Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Oregon/Archive 5
 | This is an archive of past discussions on Wikipedia:WikiProject Oregon. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
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Vandalism
Is there a procedure for reporting vandalism? One of those numbered users inserted some garbage into Fisher House Foundation article. It isn't related to Oregon, but am not sure how/where to report vandalism problem. I reversed the chgs--now what next? Any advice would be appriciated.--Orygun (talk) 05:07, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
- WP:VANDAL should answer most of your questions. Basically, there's no need to "report" most instances of vandalism; rather, just issue a warning on the user's "talk page." If the user is persistent, the number of warnings will add up, and only if there's a major problem is there a need to report it to an administrator and seek a block or other remedy. (The best way to report a first-time vandal is with {{subst:uw-vandal1|Page name}} or {{subst:uw-vandal2|Page name}}. Hope this helps! -Pete (talk) 05:30, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
- Orygun: You did good. Removing the vandalism is top priority—as soon as you see it. If you're up for it, look at his contributions and talk page to see if there is a pattern of recent vandalism. If not, it's acceptable to do nothing more. But if it's blatant and intentional vandalism, you ought to warn him (which doubles as a count of notches toward blocking him). Researching history and warning are much easier to perform if your popups gadget is enabled. (see Special:Preferences | Gadgets | Navigation popups) To simplify issuing warnings (and other useful features), see twinkle which you can enable with a simple edit to your account. If the user was recently given a final warning, by all means, report them to WP:AIV (Administrator intervention against vandalism). That is also much easier to do correctly and successfully with twinkle. —EncMstr 06:11, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
Pete(talk): This particular litter bug looks like junior high kid. Posted warning--thanks for your help with code for warning banner. EncMstr: Saw you followed up and found another vandalized article. Seemed like odd combination of sites to hit--obsure Hungarian painter and American non-profit foundation. In any case, thanks for your help as well.--Orygun (talk) 03:11, 31 January 2008 (UTC)
- Vandals tend to hit the "random aricle" button and vandalize whatever they find there. Checking a vandal's contribs is always a helpful thing to do if you have the time. For advanced vandal-fighting, I will check the "whois" link on the IP user page and often find out the vandals *are* schoolkids. There are even templates you can add to the talk page showing the IP is from a school. Those IPs may get blocked faster if there is a school IP notice posted. Thanks for helping out! Katr67 (talk) 18:18, 31 January 2008 (UTC)
Tis the season
As some of us have noticed, the political campaigns are kicking into high gear! So if you come across a bio for a candidate, it would be appreciated if you could add |activepol = yes to their WPBIO talk page template, so that maybe the editors will read it and maybe not push too much POV. Unlikely, but its all we've got. Thanks. Aboutmovies (talk) 19:09, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
- Yes, I hate all their campaigns now. There used to be a template that showed an article's subject was currently running for office, but I just looked at Barak Obama's article, thinking if it was anywhere, it would be there. Was the template deleted? Seems like it might come in handy to actually have something on the front page too, or is that just more advertising? Katr67 (talk) 19:17, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
- Nevermind--found it on Smith's article. {{Future election candidate}} Katr67 (talk) 19:21, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
- Reading the template's talk page, I'm not sure using this is such a good idea, but it should either be on all the senate candidate's articles or none. Thoughts? Katr67 (talk) 19:23, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
- It is a pain, but let's see if our nice reminders do anything...there's always asking our friendly shiny new admin to semi-protect the article if it gets really bad... --Esprqii (talk) 19:26, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
- Much of this is likely my fault. I've had some contact with both campaigns -- Frohnmayer's too, for that matter. All are aware of WP:COI, and attempting to comply. (That doesn't mean every single intern or volunteer will comply to the letter.) Anyway, a notice like this is probably a good thing -- thanks AM -- I believe that any of these campaigns will gladly adjust their editing if given clear instructions. -Pete (talk) 19:21, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
- Is there a list of them somewhere, or a category, so I can watchlist the articles? —EncMstr 19:33, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
- Much of this is likely my fault. I've had some contact with both campaigns -- Frohnmayer's too, for that matter. All are aware of WP:COI, and attempting to comply. (That doesn't mean every single intern or volunteer will comply to the letter.) Anyway, a notice like this is probably a good thing -- thanks AM -- I believe that any of these campaigns will gladly adjust their editing if given clear instructions. -Pete (talk) 19:21, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
- It is a pain, but let's see if our nice reminders do anything...there's always asking our friendly shiny new admin to semi-protect the article if it gets really bad... --Esprqii (talk) 19:26, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
- Reading the template's talk page, I'm not sure using this is such a good idea, but it should either be on all the senate candidate's articles or none. Thoughts? Katr67 (talk) 19:23, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
- Nevermind--found it on Smith's article. {{Future election candidate}} Katr67 (talk) 19:21, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
(unindent) I think the articles most of us are thinking of are at United States Senate election in Oregon, 2008. Katr67 (talk) 19:37, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
- Also United States House of Representatives elections in Oregon, 2008, once someone makes that article. It does seem oh-so-early, doesn't it?? --Esprqii (talk) 19:41, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
- Correction to my comments above: on a closer look, I agree that one editor in particular has been less than diligent in following WP:COI. I think AM and Esprqii have done a good job responding to that, so at the moment I'm not sure more action is necessary. But I just want to be clear that I'm not condoning the kind of disregard for COI that seems to have taken place -- I just misread the article histories before. -Pete (talk) 00:47, 31 January 2008 (UTC)
- And, to Esprqii: Not so early for the primaries, actually; primaries are mid-may. So, in addition to this Senate race, we should also be keeping our eyes on other statewide primaries: Vicki Walker, Kate Brown (politician), Brad Avakian, and Rick Metsger are running for the Dem. nomination for Oregon Secretary of State, and Greg Macpherson and John Kroger are competing for the Dem. nomination for Oregon Attorney General. (Ben Westlund is running for Treasurer of Oregon, but is unopposed; no Republicans have filed for any of these offices, so far as I know.) -Pete (talk) 02:00, 31 January 2008 (UTC)
- Correction to my comments above: on a closer look, I agree that one editor in particular has been less than diligent in following WP:COI. I think AM and Esprqii have done a good job responding to that, so at the moment I'm not sure more action is necessary. But I just want to be clear that I'm not condoning the kind of disregard for COI that seems to have taken place -- I just misread the article histories before. -Pete (talk) 00:47, 31 January 2008 (UTC)
Lewis and Clark journals?
Hello, does anyone own -- or know a good online version of -- Lewis and Clark's journals? A question has come up at Talk:Celilo Falls, where a more specific citation is needed. It would also be good to know a good source for these, in general. -Pete (talk) 23:24, 1 February 2008 (UTC)
- This one seems to be complete and convenient. —EncMstr 23:30, 1 February 2008 (UTC)
- And this one seems to be easy on the eyes. —EncMstr 23:33, 1 February 2008 (UTC)
- Got it. Thanks! Northwest-historian (talk) 00:08, 2 February 2008 (UTC)
I recently encountered the above article about the inventor of geocaching, who apparently lives in Beavercreek, Oregon. The article as it stands is a mess...full of unencylopedic stuff. It was written by a single-purpose account (with only 2 Wikipedia edits, both to the article) who someone else has suggested is the subject.
I went looking to clean it up, but quickly encountered a lack of sources. While Ulmer's claim to be the inventor of geocaching appears to be unquestioned, there is little material written about him. Other than the fact that he proposed geocaching after Bill Clinton disabled SA, and the particulars of the placement of the first geocache virtually none of the claims in the article can be substantiated by reliable sources.
In other words, the article probably needs to be made into a stub, if not axed outright--probably a redirect to geocaching would be best. I could do so without any admin intervention, but thought I would check here, first. The other possiblity is AfD, so that others can weigh in on the article.
The article on geocaching is not under the scope of any WikiProject currently; otherwise I would go bother them. The article on GPS itself is covered under numerous WPs (military history, electronics, aviation, systems, and maritime trades), none of which really would include geocaching in its scope.
Thoughts?
--EngineerScotty (talk) 22:13, 5 February 2008 (UTC)
- Where all did you look for sources? I know The Oregonian's archives tend to have good info on locals, and Time magazine and the New York Times archives appear to be all online and free these days too. But if you looked at those places, then what is there fails WP:BIO and should be redirected to geocaching. Aboutmovies (talk) 22:48, 5 February 2008 (UTC)
- Didn't find anything in the Oregonian archives. I did find the following link to a Wired story from 2000, which appears to identify Ulmer as a geochacher, but not necessarily as the "inventor." (Unfortunately, the link seems to be dead.) I think probably merge-and-redirect is the way to go, with a note to the orig. author. -Pete (talk) 23:20, 5 February 2008 (UTC)
| “ | May 3, 2000: Geocaching Gets Geeks Into the Great Outdoors
Wired News - May 3, 2007 The stash, squirreled away by Dave Ulmer, an Oregon computer consultant and GPS enthusiast, was intended to test the accuracy of the global positioning ... |
” |
http://news.google.com/archivesearch?hl=en&client=opera&rls=en&hs=9AX&q=Dave+Ulmer+geocaching&um=1&ie=UTF-8&tab=wn - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 23:27, 5 February 2008 (UTC)
New GA
Well it's not quite WP:OR (or…is it?), but I thought you all might be interested to know that Hanford Site just attained Good Article status. Just up the river in Washington, but a site that's played a major role in the evolution of the region since WWII. Big congrats to newcomer User:Northwesterner1, and the others involved, for taking a quality article and pushing it over the top. -Pete (talk) 06:00, 7 February 2008 (UTC)
Update on The Oregon Portal
-- Update: Portal:Oregon has recently become a Featured Portal. Thanks to the efforts of folks from this project, for churning out such great high-quality material! Keep up the great work getting articles to higher quality status, and taking such great photos! Thanks so much WikiProject Oregon members for all of your help, Cirt (talk) 14:29, 10 February 2008 (UTC)
- Woo hoo! Way to go Cirt and Aboutmovies, who I know did tons of work on this, and Zaui, who got the initial ball rolling; and of course everyone else for making such great content! We're famous! (Well, sorta kinda wikifamous anyway...) Congrats!! --Esprqii (talk) 18:17, 10 February 2008 (UTC)
- Wow, that was quick. Nice job whipping it into shape, Cirt. — Zaui (talk) 17:46, 11 February 2008 (UTC)
- Well, I first expressed interest in getting Portal:Oregon to WP:FPORT status on January 11, 2008. So it took just under a month to get there, with a lot of help and guidance from members of this WikiProject. Cirt (talk) 17:50, 11 February 2008 (UTC)
- Great job guys! Katr67 (talk) 21:02, 11 February 2008 (UTC)
- Well, I first expressed interest in getting Portal:Oregon to WP:FPORT status on January 11, 2008. So it took just under a month to get there, with a lot of help and guidance from members of this WikiProject. Cirt (talk) 17:50, 11 February 2008 (UTC)
February 10, 2008 panorama image, Portland, Oregon
FYI:
Image:PortlandScientologyProtest10Feb2008 Panorama 1.jpg
Also, commons:Category:Portland, Oregon 2008 "Anonymous" anti-Scientology protests.
Cirt (talk) 14:58, 11 February 2008 (UTC)
Talk Page Templates
I started adding talk page templates to Talk:Medford, Oregon such as Template:stale, Template:unresolved, and Template:resolved. Is this helpful in any way? Is it annoying? I am definitely not advocating some campaign for talk page beautification, but if it's useful I would just assume keep doing it. Zab (talk) 01:55, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
- Personal opinion
There are way too many entries per task in this "to do" list. There should be no more than 3 or 4 per task, so as to focus efforts on key articles. Too many and there is no point of a To Do list at all - it becomes a catch-all dumping place for tons and tons of articles. Just my 2 cents, take it or leave it. Cirt (talk) 22:04, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
- Understandable. Think of it not as a "to do today" list, but of a "things to eventually get around to" list. If overwhelmed by those, maybe just focus on the Collaboration of the Week (COTW). You'll be notified of that if you sign up at WP:ORE#Participants. —EncMstr 22:17, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
- I'm not saying this is necessarily daunting for me, just that it may put off newcomers from collaborating or focusing efforts on a few key articles. Cirt (talk) 22:19, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
- I think it could use a little judicious pruning. I think 3 or 4 might be too few, but that may just be me. (Yes, the COTW is the place for focused efforts; I don't think it's a problem for this list to be fairly long, as long as it's not too "stale.") Anyway, I'd say looking at an old version of the list, maybe a year old? and removing stuff that hasn't been moved around since then might be a good way to start. Also, maybe this list should link to or mention COTW? -Pete (talk) 22:31, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
- These ideas by Peteforsyth (talk · contribs) seem like a great place to start. Cirt (talk) 22:32, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
- I think it could use a little judicious pruning. I think 3 or 4 might be too few, but that may just be me. (Yes, the COTW is the place for focused efforts; I don't think it's a problem for this list to be fairly long, as long as it's not too "stale.") Anyway, I'd say looking at an old version of the list, maybe a year old? and removing stuff that hasn't been moved around since then might be a good way to start. Also, maybe this list should link to or mention COTW? -Pete (talk) 22:31, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
- I'm not saying this is necessarily daunting for me, just that it may put off newcomers from collaborating or focusing efforts on a few key articles. Cirt (talk) 22:19, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
I don't think the length of the list is a problem, but staleness is. I would hope a newcomer would speak up if s/he needed guidance about which to-do list items are priorities--yes, mentioning COTW might be a good idea, if the large banner at the top of the page isn't doing it? ;) Anyone want to "officially" volunteer to prune the to-do once a month or so? (Extra credit for checking out the page history and asking contributors if they still want their contributions to-do listed.) Maybe at the same time EncMstr updates the admin watchlist? Which reminds me...time for an update? Katr67 (talk) 23:33, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
Remove article from Project proposal
I'd like to propose that What the Bleep Do We Know!? be considered for removal from WP:OR. If there's a connection to Oregon it's tenuous at best and the never ending obstruction of consensus by one editor in particular means it's never going to stop showing up on our recent change list(s).Awotter (talk) 00:09, 13 February 2008 (UTC)
- I just looked at a half dozen films filmed in Oregon, and none had a WPOR tag, so if others do its not consistent. And being filmed here/set here seems to be about the only connection. So I'm for all films that have only that little of connection be axed. Now if the director/major actor/script writer for the film is also here, then I'm for keeping it. Basically something more than just set/shot here. Like One flew Over... was filmed here and was based of the book by an Oregonian. Free Willy filmed here and the star lived here too (BTW do we need a Category:Orcas from Oregon?). Aboutmovies (talk) 00:47, 13 February 2008 (UTC)
- Sounds fine to me. Then again, I may be biased ;) -Pete (talk) 00:51, 13 February 2008 (UTC)
- Keiko was a Mexican immigrant I believe.Awotter (talk) 00:54, 13 February 2008 (UTC)
- re:Category:Orcas from Oregon--only if you also break it down by county. Katr67 (talk) 01:42, 13 February 2008 (UTC)
- In other words, you'd like it removed because of an annoyingly large number of edits and you don't see an Oregon-worthy connection. I agree with the first part: most popular media articles receive an incredible number of edits, mostly to add or maintain trivia. Unfortunately, that doesn't seem a strong enough reason to remove it—the opposite in fact: such articles need strong protection from trivia creep and undue weighting of subject matter. I take it you didn't see the movie? It features many widely recognized locations around Portland and Hillsboro (and San Francisco)[1]. However, I don't think WP:ORE members will contribute much to the article, except to keep it in check. So I wouldn't object to it being dropped. —EncMstr 00:59, 13 February 2008 (UTC)
- If local settings appearing in a movie were a criteria for inclusion on Project pages then I'd hate to see WP:Vancouver B.C.Awotter (talk) 01:10, 13 February 2008 (UTC)
- I wouldn't it mind being part of WP:ORE--it's got a stronger Oregon connection than a lot of things. However the edit warring re: pseudoscience, Ramtha, etc. means I refuse to have the thing on my watchlist any more, especially because my innocent, non-controversial edits (attempting to add a redlink to the NRHP-listed church that was a filming location) continually get axed in the melee, which annoys my little copyeditor's heart. Since I don't think any of us really can have much effect on keeping the thing in check and/or don't care, I'd just as soon abandon it to the wolves. It has more closely related WikiProjects to keep an eye on it. Katr67 (talk) 01:42, 13 February 2008 (UTC)
- I succumbed to temptation, and found a really nice "calm the F down, wikipsychos!!" message near the bottom of the talk page. Ah, refreshing! -Pete (talk) 01:58, 13 February 2008 (UTC)
- My read is that the consensus is to remove it. So I did. An update to /admin is forthcoming. —EncMstr 20:16, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
Dissed by the OHS!
The Oregon Historical Society announced today that it is going to write an online encyclopedia called "The Oregon Encyclopedia", in time for Oregon's sesquicentennial a year from today. I was initially very excited to read about what I'm sure it will be a great resource, but it's too bad they had to cut down Wikipedia in their announcement, and use all the old wikipedia cliches in the process. From the article in the O (http://www.oregonlive.com/living/oregonian/index.ssf?/base/living/1202865909212180.xml&coll=7):
"Wikipedia, also a free, online encyclopedia, is written collaboratively by contributors around the world; anyone can add to entries or edit them and accuracy is not verified.
In "The Oregon Encyclopedia," though, "entries can't just be about Aunt Betty," Manning said. "They have to be about things that really make Oregon Oregon -- significant people, significant events."
Sigh. Katr, if we have to delete that article about your Aunt Betty one more time, I'm so getting EncMstr to block you.
And the Oregon Encyclopedia will be here: http://www.oregonencyclopedia.org, when they get it up, with their important and serious and non-Aunt Betty articles. (Can we make Aunt Betty the official WP:OR mascot?)
P.S. The print edition had a quiz of things the OE will answer; I knew all but two of them from reading Wikipedia, and probably could have found the other 2 if I had looked, so phhhpptt! The quiz doesn't seem to be in the online version, so I'll see if I can transcribe it later... --Esprqii (talk) 17:02, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
- Oooowee! Have you ever seen my Aunt Betty when she gets going? She is going to be sooo ticked off about this. There goes my inheritance. And I was thinking of donating some of her fortune to OHS too... Katr67 (talk) 20:39, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
- Does Aunt Betty have son who is a famous old person researcher by chance? Aboutmovies (talk) 20:48, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
- I think she is 128 years old. Actually, isn't this our Aunt Betty? --Esprqii (talk) 20:50, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
- I have an Aunt Betty, but not only is she not notable -- she currently lives in California. (But she's a very nice person.) -- llywrch (talk) 03:32, 15 February 2008 (UTC)
- Does Aunt Betty have son who is a famous old person researcher by chance? Aboutmovies (talk) 20:48, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
- Oooowee! Have you ever seen my Aunt Betty when she gets going? She is going to be sooo ticked off about this. There goes my inheritance. And I was thinking of donating some of her fortune to OHS too... Katr67 (talk) 20:39, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
- I guess having their site up for a few months wasn't working (what 20 entries) so they had to issue a press release. Though I fail to see much of a difference. They want volunteer writers, we have volunteer writers. They want reliable, we want reliable. They just have access to a crap load of good pictures. Otherwise I'm not impressed. Looks like Oregon History Project II, wikistyle. Aboutmovies (talk) 17:23, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
- Here's the difference, AM: they want $1 mllion to 2 million in donations. Great catch Esprqii, but this has me absolutely infuriated. Why are they making such ignorant and hostile remarks about a community that, I'm sure, would absolutely love to partner with them in a project like this, and that has an enormous amount of talent and dedication to offer? I'd like to contact the OHS and PSU people, and the Oregonian reporter, but I'm going to hold off till I cool down a little and, hopefully, to get a few ideas what to say. Below are my first thoughts:
- We don't beg for money.
- We don't write press releases, but still get widely viewed. (On the day it was featured on WP's front page, Oregon State Capitol was viewed over 22,000 times.)
- Two notable successes in evaluating Oregon history: (More examples would be good.)
- Discovering that Mary Ramsey Wood, dubbed Mother Queen of Oregon by the legislature partly for having lived to 120, was actually only 97 years old at the time of her death.
- Determining that the party led by Sam Barlow and Joel Palmer did not, in fact, traverse Lolo Pass in their blazing of the Barlow Road, as incorrectly reported by many sources.
- We actively hunt down articles about Aunt Betty and get them removed. (See SOULJAZZ and Michael Brewin…more examples would be good.)
- Out of fewer than 2,000 Featured Articles on WP, six are on Oregon-related topics, with many more on the way.
- Just days ago, Portal:Oregon became one of only 99 Featured Portals, getting comments along the way that it was better than other Featured Portals.
- A few specific users, cause the papers love that: something about Cacophony's excellent photos, Aboutmovies' contributions to Oregon pioneer history, EncMstr's's recent near-unanimous adminship and/or creation of charts and maps, etc. Also, Mtsmallwood's recent articles on steamboats, such as Steamboats of the Columbia River, directly address the very first question on the Oregon Encyclopedia "fundraising" (er, front) page.
- Wikipedia content is licensed in such a way that anyone can republish it, for any purpose, without permission; truly a free resource. Oregon Encyclopedia is (c) PSU. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Peteforsyth (talk • contribs) 20:46, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
- Any other ideas? Maybe we should wiki up a press release, and get our own story in the paper. It'd be a hell of a lot more interesting.
- Here's the difference, AM: they want $1 mllion to 2 million in donations. Great catch Esprqii, but this has me absolutely infuriated. Why are they making such ignorant and hostile remarks about a community that, I'm sure, would absolutely love to partner with them in a project like this, and that has an enormous amount of talent and dedication to offer? I'd like to contact the OHS and PSU people, and the Oregonian reporter, but I'm going to hold off till I cool down a little and, hopefully, to get a few ideas what to say. Below are my first thoughts:
- A very frustrated, -Pete (talk) 17:56, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
- Wikipedia is far more navigatable due to wikilinks. Aboutmovies (talk) 18:21, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
- A very frustrated, -Pete (talk) 17:56, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
- I agree that it would be very cool to contact the author of the O piece and let her know how wikipedia *really* works, and how in particular, our project is pretty awesome.
- I transcribed the OHS quiz here. Just for fun, see if you can answer the questions using only Wikipedia, and to prove how broad our knowledge is, let's add links to as many articles as we can that answer the question. --Esprqii (talk) 18:34, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
- So who is going to write the Wikipedia article The Oregon Encyclopedia? I'd be nice to find some RS with good criticism of it, just for fun. Aboutmovies (talk) 20:28, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
- I wouldn't bother. Quality and longevity will win out, and google will rank wikipedia higher anyway. Heck, I invite the competition, if only because it gives us another site to go to for references. Zab (talk) 20:45, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
- Zab, you wouldn't bother with what -- the article? or any response at all? I agree that "competing" is kind of silly, and would much rather cooperate with these folks. Actually, I've been working with some others for several months to reach out to the OHS, PSU, and other such organizations. However, it takes two to tango, and if the OHS doesn't do something to mitigate their ignorant and disrespectful quotes to the press, I think promoting our successes, and contrasting our project with theirs, is a perfectly reasonable way to go. -Pete (talk) 20:56, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
- I wouldn't bother with the article, at least until they become notable. A response would be fine, but maybe make a project subpage and let us all draft it wikipedia style? Zab (talk) 21:19, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
- Agreed, and agreed. Let's get to work!
- I wouldn't bother with the article, at least until they become notable. A response would be fine, but maybe make a project subpage and let us all draft it wikipedia style? Zab (talk) 21:19, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
- Zab, you wouldn't bother with what -- the article? or any response at all? I agree that "competing" is kind of silly, and would much rather cooperate with these folks. Actually, I've been working with some others for several months to reach out to the OHS, PSU, and other such organizations. However, it takes two to tango, and if the OHS doesn't do something to mitigate their ignorant and disrespectful quotes to the press, I think promoting our successes, and contrasting our project with theirs, is a perfectly reasonable way to go. -Pete (talk) 20:56, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
- I wouldn't bother. Quality and longevity will win out, and google will rank wikipedia higher anyway. Heck, I invite the competition, if only because it gives us another site to go to for references. Zab (talk) 20:45, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
- So who is going to write the Wikipedia article The Oregon Encyclopedia? I'd be nice to find some RS with good criticism of it, just for fun. Aboutmovies (talk) 20:28, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
- I transcribed the OHS quiz here. Just for fun, see if you can answer the questions using only Wikipedia, and to prove how broad our knowledge is, let's add links to as many articles as we can that answer the question. --Esprqii (talk) 18:34, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
When I read about it I my first thought was "Awesome, another great reliable source, hopefully comparable (or better than) Washington's HistoryLink." A Google search on "Oregon encyclopedia" still has the wiki article as #1 and probably will for a very long time to come. Any text that they add can be included and cited here, any pre-1923 photos can be included here. The only think they have us on is newer historical photographs that we can't reproduce. I'm not at all afraid of them being anything other than a niche website. We're part of a 2 million+ article encyclopedia, they might get a few thousand articles. Cacophony (talk) 00:42, 15 February 2008 (UTC)
- I created The Oregon Encyclopedia article tonight. I think would be really great if our article about them had more information than they have about themselves on their own website. I also think we need to campaign them to release their media under a Creative Commons license, although I think they are so far behind the times they wouldn't even understand what that means. Cacophony (talk) 07:40, 16 February 2008 (UTC)
- If we could get them to release media under Creative Commons, that would be very very useful. Cirt (talk) 16:56, 16 February 2008 (UTC)
- Agreed, both that CC would be a great thing to nudge them towards, and that it will be a tough sell. Also, I just heard back from their spokesperson (Sherry Manning.) It seems their budget is almost entirely going toward doing outreach to difficult-to-reach communities (immigrants, natives, rural folk.) Maybe we persuade them to include a little pitch for WP:ORE in their events, to give such people an opportunity to get involved with something more deeply, or stay engaged when OE has left town. We could always use more diverse input here too, and that kind of outreach is tough to do without a budget… -Pete (talk) 22:20, 16 February 2008 (UTC)
- If we could get them to release media under Creative Commons, that would be very very useful. Cirt (talk) 16:56, 16 February 2008 (UTC)
- I created The Oregon Encyclopedia article tonight. I think would be really great if our article about them had more information than they have about themselves on their own website. I also think we need to campaign them to release their media under a Creative Commons license, although I think they are so far behind the times they wouldn't even understand what that means. Cacophony (talk) 07:40, 16 February 2008 (UTC)
- Comment on above
I think you all are being a tad bit too adversarial towards the OHS in all this. Most likely they just are relatively ignorant of Wikipedia, and of WikiProject Oregon in particular. I'm sure it is not meant as any form of competition or anything like that, and that they'd love the help/exposure if they knew about it/were more informed. Cirt (talk) 21:06, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
- Interesting discussion; I've got comments on two points. The Encyclopedia Project is not a part of OHS, just a partner; OEP gets office space and free use of OHS materials on OEP (so you can still donate that inheritance). Also, I'm sorry to say that idea of adding OHS primary sources to the Creative Commons probably won't ever fly, at least anytime in foreseeable future. OHS is not a public institution--funding is tight, and mamma's gotta pay the bills somehow. Digitized primary sources are valuable assets. Like it or not, this view is pretty much standard among most archives/libraries/museums nowadays. Try not to take Manning's comments too personally; it's gonna take people a few years to truly recognize and appreciate the benefits of Web 2.0.Bowhead (talk) 06:08, 22 February 2008 (UTC)
Fair use of image on template?
I reverted the use of the OUS logo on this template: Template:Oregon University System because I believe the fair use only extends to the actual OUS article. I was reverted. Can someone better versed in the fair-use stuff take a look for me? Thanks! Katr67 (talk) 18:27, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
- It was removed. FU images are not allowed in template space. This is mostly because there needs to be a fair use rational for every page the FU image is used on. You could create a rational for each page that transcludes the template, except that there can't be any fair use rational that's valid for the template page itself. Because of this, FU images are not allowed in templates. FU images are only allowed in article space and image space. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 18:41, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
Template deletion?
Template:Oregontasks was slated for speedy deletion, which I contested pending discussion here. I don't know how the transclusion thing works. Do we still need this tl? Katr67 (talk) 16:42, 16 February 2008 (UTC)
- It doesn't look like it is used anywhere, and it is subsumed by Wikipedia:WikiProject Oregon/to do. Cirt (talk) 16:44, 16 February 2008 (UTC)
- I didn't realize that a template which was temporarily not being used could be speedied. But it looks like {{Oregontasks}} is almost certainly abandoned. I'll delete it in a few days if there are no objections. —EncMstr 16:54, 16 February 2008 (UTC)
- Oops, EncMstr, I didn't see your post. I just reverted to the speedy-tagged version, seeing as there are no objections. Katr67 (talk) 06:45, 25 February 2008 (UTC)
- Thanks for the reminder. It's history. —EncMstr 06:56, 25 February 2008 (UTC)
- Oops, EncMstr, I didn't see your post. I just reverted to the speedy-tagged version, seeing as there are no objections. Katr67 (talk) 06:45, 25 February 2008 (UTC)
- I didn't realize that a template which was temporarily not being used could be speedied. But it looks like {{Oregontasks}} is almost certainly abandoned. I'll delete it in a few days if there are no objections. —EncMstr 16:54, 16 February 2008 (UTC)
Red links Project
As some of you know, we had a bot go through all WPOR tagged articles and generate a list of red links from those articles. Part of the purpose was to find links that were simple misspellings, used the wrong term, or had disambiguation issues. It was also to help find multiple red links that should have pointed to the same uncreated article and standardize those for when an article would eventually be created. It also identified some red links that should just be removed as unlikely to ever be an article as the subject was non-notable. The other purpose was to generate a list of higher priority red linked articles. At this point the list has been pared down of the non-notable, misspelling, misdirected red links and is now ready for the next phase. I will start to move the high priority links to a new page here that is also linked from each of the 8 raw output pages. The criteria I was planning on was the following:
- At least three links to the red link from WPOR articles in the mainspace not counting transclusions from templates
- The article created would need to be one that would have a WPOR tag once created (as in a river in Idaho would not be listed)
- The subject would have to be easily identified as notable
That should limit it to I'm guessing 100 or so articles. Thoughts? Other criteria? Thanks. Aboutmovies (talk) 03:47, 18 February 2008 (UTC)
- I'm all for anything that can improve those lists. I took the time to download a database dump and I am writing a script to generate the redlink lists again. I can add the three-link minimum to the model. I also was going to take advantage of the show/hide javascript. Are there any other things I should consider? I'll be working on it over the next 8 hours off and on. Zab (talk) 04:10, 18 February 2008 (UTC)
- If you publish the list to Wikipedia, split it into pages of no more than 300,000 bytes, and if possible in a sortable table. If not possible for a table, at least try for alpha order. Aboutmovies (talk) 04:58, 18 February 2008 (UTC)
- I wrote a crawler and tested it on my own MediaWiki install. It gathers the correct data and seems to function ok. It's designed to run live using the mw:API and gradually build a list of redlinks. I have no idea how it would perform against WikiPedia because I haven't talked to the bot people for approval yet. Zab (talk) 13:06, 18 February 2008 (UTC)
- Holy cow that is a lot of data. Is there any way that you can put together a list of the top 100 redlinks? Great job putting together that report. Cacophony (talk) 01:31, 21 February 2008 (UTC)
- Using only the first of the 8 output data pages so far, a list has been started here, with about 50 entries. Aboutmovies (talk) 09:49, 5 March 2008 (UTC)
- Holy cow that is a lot of data. Is there any way that you can put together a list of the top 100 redlinks? Great job putting together that report. Cacophony (talk) 01:31, 21 February 2008 (UTC)
- I wrote a crawler and tested it on my own MediaWiki install. It gathers the correct data and seems to function ok. It's designed to run live using the mw:API and gradually build a list of redlinks. I have no idea how it would perform against WikiPedia because I haven't talked to the bot people for approval yet. Zab (talk) 13:06, 18 February 2008 (UTC)
- If you publish the list to Wikipedia, split it into pages of no more than 300,000 bytes, and if possible in a sortable table. If not possible for a table, at least try for alpha order. Aboutmovies (talk) 04:58, 18 February 2008 (UTC)
Anyone not burnt out on this article, like I am, could you help reply to the family member with lots of new info on the talk page? Thanks! For those not familiar with the previous...unpleasantness...take two aspirin and read the archive. Katr67 (talk) 07:22, 19 February 2008 (UTC)
We'd love to recognize the great work of WikiProject Oregon contributors at the portal, if/when you get articles to WP:GA status or WP:FA status, or get a new or stub article up at T:DYK. Drop a note at Portal talk:Oregon to keep us updated (unless that article is already selected in the particular subsection of the portal). Cirt (talk) 21:04, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
Why doesn't this project list the ongoing collaboration here, and keep this updated? Cirt (talk) 16:59, 21 February 2008 (UTC)
- An excellent idea -- I say go for it! Wasn't aware that page existed. -Pete (talk) 00:10, 23 February 2008 (UTC)
Oregon Encyclopedia, redux
I want to report back on some progress following the announcement of Oregon Encyclopedia, which has largely been taking place on this sub-page: Wikipedia:WikiProject Oregon/OregonEncyclopedia response (which I didn't announce in a very prominent way, sorry if anybody missed it.) There are some good opportunities here, and several of us have been working to make the most of them.
Before I dive in, I'd like to respond to Cacophony and Cirt's comments, above: I agree that we (mostly I) were a little over the top in the stridency of our response. I've read through all I had to say, and would probably handle it in a calmer way if I could do it over. Sorry about that. Still, I think this episode has exposed important opportunities, and I'm hoping to move forward with those, with a little less drama. In response to Bowhead, I think there's plenty of reason to believe that certain fundraising efforts would be improved with open licensing…but I'll leave that debate for another day!
So anyway, here's a little update:
- I attended the launch event, gave them a few bucks, talked to a few people. I've had more in-depth discussions with Sherry Manning (development director) and Bill Lang (professor/editor), the people quoted in the Oregonian and Register-Guard stories, and believe there's a really good opportunity to explore collaboration.
- I'm meeting with Bill Lang Monday afternoon, and we'd like to set up a meeting with their whole editorial board, and anybody interested from the wiki side of things. I'll post a followup after that, but feel free to let me know if you want to participate in that. It'd probably be in Portland, but if we need to find a way to include people from elsewhere, we can...maybe tele-conferencing people in, or using a chat service.
- I think we should issue a press release and seek some news coverage, of the recent successes of the project, and more generally the value of Wikipedia. Most notably, getting Portal:Oregon to Featured status, and getting Oregon State Capitol on the main page. There's a draft press release on the sub-page. Please edit away! I'd like to get this out Monday morning.
- Looking further down the road, I think it might be worthwhile to establish a group (called something like "Oregon Wiki Advocacy Panel") that would make itself available to reporters, politicians, bureaucrats, educators, librarians etc. who are looking to learn more about wikis or Wikipedia. Having some people with respect and name recognition in the community (professors, elected officials, community leaders, etc.) and maintaining a basic web site would make it easier for the "traditional" world of media, non-profits, etc. to figure out what we're up to, and why it's a good thing. (thoughts?)
- There's a list of specific types of collaboration and requests of Oregon Encyclopedia, also on the project sub-page. Again, please add your thoughts!
- Zab and EncMstr have been working on a letter on that page as well, explaining some general benefits of Wikipedia and wikis.
- Katr requested some coverage of us at the Wikipedia Signpost. Hopefully we'll get a little local love, as well!
Anyway -- I think the Oregon Encyclopedia is a promising project, and it looks like they want to brainstorm with us. Looks like a great opportunity to share the benefit of some of our experience with this weird new technology, and establish some connections with the non-wiki world. Please take a look at the steps we've taken, and join in the planning!
-Pete (talk) 00:10, 23 February 2008 (UTC)
- Comment re idea of Press Release
Might be something you might want to consider working on in the venue of The Oregon Portal at Wikinews, instead of released in Wikipedia space. Some folks over there are quite experienced with this sort of thing. (Wikinews in general, I mean). Cirt (talk) 05:45, 23 February 2008 (UTC)
- I live in Portland and would like to help our projects mesh if I can; personally or through the internet. If we're going to do anything, we should strike while the iron is hot and not pass this off to wikinews or whatever. If you've been talking to them in person, then the iron is red hot.
- It sounds like we'll have incompatible licenses, which isn't that much of a barrier to working together. Just like we can summarize their info, they can summarize our info. It sounds like they may have higher quality standards than us, so they may only want to summarize our thoroughly referenced articles. Or use them to find the references that they want for their own articles.
- We should set up something so that they know which of our articles are researched thoroughly enough that they have info that they can use. That might be one way they can get info from us. It could just be a list of our FAs and GAs, or maybe all the articles that have a lot of refs, regardless of passing GA/FA.
- I'm don't know enough to say how we can use their info, but it sounds like they'll be a great resource for us too. If they have high editorial standards, it will be easy for us to use them, so we should think about how we can help them with our active userbase and large number of articles. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 07:40, 23 February 2008 (UTC)
- I didn't mean to "pass it off" to Wikinews, just that if you're going to be doing a "press release", that the folks over there could help w/ guidance for that. It would also be a good idea to write an article on Wikinews, about the advent of this new resource. Cirt (talk) 07:43, 23 February 2008 (UTC)
- Sorry, my bad. I don't know much about wikinews, other than they summarize current events like we summarize longer term subjects. Can we write the "news" there, or does someone else have to write about it so that it's "notable" or whatever wikenews calls it? - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 07:48, 23 February 2008 (UTC)
- I'll write up something, after y'all decide on how/when/what to issue the Press Release. Cirt (talk) 07:52, 23 February 2008 (UTC)
- Excellent idea re: Wikinews! Peregrine, I'll be sure to let you know if/when we set up a meeting. -Pete (talk) 21:21, 23 February 2008 (UTC)
- I posted a plea for input at wikinews:Wikinews:Water cooler/miscellaneous#Local publicity for wikis, Wikipedia. If there's a better place, please cross-post! -Pete (talk) 22:02, 23 February 2008 (UTC)
- Excellent idea re: Wikinews! Peregrine, I'll be sure to let you know if/when we set up a meeting. -Pete (talk) 21:21, 23 February 2008 (UTC)
- I'll write up something, after y'all decide on how/when/what to issue the Press Release. Cirt (talk) 07:52, 23 February 2008 (UTC)
- Sorry, my bad. I don't know much about wikinews, other than they summarize current events like we summarize longer term subjects. Can we write the "news" there, or does someone else have to write about it so that it's "notable" or whatever wikenews calls it? - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 07:48, 23 February 2008 (UTC)
- I didn't mean to "pass it off" to Wikinews, just that if you're going to be doing a "press release", that the folks over there could help w/ guidance for that. It would also be a good idea to write an article on Wikinews, about the advent of this new resource. Cirt (talk) 07:43, 23 February 2008 (UTC)
So- any thoughts on that press release before it goes out? Anyone got a shorter/better title for it? And, is anybody willing to have their name listed as a contact along with me? -Pete (talk) 20:15, 24 February 2008 (UTC)
Update
I met with Professor Bill Lang, the Oregon Encyclopedia's editor-in-chief, earlier this week. The project sounds exciting, and he was interested to learn more about Wikipedia. He was particularly interested in the "Featured Article" status; he had not been aware there was any distinction among, or peer evaluation of, Wikipedia articles. He also was interested in features like history and watchlist, and the ability to track changes; he wasn't aware how sophisticated that stuff is.
He would like us to make a presentation to some of the other editors, here in Portland, in mid-March. Assuming there is continued interest, the entire editorial board is meeting April 25 in Salem.
Anybody want to work on the presentation? What are your scheduling constraints? Bill would prefer to have the meeting during business hours if possible. Maybe we can do some planning at next week's WikiWednesday? (I invited Bill, but he can't make it this month.) -Peteforsyth (talk) 22:37, 29 February 2008 (UTC)
- Yeah I could help put something together. WikiWednesday would be a good time to put an outline together and maybe divide some work up. Cacophony (talk) 00:04, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
- Cacophony, thanks for the offer, looks like so far it's you, me, and VanTucky. You gonna track us down at WikiWednesday? What are your schedule restrictions as far as doing the presentation? (Feel free to email me directly.) Also, thanks for the upgraded State Capitol photos! -Pete (talk) 23:03, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
- Yeah, I haven't been to a WikiWendesday and it would be good to meet some people. It shouldn't be a problem for me to get half a day off sometime in the middle of March, my schedule is pretty flexible. As for the presentation itself, what are the OEP members looking to get out of the presentation? I gather that we are going to show how Wikipedia works, but how are they going to use that information? Maybe on Wednesday we could talk about how their project works? Cacophony (talk) 23:35, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
WPORE Consumer Reports division
This is slightly off-topic but the answer could benefit the project in more and better-quality images soon. Because of an unexpected windfall--finding loose cash while riding my bike along one of Oregon's fine state highways*--I would like to purchase a halfway decent digital camera, possibly a used one, as I am finally resigned to the fact that my beloved Pentax K-1000 has gone the way of the dodo. (And 1980s music has officially been declared "oldies" too. *sigh*) Since many of you are excellent photographers, I'd like some opinions on what you consider a good basic point-and-shoot (though some control over settings would be nice) camera. Please reply on my talk page, and direct any inquiries about my good fortune, lack of moral character and/or spending range to e-mail. Thanks in advance! *Bicycling is fun and profitable! Katr67 (talk) 00:51, 25 February 2008 (UTC)
A new Good Article
Congratulations to Aboutmovies, who wrote nearly all of the Matthew Deady article: it was just promoted to Good Article status, joining just a handful of other Oregon-related articles at that status. Good work! -Pete (talk) 06:15, 4 March 2008 (UTC)
More congrats
Tiptoety was just given administrator tools, after lots of vandal fighting and other often thankless work. Congratulations! -Pete (talk) 00:32, 5 March 2008 (UTC)
- Yes, congratulations indeed! Cirt (talk) 03:31, 5 March 2008 (UTC)
This was just redirected without discussion to United States Student Association for being non-notable, an orphan and unreferenced. It's hard to argue with that logic, but maybe someone in the project would be interested in seeing if there is anything salvageable there. I know they're quite active in lobbying the legislature. Katr67 (talk) 02:10, 8 March 2008 (UTC)
- Well, there's certainly no shortage of newspaper coverage of their activities, so there goes the non-notable part of the complaint. I'd say we should make an article -- put it on the To-Do list at the portal/project? Or a collab of week? -Pete (talk) 02:17, 8 March 2008 (UTC)
- I undid the redirect and left a message on the discussion page that the article should have been put to a deletion discussion rather than being unilaterally redirected. A cursory glance already shows a {{prod}} was placed and deleted.Awotter (talk) 21:39, 8 March 2008 (UTC)
- Thanks for the rescue guys! Katr67 (talk) 22:21, 9 March 2008 (UTC)
- I undid the redirect and left a message on the discussion page that the article should have been put to a deletion discussion rather than being unilaterally redirected. A cursory glance already shows a {{prod}} was placed and deleted.Awotter (talk) 21:39, 8 March 2008 (UTC)
Propose renaming the category Television stations in Medford to Category:Stations broadcasting from Medford, Oregon so the area radio stations can be included in the categorization. The cat name can be discussed as well. Zab (talk) 22:00, 9 March 2008 (UTC)
- I don't care but I you will need to run this one by Categories for Discussion. This is a non-standard way of handling the problem. See Category:American media by state for how each medium is separate and broken down by state and further by city if needed. Why not just create Category:Radio stations in Medford? Katr67 (talk) 22:21, 9 March 2008 (UTC)
- Withdrawn If there is already an accepted system in place, there is little reason to modify it. Consistency is king. I will create the category myself. Zab (talk) 03:34, 10 March 2008 (UTC)
I just ran across this Afd for basketball player Grayson Boucher: Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Grayson Boucher, which I would normally just post on the Oregon-related deletion discussion page (don't know where that is? Ask me!), but it looks like it has been running for a while and may be closed soon, though with few !votes it might be relisted. I have no opinion on his notability, since it's a sports thing, but he's local, and the article definitely needs help if it doesn't get deleted. Check it out if you have a minute. Katr67 (talk) 23:55, 9 March 2008 (UTC)
Novick
Hey all, I just noticed that Steve Novick was viewed close to 3,000 times in February. Don't know if you guys have been playing with this tool as much as me, but that's a pretty high number, especially for a candidate who isn't currently holding office. (Opponent Jeff Merkley's article only had about 800 hits in the same time period, and he's Speaker of the House.)
Anyway, the article really isn't up to Wikipedia standards, by a long shot. Lots of position statements cited only to his web site, for instance. Seems to me it would be a good idea to focus some attention on this article, and put our best foot forward for those turning to Wikipedia for some of their candidate fodder. -Pete (talk) 04:14, 11 March 2008 (UTC)
- Yes, especially since the article has been in the press recently: Novick aide apologizes for Wikipedia edits. Cacophony (talk) 06:30, 11 March 2008 (UTC)
- Nevermind, I guess it was referring to a different article. Cacophony (talk) 06:31, 11 March 2008 (UTC)
- Same race, though...that's what "sparked" me to think of this. (It was Esprqii who tipped me off...) -Pete (talk) 06:51, 11 March 2008 (UTC)
- I'd fool around with it, but I'm on his staff, so it probably wouldn't be best (No, Henry Kraemer isn't my sockpuppet). Seriously, given that he's worked for the Oregon Senate (or was it the House?) as chief of staff of the Dem caucus, it shouldn't be too hard to dig up more info about him, yeah? —Micahbrwn (talk) 15:01, 23 April 2008 (UTC)
Some fun stats to play with
EncMstr was good enough to lend his tech skills to an idea I had: use that awesome hit count tool to generate a table of all Top-level Oregon articles (plus a few others that I thought might be popular or interesting, off the top of my head.) Here are the results of that, showing how many times each one got visited in the month of February. (note that the table columns are sortable by clicking the triangles.) He posted the Linux bash script he wrote do it on his talk page, if you want to apply this to another list... -Pete (talk) 06:51, 11 March 2008 (UTC)
- I wonder what the attraction to the Nike article is? Seems counterintuitive.... —EncMstr 06:58, 11 March 2008 (UTC)
- There's also an interesting correlation with DYK's. The more interesting the hook, the more hits. And in general it reinforces the power of the main page as often minor articles top 1k hits in a month with 95% coming the one day they make the main page. Aboutmovies (talk) 07:04, 11 March 2008 (UTC)
FYI, I have nominated the article 1984 Rajneeshee bioterror attack for consideration at WP:FAC. Your comments at the FAC discussion page would be appreciated. Cirt (talk) 09:12, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
even more congrats
Wow, productive group lately! William W. Chapman was just promoted to Good Article. Congrats, Aboutmovies! -Pete (talk) 17:50, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
- AND List of tallest buildings in Portland, Oregon -- our very first Featured List! -Pete (talk) 19:57, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
- That's a beautiful list. Northwesterner1 (talk) 20:28, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
IRC for WikiProject Oregon?
Does WP:ORE have a WP:IRC channel on irc.freenode.net ? If not, someone should set one up, something like #wporegon or something like that. Cirt (talk) 09:07, 14 March 2008 (UTC)
- I'm pretty sure there isn't one. But not being all that tech-savvy and seeing how IRC could be an enormous waste of time in a life already wasted on the wiki, I've only logged into IRC a couple of times when the wiki was down to see if anybody knew what was going on. But I would participate in a WP:ORE IRC if it gets set up. I know they're really good for coordinating acute issues in real time. Katr67 (talk) 19:29, 14 March 2008 (UTC)
- Trying to work w/ Qst (talk · contribs) to set up a channel, #wporegon in irc.freenode.net - not too familiar with that myself but I think it could be beneficial. Cirt (talk) 01:02, 15 March 2008 (UTC)
- I'm down, if it's really easy to use, and if somebody's willing to post a little "how-to" on the main page. Basically as long as it's something that's well-advertised, that doens't become something that's a sort of "secret back room" for those in the know. Not really familiar enough with IRC implementation these days to know if it's that straightforward. -Pete (talk) 01:22, 15 March 2008 (UTC)
- It's pretty straightforward. A bunch of the folks at WP:DOH have gained benefit from using it, and it's not used as a "backroom" or anything over there. Cirt (talk) 01:26, 15 March 2008 (UTC)
- I'm down, if it's really easy to use, and if somebody's willing to post a little "how-to" on the main page. Basically as long as it's something that's well-advertised, that doens't become something that's a sort of "secret back room" for those in the know. Not really familiar enough with IRC implementation these days to know if it's that straightforward. -Pete (talk) 01:22, 15 March 2008 (UTC)
- Trying to work w/ Qst (talk · contribs) to set up a channel, #wporegon in irc.freenode.net - not too familiar with that myself but I think it could be beneficial. Cirt (talk) 01:02, 15 March 2008 (UTC)
Recent COI on political page(s)
I came across this post at National Review Online:
Wiki Bleg [John J. Miller]
Help wanted: I'm thinking of writing an article on the politics of Wikipedia, and I'm interested in learning about how officeholders and campaigns deal with the site. Are you in a congressional office that keeps an eye on what your boss's Wikipedia entry says? Have you worked for a presidential or gubernatorial candidate who had to fact check a Wikipedia entry? If so, please contact me at nrorocks at yahoo.com. All comments and observations are welcome. I won't use any names without explicit permission. Thanks!
I emailed the author with this talk page address because I know some folks here have edited and or watched Oregon related political pages in the past and that there was some WP:COI by a particular candidates staff (? my memory is hazy on who or what the circumstances were) but I thought I'd pass this on as an fyi.Awotter (talk) 20:49, 18 March 2008 (UTC)
- hmm, thanx, I'll help keep an eye o ut...Kairos (talk) 11:08, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
- Thanks for the tip Awotter! I just had a fairly extensive talk with the guy. He said he'll let me know what comes of his story. The main point I tried to make -- which seemed to resonate with him, I think -- was that the media always tries to make a "big deal" about candidates tinkering with their pages, but in reality Wikipedia is getting better and better at dealing with that stuff quickly and effectively. The real "big deal" is that Wikipedia is a place for genuine deliberation to take place, where disagreements are addressed on their individual merits and according to guidelines and policies, which distinguishes it from blogs and other online forums. I also mentioned the Merkley non-fiasco, which seemed to pique his interest. -Pete (talk) 20:57, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
DYK
|
On 19 March, 2008, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article The Register-Guard, which you created or substantially expanded. If you know of another interesting fact from a recently created article, then please suggest it on the Did you know? talk page. |
--Gatoclass (talk) 15:35, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
This was recently changed to match the colors of the state flag, which I reverted. I'm not real invested in what color the template is, but I think it should be discussed first, as I believe some of the other Oregon-related tls were made to coordinate with this one. See Template talk: Oregon. 17:16, 20 March 2008 (UTC)
Oregon reference desk
I just started a page here: Wikipedia:WikiProject Oregon/Reference desk
We should share our tips and tricks for researching Oregon stuff! Please add your own ideas. -Pete (talk) 21:17, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
- Great idea! Feel free to mine my handy dandy list of mostly geographic and architecture stuff, if I don't get around to it soon. I use several of those links all the time. Katr67 (talk) 22:23, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
- Awesome, thanks! -Pete (talk) 19:40, 22 March 2008 (UTC)
"no free image" images
What do people think about the no free image images that sometimes get dropped into articles? I don't like them, I think they often make perfectly good B-class articles look incomplete and unencyclopedic. There are lots of ways to encourage people to upload images without polluting article space. One was recently added to Vic Atiyeh, and there are others. Anybody mind if I delete them when I see them? -Pete (talk) 19:40, 22 March 2008 (UTC)
- I say go for it, especially on the higher-rated articles, but they will certainly be added back unless you can get agreement from the editor who added them (who I see you've contacted). Maybe as you take off the templates you could make a list of those articles at the people subproject for anybody who wants to try to track down some images. Katr67 (talk) 21:05, 25 March 2008 (UTC)
- If the article is a living bio without a picture, it is in fact unfinished. WP:WIP - David Gerard (talk) 21:11, 25 March 2008 (UTC)
- Um, no wikiproject has the power to declare itself closed to new content, nor closed to particular classes of users, nor to claim ownership of any given series of articles. Wikipedia is a work in progress - David Gerard (talk) 21:09, 25 March 2008 (UTC)
- Oh - and this would almost certainly be concerning politician articles. Any US politician article without a picture is in fact a disgrace to Wikipedia - and if you don't want that shown, the best thing to do is to find a picture, not claim nothing is wrong - David Gerard (talk) 21:13, 25 March 2008 (UTC)
- Oh, and WP:WIP is an essay, you have any policy or guidelines you might like to point too? Otherwise anyone is free to revert you and come to a consensus to not include the fake images. Yes, Wikipedia is always a work in progress, but under that analysis we might as well have a permanent template at the top of every article saying that it is a work in progress and please add anything you can, or readers could simply click on the "About Wikipedia" link that is omnipresent to their left. Otherwise, I agree that the image placeholders are unneeded and should be removed, as images are optional. As to a disgrace, I'm sorry but I disagree since 1) we are all volunteers and are doing the best we can, and 2) Wikipedia has some very, very, very (did I mention very) strict copyright policies that make it very, very, very difficult to add images of living people, and almost as difficult to add pictures of dead people, regardless of if they are a politician. Instead of adding the placeholder, you may want to spend your time contacting individual politicians. Though from my own experiences doing just that, good luck, they are not particularly receptive, partly do to the very, very, very complicated copyright rules of Wikipedia (i.e. has to allow for commercial use unless fair use, and if its fair use, then they cannot be alive as it is presumed to be replaceable by free media). Aboutmovies (talk) 21:29, 25 March 2008 (UTC)
- I apologise for being an arse in my response above. What I mean is that even if you have a nice polished article, it's got to be open to new content, e.g. obvious things like missing pictures. Or red links in an article. Even a featured article is open to editing. And adding new stuff will often make the article lumpy and less polished, but all of Wikipedia is a work in progress and ridiculously far off finished - and articles do go through a cycle of add stuff, polish, add a lump of stuff, re-polish, add a lump of stuff, re-polish. So putting up picture placeholders is part of that cycle. Eventually it will get a picture and be a better article.
- But it probably wouldn't have gotten that picture without a direct request for it. I put the placeholders on articles - particularly on every living bio I can - because they noticeably work really well at getting pictures, and showing the need for pictures. That is: picture placeholders lead fairly directly to improvements in Wikipedia's content. There shouldn't be a current politician article in the world that doesn't have a photo on it (I alerted the wikimediauk-l list to the disgrace that not having every UK politician article have a picture is). Etc.
- I hope that makes why I'm doing this a bit clearer, and sorry again for being snappy about it - David Gerard (talk) 22:02, 25 March 2008 (UTC)
- I agree with the others that the biographical articles are, on balance, better off without placeholding portraits. If you look through our discussions (and archives), you'll see there has been very little disagreement within our project on any topic. That we think the portrait thingy isn't entirely an improvement appears to be our consensus, and is the recognized Wikipedia decision-making process. Besides the biographical articles, I believe we're in agreement that every article should have at least one photo or diagram. I know I'm always thinking of ways to obtain and add them. Unfortunately, the effort to do that is several orders of magnitude greater than fixing a typo, so it's natural for illustrations to lag behind. I carry around the list of requested photos in Oregon in case an opportunity arises.
- The idea that putting a big black hole on a page to attract content is hopeful, but I don't see how such a big hammer would help. For every wikieditor, there are hundreds or thousands of readers who will be bothered (to some extent) by its presence. Maybe it will convert them into an editor. Or maybe it will make the impression that the article is unusable. I strongly suspect the latter conclusion is more likely. —EncMstr 22:34, 25 March 2008 (UTC)
- I think we all understand what your purpose is, we just disagree with the approach. There is already a process using the talk page for the same purpose, and adding non-content to articles (e.g. wikify, sources, or POV templates) tends to take away from the content. Yes, people always add, but we don't have a template saying please add to every article, it is assumed. But my biggest issue with the template is more often than not leads to someone searching Google and adding the first picture they come across, which 99% of time is a copyvio. If it were that easy regular users would have already done that, but the (as mentioned before) very strict copyright policies prevent those easy fixes. At least that's been my experience. I, and I think everyone at this project, want the images, we just disagree on the process of encouraging the additions. Aboutmovies (talk) 22:40, 25 March 2008 (UTC)
- Our upload system is complicated. The image includes a specialised version of our upload system that is designed to simplify things.Geni 22:55, 26 March 2008 (UTC)
- I think we all understand what your purpose is, we just disagree with the approach. There is already a process using the talk page for the same purpose, and adding non-content to articles (e.g. wikify, sources, or POV templates) tends to take away from the content. Yes, people always add, but we don't have a template saying please add to every article, it is assumed. But my biggest issue with the template is more often than not leads to someone searching Google and adding the first picture they come across, which 99% of time is a copyvio. If it were that easy regular users would have already done that, but the (as mentioned before) very strict copyright policies prevent those easy fixes. At least that's been my experience. I, and I think everyone at this project, want the images, we just disagree on the process of encouraging the additions. Aboutmovies (talk) 22:40, 25 March 2008 (UTC)
(edit conflict)Thanks for apologizing David, because I was also going to point out that "disgrace" is a rather strong word to apply to this situation. If you look at it that way, Wikipedia is a disgrace to Wikipedia. I don't speak for the whole project, but what WP:ORE is trying to say is not that we WP:OWN the articles under our scope, but that we are very, very, very diligent about getting those articles up to standard, especially the ones about politicians. More so than many other corners of the wiki, I've noticed. Take a look around, and I'm sure you will be favorably impressed. If we were to say, go with my suggestion above about what to do about the missing images, or some other solution, rest assured it would be taken care of. Katr67 (talk) 22:47, 25 March 2008 (UTC)
- Here is a perfect example of what my main concern is Image:Phil Knight-1-.jpg which is copyrighted, and he is alive, thus I believe it fails criteria #12 under images and needs to be deleted. Aboutmovies (talk) 20:21, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
I should have noted here: I continued this discussion on David's talk page, and he agreed to exclude "Oregon" from his mass-replacement. (I'm not too familiar with how the AWB tool works, but that's what he said.) He also said whatever method he's using is not foolproof, and I should just let him know if it messes up. It's missed only one that I've seen -- I don't think I bothered to let him know, and don't remember which it was, I just reverted it. Anyway, bottom line...I think we have good justification for reverting, perhaps with reference to this discussion. If he succeeds in his goal of changing infobox templates to automatically include his tool (which I rather doubt) I think we'll have good standing, and good company (such as Wikiproject Footballers) in raising a pretty strenuous objection. So to my mind, for the time being, the issue's resolved. -Pete (talk) 22:50, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
Tagging
I'm new to this. I entered two Oregon related articles to Wikipedia day before yesterday. How do they get into the Oregon Project? They are Coquelle Thompson, and Peterson, Annie Miner. Both are category "Native American people.' --Millicoma (talk) 21:07, 22 March 2008 (UTC)
- Hi Millicoma,
- on the project front page there is a section on templates used in the Oregon project. When you place the {{WikiProject Oregon}} template on an article TALK page related to Oregon it automatically gets associated with the project.Awotter (talk) 21:14, 22 March 2008 (UTC)
- Hi Millicoma! I added the template on both pages, you can see how here and here. I rated them both as stubs and low importance to Oregon, though it's possible I'm mistaken about their importance; guidelines for those assessments are here: Wikipedia:WikiProject Oregon/Assessment. Hope you stick around and keep contributing, we could definitely use more on the history of Native American people here! You might want to check out History of Oregon and Columbia River, which both have sections on the history of native peoples that could use expansion. -Pete (talk) 21:45, 22 March 2008 (UTC)
Thank you. My computer crashed, just got a new one up and running. Another question -- my Annie Miner Peterson page has the red note that internal citations are needed. I put the internal citations in, but still cannot figure out how to get the red question about citations off. Millicoma (talk) 18:42, 8 April 2008 (UTC)
- Glad to see you back! Good job on the inline citations. I removed the {{nofootnotes}} template at the top of the "Sources" section. That's what produces the note you mentioned. -Pete (talk) 19:01, 8 April 2008 (UTC)
WikiProject Oregon: Articles of unclear notability
Hello,
there are currently 33 articles in the scope of this project which are tagged with notability concerns. I have listed them here. (Note: this listing is based on a database snapshot of 12 March 2008 and may be slightly outdated.)
I would encourage members of this project to have a look at these articles, and see whether independent sources can be added, whether the articles can be merged into an article of larger scope, or possibly be deleted. Any help in cleaning up this backlog is appreciated. For further information, see Wikipedia:WikiProject Notability.
If you have any questions, please leave a message on the Notability project page or on my personal talk page. (I'm not watching this page however.) Thanks! --B. Wolterding (talk) 15:53, 23 March 2008 (UTC)
- Thanks for doing this. Hey, to save the rest of us time, can the folks who have checked out the articles on the list please both strike them out or add the {{done}} template to them and jot down a short explanation of how you took care of the issue and your rationale for doing so? Since I tagged some of those myself, I think some of them are still iffy and the tags should stay until the problems are addressed. Katr67 (talk) 23:00, 25 March 2008 (UTC)
- I'm looking at the articles and I guess the issue I have is tagging them in the first place. If an article is reviewed and it clearly doesn't meet notability or there is a concern then an Afd/prod and or notice to the article creator seems to me more appropriate. Otherwise it's just a pain in the tush to have to come along later and review and or justify why an article should or shouldn't be tagged. Also, respectfully, I think that there is more of a burden on why someone thinks an article subject isn't notable than
visvice a versa.Awotter (talk) 23:15, 25 March 2008 (UTC)- To quote the template: "If you are familiar with the subject matter, please expand or rewrite the article to establish its notability. The best way to address this concern is to reference published, third-party sources about the subject." Thus I tag articles that do not demonstrate they are notable. That is, unless there are reliable sources, independent of the subject with substantial coverage (i.e. the notability guidelines) listed in the article, then it is subject to the tag and even deletion. It's not up to everyone else to prove it is not notable (its difficult to prove a negative as few people can check every reliable source on the planet to be able to say there are no RS in the world and thus not notable), its up to those authors wanting a subject included to assert the notability. The exceptions would be for some of the WP:NOTE exceptions, such as if the person was a state legislator and there is a source showing that, then they meet WP:BIO even if the coverage is not substantial. But even then, I need a source saying they meet the exception, and BTW being a published author does not meet any exceptions at WP:BIO. Aboutmovies (talk) 23:30, 25 March 2008 (UTC)
- I just disagree given the plethora of non-notable crap on Wikipedia and the overwhelming number of articles that need improvement. I just happen to think notability is like obscenity, I knows it when I sees it. and someone or something of note can be established on its own merits even as a stub. I'm concerned that in your view policies are like Lego blocks in that all must fit together nicely when that isn't always the case. It still doesn't change (in my opinion again) the fact that this seems to be a "make work" template" rather than one that solves an issue.Awotter (talk) 00:15, 26 March 2008 (UTC)
- All of the "clean-up" templates are "make work" templates. Who do you think should clean them up? Personally, I think the original author is the person best suited for the task, since presumably they know the topic and where sources can be found to improve it. Now others can help out, but its no one's job. As to other non-notable stuff, that's the point of tagging these things (and later deleting) so people may one day understand that Wikipedia is not just a huge collection of crap. Just ignoring the problem means it just gets worse, as invariably in AFD discussions people say, well there are articles on this, that, and the other thing so lets keep this too. There is a place for those things on the internet, I like to call them blogs or MySpace or YouTube. But the consensus has been they do not belong on Wikipedia unless they meet WP:NOTE. Now, are there times when something may not perfectly fit, yes, but those are few and far between, and there are other rules such as WP:IAR, but you have to come up with a good argument and not the "other crap exists" one. The whole point of the notability guidelines and specifically the need for RS is to try and avoid your Potter Stewart example of subjectivity in the process. By requiring RS that are independent of the subject it moves the debate into a much more objective standard that is quantifiable. I may (and often do) come across a subject I have never heard of, but if there are RS at the bottom, then I can assume the item is notable and not just made up, thus avoiding issues such as the Seigenthaler incident, Essjay controversy, and Alan Mcilwraith. As to Lego blocks, yes, I do enjoy Legos. And I always remember the top block/policy Ignore All Rules. But I also remember that the policies and guidelines that govern Wikipedia are here for a reason, and they were developed by community consensus, and can be changed by community consensus. Aboutmovies (talk) 03:34, 26 March 2008 (UTC)
- I'm looking at the articles and I guess the issue I have is tagging them in the first place. If an article is reviewed and it clearly doesn't meet notability or there is a concern then an Afd/prod and or notice to the article creator seems to me more appropriate. Otherwise it's just a pain in the tush to have to come along later and review and or justify why an article should or shouldn't be tagged. Also, respectfully, I think that there is more of a burden on why someone thinks an article subject isn't notable than
- This message was left on my talk page shortly after I posted here when I initially worked the list:
- "Hi. FYI, generally, when I tag articles with {{notability}}, it's not because they are not notable, it is because the article does not assert that notability, using a variety of outside sources, and I want to give them a chance. (Truly not-notable junk I send for deletion ASAP.) So just removing the tag doesn't really take care of the problem. I'd really like to see those articles keep their tags until they are actually improved. Thanks! P.S. Don't be offended if I end up Afding some of those (I'll assume you would contest a {{prod}} tag too.) Katr67 (talk) 23:13, 25 March 2008 (UTC)
- To clarify, I disagree again that "outside references" are the defacto standard of an articles notability, especially on stubs and I don't recall simply removing the tag without explaining in the edit summary my reasoning. I hope you can see why it would be frustrating to review an article, take an action and then have it questioned when there is a process for that already in place.Awotter (talk) 03:14, 27 March 2008 (UTC)
- Just to make sure I make clear where I'm coming from, WP:N states "If an article currently does not cite reliable secondary sources that are independent of the subject, that does not necessarily mean the topic is not notable."Awotter (talk) 03:24, 27 March 2008 (UTC)
- Hence the use of the template, to allow the editor to demonstrate the notability without moving to deletion, which is a last resort. Aboutmovies (talk) 04:21, 27 March 2008 (UTC)
- Just to make sure I make clear where I'm coming from, WP:N states "If an article currently does not cite reliable secondary sources that are independent of the subject, that does not necessarily mean the topic is not notable."Awotter (talk) 03:24, 27 March 2008 (UTC)
Hmm. Not sure why you felt the need to repost my message here, as I didn't feel the need to have this discussion with you on the project page. Sorry, but yes, I'm questioning your actions. Yes, you put your reasoning in the edit summaries, but on many of them I disagree with it. I'm afraid your personal opinion or gut feeling doesn't count. For example, you removed the tag from the ornithology professor, saying the article never should have been tagged because he had published papers in journals. Well, you probably know about "publish or perish"--all professors publish. However, there is already a standard in place for the notability of academics: WP:PROF, and it's not clear the guy meets those standards--the article doesn't show it if he does. So there is a process already in place. The process is this: if an article does not clearly demonstrate notability using the standards at WP:NOTE and the like, it can be sent for speedy deletion, proposed deletion, articles for deletion, or, if it looks like it has potential, it can be tagged with the notability tag in the hope that someone can find sources that show notability. If the tag stays for what someone deems a too-long period of time, then they can either improve the article and remove the tag or send it to deletion. I really don't know what else to say, except that simply removing tags from articles that do not measure up to the Wikipedia-wide standards for notability (which does not mean the subject is not notable, but only that the article fails to demonstrate that notability) doesn't make any sense to me. I see the tag as interim step that probably allows more articles to be saved and improved than if it didn't exist. Anyway, if you have problem with the whole system of article issues tags, I'd suggest you work to have them deleted. If you have a problem with the notability standards, you could go work on changing them. In the meantime, I'm going to work with the tags and standards as one of the tools available to me. I'm not sure what else to do. If I run across an article that has unclear notability and I don't have the time or inclination to fix it myself, should I simply tag it for speedy deletion instead? You'll note that when somebody decided to merge Oregon Student Association, I gave everyone a heads up and that resulted in a much improved article, which you contributed to. To me the tags are just a subtler "heads up", which may lead to similar success stories. Katr67 (talk) 09:32, 27 March 2008 (UTC)
- Awotter, here is a great example of it playing out, where at first blush the article would likely get deleted, but by tagging the article the interested editor fixed the problem. Aboutmovies (talk) 02:34, 28 March 2008 (UTC)
Notability Project
I moved the list here: Wikipedia:WikiProject Oregon/Notability Project since I discovered too late it was requested we don't edit the original list. Feel free to move, link or rename as necessary. Katr67 (talk) 19:39, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
Notability Tag vs. Other Tags
Continuing a conversation begun at Talk:Jona Bechtolt... In my view the notability tag should not be used in place of a general article cleanup tag or a references tag. The Jona Bechtolt article provides a discography that includes wikilinks to the record label States Rights Records. A quick check of that article shows the label to be notable. Thus, the Jona Bechtolt article in its current form meets #5 of the relevant notability guideline. So the article is notable, end of story. Discographies are not usually footnoted, but if this one is in doubt, you can put a {{fact}} tag there asking for a footnote. If the notability of the record label is in doubt, then the notability tag should be on the label's article. If you disagree with the music notability guidelines, then you can try to change them. But it doesn't seem like there's much ground for a notability tag on Jona Bechtolt.
I agree that the notability tag may get results -- in that it may spur someone to come along and clean up the article -- and that's a good thing. But in the meantime, we have an article whose main page is clouded by the appearance of non-notability. I think that's a bad thing. It tells general users who happen upon this article that Wikipedia is not a place for articles about a guy like Jona Bechtolt. But that's not true. Wikipedia is a place for such articles. He clearly meets our notability criteria. What we need to be conveying to general users is that Wikipedia is not a place for unsourced articles. And for that we should be using {{Unreferenced}} or {{fact}} tags.
In sum, I think the notability tag should be used for what it's designed to be used for and not employed for other purposes just because it's convenient. Yes, let's keep this this article on the list of WP:ORE articles with questionable notability; but putting a notability tag on the article for Wikipedia at large is not a good idea.Northwesterner1 (talk) 22:56, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
- I think the notability tag at JB can be removed with a tiny amount of work, but that tiny amount is significant. Articles are supposed to assert notability in the lead section. This one presently does not; hence the tag. Maybe I should have read the article, and the WP:MUSIC guideline more closely when I tagged it, but I didn't. So I wasn't equipped to fix it then. I am now, and will gladly do so; I just want to defend the notion that the tag was the correct one at the time when it was placed. -Pete (talk) 23:02, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
- Jona: The criteria does not need to be changed, and the tag is appropriate for the state it was in. As the criteria for music outlines in its lead section: "In order to meet Wikipedia's standards for verifiability and notability, the article in question must actually document that the criterion is true." Thus unless it is documented (see WP:CITE and WP:V) then it fails any of the criteria at Wikipedia:Notability (music), and wikilinks are not documentation, as Wikipedia is not a WP:RS. Aboutmovies (talk) 02:05, 1 April 2008 (UTC)
- Thanks for pointing that out, Aboutmovies. I didn't catch that. And I do take heart from Katr & Pete who actually worked to improve the article, rather than just sitting around complaining (er... making a process point) like me. But in general, I'm advocating for caution with the notability tags. While they can spur improvement in existing articles, they can also cause confusion for new users about what kind of subjects are appropriate for Wikipedia. When it becomes clear on the talk page that a subject is notable -- whether or not that notability is defended or properly sourced in the article -- from that point forward, I think reference templates and targeted fact templates should be seen as more appropriate tools than broad notability templates threatening potential deletion.Northwesterner1 (talk) 03:24, 1 April 2008 (UTC)
- We'll have to agree to disagree. To me, WP:V is policy (OK actually to everyone its policy) and for a very good reason: see Criticism of Wikipedia or more specifically items such as Henryk Batuta hoax and Alan Mcilwraith are the big examples of what can, and does happen when we fail to require that sources be used. If we simply go with someone just saying they are notable, then I can start an article called Aboutmovies and say I am a band from Deutchland with three hit songs in Sweden, including two albums put out from Island Records. That meets the criteria (sans WP:V) and thus should be left alone. But I can assure you, I am not a band and do not have a record deal with anyone (and with my lack of singing talent I should not have a record deal). I don't think anyone could advocate that Aboutmovies should have the notability tag removed and add {{cn}} instead. And that is where the problem is, and why WP:V is policy. My first article I started did not give any citations, I just linked about three Wikipedia articles that referred to the person and compiled the info from those pages. Soon there after someone came along and asked me to provide citations, and I did, and the article has lived happily ever after. I've done the same to other new articles by new editors, helping them format or giving suggestions on where sources may be found. But if they are not invested enough to spend the time to provide the info, then why should I or anyone else spend their time on the article? The template for me is part of a long process, template, prod, AFD. Sometimes I'll start with a note on the talk page, and then move on to the template. Now if the template causes some confusion for new editors, I actually view that as a bit of a good thing. I would bet more articles are deleted everyday than are kept, as most are speedied away as SPAM or autobios of 12 year olds. My point with this being the majority of new editors (and as pointed out above with the point about MUSIC requiring verififcation) and many established editors do not know what the notability guidelines are. You see this with all the articles speedied and in AFD debates where it almost always happens that people want to point out that these other articles exist (thus the counter of WP:OTHERSTUFF). So if people better understood the notability requirements and that this obscure topic may not meet the guidelines, then maybe they will think before they create a biography for their class turtle or at least provide some sources to show Mr. Turtle is a notable subject for inclusion at Wikipedia. If we don't have WP:V someone can just claim the thing is notable per some guideline without ever backing it up, and there really would be little one could do. Image if someone wanted to make up some 14th Century noble person, that subject would likely not turn up anything on Google even if they did exist. It comes down to being able to prove a negative. I can easily prove their are no sources in article X. I really cannot prove that there exist absolutely no sources anywhere in the world, and thus show X is not notable. It would be like proving the Flying Spaghetti Monster did not create the universe. Aboutmovies (talk) 07:08, 1 April 2008 (UTC)
- Thanks for pointing that out, Aboutmovies. I didn't catch that. And I do take heart from Katr & Pete who actually worked to improve the article, rather than just sitting around complaining (er... making a process point) like me. But in general, I'm advocating for caution with the notability tags. While they can spur improvement in existing articles, they can also cause confusion for new users about what kind of subjects are appropriate for Wikipedia. When it becomes clear on the talk page that a subject is notable -- whether or not that notability is defended or properly sourced in the article -- from that point forward, I think reference templates and targeted fact templates should be seen as more appropriate tools than broad notability templates threatening potential deletion.Northwesterner1 (talk) 03:24, 1 April 2008 (UTC)
Tuyas
Tuyas are unique to Oregon because they are a rare and unusual type of volcano found in very few places around the world. Other volcanoes in Oregon such as cinder cones are widespread throughout the world unlike tuyas. I think it's odd WikiProject Oregon should be left out because all the other country projects associated with tuyas (i.e. Canada, Iceland and Antarctica) are added. Lots more infomation is still needed for the tuya article, explaning its geology, formation, locations, etc. Black Tusk 02:18, 26 March 2008 (UTC)
- Imo, I don't think any localized Wikiprojects should be on that page. They should just work on the individual tuyas that are in their areas and leave the main tuya page to the geology and volcano Wikiprojects. -- Hux (talk) 16:53, 1 April 2008 (UTC)
Oregon coast link addition request
Good day, fellow Oregonians!
I've had a web site, Romantic Oregon Coast Vacations, for nearing 2 years now that I would love to have added to the external links section. It's main focus is romance on the coat, including beach wedding and honeymoon information.
The URL is www.romantic-oregon-coast.com
I hope you'll consider it's inclusion. Thanks!
TonyT (talk) 04:59, 26 March 2008 (UTC) Tony Thomas, 3/25/2008
- No thanks. It doesn't meet WP:EL guidelines. OhNoitsJamie Talk 05:02, 26 March 2008 (UTC)
- Ditto. Wikipedia is not a tourism guide or vacation planning site. But I believe you should know that since you have been warned about spamming the link before. Thanks for asking though! Katr67 (talk) 05:35, 26 March 2008 (UTC)
- See the previous discussion. Katr67 (talk) 05:41, 26 March 2008 (UTC)
- Ditto. Wikipedia is not a tourism guide or vacation planning site. But I believe you should know that since you have been warned about spamming the link before. Thanks for asking though! Katr67 (talk) 05:35, 26 March 2008 (UTC)
Wikipedia:The Missing Manual
For all WikiProject members in the Portland-metro area, I just picked up a copy of Wikipedia:The Missing Manual at Powell's. If you like, I'd be happy to let people borrow it or use the free online version that supposedly comes with it. I'll also bring it along to the next Portland WikiWednesday. VanTucky 00:46, 28 March 2008 (UTC)
- Very cool -- I'll be interested to see that! -Pete (talk) 18:07, 28 March 2008 (UTC)
Sho Dozono
There is no article on Sho Dozono, a well-known Portland businessman and current candidate for Mayor. I think this is a major oversight. I am on the Portland Citizen Campaign Commission, so for me to write it would present a conflict of interest. But I'd really encourage someone else to work one up, and also make sure that Sam Adams (Oregon politician) is up to snuff -- as well as any other mayoral candidates that pass WP:NOTE. This Oregonian profile of Sho Dozono would be a good starting point. -Pete (talk) 18:07, 28 March 2008 (UTC)
- Great idea Pete! VanTucky 03:27, 29 March 2008 (UTC)
- I made a simple stub for now with a couple Oregonian refs. I'll continue to expand it and would welcome some help, I haven't been following the race much. Pete, if you want I'd appreciate it if you could work your magic on the Oregonian refs since they tend to disappear. That wouldn't violate your COI (feel free to make other content suggestions on talk). VanTucky 03:45, 29 March 2008 (UTC)
- Yeah, The Dozono article really needs to be created and the Adams article needs a lot of work. I'll start chipping away, but I don't have a lot of spare time these days. Cacophony (talk) 03:51, 29 March 2008 (UTC)
- Thanks for working on that, guys! Just to be clear, I'm as much concerned about perception of COI outside Wikipedia as within it, so I will probably not edit either article at all in this election cycle. There's no truly magic solution to O-vanish -- you can retrieve articles from NewsBank through a Multnomah County Library account, and then paste that URL, which is what I sometimes do. But those only seem to work sometimes for other people, who aren't logged into Newsbank. I've never been able to detect a pattern. -Pete (talk) 19:35, 29 March 2008 (UTC)
Importance adjustments
A while back (see most recent archive, above), EngineerScotty, Katr67, Aboutmovies, and I discussed some adjustments to what articles are listed as "top" or "high" importance in this project (based on the work of Theophilus75, who set up the ranking system). Lots of good ideas and discussion, zero changes. I'm posting an abbreviated list of the suggestions below, and would suggest that anyone who wants to make a change should probably review the earlier discussion, and if it doesn't change your view, WP:BOLD just do it. We can always discuss any changes that prove cotroversial. -Pete (talk) 22:41, 1 April 2008 (UTC)
- maybe remove from "top" importance
Columbia River Gorge, Cascadia subduction zone, Oregon Department of Transportation, Oregon Ducks, Oregon Ducks football, Oregon State Beavers, Oregon State Beavers football, Interstate 5 in Oregon, Miss Oregon, Common Hazel
- State symbols: Alis volat propriis, American Beaver, Flag of Oregon, Fusitriton oregonensis, Oregon-grape, Oregon, My Oregon, Sunstone, Thunderegg, Western meadowlark
- maybe add to "top" importance
Columbia River, Willamette Valley and/or Willamette River, perhaps Central Oregon and Eastern Oregon, Matt Groening, Beverly Cleary, Gus Van Zandt, Everclear (band), Clyde Drexler, Bill Walton, Herbert Hoover, Tom McCall, Neil Goldschmidt, Mark Hatfield, Oregon Trail, the Oregon Country, the Oregon Territory, or of summary articles like History of Oregon?
- businesses: OHSU, Les Schwab, Jeld-Wen, Tektronix
- considering that Rose Garden Arena is top importance, perhaps these too: Bonneville Dam, the Oregon State Capitol, the Interstate Bridge or Glenn Jackson Bridge, the Portland Public Service Building, Portland International Airport, Oregon State Fairgrounds, Memorial Coliseum (Portland) or Hayward Field, Oregon Convention Center.
I'm going to be bold and get it going by bumping up Columbia River, which I think is a pretty uncontroversial one (although AM did wonder how to distinguish it from other major rivers, but I think it stands apart because it cuts through the Cascades, was a major object of exploration in the early fur trade days, is a shipping channel that connects us to 2 states and the world, and has 4 major Oregon dams.) -Pete (talk) 22:41, 1 April 2008 (UTC)
- Since I doubt we could ever come up with a perfect list, we could do something like what WPBIO did (come up with a "core" set of articles that none are added too) and then go sports poll like and vote on the top articles. Unlike WPBIO, I think we should not make it a permanent list, just close to it. For the poll, I suggest we come up with a number, say 30, and each WPORE member lists the 30 articles they think should be in the Top importance cat, ranking them 1-30. We then tally up the votes using a weighted vote system where a person's #1 article choice would receive 30 points, #2 29 points, and so on. Then total it all up. I would suggest we limit the Top cat to 50 articles, WPBIO had 200 (now 203 for some odd reason) core articles out of 500,000 total articles. Any other suggestions, thoughts? Aboutmovies (talk) 06:25, 2 April 2008 (UTC)
- I don't think so -- we all have the ability to adjust them anyway, and there was good judgment (mostly yours) that went into the original round. In the last discussion, you made a good case for George Henry Williams, who I think none of us had never heard of; in a vote, he'd have lost out, but in reality, he's an important part of the history of the state. I don't think we're at a point where something as arbitrary as a vote would improve things -- I think it would actually give us a worse list. I think it's better if we each just look at it as something we can change, as long as we have a good reason for doing so.
- One other thing -- we should think about what are the "real" consequences of this. They're not much, but they are something. One thing is that only articles of "top," "high," or "mid" importance (that are also of "B" class or above) get summarized on the Portal:Oregon page. Not a lot of people look at that page right now, but hopefully that will change in the future; so, we should try to make sure that Oregon's most significant subjects, and best articles, are represented there.
- Also, I'm looking to present a list in a presentation that VanTucky, Cacophony, and I are doing for the Oregon Encyclopedia editorial team next week. Again, I'd like to make sure we're putting our best foot forward.
- Beyond that, I think it's fair to say these ratings only indicate where we might want to focus our collective energies -- I don't think there are other "real world" impacts of these judgments.
- Is that a reasonable summation? -Pete (talk) 08:22, 2 April 2008 (UTC)
- My attempt to add was complicated by an edit conflict with Pete, but he says it better than I would have. My only addition is that the effort, instead, is best spent on clarifying how to identify a "top importance", "high importance", etc. topic. —EncMstr 08:33, 2 April 2008 (UTC)
- There are no real world implications, just the focus component. But I believe this is at least the third time something like this has come up, so people obviously are looking for a change to the status quo. We can debate each article individually, which looks like about 52 debates based on the articles you alone have brought up, and I know there have been others in the past. That's a lot of wasted energy for something with few "real world" impacts. Even if we spend time clarifying the criteria, there will still be debate as the criteria already exists and people still are debating on what should be where. To begin with is it important to Oregon, or what outsiders may view as Oregon, or somewhere in between. Take Hoover, the only thing really named for him in Oregon that I know of is a stretch of 99W between Newberg and Tigard. For an president that isn't much. But people just don't consider him as an Oregonian since he was forced to move here and pretty much left as soon as he could and didn't come back. Going by the article two schools in Oregon are named for him, compared to 8 in California, and no political offices in Oregon. So any criteria will still have the issue of what goes where. "Voting" if you will at least gives a certain level of certainty and would allow for a broad range of opinions if we get enough participants from the project. Not to mention put an end to the debate for at least a while, much like an AFD.
- Now with the Williams example, and other less well known articles, as long as someone knows of the article it has the same chance. After all if nobody knows about it now then it would not be Top now. If I hadn't come across Williams to begin with, he would likely not be Top. Since I have come across the article he would be in my Top 25 for sure, and that alone would likely be enough "points" to qualify, as I'm sure there would be a large duplication of certain articles (Oregon, Portland) which would clearly show at least a handful of almost unanimous choices for the Top cat. And that would be the same for other editors as well. After those few unanimous choices the diverse attentions of the group would show through and articles I may not consider important would come into play and vice versa. Currently I don't think we have much in the way of NRHP articles in the Top cat (Oregon Cap is one, but it's not there because its NRHP), yet we have several editors that do a lot of work on those types of articles. Plus it would be much like AFD or RFA where debate could go on for however long, and even include a candidate list with a platform for each article. I guess more than anything I'm looking more for finality, but also a more broad base of input than before (which goes towards finality since there would be a bit of a buy-in with the change). Honestly, I don't care if it is a vote like I propose, or something else, but I really would prefer we not debate every article someone thinks should or should not be Top/High/Mid/Low. Aboutmovies (talk) 09:28, 2 April 2008 (UTC)
- What about something like this: Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Oregon/importancevote? Allows an opportunity for discussion (if we need it) and allows a quick-and-dirty voting system for moving articles up or down the ladder (if we don't). Northwesterner1 (talk) 11:44, 2 April 2008 (UTC)
- I'm really not proposing that we discuss them all, merely reviving a list that Scotty put some thought into and argued for a while back. I like the idea of creating a sub-page for this; it needn't dominate our discussions, but I think it's worth having an ongoing record of stuff that's been proposed, and I do think it gives us all a good opportunity to reevaluate what is or isn't most important. Which I think should be a continual project, as we all get to know our state better. (It could just be a section of the assessment sub-page, we probably don't need a whole separate page for this.) -Pete (talk) 22:57, 4 April 2008 (UTC)
Hanford Site, and other GA/FA news
Hey all, Hanford Site a (very) good article, has been up for WP:FA review for a little while now, and hasn't gotten the attention it deserves. Northwesterner1 has done a great job getting it to GA status and beyond; it's an enjoyable and interesting read, and is a complex enough story that it would really be good to have a few more eyes on it in the FA review. (Comments go here.) (I've wondered off and on whether this should be tagged for WP:ORE; though it's not in Oregon, it's not terribly far, and has had a pretty big impact on the state. It has been a huge regional employer, has polluted the Columbia for many years with radioactive waste, and affected downwinders in parts of Oregon as well.)
Also, Columbia River was recently promoted to GA, and with a few additions will hopefully be ready for FA soon. Cirt got 1984 Rajneeshee bioterror attack up to FA, and Aboutmovies continues his impressive streak of GA's with Joel Palmer, and we've all had numerous Did you know... entries from new articles.
Neil Goldschmidt will be up for GA very soon, as will Barlow Road -- feel free to perform the review for an article, if you haven't substantially contributed to it! Or just help respond to concerns as they come up. Also, I've dabbled with the little-used A-class assessment system, by doing a review of the Portland City Hall article. If a second editor performs a review, and all issues are met, we'll have our first A-class Oregon article. So jump on in! -Pete (talk) 02:39, 2 April 2008 (UTC)
Typically late WikiWednesday announcement
Hey, if you want to chat face-to-face with other wiki enthusiasts, with pingpong, beer, snacks, and the internet on hand, tonight's your night. As we are the first Wednesday of every month, we'll be at the AboutUs offices, in inner SE Portland, from 5:30 on (for what, two hours usually?) I suspect we'll be hearing a report about last weekend's Startupalooza, and chatting a bit about the presentation some of us are planning for the yet-to-be-wikified editorial team of the Oregon Encyclopedia project.
5:30pm at the AboutUs offices, inner SE Portland
- 107 SE Washington St., Suite 520 (just go to the 5th floor and follow the colorful tape)
Hope to see some of you! -Pete (talk) 18:27, 2 April 2008 (UTC)
- Will the next one be May 7? I'll take the day off and come up! Katr67 (talk) 20:17, 2 April 2008 (UTC)
- Yaay! Yeah it will :) -Pete (talk) 04:49, 3 April 2008 (UTC)
News headline today (3 April 2008) refers to Paisley Cave in Cascade Range, OR -?
By following links in today's Google News headline, "Scientists Find Oldest Human Remains Uncovered in the Americas", I came to this (Scientific American) and this (NYTimes); this material was found "in caves known as the Paisley Caves, about 220 miles southeast of Eugene, Oregon, on the eastern side of the Cascade mountain range." Wiki-worthy? or, not yet? A Wiki search for "Paisley Caves" returns nothing; "Cascades" returns Cascade Range - which does not mention the caves, NOR is it in WP:ORE - should(n't) it be?
Now guys…don't look at me to get this information included! :) If I were to devote myself fully to everything that I see that "could/should be done" in Wikipedia, I would be taking on yet one more full- and over-time career! and I'm way behind on the ones I already have. — Martha (talk) 20:08, 3 April 2008 (UTC)
- If you don't want to (or can't) do all of it, make a stub article. Put the references in it, or in the talk page so someone can take it from there. —EncMstr 20:20, 3 April 2008 (UTC)
- Great find Mom, thanks! Amazing what the local news doesn't pick up on sometimes. I agree with EncMstr -- just make a little page at Paisley Caves (Oregon) with a brief overview like you put here, and links like you put here, and watch what happens...you may be pleasantly surprised! -Pete (talk) 20:29, 3 April 2008 (UTC)
- Yeah, great find Pete's Mom! :) I bet it is part of East Lake Abert Archeological District (NRHP). I can check Archaeology of Oregon tonight. Durn book doesn't have an index though... Katr67 (talk) 20:36, 3 April 2008 (UTC)
- I just linked Paisley Caves (I don't think it needs a qualifier) in Summer Lake (Oregon). Katr67 (talk) 20:45, 3 April 2008 (UTC)
- This article would be a great source to start with: http://www.uoregon.edu/~ftrock/paisley_caves_description.php Lots more online--lots of archaelogical field schools do work there. I will resist googling for more. Katr67 (talk) 20:55, 3 April 2008 (UTC)
OK guys, here I go - Peter I just took the liberty of changing your "red link" a tiny bit, to "Paisley Caves (Oregon)" (plural), because that's what I deduced earlier from the articles. Next I'll start it out (and list some of the refs, try to figure out all the "stub" etc things I should put on it) - and people can take it from there. Martha (talk) 23:20, 3 April 2008 (UTC)
OOPS - too hasty - I'll go with Katr's suggestion of simply Paisley Caves. — Martha (talk) 23:23, 3 April 2008 (UTC)
- Wouldn't have taken me half as long if I'd remembered that what I had to click on was "Save page"...I clicked on "Create this page" and...of course...it All Went Away, and I had to reconstruct it!! ALWAYS copy your stuff into the copy buffer when trying out new things..... Time to cook dinner! — Martha (talk) 00:31, 4 April 2008 (UTC)
- Great job everyone! Not only did we scoop the Oregonian's front page story today, they misspelled Lake "Albert". Katr67 (talk) 14:48, 4 April 2008 (UTC)
David Wolman
I just tagged David Wolman for WP:ORE. However I'm his webmaster, so I'd feel better if someone else cleaned the article up. —EncMstr (talk) 21:00, 25 April 2008 (UTC)