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Index –index– October 28, 2001 – April 12, 2004 April 16, 2004 – August 23, 2004 August 28, 2004 – December 8, 2004 December 9, 2004 – March 23, 2005 March 23, 2005 – July 24, 2005 July 26, 2005 – September 9, 2005 September 9, 2005 – September 24, 2005 September – December 2005 January 2006 January – February 2006 February 2006 February 2006, cont. March 2006 April 2006 – late May 2006 May 24 – July 2006 July 2006 – August 2006 August 2006 Most of September 2006 Late September 2006 – Early November 2006 Most of November 2006 Late November 2006 – December 8, 2006 December 9, 2006 – Mid January 2007 From December 22, 2006 blanking Mid January 2007 – Mid February 2007 Mid February 2007– Feb 25, 2007 From March 2, 2007 blanking March 2–5, 2007 March 5–11, 2007 March 11 – April 3, 2007 April 2 – May 2, 2007 May 3 – June 7, 2007 June 9 – July 4, 2007 July 13 – August 17, 2007 August 17 – September 11, 2007 September 14 – October 7, 2007 October 28 – December 1, 2007 December 2 – December 16, 2007 December 15 – January 4, 2008 January 4 – January 30, 2008 January 30 – February 28, 2008 February 28 – March 11, 2008 March 9 – April 18, 2008 April 18 – May 30, 2008 May 30 – July 27, 2008 July 26 – October 4, 2008 October 4 – November 12, 2008 November 10 – December 10, 2008 December 5 – December 25, 2008 December 25 – January 16, 2009 January 15 – January 27, 2009 January 26 – February 10, 2009 February 8 – March 18, 2009 March 18 – May 6, 2009 May 5 – June 9, 2009 June 10 – July 11, 2009 July 12 – August 25, 2009 August 26 – October 3, 2009 October 4 – November 20, 2009 November 20 – December 21, 2009 December 22, 2009 – January 25, 2010 January 22, 2010 – February 22, 2010 February 22, 2010 – March 17, 2010 March 17, 2010 – April 9, 2010 April 11, 2010 – April 24, 2010 April 23, 2010 – May 12, 2010 May 10, 2010 – June 4, 2010 June 4, 2010 – June 26, 2010 June 26, 2010 – July 22, 2010 July 22, 2010 – August 23, 2010 August 4, 2010 – August 28, 2010 August 28, 2010 – September 14, 2010 September 13, 2010 – October 6, 2010 October 6, 2010 – November 8, 2010 November 8, 2010 – November 21, 2010 November 21, 2010 – December 6, 2010 December 6, 2010 – December 22, 2010 December 21, 2010 – January 17, 2011 January 16, 2011 – February 10, 2011 February 6, 2011 – March 19, 2011 March 16, 2011 – March 26, 2011 March 26, 2011 – April 22, 2011 April 22, 2011 – May 16, 2011 May 17, 2011 – June 9, 2011 June 10, 2011 – July 1, 2011 July 1, 2011 – July 15, 2011 July 16, 2011 – July 26, 2011 July 26, 2011 – August 15, 2011 August 14, 2011 – August 23, 2011 August 21, 2011 – August 31, 2011 August 30, 2011 – September 7, 2011 September 4, 2011 – September 25, 2011 September 26, 2011 – October 19, 2011 October 16, 2011 – November 5, 2011 November 4, 2011 – November 12, 2011 November 11, 2011 – November 24, 2011 November 24, 2011 – December 6, 2011 December 3, 2011 – December 14, 2011 December 10, 2011 – December 16, 2011 (RFC about the Stop Online Piracy Act) December 15, 2011 – December 30, 2011 December 27, 2011 – January 9, 2012 January 9, 2012 – January 18, 2012 January 17, 2012 – January 30, 2012 January 28, 2012 – February 12, 2012 February 7, 2012 – February 25, 2012 February 19, 2012 – March 4, 2012 February 27, 2012 – March 18, 2012 March 17, 2012 – April 2, 2012 March 31, 2012 – April 13, 2012 April 12, 2012 – April 18, 2012 April 18, 2012 – April 26, 2012 April 26, 2012 – May 6, 2012 May 2, 2012 – May 22, 2012 May 19, 2012 – June 9, 2012 June 4, 2012 – June 20, 2012 June 18, 2012 – June 28, 2012 June 26, 2012 – July 12, 2012 July 3, 2012 – July 22, 2012 July 19, 2012 – July 29, 2012 July 25, 2012 – August 9, 2012 August 7, 2012 – August 30, 2012 August 29, 2012 – September 13, 2012 September 13, 2012 – September 27, 2012 September 26, 2012 – October 5, 2012 September 24, 2012 – October 20, 2012 October 9, 2012 – October 31, 2012 October 29, 2012 – November 19, 2012 November 17, 2012 – December 5, 2012 December 2–15, 2012 December 15–28, 2012 December 24, 2012 – January 12, 2013 January 13–31, 2013 February 1–10, 2013 February 11–28, 2013 March 1–16, 2013 March 17–27, 2013 March 28 – April 6, 2013 April 6–19, 2013 April 19 – May 3, 2013 April 25 – May 8, 2013 May 6–19, 2013 May 18–30, 2013 May 27 – June 16, 2013 June 17–30, 2013 June 27 – July 30, 2013 July 31 – August 4, 2013 August 4–12, 2013 August 13–27, 2013 August 28 – September 4, 2013 September 5–10, 2013 September 11–22, 2013 September 24 – October 6, 2013 October 7–16, 2013 October 17–27, 2103 October 28 – November 6, 2013 November 7–19, 2013 November 20–27, 2013 November 28 – December 5, 2013 December 6–24, 2013 December 25–30, 2013 December 31, 2013 – January 14, 2014 January 15–24, 2014 January 25–29, 2014 January 30 – February 10, 2014 Archives not yet dated: 157 158 159 160 161 162 163 164 165 166 167 168 169 170 171 172 173 174 175 176 177 178 179 180 181 182 183 This manual archive index may be out of date. Future archives: 184 185 186

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Please take your comments to a proper venue

Thanks! --Ronz (talk) 01:17, 12 October 2011 (UTC)

The talk page of the article is precisely the place to discuss POV pushing and WP:OWN issues in the article.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 05:27, 12 October 2011 (UTC)

Without following the relevant policies and guidelines, it is disruptive at least. Please stop disrupting the article so. --Ronz (talk) 21:13, 12 October 2011 (UTC)

Ronz, in cases where other users feel someone is showing WP:OWNership of an article, then try a voluntary break from the article, perhaps 1-3 months, and let others debate the issues. I, and others, have taken 3-month breaks from article "Murder of Meredith Kercher" (the Amanda Knox case), where I am currently topic-banned, to show that I can let others debate the issues without me. In the next month, I plan to refute my current topic-ban, but the point is to at least show a multi-month break from debating an article. Try it. -Wikid77 (talk) 16:03, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

No disrespect, Jimbo, but it's usually better to take such concerns to a user talk page, or to an administrative page like wikiquette or ANI. In my experience, once an article talk page falls into cross-discussions of editor behavior (like POV-pushing and ownership issues), it can rapidly deteriorate to a point where meaningful discussion of article content is all but impossible. Not that anyone's going to actually respect the ideal, mind you (people who get angry at each other are sometimes going to make it personal, and editors who enter that mindset tend to see article-talk as a public forum for airing grievances - human nature...). But I really don't want to have people calling me names in article talk and justifying it with 'Jimbo said we should do it'. --Ludwigs2 14:54, 12 October 2011 (UTC)

• Question POV-pushing politely on article talk-page first: In case some of the article's editors have a group-view POV, it would, in fact, be better to start on the article's talk-page (very politely), to allow responses from the other editors who believe that the text is not overly slanted. Otherwise, it is a heavy burden for each editor to defend charges on their separate user-talk pages, especially if the fellow editors could better explain, or refute, charges of POV-pushing. By the time an issue reaches WP:ANI, then it can become a dog-fight because there are few rules of fairness at ANI, and many "drive-by" opinionators just dog pile into a group attack, as drive-by !voters who do not even know the original article(s) which started the claims of POV-pushing, and the history of how people were goaded into the escalated debate. Of course, I have also seen cases where the article talk-page becomes a WP:BATTLEground, but perhaps at that point, then clearly direct the discussion to WP:ANI with many people (of all sides) ready to debate, not just one lone guy besieged by a pack of regulars and killed off with a WP:SNOW-instant decision before 10 opposing people have stated their opinions. ANI does not have a "due process" restriction to require real evidence and allow 2-weeks for supporters to come and clarify a "defence" of a person being viciously non-attacked at ANI. The use of WP:SNOW, to rush a verdict before other views are stated, is rampant there. -Wikid77 (talk) 19:53, 12 October 2011 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

	The Tireless Contributor Barnstar
	:) IIVeaa (talk) 17:48, 12 October 2011 (UTC)

Google Street view imagery

Given that google is keen to work with/help wikipedia with search results and translations on certain other wikipedias I wonder if there is a chance we could arrange something with them to take photograph shots of google street view/map imagery to use in articles. I mean how many articles on US places are without images and in google street view you could simply photograph a select area and upload to article. Obviously quality would't be the best but the opportunity to be able to freely photograph any part of any town would be a massive step.♦ Dr. Blofeld 23:55, 12 October 2011 (UTC)

See Misplaced Pages:Requested pictures and scroll down to links to pages by category.

—Wavelength (talk) 00:14, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

A request is not the same as actually getting us images though is it? I could put in a request today for a photo of a village in the forests of Shan State and we'd be unlikely to get one in the next 10 years.♦ Dr. Blofeld 00:18, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

Is that Shan State photo one that you could get from google images? Is that a good example that I could show to people at Google? If not, then could you show me a few examples?--Jimbo Wales (talk) 06:43, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

Nah, I was just using it as an example for what images we really need! Someday, maybe there might be a Google street view for Burma but likely to be in several decades.. Well somebody could take a screenshot from google street view or photo from the 45 degrees view from google maps of say Calabasas, California, strangely devoid of any images and put it in the article as an example. I think the future of imagery lies in the virtual , like being able to access any part of the world and to access imagery of it. I mean imagine there was google street view for rural parts of Africa and Asia and we were free to take images at our own will and freely use them. Of course the quality would be poorer than actual but it would still be good. The reason I brought this up is because I see the vast majority of US smaller towns and unincorporated communities being devoid of any images. And then when I check it out on google street view you can explore the whole area! If you were free to approach any settlement in google street view and take a photograph from whatever angle and area you want and freely upload to the article is would be of massive benefit I think. Is there any chance you Jimbo or somebody could address this to google about working together with images? We could actually photograph most settlements in somewhere like Shan State, Burma from google maps satellite view and zooming in and taking a shot of the village from above... ♦ Dr. Blofeld 10:52, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

OK take Gwebin for example. We are unlikely to get a photograph in the next 10 years. Now click on the coordinates and zoom in on google maps. You can zoom in so the settlement is pretty clear. Imagine you could crop out a photo of it and add it to the infobox of the article.♦ Dr. Blofeld 11:07, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

It's certainly better than what we have now, which is nothing. Hopefully we'll eventually get a better picture (and hopefully Aung San Suu Kyi and her supporters will be able to take care of business before 10 years, but it's true that it's not likely), but it's a good placeholder until such a time when people can take photos outside of Yangon and Naypyidaw without being shot. Now if only we could do the same kind of thing for getting pictures of the people there too... (a little over a year, and I still haven't found a free image of Zoya Phan; it's very frustrating). The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 19:31, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

Jimbo, a response please as to whether something like this could be proposed to google.♦ Dr. Blofeld 15:52, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

Fate of "important" articles at FAC

Hi Jimbo -- I recently spent some time doing a bit of crude statistical analysis of the FAC process, with results that I think might interest you; see User:Looie496/Analysis of FAC. I should point out that this has given rise to a lively discussion at WT:FAC -- most of the comments there do not agree with my conclusions though. Looie496 (talk) 03:26, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

You might wish to repeat the process with Misplaced Pages:Vital articles.

—Wavelength (talk) 05:19, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

It will not change the insight. All one needs to do is look down the list of VAs and see that the vast majority of them are below GA (ten years into the project). And that that VA project is "dead" (no activity in the talk). I think that pretty clearly shows the massive "miss" for Misplaced Pages. Something that people at the Sue/Jimbo level should care about. (And if they don't, maybe we need more critical external essays, to prod them.)

For that matter, if you just look at the current list of 30 FACs. Only one, "Brain" is from the VA top 1000 list. "Fluorine" is from the top 10,000. The other 28 include such cruft as the 1860 hurricane season and an 11,000 person "neighborhood".

Interestingly, 3 days ago, we had a TFA on an obscure abondoned station of an obscure abandoned railroad. The article should not even be a GA as it is not "focused" on the topic of the obscure station, but padded with info on the railroad. (Actually, we maybe should not even have an article on the station as the sources mentioning the station do so in passing rather than as the subject.) Yet this criticism was not raised within the 2009 FAC, which had only a single "working" review, which looked only at ref formatting and the like. The other supports were RFA "me too" short. And then this was passed by arguably our best and most critical FA director (Sandy). And it was from one of our community leaders (a now-skipped arbitrator).

That's fine from a "star collector" perspective, if people want to work on minutia (have seen several recent FAs that got less than 20 pageviews per day). But from a LEADERSHIP and PROGRAMMATIC standpoint, it is important to realize that "the encyclopedia" is not getting built. Let's go get a grant and spend some money and figure out and take action on THIS issue.— Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.246.147.40 (talk • contribs) 23:01, 13 October 2011‎

To be clear, I don't have any problem with the number of FAs on low-importance topics -- the more the merrier. My concern is whether there is anything we can do to increase the number of FAs on high-importance topics, lest FA become a mark of triviality. I am convinced that there are things we can do. I also think it is important to maintain an attitude of optimism -- angry criticism is rarely productive. Looie496 (talk) 00:35, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

Plagiarism guideline

Following up you comments on Talk:Anthony Ashley-Cooper, 3rd Earl of Shaftesbury. There is a guideline called Misplaced Pages:Plagiarism. It not only gives guidance on when plagiarism is a problem but how to annotate copyright expired text such as that in the article Anthony Ashley-Cooper, 3rd Earl of Shaftesbury (see the section "Public-domain sources"). It also includes a section on where to place attribution.

The template {{1911}} can take parameters like article title, volume and page number (see Template:1911). This helps the reader locate the original source. Unfortunately Wikpedia still has just over 10,000 articles tagged with {{1911}} with no parameters set (mostly placed there long ago before the template accepted parameters). Without such additional information the reader is informed that "somewhere in the 29 volumes of the 11th edition you will find the original text of some or all of this Misplaced Pages article (but I'm not saying where)".

-- PBS (talk) 23:14, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

Interview for English paper

Aloha Jimbo! I'm doing a paper for my Principles of English Composition class about the Misplaced Pages discourse community. Part of this project is interviewing people from the discourse community. I would be honored if you as the founder of the discourse community would please take the time to respond to my interview, which can be found at User:Ks0stm/Discourse Community 2. Thanks in advance, Ks0stm 23:45, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

Will try but very swamped for the next few days. What's the deadline?--Jimbo Wales (talk) 11:00, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

Fundraising joke

If I donate to Misplaced Pages, it isn't exactly free for me, is it? LOL. 59.177.68.252 (talk) 14:56, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

wikipedia is not free as in "free beer". Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 15:30, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

Lord Foster

Rename proposal.Kittybrewster ☎ 14:58, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

Open confessions of a closed mind

Sometimes we encounter people who seem to give evidence of being closed-minded about one thing or another. Rarely we meet someone who speaks openly about being closed intellectually to evidence that would contradict a position already chosen. You might be interested to read the words of Richard Lewontin, as found at the following page.

• RICHARD LEWONTIN: Billions and Billions of Demons

Our willingness to accept scientific claims that are against common sense is the key to an understanding of the real struggle between science and the supernatural. We take the side of science in spite of the patent absurdity of some of its constructs, in spite of its failure to fulfill many of its extravagant promises of health and life, in spite of the tolerance of the scientific community for unsubstantiated just-so stories, because we have a prior commitment, a commitment to materialism. It is not that the methods and institutions of science somehow compel us to accept a material explanation of the phenomenal world, but, on the contrary, that we are forced by our a priori adherence to material causes to create an apparatus of investigation and a set of concepts that produce material explanations, no matter how counter-intuitive, no matter how mystifying to the uninitiated. Moreover, that materialism is absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door. The eminent Kant scholar Lewis Beck used to say that anyone who could believe in God could believe in anything. To appeal to an omnipotent deity is to allow that at any moment the regularities of nature may be ruptured, that miracles may happen.

Other statements by him can be found at Richard Lewontin - Wikiquote.
—Wavelength (talk) 15:59, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

Not quite sure what your point is, but of course any sane person is closed to almost all propositions. I am closed to the proposition that the my teacup is the planet Jupiter, for instance, and countless similar propositions. You yourself, in creating this message, implicitly accepted a number of materialistic assumptions, i.e. that pressing the keys would set in motion a sequence of material events. You didn't just shout your message into a hollowed-out pumpkin and pray that it would be delivered to Jimbo's talk page. (If you did, and since the message did appear, then I'd be willing to reconsider some of my assumptions.) Herostratus (talk) 17:41, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

He spoke of a "commitment to materialism" that led to an acceptance of "patent absurdity" and "unsubstantiated just-so stories".

—Wavelength (talk) 18:36, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

But a commitment to materialism has some rather impressive benefits as well. After all, we don't die of smallpox or end up paralyzed from polio anymore. Diseases like active tuberculosis, pediatric acute lymphoblastic leukemia, or Hodgkin lymphoma were death sentences for all of human history except the past 60 years or so. Even HIV/AIDS was transformed from an invariably fatal disease to a largely chronic illness in the space of about 15 years. That's not even getting into the freedoms afforded by easily accessible ground and air travel, telephone and electronic communication, and so forth.

Obviously, materialism has its flaws and its place, but surely it's a bit one-sided to ignore its benefits. Spirituality, prayer, and metaphysical ideas are great, but sometimes there's no substitute for penicillin. MastCell  18:46, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

After having read the article (admittedly not every word of it yet; it's pretty long; but enough to "get it") I have a suspicion that the point Wavelength is trying to make is not quite the point that Richard Lewontin was making. But first it would help to know, Wavelength, what point are you trying to make? Neutron (talk) 19:02, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

Some people are closed intellectually to evidence that would contradict positions already chosen. Avoiding the inconvenient truth can happen in various fields of study, including cosmology and climate change. As a general point, it is helpful in discussions for us to be aware of the thinking that might be behind some claims, and such awareness can be applied to discussions in specific fields of study.

—Wavelength (talk) 20:49, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

The article "Materialism" (permanent link here) says: "In philosophy, the theory of materialism holds that the only thing that exists is matter; that all things are composed of material and all phenomena (including consciousness) are the result of material interactions." Materialism is not a prerequisite for scientific progress.

—Wavelength (talk) 20:49, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

• Scientists who name things after Biblical figures seem very open-minded. For example, the "Methuselah gene" was named after Methuselah (in Genesis 5:27, who lived to be 969), as a gene which slows the use of growth hormones and presumably stretches the use of hormones to allow a longer, healthier life over 100 years? -Wikid77 (talk) 20:32, 14 October 2011 (UTC)