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24 December 2024
News and notes: Responsibilities and liabilities as a "Very Large Online Platform" Op-ed: Beeblebrox on Wikipediocracy, the Committee, and everything Opinion: Graham87 on being the first-ever administrator recall subject In the media: Delhi High Court considers Caravan and Ken for evaluating the ANI vs. WMF case From the archives: Where to draw the line in reporting? Recent research: "Misplaced Pages editors are quite prosocial", but those motivated by "social image" may put quantity over quality Humour: Backlash over Santa Claus' Misplaced Pages article intensifies Gallery: A feast of holidays and carols Traffic report: Was a long and dark December
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New WikiProject Novels initiative

We have begun a new initiative at the WikiProject Novels: an improvement drive. As a member listed here, you are being notified. Please see Misplaced Pages talk:WikiProject Novels#5-5-5 Improvement Drive and Misplaced Pages:WikiProject Novels/Collaboration for more details. Also I would like to remind you to keep an eye on the project talk page at Misplaced Pages talk:WikiProject Novels. Thanks, Sadads (talk) 02:07, 13 January 2011 (UTC)

February 2011 Wikification Drive

Hi there! I thought you might be interested in WikiProject Wikify's February 2011 Wikification Backlog Elimination Drive. We'll be trying to reduce the backlog to 18,000 articles and clear the 2008 backlog, and we need your help! Top participants in the drive will receive barnstars for their contributions! If you have a spare moment, please join and wikify an article or tell your friends. Thanks! Note: The drive starts February 1, but you can sign up today!

Delivered by MessageDeliveryBot on behalf of Wikiproject Wikify at 00:37, 20 January 2011 (UTC).

WikiProject Wikify's Coordinator Election

Hi there! I thought you might be interested in WikiProject Wikify's Project Coordinator Election. There are 5 nominees for coordinator positions; Guoguo12, Nolelover, Mono, Sumsum2010, and WikiCopter. If you have a spare moment, please come and help us choose coordinators. Remember, voting ends February 1, 2011. Thanks!

Delivered by MessageDeliveryBot on behalf of WikiProject Wikify at 22:24, 23 January 2011 (UTC).

The Wikifier, WikiProject Wikify's First Newsletter (January 2011)

The Wikifier Your Wikification Newsletter – Volume I, Issue I, January 2011 From the editor • General news Membership • December drive results To assist with preparing the newsletter, please visit the newsroom. Past editions may be viewed here.

Welcome to WikiProject Wikify's first newsletter! This newsletter will be published every two months, right before the start of the upcoming drive. February's Drive is projected to be a huge success, with announcements posted at The Signpost and Community Portal. Participants will be rewarded with barnstars. Sign up if you have not already! Project Coordinator elections are still open until February 1, 2011. Happy Wikifying, The coordinators of The Wikifier: Mono (talk) and Sumsum2010·T·C·Review me!

Delivered by MessageDeliveryBot on behalf of WikiProject Wikify at 02:46, 28 January 2011 (UTC).

Autopatrolled

Hello, this is just to let you know that I have granted you the "autopatrolled" permission. This won't affect your editing, it just automatically marks any page you create as patrolled, benefiting new page patrollers. Please remember:

• This permission does not give you any special status or authority
• Submission of inappropriate material may lead to its removal
• You may wish to display the {{Autopatrolled}} top icon and/or the {{User wikipedia/autopatrolled}} userbox on your user page
• If, for any reason, you decide you do not want the permission, let me know and I can remove it

If you have any questions about the permission, don't hesitate to ask. Otherwise, happy editing! Acalamari 18:52, 28 January 2011 (UTC)

The February 2011 Wikification Backlog Elimination Drive has begun!

Get going! The February 2011 Wikification Backlog Elimination Drive has begun. Please get started, as the drive aims to wikify over 2,000 articles this month. We're going to need all the firepower we can get, so please remind your friends to join up as well. In case you didn't know, wikification is fairly simple: just add wiki markup, links, and similar formatting. Thanks for joining; we're looking forward to an exciting time this month! Regards, Guoguo12 (talk · contribs), Mono (talk · contribs), Nolelover (talk · contribs), and Sumsum2010 (talk · contribs).

Delivered by MessageDeliveryBot on behalf of WikiProject Wikify at 00:54, 2 February 2011 (UTC).

WikiProject Novels Collaboration for February

Thank you everyone who participated in the January Collaboration, it was quite a success with 5 new C class articles, 3 stub kills and several articles were removed from our backlogs. In support of the Great Backlog Drive, the WikiProject Novels Collaboration for February is going to help remove backlog candidates in the backlogs related to WikiProject Novels. Please join us, and help us wikify, reference, clean up plot sections and generally improve Novels content, Sadads (talk) 21:48, 5 February 2011 (UTC)

You are recieving this message because you are a member of WikiProject Novels according to Misplaced Pages:WikiProject Novels/Members

The February 2011 Wikification Backlog Elimination Drive Needs Your Help!

Please help! The February 2011 Wikification Backlog Elimination Drive is almost complete. Please help, as the backlog is still very large. Still exceeding 20,000 articles! The goal is 18,000 or less. Lets see if we can do it! We're going to need all the firepower we can get, so please remind your friends to help as well.Thank you for all your help thus far! Regards, Guoguo12 (talk · contribs), Mono (talk · contribs), Nolelover (talk · contribs), Sumsum2010 (talk · contribs), and WikiCopter (talk · contribs).

Delivered by MessageDeliveryBot on behalf of WikiProject Wikify at 04:12, 24 February 2011 (UTC).

Thanks for the help

I just wanted to thank you for the help on the netball article. This is my first time really editing a Misplaced Pages article and I'm not all that knowledgeable about netball... and thus, your edits are very much appreciated. :) --LauraHale (talk) 12:24, 2 March 2011 (UTC)

While I'm thanking you for the help, if you know any New Zealand netball clubs... I'm trying to set up some sport wiki academies in New Zealand. :) Any help trying to find some netball clubs who might want to learn about wikis (or social media) would be very much appreciated. :) --LauraHale (talk) 12:26, 2 March 2011 (UTC)

Sorry about the headings

Some one else suggested I do that.  :( They said it was eating the space on the TOC and it should be fixed. So I did. :( Not very familiar with the Style guide. :( --LauraHale (talk) 11:08, 3 March 2011 (UTC)

WikiProject Wikify's March Mini Drive

WikiProject Wikify's March Mini! Hello, I thought you would be interested in the March Mini, a coordinated effort by WikiProject Wikify members to eliminate the 2008 backlog of articles tagged with {{wikify}} and/or {{dead end}}. Come join in the fun! There are only three prizes to be won, including a special barnstar created just for this drive! Regards, WikiProject Wikify

Delivered by MessageDeliveryBot on behalf of WikiProject Wikify at 04:05, 9 March 2011 (UTC).

All England Netball Association

Hopefully this isn't viewed as a copy-vio but I thought I would share the text from the All England Netball Association book that is quoted on the netball article in the history section. (I've been trusting this source because I figured they were possibly more credible as they may have had access to primary source documents that others did not have.) This is all from page 13

Early Beginnings

1891: Game invented in USA by YMCA Secretary, where it was then, and is now, called Basket Ball.

1895: Visit of Dr. Toles, an American, to Madame Osterberg's P.T. College (then at Hampstead). Students were taught Basketb Ball - indores - no printed rules - no lines, circles or boundaries. The goals were two waste paper baskets hung up on walls at each end of the hall.

1897: Game played out of doors on grass. An American lady paid a visit to the College (moved to Dartford), and taught the game as then played by women in America. The students at Dartford introduced rings instead of baskets, the larger ball and the division of the ground into three courts.

1900-1: The newly formed Ling Association (now the Physical Education Association) set up a sub-committee to revise and publish the first set of rules. 250 copies were published and many changes were adopted.

End quoting.

This source also talks a bit about the history but I'm not sure of their sourcing. Hopefully these two sources can help you with any improvements in that section. :) I can paste this to the talk page on Netball if you think it should also be there. --LauraHale (talk) 22:56, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

The whole thing was confusing for me too. It was one of the reasons I asked Hawkeye7 to try to fix the wording because I was just stumped. I put that source next to him and another one (the Gilbert netball book) and asked him to try to make that coherent. It might be worth it to say try to rewrite the whole section on the history of netball section to get the big picture and then try to summarise it down from there? --LauraHale (talk) 23:33, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

Not sure if this is helpful but from the same book on page 46:

Jane Blunt, who has visited the columns of Netball over the last quarter century, picks out a few only of the multitudinous changes in The Rules of the Game with comments of the day. She has listened to nostalgic memories and shares them with present day players.

1890's: Long before the AENA came into being, a game was played "indoors without printed rules or boundaries", "outdoors on grass and with waste paper baskets tied to clothes line props"; a court (100 ft. by 50 ft. with a flag at each corner) was divided into three sections. There were nine players in each team.

End quote.

Page 4:

It was not until the end of the 19th Century and the opening years of this century that public opinion became aware of the serious neglect not only of the well being of children in State schools but of the health, welfare and recreational needs of young people in offices, shops and industry.

Many voluntary associations for years had been doing their best to meet the problems. Children's Happy Evenings, Mrs. Humphrey Ward Play Centres, Guild of Play, the Boys' and Girls' Brigades, University Settlements, all took an active interest in fostering centres of recreation. The various school sports associations arranged matches for the more gifted children. But for the masses there was little opportunity for organised recreation.

Secondary schools were more fortunate. As soon as the qualified teach of PE and Games came on the scene at the turn of the century and physical education and games became a regular feature of the curriculum in the secondary schools, netball was played and developed very largely in London and other large industrial areas in the Midlands and the North to suit playground conditions and open space available. The rules and regulations of the game were laid down by the Ling Association (founded 1899), a body of expert gymnastic teachers. The game soon became highly skilled and a strong association formed throughout the country in these more privileged schools.

En quote. Those are pretty much the pre-1900s references. Hopefully that is useful. --LauraHale (talk) 23:47, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

This was largely due to the efforts of Martina Bergman-Österberg, who with her students pioneered the physical education teaching profession in the UK (which women initally dominated). The spread of netball during the early 20th century in the UK and throughout the British Empire was due largely to the movement of her students, some of whom formed the Ling Association. Interesting stuff. – Liveste (talk • edits) 00:24, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

Very interesting. :) Based on what I've been reading, I think the English were probably the dominant forces in spreading the game until probably the 1960s. At that point, New Zealand and Australia probably helped spread the game in Oceania. I would think that Caribbean players helped promote the games more on those island nations where the game wasn't as popular and in the United States. South Africa appears to be helping export the game to countries the general Southern African region. Seeing these trends is one of the reasons why I felt so vocal in the need to keep the sections by nation to understand how the game spread and how patterns differed with male and female administering of the game and the level of professionalism in the country, participations rates where available and what segments of the population were playing. --LauraHale (talk) 00:41, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

Netball good article

Hey. I wanted to thank you for the massive help on the good article process for the netball article. Things just got weirdly out of control. I know we don't fully agree on how information should be presented but I do think we've done a really, really good job at overall improving the article to what it was before. The second reviewer apparently has a history of problems with good article reviews. I'm not entirely certain how to resolve our differences regarding American women's basketball and English netball. :/ I think we both agree that the sport has roots in basketball. The question is the how much of an influence did American women have on what the English were doing and what of the shared history should be in there. (I'm inclined for less and seeing it put over on the history of netball article... but that's more because I can't find netball sources that support a connection, that cite the Ling Association being inspired by it, nor sources that support Australians and New Zealanders being inspired by the American women's game.) In any case, while we disagree, I don't hold any ill will or feel anything but real appreciation for the support you've given on trying to improve the article. Hopefully, we can fix things and try to get it improved.

On a back to the basketball issue, do you think it would be worth getting additional sources cited, talking it over on the history of netball, trying to improve the summary of the game's early development on that article? And after that's done, taking what would basically be a well cited lead and putting that into the netball article? I can probably find some sources for changes in tactics and some of the rules. (The All England Netball Association has details regarding that.) Doing it that way might make it easier. (And if the history section becomes too long, it shouldn't be an issue as length isn't supposed to be a good article criteria.) --LauraHale (talk) 05:50, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

The good article process shouldn't take that long. I asked several people about the process so I could make sure I knew what I was getting myself into. The guidelines suggest a week. I had people tell me that this experience was worse than many FACs they had been part of. Racepacket had been indefinitely blocked from Misplaced Pages before. A few people are apparently trying to get him blocked again. Their complaints are much the same as mine have been, with issues about wanting things included that make no sense, trying to insert factually incorrect information in the article, not adhering to the Manual of Style, etc.

I should have removed the nomination earlier. There were some bits in there that just leave going WTF? The Olympic section has become a bit of a train wreck of wording. The British Council section should be integrated back in along side Olympic funding. The whole Olympic sections feels a bit disjointed if you want to take a crack at improving it. (Hawkeye7 added some information to GA1 that might be citable. He may also have put it into the article because I recall my last reading thought it sounded like an angry person made this edits to appease another person.) I found some book related citations that may be useful and I can share that on the talk page for netball.

The history part is kind of really interesting. I was thinking it might make an interesting academic article to explore the parallels between the growth of basketball for American women and the growth of netball for the English. And beyond that, look to see if contemporary sources are citing women's basketball in the USA as the origins of the game. (As opposed to Naismith's game.) I've tried to provide sourcing to help explain my point of view and to help you as you appear to be the major contributor to the history article. It just isn't my area. (I've learned a huge amount about netball from editing the article but still not that knowledgeable.)

If you're in Auckland, Dunedin or Wellington, let me know as I'll be in New Zealand from April 5 until probably Easter time. I'd be happy to pay for coffee. :) --LauraHale (talk) 08:24, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

More commenting. (I don't shut up. I take 5 sentences to say what normally takes 1.) I just wanted to let you know that after examining and thinking critically about some one's edits, I'm feeling a bit... put out and just a little bit stupid. (Hence Misplaced Pages editing at this time of night.) This is something that I put into another article and I might like your opinion on it as it may require us to make fixes to the netball article:

1. NPOV violations. Racepacket reviewed both Netball and Netball in the Cook Islands with the clear intention of pushing a point of view that the sport was not popular in general, and specifically was not popular in the Cook Islands. This can be seen by his repeated claims of wanting more information on the popularity of the game, by his insistence in saying "X amount of countries of the Y amount of countries in Africa are affiliated with the regional federation." He wanted similar statements in every region. He wanted the total percentage of players as a representation of the country's total population. He wanted to know how many teams competed and to let people know that they were ranked X out of Y, to make the game appear less popular. He wanted to irresponsibly gender the article to highlight the fact that the game is played by women, and is thus less popular and less credible. He wanted to remove the country sections and information on statistics that showed relative popularity by country. He tried to get phrases like "most popular women's participation sport" in the country removed because they were biased, even if there were citations that supported this claim. He wanted to remove the Olympic sport part because by removing the Olympics, he makes the game appear less popular and credible as a sport. He demanded its removal even in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary. He tried to diminish the importance of international competitions by treating international federations, similar to CONCACAF and CONMEBOL for FIFA into regional leagues that countries in the area compete in.

End quote. If we inserted stuff to make netball appear less popular than it actually is, then I'm a bit worried. :/ It would also go a long way towards explaining some of the issues that we've dealt with... and I don't know how to clean this up. :( --LauraHale (talk) 12:13, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

I honestly am surprised that LauraHale felt that way, particularly because she never expressed those concerns to me directly. A free exchange of ideas is much better that hostility or a passive-aggressive stance toward ones collaborators on a project. Needless to say, those are not my views. I want neutrality, not a pro-Netball or anit-Neball bias. The subject matter experts should help determine how to achieve that objective. Thanks, Racepacket (talk) 16:31, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

GA Netball

I understand that User:LauraHale wishes to withdraw, but I hope that you and the other editors could continue so that we can wrap this up and not have to start from scratch next time. I have placed the article back on hold because only the review can "fail" the article. Thanks, Racepacket (talk) 16:25, 23 March 2011 (UTC)