User talk:JPcashcash

Re: Cash Cash

I don't understand what would be needed to be discussed in private. If it is about a legitimate direction for the band's article, then it should be discussed in the open.
That being said, I understand the stance of the band and your "helpers" on the talk page. I'm well versed in the music world, I get it. There's lots of times where band's aren't exactly thrilled about their original sound, or try to distance themselves from a genre that has fallen out of mainstream popularity. I'm sure Alice in Chains isn't especially thrilled with their beginnings where they were lumped into the glam metal movement. Linkin Park has gone out of their way to distance themselves from their original nu metal sound. Same as Sugar Ray as they went from alternative metal to pop rock. There's no problem with that, whether it be changing of musical interest, trying to make it big, money, whatever. And its fine to change your image, your Facebook page, your Twitter, whatever marketing and communicating tool of your choice. But it's not alright to do that on Wikipedia. You must understand - Wikipedia is not a tool for advertising. You have a Conflict of Interest when it comes to your own Wikipedia article. It is not for you to be documenting. The entire basis of the website is to document what is said about a subject through reliable, third party sources. First party accounts can be a source for small, non-contentious details, like whether or not you played a certain concert or something, but they're not to be used in the interpreting the general history or career of a topic. That's the role of third party sources.
That brings us to the recurring issues with the article. Two very prominent, reliable third party sources, have referred to the band's sound as emo pop. I understand you guys are moving more into an EDM direction. And that's fine. And you can distance yourself from that as much as you please, in your concerts, Youtube account, social media, whatever. But on Wikipedia, that's not valid grounds for removing what two prominent reliable sources have said in the past. Other editors may add more information on the band's sound section, citing other reliable sources who use other descriptors for the band, to make "emo-pop" seem like less of a prominent viewpoint. (I've even suggested this, though no one took me up on it. WP:ALBUM/REVSIT is a place where a bunch of acceptable sources are listed.) But you can't just remove it because you don't like it, or its not helping your new direction, or anything else related to your vision of the band.
While I've assumed this is in regards to the emo pop arguments, this response could generally be applied to any of the on-going arguments at the talk page.
Anyways, let me know if you have other questions or concerns, though I'd prefer to keep our discussions on Wikipedia. Sergecross73 msg me 16:28, 22 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Re: My talk page

Hello again. Serge beat me to the punch, but I was going to ask the same - I'd prefer to keep discussion here on Wikipedia. I am not sure what has brought you back here, though you may have been contacted by a couple of Wikipedia editors who have lately taken a strong interest in the article about Cash Cash. The article has, to be honest, improved some over the course of a significant battle of words and sources, though of course it is far from perfect. But my main concerns have not changed. I am simply trying to maintain the article as an accurate reflection of what we know about the band from independent observers, and am (doggedly) attempting to keep it from being whitewashed as a promotional exercise. I can't stop you from changing the article to suit your needs; I guess all I can really hope to convince you is that encyclopedias ought to be treated differently than other information sources over which you may have complete control. Chubbles (talk) 21:31, 22 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Well, I'm still happy to talk over anything here and/or on my talk page. I am frankly quite fatigued with the Cash Cash page and really wish more Wikipedia regulars were watching over it; part of the problem is that this is kind of a backwater article that isn't on many editors' watchlists, so you don't have many people with a stake in keeping it well-sourced and neutral. I sought help to that end and attracted the attention of a couple of editors, which I think has helped improve things. Wikipedia has a user e-mail function, but I always thought of the talk pages as the best places to talk over site issues. Chubbles (talk) 02:37, 25 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I think maybe what's happened here is a little bit of the Streisand effect...if there hadn't been so much of a fuss raised about it, the genre designation wouldn't be as prominent on the page as it now is.

I'm sorry if you've gotten some flak from lazy interviewers about your early work; that's bad journalism, in my opinion. There's no good excuse for him, as a professional reporter, to refrain from using his eyes and ears - and multiple sources - to know his territory before he hosts an interview. Honestly, there's a larger issue there, which is that Wikipedia is now so firmly ingrained as the top place to look for information (even though it is wildly incomplete, biased in myriad ways and, in certain places, of really poor quality) that most people trust it as gospel, and never look anywhere else. I'm a bit ashamed to have contributed so much to an institution that is, I am now convinced, an exceedingly poorly-designed repository for the world's knowledge. Its strength was that it was easy to build; its Achilles Heel is that it is trivially easy to degrade. (It has no authorial control - anyone can walk in and remove something they, in their shortsightedness, consider irrelevant; all that has to happen is for no one to notice, or no one to give enough of a shit.) But here I am; I would be a fool if I sat here and tried to undo everything I've done, so I'm stuck with it, and will continue to weed and water my little patch of it as best I can, even if I wish I had never started in the first place. Chubbles (talk) 21:02, 5 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Well, given that you have such dedicated fans, there's not much more I can do to stop them from running the page; this Ken fellow is pretty insistent, so I guess at least you can take some solace in having such devoted listeners. You should VIP him at a show sometime, for all his efforts... If you have any interviews where Cash Cash discusses their early work in retrospect - such as the one you've just mentioned above - that might be an interesting read on my end, so I wouldn't mind it if you passed it along and posted it to my talk page. Chubbles (talk) 19:51, 8 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I trust that Ken can fight his own battle; he's never done anything else on Wikipedia except fight that fight. With all due respect, I don't think Cash Cash is being hurt, in any way, by the current wording of the article. (Certainly, no more than Lana Del Rey, or Katy Perry, or Sleigh Bells, or Skrillex...all of whom have far more damning and well-documented "skeletons in the closet", if you must needs think of it in that way.) Three sentences in a Wikipedia article are going to have a negligible effect on sales and credibility overall, and the band's getting far more press and chart action for its recent stuff than it ever got for its first album. I wish Ken would see the wisdom of taking the opportunity to expound further on the band's latter-day stylings, but at this point I'm just getting brick-walled there. I have to say, I'm flummoxed as to his motivation. Chubbles (talk) 08:07, 9 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Interested readers have an article about emo-pop and access to Take It to the Floor to read to clear up that confusion. Look, man...you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink; if someone is too lazy to look up what something means or what an album sounds like, there's only so much Wikipedia can do to make it clear to him. Hiding the historical record is not the right way to correct it. I've maintained that from the start. I think I am helping Cash Cash, even if they are not pleased with the final result, and honestly I'm okay with that. My fealty is not to the musicians I write articles about - if it were, that would compromise the integrity of the articles. You've got Ken in your corner, here, anyway, and I doubt he's leaving the ring yet. Chubbles (talk) 05:27, 10 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah, you and Ken are really of one mind on that one. (Heck, he's probably reading this thread!) As I noted to Ken on the talk page, the genre designation is discussed at length because I had to demonstrate, using quotes from the original sources, why it was important to include there at all. I had to show how the sources discussed the style; otherwise, I would have just gotten into a shouting match with these other editors - "yes it is" "no it isn't" was where we were deadlocked, so I went to the sources and dug up the actual quotes. Sorry, man...that's the end result of this whole protracted affair: a well-sourced, well-rounded article with extensive quotations and contextualizations of original style judgments. In other words...a good Wikipedia article! Chubbles (talk) 06:55, 10 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]