorry.

BTW, thank you so much, WhatamIdoing, for your work on alerting people to what's happening around VisualEditor; it's hugely appreciated, at least by me! Jdforrester (WMF) (talk) 03:22, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

That's interesting: Different skins are chosen by about 2% of global users, but by up to 7% of power users (before the list was shortened significantly), and it's the power users who are most likely to pitch a fit if something changes on them. Modern itself is 1 out of about 260 users, but the new edit window may not work for Cologne Blue, either, which has slightly more users. Still, it's less than 1%, so I'm not sure that a general note is necessary for that.

(I'm doing this largely out of self-interest: I want to minimize the amount of "but nobody consulted me about this!" whining that we will have to listen to when the default switches.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 14:19, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

VisualEditor and Flow

You wrote:

the old edit window will be the only option for talk pages (I believe that WP:Notifications (aka Echo) is ultimately supposed to deal with talk pages)

Actually, the entire talkpage system will be replaced with a system called Flow. The documentation page is here. Flow will be released before VE according to this, which means in a month or two. Incidentally, you might want to advertise Flow, since NO ONE seems to have heard of it, even though it's an enormous change. -- Ypnypn (talk) 03:42, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

Wouldn't that interfere with current talk page usage as a place to document article history (old AFDs, copy/split templates, etc) and attach wikiprojects? -- 65.94.76.126 (talk) 03:52, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

Why don't you ask that at mw:talk:flow? -- Ypnypn (talk) 13:00, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

Message posted -- 65.94.76.126 (talk) 05:55, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

You're right: I have screwed that up. Well, I can go fix it.  ;-)

Thanks for the note. WhatamIdoing (talk) 14:23, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

Is there any way at all to stop them from making all these huge changes? I'm afraid my reaction is to step back from communicating with other editors unless they seek me out - I can't deal with the weird form of threading MediaWiki prefers and learning things like getting interwikis onto WikiData is taking all the time I could devote to schmoozing. With a new system replacing talkpages I'm afraid I don't think I'll be able to welcome people or help them out nearly as much because of the learning demanded. Also, it is demonstrating again and again that the developers just don't care about editors, only about new, new, new. It's too much, they respond arrogantly when we explain on the Village Pump that we were not told about the latest change or that it is having an unfortunate side effect (latest instance - failing to realize IPs need the orange bar or some other highly noticeable sign so they can be made aware of warnings before someone blocks them), and I'm not persuaded of the usefulness of 90% of it. Sorry to unload, but your post at WikiProject Trains was the first I'd heard of "Oh by the way talk pages are going away". Rah, rah. New! Exciting! I don't think I'll bother complaining anywhere else - but if there is any way to get them to STOP, please! Get them to STOP!!!!! It's hurting the encyclopedia. Yngvadottir (talk) 16:27, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

I'm truly sympathetic, since any change to workflow affects affects me, too, and anyone with even a tiny bit of experience knows that the first several versions of major changes like this will suffer from growing pains. You and I will have to re-program both our eyes and our fingers, and in far more serious ways than the minor changes that people have pitched fits over, like using the Mediawiki defaults for watchlist formatting (Remember all the admins edit-warring over the CSS pages to stop the appearance of bold-faced text on a watchlist?) or cluttering up the top line of the screen by adding "sandbox". No matter how amazing the final outcome, we are going to have some seriously disruptive change in our immediate future.

Ultimately, I have little respect for the "you didn't tell me" argument, especially in its more honest form, which sounds a lot more like "you didn't get my personal permission to change the software". They aren't spending a lot of time posting warnings where non-tech editors might notice*, but the devs are trying their best to do what their research shows they should be working on. Much of that research is based on demands from us for major improvements. We have been asking for a WYSWIG editor almost since the first day that the English Misplaced Pages began. We have been asking for a more integrated communication system (which Flow is supposed to provide) for years. Notice that in the "us versus them" concept, it's the "us" that has been making these requests. They talk about retaining new editors, but we are the ones who originally made the requests. As far as I can see, "new editors" is just their official budget excuse for finally doing what we have repeatedly asked for.

(* Given that most responses to communication, when they do post messages, are complaints that they didn't tell people, which is as silly as the joke about the elderly mother who spends all the longed-for visits complaining that her child never visits, or orders to stop on the grounds that the editor doesn't understand WP:CONEXCEPT and believes that he's in charge of the developer community, I can see why they might not believe this to be a very good use of their time. I also hear that the WMF is trying to get someone in whose job is to do exactly this.)

But—but the reality is that change is painful to people whose fingers already do everything automatically. As Facebook's redesigns have proven, it takes weeks for people to get used to much smaller changes. Honestly, if most editors like you see those notes and put a note on their calendars that says "01 July: go directly to Special:Preferences, turn off that new whizbang thing, and let someone else deal with the ensuing mess for the next year", then I think that will be a positive outcome. The take-away message for our power users about the VisualEditor is that the old version isn't going away.

I don't have any pull with the WMF, of course. If I did, then the VisualEditor would be deployed somewhere else first (why the heck would any engineer want to deploy VE first on the biggest, busiest, and most complicated project?! Why not simple.wikipedia first, or meta or something?), and we wouldn't be changing the editor, the notifications and the talk pages all within the space of a couple of months. I guess I'm more of a "peel the bandage off slowly" person, and the devs seem to be in a "rip it off quickly and get the pain over with all at once" mode. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:53, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

I have considerable doubt about the validity of their research as to what we want, based partly on how out of touch they are with what we - the editors - do. Two examples: the recent huge drop of the ball on taking away the orange bar for IPs with no replacement, so that there was no way for an IP to see they were being warned; and the massive example of flat-out arrogant rudeness at Village Pump/Technical last year when a huge change was made with no warning and the dev said we would have known about it in advance if you hadn't turned off general notices .... and then after I (!) pointed out I had seen such notices on other language Wikipedias but not on en. ... realized they had personally disabled general notices on en.wikipedia so no, we had had no warning here. I am also glad to see you distinguishing between wysiwyg/visual editing - which is indeed something that will help a lot, if it can ever be harmonized with the use of templates, which is simultaneously being pushed - and whatever flow is (if it's that truly awful form of threading used for Wikimedia discussions, it involves a lot more than forming new muscle habits - it involves abandoning all hope of conducting conversations) and recognizing that a rapid succession of massive changes is going to leave us all reeling - and that the dissemination of information has been somewhat lacking. Thank you for providing the single sole mention of the talkpage aspect that I have seen. However. I should not have to hang out on technical noticeboards to know about this kind of massive change. I should not have to attempt to understand technical jargon to understand what is happening. And most importantly, if I have to choose between editing articles and helping new editors, I may just take my time and expertise elsewhere, admin or not. Mediawiki seems to have lost sight of the objective, and it's getting close to too upsetting to try to both work on it and to help others with them making now one, now the other harder. Plus the attitudinal thing. I have neglected other worthy tasks to work on Misplaced Pages and I'm very close to packing it in at this point. So - if you can get them to even think twice, maybe just put effort into making it a real and functional visual editor - it's very clear from some of the things you say that there is next to no chance they will actually listen, or care in any way, but "oh by the way no more talkpages! not right now but soon!" - I have other things I should be doing that are also important. Yngvadottir (talk) 17:43, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

Yeah, it's a painful place to be in, isn't it? I'm finding that I'm having more fun with simple tasks that don't require interaction with anyone else these days. I'm slowly diffusing some medicine-related cats over at Commons, and some days it's a huge relief to get to do something plainly useful all by myself.

I agree with you that it's important for plain old editors to get some warning about these things, and without having to hang out at VPT, which is why I spammed those notes to the three dozen most-watch WikiProjects last night. Word is slowly getting out; there's even a partial catalog of places that have been notified at Misplaced Pages:VisualEditor/FAQ. My next target is to get people worked up into a near-panic about the editing documentation. Help:Editing is going to be about as unhelpful as possible in less than two months, and simply saying "Hey, we need to fix this" doesn't seem to get anybody motivated enough to actually fix it, or even to start thinking about it.

Part of the larger problem is that we (especially here at the English Misplaced Pages) tend to think that we're the reason for Mediawiki to exist. There are thousands and thousands of Mediawiki installations. I believe that 90% of the Mediawiki devs don't work for the WMF. So the interests of the dev community and the en.wp community are naturally not the same; we aren't the sole objective, and for many of the devs, we're not the objective at all. A dev who is mostly interested in his employer's internal wiki is just not going to care what works for us. In many respects, the English Misplaced Pages is actually the problem child for Mediawiki, not the goal. We're too big and too complex and too busy, and that puts a huge number of constraints on the devs. At some level, we have to take what we can get. We don't control how they spend their time, just like they don't control how we spend our time.

In the category of reassuring facts, Flow isn't LiquidThreads. But I think that's the only categorically reassuring fact that I can add to what you know already. I'm hoping to find a little more information about Flow. Jorm seems to be working on it, and he's cool, but even a totally, objectively, perfectly designed and bug-free implementation will still be different, and that alone is enough to freak people out. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:25, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

(Very useful discussion here. Thanks to both of you, from us lurkers.)

Quick clarification: the current page mw:Talk:Flow is Not using Flow, it is using Liquidthreads v.2.0 (from c.2010 I think?).

Also, the two screenshots at the mw:Flow page are just mockups.

When it does arrive (which I'm looking forward to), it will be customizable into a personalized mix (both content-wise and aesthetic/design-wise), for powerusers and newcomers alike (of all demographics, from code-savvy-teenagers to retired-professors to busy-professionals). I'm going to enjoy assisting new-editors, without having to go on long tangents about the expected wikiquette of talkpage-comments: where to reply, how to indent/outdent, how to sign, etc. Overall, I suspect it's going to be 99% good - Hectic for a few weeks when it arrives, certainly, but rapidly appreciated by almost all. –Quiddity (talk) 21:37, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for that note. I've created WP:Flow, by the way. Keep in mind that WP:FLOW goes elsewhere. I didn't want to mess with the redirect without knowing more about its previous use. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:42, 8 May 2013 (UTC)

That page is a verygoodidea; watchlisted, and I will try to help/poke at it soon. The allcaps shortcut should be fine to usurp, as WP:Flower garden was unceremoniously redirected (not merged) into WP:Walled garden 5 years ago. (Plus the dearly-missed Radiant! is a smart&friendly&empathetic editor, and would surely agree) –Quiddity (talk) 04:51, 8 May 2013 (UTC)

WPP

Thank you for your words and participation, the project has attracted some interest despite not being really announced. With the grudge that they have against me, the best thing I can do is ignore their editing areas for now. The effort to disrupt and drive off supporters is a part of the goal and I will not feed that fire further. ChrisGualtieri (talk) 04:19, 8 May 2013 (UTC)

Good luck. WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:30, 8 May 2013 (UTC)

Just to be sure

WhatamIdoing, just to make sure I haven't left any wrong impressions, our friendly discussion at wp:rs was a reminder that I wanted to bring up FAQ's at the talk page guidelines, but was NOT the reason for it. Also, the title of the thread at wp:talk page guidelines is NOT applicable to this situation. Both the original text and your revised text that I was advocating dropping were and are purely good faith efforts to provide useful advice. Also, I left that thread at wp:rs about two weeks ago, considering the end result to be OK if not ideal. I should have been clearer on that. Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 20:26, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

Good luck with the discussion at TPG. I don't think that Guy's current proposal is at all functional, but it might be valuable to add something about not using FAQs and other headers to in an WP:OWNer-like way. On the other hand, it might just be more WP:Instruction creep that drags us away from using our best judgment in favor of mindlessly following "rules". WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:19, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

Talkback

Unforgettableid (talk) 00:08, 10 May 2013 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

	The Tireless Contributor Barnstar
	For your work socialising the VisualEditor :). Okeyes (WMF) (talk) 20:08, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

You beat me to the punch

Hah! I was going to start building out a version of mw:Flow Portal on enwiki tomorrow (which is my WFH day). But you beat me to the punch. I'm going to go ahead and start moving content in. Thanks!--Jorm (WMF) (talk) 22:41, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

As my husband says, "Great minds think alike—and so do ours". I'm very happy with what I've seen of the plans for Flow so far. It looks like a great design. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:45, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

done--Jorm (WMF) (talk) 20:23, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

Awesomesauce

That comparisons table is just magnificent. Thank you!--Jorm (WMF) (talk) 20:33, 19 May 2013 (UTC)

I'm glad you like it. It's a first draft; perhaps it will improve over time. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:34, 19 May 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for the correction. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:16, 20 May 2013 (UTC)

My bad.

Madam, I can explain, but I cannot deny. Please accept my apology. Butwhatdoiknow (talk) 21:19, 19 May 2013 (UTC)

You're forgiven. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:16, 20 May 2013 (UTC)

Help with another matter

I wondered if you could help me with another matter. I ask you the following reluctantly. If I have a complaint about another Misplaced Pages contributor, where do I turn? There is another Wikipedian who makes minor changes and occasionally major changes because of something like an idée fixe that animates him (I think it is a him) to concentrate his editorial fire on occupational health psychology as it appears in the entry and as it appears in the applied psychology entry. I have asked him on his talk page a number of times to discuss edits but he doesn't respond. I think it was he who had a similar bent back in January under a different name. What can I do? Thanks.Iss246 (talk) 18:28, 21 May 2013 (UTC)

That's not, unfortunately, an unusual situation. What you need is help from multiple people, so that it's not just two individuals who disagree. If he would respond to your messages, then you could request a WP:Third opinion. Don't overlook posting a note on the article's talk page, so that other people can see what your reasoning is. His own user talk page is less likely to be watched by other people.

Assuming that he continues his pattern of non-responsiveness (which might be simply because he can't figure out how to reply; it's not as easy or as obvious as it should be), then I suggest that you post notes at WT:PSY and/or WT:MED to request that other people keep an eye on the articles he is targeting. That might get you enough eyes and hands to keep it in check. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:14, 21 May 2013 (UTC)

Thanks. Earlier I included a link to his talk page after I fixed one of his many changes to an entry. The link is in my comment on reversing a change.Iss246 (talk) 01:00, 22 May 2013 (UTC)

You must be talking about Mrm7171 (talk · contribs), who seems to be quite inexperienced. I'll leave a note explaining how to edit a talk page. Perhaps it will help. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:17, 22 May 2013 (UTC)

edit summaries

Please be more cautious in using edit summaries -- I'm pretty sure that particular discussion is well beyond lame. NE Ent 11:36, 23 May 2013 (UTC)

It is normal and acceptable to refer to Misplaced Pages pages by their shortcuts, including WP:LAME. WhatamIdoing (talk) 14:14, 23 May 2013 (UTC)

Sorry, wasn't clear -- I'm saying that that particular discussing isn't "approaching" lame -- it's way past lame. NE Ent 15:16, 23 May 2013 (UTC)

Talkback

Northamerica1000 16:07, 24 May 2013 (UTC)

Re: RfC/U

Judging from the RfC/U Talk page, you're the "go to" person for questions like this one.

I'm trying to start an RfC/U regarding User:Xenophrenic. The main allegations are that he's tendentious and a POV-pusher. There's already substantial support from at least four different editors. The two certifiers are myself and User:Malke 2010, and we've posted diffs of our efforts to resolve the matter with Xeno on the Talk page of Tea Party movement (where this long simmering dispute came to a boil). Actually I've been encountering Xeno and his editing habits on several articles related to U.S. poli tics for years, starting out with Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now in 2009.

This has reached the point of Xeno edit-warring over whether the RfC/U meets the minimum requirements, repeatedly moving the RfC/U up to "Candidate pages" from "Certified pages" on the UsersList: Please review the RfC/U and the diffs provided. If he's correct, and it doesn't meet the minimum requirements, please let me know what the problem is — with a note on my User Talk page. If I'm correct, and it does meet the minimum requirements, please let Xeno know on his User Talk page. Thanks ... Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 19:00, 25 May 2013 (UTC)

...or you can respond here, whatever is most convenient. I've watchlisted this Talk page. P&W's description about the situation is mostly accurate. I contend that the two certifiers have not identified a specific dispute with specific evidence diffs, and with specific diffs to attempted resolution of that same dispute by both editors. This not only fails to meet the RFC Minimum requirements, but also makes it nearly impossible for me to productively respond, as all I see is unsubstantiated accusations and name-calling. Regards, Xenophrenic (talk) 20:10, 25 May 2013 (UTC)

User:Phoenix and Winslow, Generally speaking, if two people say that they've certified a dispute, and their assertions are at all plausible, then we accept that. It's simplest if both certifiers can point to a single talk-page section in which all three participated, but it's not strictly necessary, as long as the subject was the same. As the subject of the complaint is relatively general, then these conversations, all related to the same general dispute, will suffice.

Edit-warring over the UserList page is always a bad idea. I would accept this RFC/U as being certified.

User:Xenophrenic, I think your best course of action would be to have it listed as an certified dispute and to request politely on its talk page that they try to explain their concerns to you again. Then you will need to make a truly diligent effort to figure out what is upsetting them. I can tell you that you are not accused of a one-time action that would be easily identified in a diff. Instead, you are accused of persistent POV pushing, uncollegial behavior, edit warring, and tendentious editing to promote your political views and to denigrate other people's political views. These are all problems that manifest as the cumulative effect of many small actions. If you don't understand what you are doing that upsets them—if you honestly can't understand why it's a problem to repeatedly restore contentious or negative trivia over the objections of multiple editors—then you are very likely to find the entire discussion extremely frustrating, and it's likely that the end result will be a discussion next month at WP:AN or ARBCOM about a long topic ban. So please do make an effort to figure out why your behavior has produced this complaint, and how you could change your behavior to reduce the grounds for the complaint.

Speaking of ARBCOM, if this ought to be part of the Tea Party case, then the RFC/U should be closed and the matter handled there. RFC/U's are always superseded by accepted ArbCom cases. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:24, 25 May 2013 (UTC)

Thank you very much for the considerate reply. I spend a considerable amount of my Misplaced Pages editing time (going into my 7th year) in controversial areas where there are often editors with strong opinions and convictions, so I am no stranger to the occasional unfortunate clash. I am fully aware of that of which I am being accused. I am very familiar with this particular group of accusers. The issue here is not that I do not understand what is upsetting these editors, as we are well acquainted with each other after having previous disagreements during other dispute resolution processes. I've attempted to have the filers and certifiers of this RFC comply with the minimum requirements of RFC filing as a way of helping them to realize the flaws in their assertions. I figure some these folks truly believe the accusations they make, and when they are repeated often enough their conviction just grows stronger. That repetition also has the effect of influencing others who may then take what they say for granted. Take for instance your words here:

"if you honestly can't understand why it's a problem to repeatedly restore contentious or negative trivia over the objections of multiple editors"

That tells me you are taking for granted as a fact that I've "restored contenteous or negative trivia over the objections of multiple editors", and that I don't see such an act as a problem, when I have never done such a thing. I am curious, did you see substantiation for that accusation somewhere? (I already know the answer - you did not.) There has long been disagreement among editors - many editors on all sides for years - as to what constitutes "trivia", and what should and should not be conveyed by our articles. You requested that I please "do make an effort to figure out why your behavior has produced this complaint", but I already have, as this is not the first time this complaint has been aired. I've edited toward a neutral point of view, against the POV of one or more of the complaining editors, and this has upset them. I am having this same discussion here, if you'd like more insight into the matter. Please let me know if you see things differently. Just so you know, I'm all for self-improvement, but I'm sure I don't have to explain to you that it is impossible for me to change a behavior that I don't have.

By the way, this exact matter has already been raised at ANI here and also ARBCOM here, which makes this redundant RFC/U appear to be a step backward in the process. Xenophrenic (talk) 00:18, 26 May 2013 (UTC)

If you are "fully aware of that of which I am being accused", then you will not find it "nearly impossible for me to productively respond". You'll have to pick one position or the other here. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:42, 26 May 2013 (UTC)

I apologize if I wasn't clear. I'm being accused of behaving in a way in which I have not behaved. If examples of this alleged behavior were provided by the accusers, then I could review those examples and try to better understand what has left these editors with this misperception. But the editors refuse to give examples, claiming that specific examples do not exist, and instead they say it's a cumulative effect of many small actions, to use your words. Do you see the dilemma this poses for me? How does one respond to a request to change behavior that doesn't exist? What change are they asking for? Xenophrenic (talk) 01:15, 26 May 2013 (UTC)

It is very easy to respond to false allegations. When you are accused of edit warring, you say something like, "I have never edit warred". Then your accusers will say something like, "Wonder how you managed to get blocked for edit warring so many times, if you never edit warred." And so forth. I'm sure that you can manage to have this discussion. WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:21, 26 May 2013 (UTC)

@WhatamIdoing: I appreciate your patience in this matter. Although there is a pending ArbCom proceeding, Xeno is definitely not — I repeat, NOT — a named party to ArbCom, and therefore it is my understanding that a community-based remedy is appropriate. This is that remedy.

@Xenophrenic: Specific examples exist. In fact, your behavior in response to this RfC/U — trying to editwar it from "Certified" back to "Candidate," and generally trying to Wikilawyer your way out of it — is an excellent specific example. I again encourage you to participate in the RfC/U and address it on the merits. regards ... Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 01:28, 26 May 2013 (UTC)

One fairly typical way to present evidence for a widespread behavior is to pick one dispute as an example and describe it in detail, perhaps something like "First, he removed the disputed sentence, and three people complained on the talk page, as seen at Talk:Example/Archive 1#Specific dispute. Somebody restored it, and he blanked it again and told everyone on the talk page that they were wrongtalk page diff. During the next three days, he removed the sentence four times before getting blocked for edit warring (diff of block notice)." Good luck, WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:17, 26 May 2013 (UTC)

I think that will be very helpful. Thank you. Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 04:51, 26 May 2013 (UTC)