Misplaced Pages

Recommended reading;

Papillon,

by Henri Charrière

Paradise Lost: Smyrna, 1922:
The Destruction of Islam’s City of Tolerance

by Giles Milton

• amazon.com

reviews;

• nysun.com
• timesonline.co.uk
• brisbanetimes.com.au
• economist.com

Indonesian killings of 1965–66

Catherine Bonkbuster

On Slim virgins and arbcom dragons

Martyred Armenia

by Fâ’iz El-Ghusein

A course in troll sockpuppets

by Durova

Johnny Got His Gun

by Dalton Trumbo

• Archive 1, 2

Blood and Roses was a trading game, along the lines of Monopoly. The Blood side played with human atrocities for the counters, atrocities on a large scale: individual rapes and murders didn't count, there had to have been a large number of people wiped out. Massacres, genocides, that sort of thing. The Roses side played with human achievements. Artworks, scientific breakthroughs, stellar works of architecture, helpful inventions. Monuments to the soul's magnificence, they were called in the game. There were sidebar buttons, so that if you didn't know what Crime and Punishment was, or the Theory of Relativity, or the Trail of Tears, or Madame Bovary, or the Hundred Years' War, or The Flight into Egypt, you could double-click and get an illustrated rundown, in two choices: R for children, PON for Profanity, Obscenity, and Nudity. That was the thing about history, said Crake: it had lots of all three.

The exchange rates — one Mona Lisa equalled Bergen-Belsen, one Armenian genocide equalled the Ninth Symphony plus three Great Pyramids — were suggested, but there was room for haggling. To do this you needed to know the numbers — the total number of corpses for the atrocities, the latest open-market price for the artworks; or, if the artworks had been stolen, the amount paid out by the insurance policy. It was a wicked game.

The sack of Troy, says a voice in his ear. The destruction of Carthage. The Vikings. The Crusades. Ghenghis Kahn. Attila the Hun. The massacre of the Cathars. The witch burnings. The destruction of the Aztec. Ditto the Maya. Ditto the Inca. The Inquisition. Vlad the Impaler. The massacre of the Huguenots. Cromwell in Ireland. The French Revolution. The Napoleonic Wars. The Irish Famine. Slavery in the American South. King Léopold in the Congo. The Russian Revolution. Stalin. Hitler. Hiroshima. Mao. Pol Pot. Idi Amin. Sri Lanka. East Timor. Saddam Hussein.

"Stop it," says Snowman.

Sorry, honey. Only trying to help.

That was the trouble with Blood and Roses: it was easier to remember the Blood stuff. The other trouble was that the Blood player usually won, but winning meant you inherited a wasteland. This was the point of the game, said Crake, when Jimmy complained. Jimmy said that if that was the point, it was pretty pointless. He didn't want to tell Crake that he was having some severe nightmares: the one where the Parthenon was decorated with cut-off heads was, for some reason, the worst.

— From Oryx and Crake, by Margaret Atwood

your mission should you choose to accept it.....

I thought you may be amused by this:

I guess along the lines of pop culture, some editors were bemused at the obscurity of many hooks that appear on the main page. I have on my travels seen plenty of more notable stubs which could be expanded five-fold, which I thought would be interesting to expand and place on the main page. I think I will copy this archived stuff into my userspace anyway, but held a (largely aborted) competition to highlight/find some more notable material that is too stubby and too expanded. I guess this is my way of addressing systemic bias (though with carrots rather than sticks). Your own personal mission, should you choose to accept, it is to find the most notable indonesian/balinese stubs to expand 5-fold and get onto the main page. Your skill with prose and thoroughness with referencing should make this easy. It is funny to see how a selection of contributors modifies the brownian motion of article creation, so for a while, rather than a spread of random articles, there were overrepresented birds, fungi, medieval Chinese figures, miscellaneous North American synagogues, and lots of US historical houses. Definitely needs more third world mateiral. Also, there is systemic bias in the birds wikiproject with a definite anglophone preponderance, so if you run across anything interesting from a local perspective avianwise that might make a good DYK, GA or even FA. Anyway, all this is presuming the arb works out...Cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 11:31, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Jack Merridew ban review motion

The above-linked ban review has been closed and a motion passed. You have been unblocked, conditional to the restrictions and mentorship arrangement set out in the motion, available in full at this link. The three mentors assigned are Casliber (talk · contribs), Jayvdb (talk · contribs) and Moreschi (talk · contribs).

For the Arbitration Committee,
Daniel (talk) 10:03, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Terima kasih (id:thank you), Daniel. Others, too, of course. Cheers, Jack Merridew 10:08, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Yes, I can see what you mean about WP:AN, WP:AN/I etc and common boards (I would think it'd apply to threads rather than the whole board as such. Need to clarify that with the arb committee I think. Cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 04:23, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

Ya, me-thinks so; user talk page, too. Cheers, Jack Merridew 04:33, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

Hello

Welcome back Jack. --Pixelface (talk) 15:33, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Thank you. Jack Merridew 15:37, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Welcome back. In the spirit of the upcoming season, I'm hoping for peace on Earth; hopefully we'll at least have peace with you this time? Hope springs eternal, you know. :) BOZ (talk) 16:47, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Thirded (if that's a word?). Also, as Eleanor Roosevelt said, "Learn from the mistakes of others, life's too short to make them all yourself," i.e. I have found that editing in new areas that I did not previously edit in seems to get positive feedback, whereas old whatever you want to call them have a tendency to be well you know in the areas I used to focus on. Best, --A Nobody 16:54, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Uh, the upcoming season here is the wet season… but I get it. BOZ, I am going to offer a view on Gavin's RfC, however I'm not going to focus on D&D nearly as much (unencyclopaedic, and all). I will vigorously oppose D&D's Notable Dick, if necessary; that's always been a key reason for my involvement there.

Nobody, I am focused on editing in a wider range of areas; see? I have not been 'gone', I have better than 10,000 edits while on holiday from en:wp; see?

Cheers, Jack Merridew 04:59, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Hey Jack. :) It's good that you would step in to help against "He Who Must Not Be Named Because He Loves To Hear His Name And That Makes Him Show Up"; however, I always assumed he was doing what he was doing to D&D articles more to annoy you (and to a lesser extent, Jeske and Gavin) than because he wanted the templates gone (although I'm sure he wanted that also). Regardless, I haven't seen any clear evidence (not the same as him not being there) of him getting involved in D&D articles in that same way while you were gone from here, whether or not that backs up my theory. I have seen evidence that he has been around, moving pages to nonsense titles before someone moves it back (this comes to mind, for example) so we all need to keep an eye out. The best way to handle that is, as always, revert the change if you can, then let an admin know so they can block and semi-protect. Carry on! :)

I see you've been doing a lot of good work. Carry on with that as well! :) (But yeah, I'm sure it's not as wet here as it is on an island, but we've got plenty of slush and snow, so wet it is.) BOZ (talk) 15:30, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

The nakal anak needs to get laid. If he thinks he's annoyed me, he's way off; he's kinda fun to beat-up on ;) See my history and compare the timing circa 2005 with his; I was reading the rfar pages quite assiduously back in the day. I also understand the entomology of his usersname. The D&D crowd needs to quite clearly disown their patron vandal. Comments like this one ("Giving him the Grawp treatment seems to be the only way to get anything done") amount to an endorsement of such disruptive behavior. As the meme goes, he's got over 9,000 cockpuppets; how sure are you that a few of them aren't of the WP:GOODHAND variety?

I have no idea where you are; I'd speculate that it would be the northern United States, but that's just what you seem to be implying. Here's it always about 27°C (a bit over 80°F) and breezy and not very humid, even in the heavy rains. It rains about every other afternoon for an hour or so; most often late at night and early in the morning. This is the season when stuff grows at an amazing rate. Cheers, Jack Merridew 05:55, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

Well, partly to annoy you, and partly just to get his kicks. ;) If he hasn't been around to bother you lately, then that can only be a good thing (unless it just means he's moved on to someone else). I do remember JA fighting any little edit he didn't agree with to one of "his" articles, so that was certainly no fun. Advocating JA/G's (heh) seriously overt bad behavior is certainly not where I'm coming from, and I've been trying (god help me) to be as cool and calm and productive as I can to hopefully inspire others to do the same. Although before JA's block he was contributing some decent work to the project, he hasn't contributed anything useful since then and I would hope the majority opinion of our project reflects that. Anyway, sounds beautiful where you're at - want to trade? :) BOZ (talk) 16:49, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

No-trade; fuck winter. I wear sandals every day; Summer, Day 1307.

I have a dim view of WikiProjects; all of them. When you say 'project' you mean WP:D&D, when I use the word 'project' I mean an encyclopaedia that doesn't suck. In an even broader sense, I mean all of the WMF projects. I have more edits elsewhere than here. You're a Single Project Account. Think about it. WikiProjects are a self-selecting group and often they have WP:OWNership agendas, and amount to attempts to seceed from the real project. A lot of WikiProject will morph into WikiaProjects. That's what Pixel's so afreaid of. Cheers, Jack Merridew 13:55, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

Jack, please do not use any variation or allusion to my old username (please see the note on the top of my talk page why). Anyway, yes, I see that you have been doing some other good stuff and I believe that is why you are back. I am hoping to help Durova bring some rock articles out of stub status and maybe even get some good article contributions as well as my usual welcoming and rescue efforts. All the best! Sincerely, --A Nobody 00:51, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

Done; see my userpage and the Category: Misplaced Pages sockpuppets of Davenbelle at the bottom. I believe in acknowledging one's history. I can see that some RL issue may be at play here, in you case. I've not missed your history of late; let me offer a bit of advice: read WP:TEND and WP:DISRUPT. You really need to accept that your approach to AfDs and RfAs is problematic. The wiki does discriminate against WP:NOT#INFO all the time. Judging an admin candidate solely on your perception of their views on inclusion criteria is a colossal assumption of bad faith. I, for example, would not close an AfD on an article about cruft as delete, I'd let someone else do it, as my doing it would only inspire others to go disrupt DRV.

Want a project? Get encyclopedia up to FA status. _{terima kasih, John} Cheers, Jack Merridew 05:55, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

New Assignments

Given your unique perspective of being (a) intelligent (b) bahasa-speaking, you may have some opinion on the balance of articles such as this one. Cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 14:02, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Also, maybe constructively reviewing articles at Misplaced Pages:Good_article_nominations or WP:PR maybe good. Cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 14:03, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

My talk page is too fat

Weird - it looked fine yesterday but has now gone too wide for some reason - can you see what is amiss? Cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 00:07, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

Fixed; page widening. Cheers, Jack Merridew 07:06, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

Regarding Wikia

I do recall reading several of your comments about Wikia at the E&C2 workshop, but I also recall several mentions of Wikia at the E&C1 workshop and particularly at Talk:List of Scrubs episodes before E&C2 opened. I also recall being contacted last December about the Wikia Annex, along with several other editors, including you — although it was later determined that that editor was a sockpuppet of Grawp. And yes, the Wikia Annex was mentioned in E&C2.

I'm sure your comments had some influence on me, but I've been looking into the matter more and more. You may be interested in reading this comment from me on my talk page, which refers to an email by the CEO of Wikia, Inc in June as well as an article in The Guardian. Basically, Jimbo Wales (User:Jimbo Wales) and Angela Beesley (User:Angela) founded Wikicities, a for-profit wiki, in late 2004. In March 2005, the Misplaced Pages Board of Trustees, which Angela was on, suggested a user create a Star Wars wiki there. Angela has edited several Wikia templates on Misplaced Pages. In March 2006, Wikicities was renamed Wikia and the official press release on March 27, 2006 mentioned Wookieepedia. Also on March 27, 2006, WP:WAF was created, and it plugged Wookieepedia. On June 16, 2006, WAF was marked a guideline, and WAF continues to plug Wookieepedia to this day — including several other Wikia sites. Thirteen days later, WP:NOT#PLOT was proposed based on WP:WAF. WP:PLOT was added to NOT on July 9, 2006, and PLOT encourages the deletion of articles that are just plot summaries — which includes articles about scores of fictional characters. WP:FICT mentioned Wikia from August 2007 to March 2008 — during the span of E&C1 and E&C2. I've already noted that TTN, a central figure in E&C1 and E&C2, is apparently an editor at xiaolinshowdown.wikia.com as well as gaming.wikia.com.

This press release from 2007 by the Wikimedia Foundation states that Wikia, Inc. is not the commercial counterpart to Misplaced Pages or the Wikimedia Foundation. However, several Misplaced Pages policies and guidelines currently promote Wikia, and have for some time. So Wikia has leverage. I am thinking of proposing a Misplaced Pages policy on how to deal with Wikia at WP:WIKIA. If that ever happens, your input would be welcome. --Pixelface (talk) 20:11, 13 December 2008 (UTC)

Countering systemic bias #65 - bird folklore

One thing that might be kinda fun, I have been trying to counteract the anglosaxon bias of bird folklore (I love how various cultures have interpreted their little critters)

• So European Robin has the obligatory material, as do many other english birds etc. I have hunted some aboriginal material to embellish aussie birds such as Willie Wagtail and others, but thought it may be good if you found anything in bahasa or knew of some local folklore, I have some books on parrots of the world and some SE asian birds, so whipping up a DYK from a stub is easy-peasy, plus we get some 3rd world folklore into it - if you find something interesting....let me know the species/bird. Cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 12:07, 14 December 2008 (UTC)

1. my bahasa sucks; I recognize maybe one in 20 words.
2. 'burung' is bird, as in flu burung; also a nasty computer virus from Ambonese separatists.
3. most of the birds I see here, and hear here, are chickens.

1. 'ayam' is chicken; tastes like chicken, too.
2. a very common pastime is…

Balinese men sure do love their cocks!

In the early evening they take them out, stroke and fondle them, croon to them and sometimes play “my cock’s better than your cock″ by the side of the road along with their Balinese companions. To a visitor from the west, one cock looks pretty much like another cock. After all, to most westerners, a rooster’s just a hen with a bad attitude.

Cockfighting (or at least the betting on them) is illegal in Indonesia. At least there’s a law against it someplace on some law book. Nobody seems to know where that place is or what law book. It has something to do with practicing one’s religion. If you need to throw a rooster at another rooster and good money after bad in your quest for a better relationship with god(s), you’re golden. You can do roosters. And wagering.

Roosters are kept separated from each other (so they don’t do freelance fighting when you have no money on the outcome) in cock cages. You’ll see them everywhere, often right outside your room. Cocks in cages awaken as early as cocks ranging free, and they are just as enthusiastic in announcing the dawn. When choosing a place to sleep, keep a sharp eye out for hive-shaped baskets with grown-up chickens inside.

— a tale from a website that never launched

I can get pictures ;)

I also have a dove that lives just outside my bathroom window; there's a bit of roof over it and the nest is perched on the support.

Cheers, Jack Merridew 12:41, 14 December 2008 (UTC)

Aha --> Cockfight ( they don't look balinese in the top image though) a agood place to embellish the SE asian bit (and fix some foramtting gaffes). Cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 12:58, 14 December 2008 (UTC)

Puputan

This topic is an interesting one and your addition of it to Misplaced Pages is welcome. However I notice that you have peremptorily removed the merge proposal which I suggested without allowing time for other editors to comment and with the edit summary "silliness sorted". As I understand it, you seem to be describing the merge proposal as silliness. This seems improper in that it obscures the nature of your edit and is uncivil to boot. Please explain or retract your imputation.

Having engaged with this topic, I may well make further contributions to it, as discussed on the article's talk page. My main concerns at the moment are that we should be using English to describe this topic, rather than using the Balinese language, and that the presentation should be neutral in describing the clash between the Dutch and the Balinese. Such issues of nationalist NPOV can be tricky to resolve and so we should strive to proceed in an open and amicable way. Colonel Warden (talk) 12:18, 14 December 2008 (UTC)

(sigh) yeah, be careful Jack...keep it all positive :) Cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 12:27, 14 December 2008 (UTC)

reverting Moulton

Hi... I strongly suggest you leave reverting Moulton to others... at least for now anyway. Your best course of action (after coming off a recent indef block) is to stay away from all drama as much as possible. Being involved with Giano is a high drama activity regardless of what "side" you are on... it's MAD in there if you ask me. ++Lar: t/c 16:29, 14 December 2008 (UTC)

Yep, I can vouch for that recently (now to rummage round for linkies). Cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 19:53, 14 December 2008 (UTC)

• Point taken; thank you, guys. I'll go read it all without comment. I'm on the wiki's side ;) Cheers, Jack Merridew 06:27, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

Speaking of madness, I've read this somewhere before; it amounts to digging a deep pit and throwing some folks in along with somewhat fewer knives. Sheesh, Jack Merridew 07:44, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

Fix code

See request on my talk page. — Rlevse • Talk • 10:54, 16 December 2008 (UTC)

 Done — Cheers, Jack Merridew 07:48, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

Ieyasu precepts

It would have been better created by Tenmei, for attributions sake. John Vandenberg 06:13, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

oops. maaf. I did link to his diff (in an html comment). Jack Merridew 06:21, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

OK, I have no idea WTF I have done...

what happened can you see the code which has gone awry?? Cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 07:19, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

ya ;) Cheers, Jack Merridew 07:52, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

 Done, see here. Cheers, Jack Merridew 08:17, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

User page

Can you do that to my user page too? Same thing is on that page as well as talkpage. — Rlevse • Talk • 12:10, 21 December 2008 (UTC)

I was about to, but edit conflicted with John... will sort it out. Cheers, Jack Merridew 12:11, 21 December 2008 (UTC)

Tks. You're pretty good at this stuff. — Rlevse • Talk • 12:13, 21 December 2008 (UTC)

 Done and I'll do more; worked on Cas's page earlier. Cheers, Jack Merridew 12:16, 21 December 2008 (UTC)

Nice job, except I don't like the padlock and trout thing, so I deleted that. Feel free to tweak if it makes it better. — Rlevse • Talk • 13:16, 21 December 2008 (UTC)

re the trout: the idea is really that there's room top-left for one preferred icon; your choice, of course. Not sure what padlock you mean; wasn't intentional... I'll tidy some other stuff I noticed. Enjoy, Jack Merridew 13:21, 21 December 2008 (UTC)

The padlock may be because I use a secure connection to wiki. The Trout was on the far left of the screen and covered up the first letters of the page name. It does this on Cas' page too. — Rlevse • Talk • 13:44, 21 December 2008 (UTC)

Hmmm. Might be a browser thing, but you seem to be using Firefox. Using Monobook? My sock icon must be off for you, too. These are supposed to be to the left of the word 'User' and straddling the vertical line at the edge -- hanging a bit overboard towards the wiki-globe. These have class="topicon" which causes a script to move them a bit. I'll go nix the one on Cas's high-profile page for now... Thanks. Cheers, Jack Merridew 14:01, 21 December 2008 (UTC)

Ya I use FF. Your sock icon is on the left but the trout and padlock are on the right on your page. — Rlevse • Talk • 14:07, 21 December 2008 (UTC)

Ya, my trout is meant to be on the right, along with three others; no padlock, though; I'll try the secure login -- I usually don't bother. I certainly see why you would. About to save a tweak to your user page code. Cheers, Jack Merridew 14:13, 21 December 2008 (UTC)

File:Phaedriel's-orchid.jpeg...do you know this scientific name? Since it's PD, we can move it to commons, where it'd be good, but not required, to know the scientific name of this orchid variety. — Rlevse • Talk • 17:28, 21 December 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, no idea; it was growing in the garden of a place I stayed a few years ago. I'll ask Cas. Cheers, Jack Merridew 02:39, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

User pages/divs/etc

Hiya. I noticed that you seem to have a rather better grasp of div placement than I do. I have a custom banner overriding my page titles in my userspace, but for some reason it always displays as indented slightly down and to the right, unless I purge the page, at which point it displays correctly. It also displays correctly on diff pages, for what reason I do not know. Would you have the time to take a look here and see what I've done wrong? // roux   05:07, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

Sure; I've noticed your page seemed a bit amiss, but have not looked into just what's up. I'll take the above as license.

Your sig should lose the font-elements ;)

Cheers, Jack Merridew 05:13, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. And yes, please do take that as permission. Also.. sig better now? // roux   05:35, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

I'm very down on font tags; they pollute this site with tons of bad markup. I'd be in favor of removing most all of the sig customisation 'features'. Yours is better now (and wasn't bad before; the worst are the ones with big gaudy boxes).

I'm about to save a set of tweaks to your user page (/u); I've not sorted the specific issue yet, but am on it. This first pass is fixing syntax nits and converting to a wiki-table instead of an html one. I've not used 'title-override' before. fyi, it's script moving it.

User:Jack Merridew aka david 05:47, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

Hey.. wow. Amazing. Thank you! But here's the weird thing. On /u it looks perfect. But when it transcludes, the header obscures all the tabs etc at the top of the page. // roux   07:22, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

Scratch that.. the obscuring only happens when I purge. When I don't purge, it's perfect. How weird is that? // roux   07:24, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

You're welcome ;) I was about to leave you a note. When you purge, the repositioning is not occurring; this has nothing to do specifically with your pages. The key bit I added is top: -34px !important; which says 'I win, please' — higher specificity that a style sheet rule. The specific positioning offsets may need tweaking; I'm not sure just what the values or units of the offsetting is. I suspect this has to do with getting stuff out of the way of the fundraising banner. I also see that you've a complex userspace and this bar is used in complex ways; I didn't look much at other pages, so reviewing would be prudent. Cheers, Jack Merridew 07:33, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

Yup, I've been fixing it on the other pages too. Thank you again! // roux   07:38, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

You're most welcome. I'll look a bit further, see what else there is. See you about; pleased to make your acquaintance. Cheers, Jack Merridew 07:54, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

I just refactored the html-table in your dashboard page, too; wiki-tables are preferred unless you really need tight control of details (of course, my user page is full of divs and little wiki-text). Something tweaked in the regard to the font-size on your dashboard page, so you may want to add 120% in a few spots. Cheers, Jack Merridew 08:09, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

Christmas

re this edit

Why does your not celebrating Christmas have anything to do with systemic bias? Lots of people do celebrate it, including in America, and I am baffled by your edit summary, removing systemic bias means recognizing all celebrations. I imagine their are celebrations in Bali and that when there are you join in. Thanks, SqueakBox 04:46, 23 December 2008 (UTC)

I didn't say that I don't celebrate Christmas (although I don't). A few points;

• I don't think it appropriate to promote such a holiday on that fellow's page. Certainly, there should be an article at Christmas and I'd have no issue with a DYK or some other mention on the main page.
• just about every day is somehow special to some group, somewhere. I don't recall any recognition anywhere on-wiki last Saraswati Day and that would be a whole lot more appropriate to an encyclopaedia; lovely, it's red: see Saraswati and http://www.indo.com/culture/saraswati.html; it's a celebration of knowledge. See why I see systemic bias? It's pervasive.
• the image was not placed the by the user. That page says 'edit this page' and especially encourages things like code fixes, which I did some of. It does not say to mess with the content itself, which mucking with the picture amounts to. If the user had placed the image themselves, I'd certainly not have touched it.
• the image is a lame photoshop job and looks like something off a GeoCities page from about 1996.

Cheers, Jack Merridew 05:14, 23 December 2008 (UTC)

Please consider this thread moved to:

• User talk:Jimbo Wales#Christmas

Cheers, Jack Merridew 05:18, 23 December 2008 (UTC)

I responded on Jimbo's talk but will say here that Saraswati pooja has been an article in the mainspace for nearly 2 years now and I redirected your red link to it. Thanks, SqueakBox 15:18, 23 December 2008 (UTC)

• a fine Xmas message for all of us to be mindful of.... hehehe. Cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 22:53, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

I see nothing wrong with celebrating the holidays of one's own country/culture. You're denying Jimbo that right. Would you remove such a picture from a Muslim user's page if he were celebrating a Muslim holiday? — Rlevse • Talk • 23:23, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

But Jimbo didn't place the image, an anon did. If he had put the image up, I'd have not touched it (3rd point above). As I said to SqueakBox (on his talk page), I see this as others goofing around with his user page for the lulz. Merry Christmas, Jack Merridew 04:36, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

Re:Museum Puri Lukisan

Welcome back! The only way around these to get email permission from an official address at the museum- if the museum sends an email saying something like "We're X museum, and we are happy for the material on our website to be released under Y license" to our OTRS address, along with a link to previously uploaded images, then that's the problem sorted. Alternatively, permission letters to Wikimedia are sometimes used, but just trusting the user is not really feasible. J Milburn (talk) 10:55, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

Hi, and thanks.

See the note I left the user; User talk:Swidagdo#an end to the image hassles?, and the note to Lar; User talk:Lar#A user needs OTRS help. I've also fired-off email. I believe this is on the up and up; things need to be done properly, of course, but I suggest giving this a few days. If all goes well, I believe there's some stuff to be undeleted and pretty much all of it should go to commons. FYI, these images do not appear to be off their website, but I've not looked extensively. Cheers, Jack Merridew 11:07, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

Joyeux Noël

Joyeux Noël, David. --Pixelface (talk) 03:07, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

Sorry

Sorry about that. I misunderstood your intentions and took you for a petty vandal. Sorry again. --Balloholic (talk) 14:32, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

Replied there. Cheers, Jack Merridew 14:35, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

Indonesian project

It might be hard to understand what exactly you are doing with all the indonesian templates - would it be possible to actually expain why and what at Misplaced Pages talk:WikiProject Indonesia it would be good to have it on record what exactly you are up to - cheers SatuSuro 11:51, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Ah, sure. Short version is I'm cleaning-up markup issues. Cheers, Jack Merridew 11:53, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

As a matter of courtesy a longer one would be appreciated at the project discussion page -

The Indonesian project has been abeyance for a while - expect lots of nuisance messages - there are quite afew non wikipedia practices creeping into the project once again - good view is at - User:AlexNewArtBot/IndonesiaSearchResult - if you edit or create articles and dont want to hear from me very regularly - please be kind enough to put WP:RS with your work - and also on the talk pages WP Indonesia - other than that have a good new year or whatever - selamat apa apa SatuSuro 12:01, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Yeah - I'd really like to know too what the changes are about. What does "markup issues?" mean. Cheers. --Merbabu (talk) 12:15, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Maaf; I was just finishing up what I was doing. Mark-up refers to html and wiki-text. I was converting all those stub templates to use wiki-text for the tables instead of hard-coded html; the whole need for a table is dubious, but that an issue for another day. I'll leave a note on WP:ID next, and get better acquainted with both of you guys Cheers, Jack Merridew 12:25, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

The more clear explanation to the noticeboard the betters - personal talk page stuff gets lost too easy - cheers SatuSuro 12:28, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Sorry to be a damp squib at the poject talk page but outright copying from wp:id is actively frowned upon - for a whole rang of issues - most of which need to be off wiki - but in essence few WP:RS exist - and as a consequence to flood a project with articles with no WP:RS WP:V is like cursing it - please do not SatuSuro 13:13, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for explaining your credentials - it is appreciated - the Indonesian project has enough issues to fill a bemo and scare every one out :) SatuSuro 14:14, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

I was about to answer over there, but here's fine. I was looking at the football clubs and such things. One of my pet pet peeves here is unencyclopaedic content. You'll not be seeing any from me. Cheers, Jack Merridew 14:21, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Susuhunan - I am a very strong anti oggle bastard (to use australian) - and to see the find a source and the oggle as a way of doing it - aarrgggggghhhh - a simple check of my library i could fill a reference list with 25 refs + but i am going to bed. cheers and good night - some other time SatuSuro 14:45, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

It's for others to use ;) I have to take a 737 to get to the bookstore. Cheers, Jack Merridew 15:13, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Well got dsitract5ed so can answer - have more refs and books than can poke a sate kambing stick at - also lived in Jawah Tengah in deep deep dark past and more recently a couple of visits to singers visits have helped - btw 737 hope its not with the dubious carriers :( - off now for cert - cheers SatuSuro 15:21, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

I expected there was some id:connection. The Garuda birds I fly are all about 30 years old. At least I wasn't on the one that tried to land at over 400km/hr (nb: I started that article ;). Cheers, Jack Merridew 15:28, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

I used to live v close to adiscupito and used to take anak yang tiga to watch the planes when he as v small - what used to get to me when i used it as a passenger was the mid runway angle change - there was a brilliant rumour/folklore about bullion under the tarmac at one stage in its history i must tell you about off wiki sometime. the wife (before she was) used to live less than 5 km from the mouth of merapi during one of its dormant eras :( - so the story unfolds. the rest should be offwiki - cheers SatuSuro 15:43, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

User talk:Bennylin#Template moves

discussion refactored to User talk:Bennylin#Template moves.

You move them. I absolutely don't mind, even I'll thank you as long as they're properly sorted. I don't like war. You know the rules here whilst I not. Thanks. I'm gonna continue for a while and then go to rest. I'm very tired, so I'm sorry if I offend anyone. Bennylin (talk) 08:01, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

Well, someone has to move them, and if you won't, I'll do some of it. I have no idea where you are but it would seem to be on the other side of the world than Bali; i.e. late night for you. Ya, I know the rules here; I've been on-wiki for over four years. Lots of history ;) Jack Merridew 08:07, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

Templates

Am gonna check em all sometime - and make sure they are with project tags - when its not so hot - trust the issue can get to the project talk page so we can establish that we want english terms in titles and usage and not indonesian. cheers SatuSuro 11:06, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

(ec) re "LOTF" Well it could be Laughing On The Floor. The English named ones should be tagged; skip the id:names as that would only result in silly redirects on id:talk page names, too. Nice, cool, rainy day here. I'll chip-in re template naming conventions over there. Cheers, Jack Merridew 11:13, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

If youre doin redirects thanks caniago has been slaving them all back to inggeris - ta SatuSuro 11:25, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

Ya, I'm seeing that; I don't miss much ;) This will all prompt a deep cleaning of this stuff. Cheers, Jack Merridew 11:27, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

{{RiauIslandsProvince}} - classic case of rocks in head - will leave you to move it :( SatuSuro 07:27, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

That was an inappropriate merge, I think. FYI, he's edit waring with me on id:wp. I left him a stern note. I'll have a chat with Revi about all this, too. Also, I believe he's running an unauthorized bot over there. He didn't answer my note, but kept right on editing at high speed. Cheers, Jack Merridew 07:36, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

Maybe rocks everywhere then - if i dont get the chance later - happy new year orang barat style - cheers SatuSuro 07:46, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

Found out where the rocks might be coming from - check your gmail - sigh SatuSuro 08:03, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

Be careful

This sort of fun and games doesn't look so good so soon after an unban. Cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 07:45, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

Ya, noted; I'm not touching those further — at least not for the duration of Misplaced Pages:Requests for comment/Pixelface. Basically they popped up on my watchlist and it seemed my duty to undo the disruption. This isn't 'fun and games' — he's disruptive. Cheers, Jack Merridew 07:52, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

Good, because you were doing good so far, don't blow it with stuff like this. — Rlevse • Talk • 12:38, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

I'm doing tons of good things! Happy New Year, Jack Merridew 12:43, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

Happy New Year

Thank you, Sydney. I had a few beers with the lads at my usual restaurant. The Balinese do love a celebration. Lots of noise makers and pool games. I hope your evening was enjoyable, too. It's going to be a fine year. Cheers, Jack Merridew 05:51, 1 January 2009 (UTC)

Happy New Year as well. My New Year's resolution is to use mixed metaphors. I feel they add humour as well as enabling me to get my viewpoint across on the grounds that it is better to use two stones to kill the bird in the hand. Perhaps you would like to join in the fun? Let me know if you come across any good examples. You get extra points for biting humour, bonus for originality. --Gavin Collins (talk) 16:15, 1 January 2009 (UTC)

How about

I believe that hardware stores should always have sufficient rope available for folks to shoot themselves in the foot.

They're about inducing cognitive dissonance. Cheers, Jack Merridew 16:22, 1 January 2009 (UTC)

Lets hear it on the nose for cognitive dissonance - hip hip foot doesy doe blue ray blu ray! SatuSuro 22:57, 1 January 2009 (UTC)

• I got my second mixed metaphor in today: This proposal does not have enough clothes to stand on one leg. However, I feel I could have come up with a variation on this theme that was more dissonant, and the opportunity for me to mix my metaphors in a new and orginal way may have saddly passed without so much as wimper passing in the night. --Gavin Collins (talk) 22:43, 10 January 2009 (UTC)

Find Sources

Interesting. However, my Google (do we have a different machine?) have a different result http://www.google.co.id/search?hl=id&q=Revo+Arka+Giri+Soekatno&meta=&aq=f&oq= . I even found (doing that way, never really occurred my mind since the reference is archived in a way in WBI) a news site: Sinar Harapan, that was not mentioned. Serenity id (talk) 07:07, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

Hi. Ya, Google results vary. They have different stuff at different domains (.co.id vs .com vs others). You will also get different results based on their profile of you (such as a language setting of bahasa Indonesia). I hope those links are helpful. I'll tidy up the English on Revi's page when I get a chance. Cheers, Jack Merridew 07:23, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

Tidy up. Hmm, that's new. Writing in general regardless what language you're in needs to be read and rewritten several times til it reaches acceptable level. Second eye for proof reading is almost always needed. Anyhoo, even when I started the article already asked a friend to check it out because I was lazy myself. So don't worry. Serenity id (talk) 07:55, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

I usually use 'tidy up' to refer to formatting details, not the text itself ;) I'd like to tweak the text, too; I'm meeting-up with Revi soon. Cheers, Jack Merridew 08:50, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

oggle rubbish

Bah anyone who over relies on oggle has serious problems - there at least 3 to 5 other search engines that are far more useful for wikipedia usage that have more relevant architecture and logic.

However not what i was here for - could you run your bullsh-- detecting eyes over ]? Its like he invented water and saved mars from a drought or something - i think your opinion at least would be worth having on it - it should have been speedied as a vanity but its socks have been playing which would make it diff to afd if it went there - cheers SatuSuro 12:18, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

Go nuclear ;) Cheers, Jack Merridew 12:38, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

Bah -have better things to do - could spend my whole waking hours making grammar and spellchecks of non english speakers edits in a certain project - have at least identified it and warned the (sic) socks that have created it SatuSuro 12:42, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

To use the language of my eldest teenager ohmigawd - that was a bit brusque of you - oh well someone else can deal with it - i started the delinking the overload - and did a bit - will be interesting to see what happens i might not be back on for a day or two - cheers SatuSuro 12:46, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

Don't worry; it'll go away soon. For the Evil Deletionist Cabal, Jack Merridew 12:49, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

How true how true even while we talked... trust things dont come and go as quickly in your area as they can in the central javanese night... SatuSuro 13:22, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

I've made a lot of shite go awayCheers, Jack Merridew 13:41, 5 January 2009 (UTC) (Master Dalang)

Sulawesi cat items

Some really bright spark has tried to create a cat which identifies provinces of sulawesi as regencies - currently removing the apparent issue and trying to create the appropriate cat - there is simply no measure of the idiocy that seeps into this dammned project SatuSuro 03:30, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

I think i worked it out conflation of cities and regencies into one template making cities regencies and regencies cities - sigh SatuSuro 03:39, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

Worse than I thought - must be project wide - in central java - a province is in the regency cat - god give somebody a new brain, sigh SatuSuro 03:49, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

That was me. I've been adding categories via navigation templates. The mechanism may need tweaking, but please stop removing navboxes. Jack Merridew 04:31, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

On condition that you fix it - it makes a mockery of the whole category process in the whole project - provinces are not regencies etc SatuSuro 04:56, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

Trust I am not being too australian and confrotnational - would you prefer the javanese beat around the bush style and suggest a small trip to siberia for the week and then a hint in vladivostok? SatuSuro 05:07, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

Speak in a less obscure voice or I'll simply ignore you. Jack Merridew 05:09, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Let me be "less obscure": Red links suck, they look like s**t. Please stop spreading them all through the project. If you must, why not create 1 or 2 sentence stubs and then link to that? - and, as a bonus you get the cred for starting articles. cheers --Merbabu (talk) 05:18, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

O RLY? See WP:REDLINK. They're a good thing, assuming they're to an encyclopaedic subject. Jack Merridew 05:23, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

Hahaha it must be Bali? Javanese style you obviously have no time for - ill be more direct then - good oz style - when i find a mistake it will be said as that then - as for ignoring - there is one editor you might find enjoyable - Arief S - hasnt replied to one message in six months and keeps creating rubbish SatuSuro 05:13, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

You cut too rashly. Removing the navigation templates because they added categories, was improper. In the future, you should discuss issues first. I've cut most of the cat-adding code I added; I was not the only one doing this. If you prefer to add them manually, it's your time to waste. Such an approach is also more error prone. No 'cheers' for you today, mate. Jack Merridew 05:23, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

Not expecting it - the point is I hadnt realised you had set part of it up - I probably would not have deleted as much if I had gone far enough to see where it had all come from. Apologies for your extra work.

The big issue with the whole project is that people who are nowhere adept as yourself have created double category confusion where parent and child categories sit together and create unnecessary duplication.

As for thanks and no thanks - the whole thing of trying to keep the indonesian project from looking like a farce is never a thanks receiving task - and insufficient annotation in talk pages to identify why say a template creates a hidden category creating facility - does not inspire confidence in such a template.

Bah humbug to all im off for the day - no apologies for seeking out a template creating a category - that was not a good idea SatuSuro 05:32, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

The extra work is yours; add the categories as you see fit. Insisting that the cat be out of the parent cat immediately or you would continue removing navboxes is more rashness. Adding categories via templates is a good idea; look around and see how widely it is done. The best approach forward would have been to take the time to tweak the template to not add the category to pages that match it's own name (another reason for naming conventions). I was beginning to implement that, but decided it was more important to not have more navboxes cut. Frankly, you have ownership issues with WP:ID. It happens a lot on-wiki; see, anyone can edit. Noticed you're reading my editnotices; I have more to add, too. Jack Merridew 05:46, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

Not off yet -I have absolutely no ownership issue with Id for a start - I have just come back from a break and see issues in the project - no one else seems to be doing anything about them - if actually wanting to do some cleaning up - if that is perceived as ownership - well well.

If it had been explained that tweaking templates is a way of creating categories somewhere - clearly and accessible - I have no issue with that. If you went a bit further you could have explained further early in the stage - by reverting all your templates you are supposedly putting it on me - classic projection.

Rather than revert you could have explained and save yourself a lot of trouble just then. SatuSuro 05:55, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

Humble pie

Ok yesterday i was a complete utter idiot and i apologise for the (a) abusive comment re your templates that create categories (b) slow on the uptake as to what was happening. (c) going around in circles re the category/template issue. Having wasted a lot of space on your talk already I will not take much now.

I still have very mixed feelings re templates that create categories having discussed off wiki with some who have created used and abused the process. However I would have no problem if someone wanted to revert your reverts and return them to template creating category. My initial response was misguided - as I blindly wanted easy manually created categories. I can see some projects would or could have problems with the template tweaking. The thing takes time either way. In view of the heat that we have here at the moment I honestly couldnt give a damn if you respond or not. And for that if the Indonesian project went up in smoke so what. Its too hot here to bother about things like that. I'l get out of your way now. Bah SatuSuro 00:13, 8 January 2009 (UTC)

Terima kasih. I see categorizing and navigation as closely related; if an article is about, say, a kabupaten, it should have a navbox and an associated category. Categorizing via the template amounts to killing two pigs with one stick. Such a mechanism also facilitates accuracy. If such a system is used, the articles should not have the categorization done explicitly as that is a) duplicative, and b) error prone. That the scheme as of yesterday had an artifact that caused the parent administrative divisions (i.e. provinces) to be included in the regency cat was a mere implementation nit; see WP:NOTFINISHED.

We also seem to have divergent views on redlinks; I expect to create links to every kabupaten in Indonesia; if the articles don't exist yet, fine; this is about building structure. The provinces are, hopefully, all extant, so kabupaten are the next level, along with their capitals. I noticed the other day that South Tangerang is red; would you cut the links, add more, or start the article? A million people live there.

Please see Misplaced Pages:WikiProject, specifically the second paragraph. WP:Indonesia has no authority over articles related to Indonesia. WikiProjects are basically clubs. I have a dim view of WikiProjects in general because too many of them miss this point. My above comment on ownership derives from this.

Jack Merridew 03:18, 8 January 2009 (UTC)

oh!?!

This seems ominous. If it is related to your comments about projects being clubs, while I sympathise with your views (and indeed, a project does not denote authority) there is always value in seeing what they are doing. Often they have established conventions that are not necessarily correct, just consistent. I would like to say that projects are intended to have and do have "influence" over articles (and in the case of the Indonesia project it is, of course, influence of high quality!! he he). I'd certainly reject any notion either explicit or implied of projects having "authority". oh, and red links still suck though. ;-) Cheers. --Merbabu (talk) 05:25, 8 January 2009 (UTC)

WikiProjects have no influence on articles; editors do. You could always stub an article a forward-looking editor has offered a redlink to.

Do note that some WikiProjects like to wiki-link every noun and then create in-universe fanwank articles. The I've seen the future; whole WikiProjects will be transwiki'd to Wikia along with their unencyclopaedic content. Cheers, Jack Merridew 05:45, 8 January 2009 (UTC)

Oh well at least we are not in new order Indonesia where the question was always which religion are you? Heheh - beg to differ on most of what you have written above as well as no problems ignoring your pov as well as your what appears to be sense of humour. At least after some of the hard work we seem to be doing we might see the Indonesian club a bit better working, and thank you for that - even if it is diverging views we maintain in the face of that

I was not necessarily joining in with Merbabu re red links but my point is the following. Most non english speaking eds who add to the WP Indonesia (club..heheh) have almost no english or limited interpreting skils - so the project gets filled with lists and links etc as their piece of whatever - the consequential mess of the project is there is less text but lots of links and lists (in a lot of cases not in alpha order or any sense at all) - so has grown a particular dislike of lack of meaningful text that is supplanted by lists - like Kodam VI/Tanjungpura and noting the effort on everthing apart from the history SatuSuro 07:42, 8 January 2009 (UTC)

There are hundreds of thousands of articles that should be deleted and I've no doubt that you've encountered a lot. That 'article' on Freeport's hired security detail seems like one. You comment that a lot of "non english speaking eds" … "add to the WP Indonesia". Mostly, no, they add articles to the English Misplaced Pages that WP:ID sees as 'theirs'. It is likely that most of these editors have no idea that WP:ID even exists. Jack Merridew 08:37, 8 January 2009 (UTC) struck bit as I thought it said Papua.

Can we quit with the sabre-rattling?. I will stub that city soon...Cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 10:29, 8 January 2009 (UTC)

w:id:Kota Tangerang Selatan; 966.037 jiwa are without w:en:coverage ;) Cheers, Jack Merridew 10:47, 8 January 2009 (UTC)

Three-pronged test for Elements of Fiction

I have drafted a revsion to WP:FICT that may address some of your concerns. I would be grateful for your views at WT:FICT#Three-pronged test for Elements of Fiction. --Gavin Collins (talk) 00:49, 10 January 2009 (UTC)

Re:Menu

For some reason, the text wasn't coming out as Verdana or the color I wanted on my screen, so I moved back to the old style, as clunky as it seems to a HTML nerd like yourself ;-) — sephiroth bcr 09:48, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

Thread is at User talk:Sephiroth BCR#your menu

Thanks

For portal update - it is getting a bit long in the tooth :( SatuSuro 09:44, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

Less than civility

Jack, such comments and edit summaries as what you have here are rather unhelpful if not mocking of another user. It is unseemly to allege someone has "contempt for the community" and to then go ahead and dismiss that editor when he makes what looks like a good faith and constructive suggestion. Look at how say Masem and Drilnoth replied, i.e. there are ways to acknowledge a good faith effort to contribute and say you don't think it's a good idea without resorting to a more mocking tone that only escalates disputes and that again is out of place if at the same time you are trying to criticize that particular editor for his own behavior. Sincerely, --A Nobody 19:05, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

Copy that. Contempt for one editor is only slightly better than contempt for the community. If you think Pixelface has bad ideas, then just say so as a matter of fact. And in general, if you can't remain WP:civil with those you disagree with, then don't respond at all. The RFC/U with Pixelface is in progress, so let's not turn other discussions into a WP:BATTLEGROUND by making snippy remarks towards him. Randomran (talk) 22:40, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

;) Tempest in a teapot. I didn't say that Pixelface is contemptible or that I view him so. If you don't show up for a court date, you get bagged for contempt of court. Pixelface has blown-off the RfC and should be called-up for it; see one of the noticeboards in February. Pixelface is highly disruptive and highly uncivil.

Pixelface certainly does have Bad Ideas — that's a fact. If I ever see good faith from him, I'll acknowledge it. He is largely ignorable and definitely risible. Cheers, Jack Merridew 03:33, 14 January 2009 (UTC)