User talk:Brian McNeil/Archive 10

Username Usurpation

Hi, it's Nick from Commons, English Wikipedia and OTRS. Can you possibly rename User:Nick away from that username in order that I may "claim" that username with my global account. Many thanks in advance. Heligoland - (talk) 00:57, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

I'm afraid not. I just tried and got the error "Cannot rename user Nick locally as this username has been migrated to the unified login system." This may be one where you actually have to speak to the devs. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 09:09, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

Accounts can't be renamed locally after they've been merged into the gloabl system. There's a bug already filed about it, and a page on Meta dealing with it, if I remember right. {{SUBST:Ss|thunder}} 06:05, 29 March 2008 (UTC)

I kind of have the same question about the usernamne Natox, which is my name at the global acount. The problem is that username has been claimed here (not by me). Purhapse you could check if I have the same problem as Heligoland/Nick. PS. If you could answer at my User talk at the Swedish Wikipedia, it will be easier for me to know that you have answered. DS./Natox nox - (talk) 18:38, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, could you perhaps rename this account to User:Natox now? Then there won't be a problem I think. /Natox nox - (talk) 19:00, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

It won't let me do that, says the account name is reserved. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 19:02, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

Okey, I'll look in to it. Thanks anyway. /Natox nox - (talk) 19:10, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

It works! Thanks, and if you would'nt mind, you could delete or redirect Natox nox now, since I only used it to get hold of this name. /Natox - (talk) 19:14, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

Press Passes

I'm trying to get a big interview coming up, and I may need a press pass for it. Is Messed still doing press passes, or is someone else in charge of that for now? {{SUBST:Ss|thunder}} 06:05, 29 March 2008 (UTC)

I believe Messed still does them. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 07:23, 29 March 2008 (UTC)

Wikibreak

My grandmother died last night, sometime in the coming week I will have to fly to Scotland for the funeral. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 08:45, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

You have my condolences, Brian - take as long as you need. --Skenmy^(t•c•w) 09:46, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

You have my condolences --Anonymous101 (talk · contribs) 10:05, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

It did not come as a particularly great shock, I'm 39 so you can probably make an educated guess at how old my grandmother was. She'd recently been admitted to a nursing home after my mother had a hellish time trying to get that sorted out. She'd pretty much gone anyway, dementia had set in and she had issues recognising people. My grandfather is apparently being particularly stoic about this, there's been a few close calls for him recently with the frailties age brings. My mother's experience in dealing with both her parents has prompted her to tell me to stay in Belgium or move even further away before she gets to that stage, and thus force the state to fulfil their obligations. I really appreciate her saying that while she still has command of her faculties, but I know when it comes down to it I will feel guilty if I don't give up what I'm doing and look after her. My sister can't deal with that as she's Downs Syndrome, I've always felt guilty that I don't consider myself strong and disciplined enough to take over my sister's care from my mother when mum becomes too frail. It has coloured my entire life knowing that my sister will never be able to get married and lead a "normal" life.

I am really not looking forward to the next one, which is likely to be my grandfather. Without my mother having given up her job with Edinburgh University to make sure he ate properly, he'd already be gone. He's had a few close calls in the past few years, and cancer saw him get about six inches removed from his lower intestine in 2005. When he does go I'll likely inherit his whiskey collection, many of the bottles only have one or two glasses taken out of them. I spent about ten to fifteen years buying him single malts as Christmas and birthday presents. I kinda tell myself that was a cop-out and an easy option for presents, but he's always taken pride in being able to open the cabinet and ask his Masonic lodge colleagues to "pick your poison, my grandson bought me it".

I'm not likely to stick much to the Wikibreak. Keeping involved with the project is likely to prove somewhat therapeutic, take my mind off this, and help me avoid ending up back in a depressed state. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 12:32, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

I am sorry to hear :( That really sucks. Take your time and come back soon. DragonFire1024 (Talk to the Dragon) 16:05, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

very sorry to hear this, best wishes --MarkTalk to me 20:28, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

Brian, I am saddened to hear this news. I know how it can be as I have already seen the passing of three of my grandparents, as well as that of my own mother. My thoughts are with you. --SVTCobra 23:44, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

very sorry to hear that, Brian. my condolences to you and your family. –Doldrums(talk) 06:20, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

User:Churchofscientologyint

I'm not particularly convinced that the content of this page, consisting of basic contact details, could be described as spam. Actually, I think it is very useful that everyone has a clear idea who this user is. I am considering restoring it on this basis. Adambro - (talk) 11:43, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

I'd question the authenticity of the claim to be CoS. Per CheckUser results the edits were made through an open proxy. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 12:38, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

I don't think this is an official Church of Scientology account. Last year when I spoke to their director of media relations for an interview with David Miscavige, they were pretty hostile to Wiki. I had a twenty minute conversation. --David Shankbone - (talk) 17:16, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

I can only add that Markie (talk · contribs) said on IRC that he verified the account via e-mail. Perhaps he can be consulted on this. --SVTCobra 21:33, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

It certainly seems odd that they are using some sort of open proxy. Cirt - (talk) 21:42, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

Not really. As I recall they have thousands of IPs...so this IMHO is not a surprise. But nonetheless, Markie e-mailed the said address provided ion the user page and got the confirmation in a reply. DragonFire1024 (Talk to the Dragon) 21:45, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

Yes, that may be so, but if you take a look at w:Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/COFS and w:Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/COFS/Evidence#Evidence_presented_by_Jpgordon - the Church of Scientology seems to usually use IPs that track back to their own domains - and one would think that if they are openly saying that this is a Church of Scientology-account (which would be outright not allowed and blocked on Wikipedia according to their policy on usernames and role accounts) - then the checkuser in this case on Wikinews wouldn't track back to an open proxy. Cirt - (talk) 21:51, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

re the email and confirmation. i emailed the address specified on the user page, which incidentally also appears on a scientology.org page, and received an email back (admitadly from a gmail account, but thought that as they had got the email to reply to it wasnt really a biggy) confirming that the account was theres, and could i unblock it. i will forward to other admins on request. --MarkTalk to me 22:05, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

Checkuser? Why?

Why was checkuser used in this case? Checkuser is a last resort. The only issue here was to confirm this CoS account was genuine which was done as far as I'm aware. Adambro - (talk) 22:04, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

Well, in light of w:Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/COFS/Evidence#Evidence_presented_by_Jpgordon, it's possible that there could have been a connection to Misou (talk · contribs), who had previously been confirmed as a sockpuppet at w:Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/COFS (though this Misou (talk · contribs) on Wikinews has claimed to be a different individual than the Misou on Wikipedia, but that's another story. Cirt - (talk) 22:11, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

I had to know.

FYI CheckUser is not "a last resort". If you've any serious problems with me taking this action bring it up with the ArbCom. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 22:20, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

From WN:CU, the first point is "Due to the effort involved, difficulty of interpretation of results and privacy issues raised, checkuser is a last resort for difficult cases. Use other methods first." Adambro - (talk) 05:27, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

I have raised this issue on the checkuser-l mailing list. I will report what I can here, and have asked people to give explicit permission to quote either here or on WN:AAA. To date I only have two replies with the first specifying that both the checkuser on suspicion that this was a sock of JustaHulk, and the deletion of the userpage were justified actions. For the second I have permission to quote...

I've recommended to the en:wp arbcom that they regard all "official CoS" accounts, and all accounts that reasonably appear to be CoS official action (or are on a CoS-owned range) as a single user. Because they effectively are. My recommendation to keep the peace is to allow one unblocked at all times, and watch its edits like a hawk.

In addition I have requested a cross-wiki check by an uninvolved steward on User:Misou to verify if the accounts on Wikinews and Wikipedia are unrelated. I never found the claim to be a different Misou who also happened to be interested in CoS material credible.

If you wish to know who the quote is from, then let me know off-wiki. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 09:18, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

Vandalism warning

Please do not delete my user page. Thank you. Churchofscientologyint - (talk) 17:13, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

There is a simple answer to that, don't set up an account to simply post your - or someone else's - contact details. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 22:13, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

No Personal atacks

Hi Brian,

I understand you are currently going through a difficult time but I would like to remind you that it is not appropriate to suggest that a user could be a murderer as you did on this page. I am completely aware of what fair game is but you have no reason to imply the JustaHulk (talk · contribs) is engaging in this type of activity. I am not a Scientologist but I thing it is unacceptable to suggest someone is linked to murder because of their beliefs.

Thanks for taking the time to read this message,

--Anonymous101 (talk · contribs) 17:24, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

You are reading something into my comments that is not there, or in any way implied or intended to be taken from my comment. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 22:12, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

I usderstand that yiu may not have intended to imply that but JustaHulk seemed to think that that was implied. --Anonymous101 (talk · contribs) (Note I have no link with the organization anonymous) 16:38, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

In which case you are out of order reminding a very well respected contributor to not make personal attacks. --Skenmy^(t•c•w) 16:40, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

OK, I was probably going too far with my original comment but at that time I was angry at the reaction of some contributers towards JustaHulk and others. Brian is an excellent contributer who has probably helped this project more than vitually any other user. It was just at that time I considered his comments to be clearly implying that JustaHulk was linked with murder. That reaction was a result of my anger at the time. I do, however, think that Brian had made a mistake in including the information about murders in the comment. --Anonymous101 (talk · contribs) (Note I have no link with the organization anonymous) 16:55, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

April Fools

I wrote an April fool's prank for Wikinews. In response to your comments at the water cooler, however, what I decided to do is leave it in the sandbox. 69.140.152.55 22:30, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

Help

Can you help me? --Humberto 2 - (talk) 00:48, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

Craig got this one. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 10:50, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

usurp request

I would like to request usurpation of User:Martijn Hoekstra. Someone has been vandalising, and using my en.wiki username across different projects. I'd like to get them all into my unified login. confirmation that I'm me. 213.132.174.10 09:28, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

I have renamed the user out the way, grab the name while you can - and wait until you've got all the vandal accounts renamed before doing the consolidation. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 10:49, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

FYI

I opened this Who can vote on deletion requests discussion at the Water cooler. --SVTCobra 18:51, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

Checkuser

I just wanted to notify you about 4 users who seem to be sock puppets, based on there user name and contributions. I therefore suggest you check user them. The users are

• JoshuaSchoolEditBoy (talk · contribs)
• JoshuaSchoolBoy (talk · contribs) (blocked indefinately)
• JoshuaSchoolBoy2 (talk · contribs) ( 0 contributions)
• SchoolTeacherJosh (talk · contribs)

Thanks for reading this message,

Anonymous101 (talk · contribs) (Note I have no link with the organization anonymous) 17:13, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

Don't worry, I'll wait till these users start vandalizing. Anonymous101 (talk · contribs) (Note I have no link with the organization anonymous) 17:38, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

User:Jack Merridew returns

Hi Brian,

FYI, that was not me; that was en:WP's Grawp vandal. I expect this is well-known, but want to say so explicitly. I've only recently created a number of wiki accounts, in part to keep vandals from grabbing the user name; see m:User:Jack Merridew/Matrix. Cheers, User:Jack Merridew a.k.a. David 09:44, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

Signpost and 2000th FA.

That actually works out really well; I was going to work on something along those lines myself. If you want it in the Signpost, you'll need to dual-license the questions and answers under CC and the GFDL, and I'll be happy to use it (making some minor edits to the introduction to reflect the more Wikipedia-savvy readers of the Signpost, but otherwise keeping it fairly similar). If you can get it by late Monday UTC, I can publish it next week. Let me know if you have any other questions or need any other help. Ral315 (talk) 15:09, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

But there's a problem with referring to this as "the" 2000th FA; it was one of five 2000th FAs. 68.199.231.122 18:48, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

I don't have a problem with the way the Wikinews interview piece is highlighting this one article, but FYI: [1] Cirt - (talk) 19:01, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

Professor Beasley-Murray has started filling in answers and one of the students has registered and got in touch with me about what they need to do now. Ideally I'd like to see this up as one of Sunday's features. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 06:32, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

Sounds like a good timeframe. Cirt - (talk) 06:47, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

FYI w:User:SandyGeorgia posted a comment at w:Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/Newsroom/Suggestions which she wanted me to notify you of - I'll let you monitor that thread on your own from now on. I also commented in it, sort of in response to the other comments above as a clarification. Cirt - (talk) 09:12, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

I've answered it... without swearing. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 10:02, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

Usurp request

Hi, I'm hoping you can move the username User:Nick out of the way so I can claim the account here with my SUL global account. Just give me a shout on IRC (I'm NotASpy) if you need confirmation this is me. Cheers. Nick 23:56, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the usurp, much appreciated. Nick - (talk) 23:14, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Reply

Duly noted, from now on I will wait for you to show up in IRC before attempting to contact you. I am sorry. I will also apologize to Skenmy. Cirt - (talk) 08:10, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Article rename

Wikinews interviews: The team behind the 2,000th featured Wikipedia article is a bit long, and dup use of word "the". Mind if I rename it to "Wikinews interviews: Wikipedia's 2000th 'featured article'" ? Cirt - (talk) 07:27, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Nevermind, changed it to Wikinews interviews team behind the 2,000th featured Wikipedia article. Cirt - (talk) 07:41, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Ok, I think I have signed the liscence permission properly. Please let me know if you are in need of anything else! Thanks again,--Mfreud - (talk) 17:45, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

This diff

I noticed you reverted this edit and gave the user a warning for this diff. I think that is unreasonable as the user was just making a correction to the article. He was a new user who was not aware that we don't edit old articles. I think {{hello}} would have been better thatn {{test}}. I recommend you change the message to a friendly welcome. A warning may put a user of editing. --A101 - (talk) 20:18, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for changing the message. --A101 - (talk) 20:24, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the welcome!

Hello Brianmc! Thanks for the welcome! I just wanted to let you know that this IP is a shared address by Richmond Community Schools...And I, personally am Letter 7 (Wikipedian). Thanks for the welcome!

165.139.156.41 15:19, 18 April 2008 (UTC) (Letter_7)

Symode09

Is there a reason why you are giving Symode09 lots of one minute blocks rather than one longer block. --A101 - (talk) 16:49, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

You could call it perversity or personal amusement, it's just because of the somewhat offensive copyrighted image he uploaded and he deserves a long "block history" for it. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 16:51, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

I'm not sure if policy allows them to be blocked at all for that image but I won't stop you as they haven;t complained. --A101 - (talk) 16:54, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

I'm done now and he has six entries in his block log. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 16:56, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

Good --A101 - (talk) 16:59, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

I'm really not sure why either of you consider this blocking to be appropriate. It doesn't reflect bad on Symode09 in having a long block log made up of one minute blocks, it reflects bad on Brianmc. Adambro - (talk) 18:43, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

Adambro, get a sense of humour implant. God knows you need one! --Brian McNeil / ^talk 21:24, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

Series of earthquakes strike Reno, Nevada area

Mind renaming the article? Do you think it's ready for publication? I've never created a Wikinews article before, so I'm a little new. Jade Knight - (talk) 09:01, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

• Done

As you'll see I did the rename after giving you the welcome. It was more important to get you the links to things like the style guide so you can judge for yourself where it might not be to the project standards. Will give it a quick look over and see if there's any obvious edits. I'd guess the main thing is filling in appropriate {{source}} templates. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 09:05, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Well, the Wells quake was in February, and it was a 6.0. There's a Wikinews article on it which I included in this article. Jade Knight - (talk) 09:38, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Really cool map about Nevada History. Says its source is the USGS, but I'm not 100% sure that the image comes from them: [2] This is somewhat interesting, however: [3].

Perhaps better: [4], [5]. Jade Knight - (talk) 09:45, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Wikimedia Radio (Wikispecies)

You're right about having too many latins! Wikispecies welcomes everyone, but strongly recommends that they have some biology background, particularly familiar with binomial nomenclature. Nevertheless, we're trying to dispel the aura around Wikispecies that it's for scientists only. Whether it is feasible to actually have a session specifically for Wikispecies, that even I'm not too sure, because it will be a very boring subject unless you're biologist. OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 18:29, 26 April 2008 (UTC)

Usurpation request

Hi. It's RedWolf here from the English Wikipedia. I request that User:RedWolf be usurped here so that I can claim it under my global account. The existing account has just two edits, both from October 2006. Thanks. RedWolf@en.wikipedia.org 03:52, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

Featured Article Candidate

I have nominated an article you worked on as primary contributor, Wikinews interviews team behind the 2,000th featured Wikipedia article, as a Featured Article Candidate. Cirt - (talk) 06:25, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

Editors' Blog, Computex, and something related to my recent articles

Should I do some notices on Computex-related information and articles to Editors' Blog? There's only me participating the Computex in this community as I know. By the way, if there are English news releases related to my participations, should I mail to Wikinews Mailist for Copy-edit Check-up and Backup? I hope some recommendations can be helpful for me if no any English news releases from my officials. Brock ^contact... 13:25, 4 May 2008 (UTC)

A short piece on the Editors' blog might be a good idea. Not sure what you mean about press releases. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 13:29, 4 May 2008 (UTC)

would just like to say thanks for the cheerful welcome.

ty Brian --Nohawkson - (talk) 09:10, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

Rfa

Just an FYI, its been more than seven days for my Rfa, it's 3 support, 2 oppose, with a 4th support that I think came in too late. WN:A#Ryan524.--Ryan524 - (talk) 19:40, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

Can I clairify something? How does 3 support, and 2 oppose fail?--Ryan524 - (talk) 22:28, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

I couldn't find a template for "no consensus". You've come back to a community that doesn't know you. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 22:36, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

I fail to see how you could say "no consensus" when the majority of the community (taht voted) voted in support since their is no policy or even gideline that specifies a consensus must be a specific supermajority therefore a simple majority should safice IMO, but it's your call.--Ryan524 - (talk) 22:49, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

I will write here because I have had so many edit conflicts on the Water Cooler, and my repeatedly cut and pasted comment may now be out of context.

60% seems like a pretty solid majority, but if you're talking about a turnout of 5 who chose to vote it is kinda slim. So, in all seriousness, stop taking it so negatively and get busy editing. Spend a week or two proving to the community that you can make a difference and afford the time commitment. I would have added the sysop bit had it been triple the voters with the same percentages. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 23:31, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

You make a good point about a low number of votes, I have proposed a policy that dictates what a consensus is but takes low umber of votes into account.--Ryan524 - (talk) 16:24, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

While I cannot aggree with how you handled my Rfa, and honestly I feel kinda cheated, I respect that the community has chosen to give you the power to make a decision and I am going to try not to hold it against you since you were doing what you thought was best. IMO I can see that a low turnout can make you think twice before passing it but I think the fact that I was formerly an admin and left in good standing should have been concidered, and even if you still didn't want to pass it IMO it would have been better to extend voting to get a consensus one way or the other instead of closing it as failed.--Ryan524 - (talk) 22:07, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

Dispute Resolutions

Aren;t dispte resolutions normally on subpages. Anonymous101 :) 18:54, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

{{User:Brianmc/Sosueme}} someone will fix it. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 18:58, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

IRC

Could you please get on and PM me (DanielB)? Daniel (talk) 09:03, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

Wikinews:Dispute resolution/Brianmc and Adambro,

While not explicitly in the still open Wikinews:Dispute resolution/Brianmc and Adambro, it turned up in your RFR (is RFR used?). In any event, I reviewed your block log (of other users, not the times you were blocked). Unfortunatly, I had to conclude that the series of one-minute blocks on User:Symode09 did not correspond with any edits that the user made on Wikinews. The response that Symode09 is the same as brown_cat on WN:IRC fails to carry any weight as it doesn't explain why a series of one-minute blocks would do any good.

I am trying to look beyond my own personal opinion that User:Symode09 should have been permanently banned after perpetrating the greatest copy-vio we have had since I joined (namely Candlelight vigil for victims of Virginia Tech shootings and the efforts made by this user to explain that somehow it was not a copyvio).

Nevertheless, one-minute-blocks, don't really do anything to impede an editor, and if Adambro's allegation is true that these blocks included a statement that it was to make this editor look bad, I don't see any actual harm, since this user could not ever look worse. Nonetheless, it is bad form and ought not be repeated, regardless of who it is. I am not a regular on IRC, and I have no idea what recourses there are for trolls, but on-wiki retaliation is probably not one of them. --SVTCobra 02:09, 17 May 2008 (UTC)

I can't recall the precise edit on WN that Symode09 made which prompted this, but the one minute blocks were to have him get a block warning on the wiki but not actually be long-term blocked. I was waiting in IRC until he noticed then ceased. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 09:52, 17 May 2008 (UTC)

I checked both his contributions as well as deleted contributions. There was nothing seemed to correspond for the time in question, so unless they were removed by oversight. --SVTCobra 15:59, 17 May 2008 (UTC)

maybe if you paid attention to what people tell you. this should help you svt.--MarkTalk to me 16:13, 17 May 2008 (UTC)

Should we link to copyvios like that imageAnonymous101 :) 17:52, 17 May 2008 (UTC)

It isn't a problem because only admins can see it. Adambro (talk) 19:13, 17 May 2008 (UTC)

OK, I see it now. Sorry. --SVTCobra 11:16, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

Leak of copyright infringement notice from OTRS

This user has nailed a stake in the ground and will not yield. You are suggested to contact a lawyer and take it up in court.--Brian McNeil / ^talk 09:52, 17 May 2008 (UTC)

Wikinews Bulletin

Here is the latest Wikinews bulletin. Enjoy!

About the Wikinews Bulletin The Wikinews Bulletin is a free internal newsletter for members of the Wikinews community. The newsletter is "staffed" by several editors, who produce the (more or less) fortnightly publication. Don't hesitate to join our team, or leave us a tip. The publication has produced nine issues.

Anonymous101 :) 12:17, 17 May 2008 (UTC)

Wikimedia Radio

Hi Brian,

I'm starting to work to getting WCR spun back up. I've commented a bit on the WM Radio proposal, and I'd be glad to help out. Are you guys having any kind of IRC meets or formal discussions, or is everything on wiki? v:User:Historybuff 19:20, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

2007/08 European football season: Spots finalized for European stage

Can you help on working on the table? This is a massive table and a lot of people need to work on it. Kingjeff (talk) 01:27, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

CSV upload

Brian, Last year you were interested in a CSV upload feature in AWB. It is ready now and was wondering if you would like to beta-test it. If interested, check out Ganeshbot/CSVLoader. Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 02:47, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

Re: I are not Anon

Very true. You did indeed. In my defence I ... uh ... yeah. Chris Mann (Say hi!|Stalk me!) 00:10, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

Interwiki

Hi, could you also add interwiki to articles 2008 Juno Award nominees announced and 1960's guru icon Maharishi Mahesh Yogi dies. More in its talk. Thanks. --Sevela.p (talk) 21:22, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

Usurpation request 2

Hi, I'm MER-C from Wikipedia and I'd like to usurp the impostor account here for SUL purposes. (Sorry for the silly username, the string "MER-C" is username blacklisted). The instructions say to spam a few talk pages, so here we go. Thanks. TempAccount (talk) 07:22, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

I have renamed the MER-C impostor account out the way and renamed "TempAccount" to MER-C. Hope this helps. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 08:05, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

Accreditation

Hi Brian! I've ask to DragonFire how can I obtain the accreditation on en.wikinews, even if I'm most active on the Italian version of Wikinews, and he suggested me to ask you how can I do. Can you help me? ;) --Stef Mec (talk) 18:02, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

Ok, thanks for advice. I've added the basic form of my home page, which you can find similar both in Italian and Spanish wikinews. I'm also interesting to contribute here, and I'm beginning to search somebody useful to do ;) --Stef Mec (talk) 06:16, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

{{haveyoursay}}

OK, thanks for the clarification. b2xiao (talk) 03:02, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

Your question for the Board candidates

To be honest, I don't think that I understand it. Could you provide an example of when this tension has played out? Sarcasticidealist (talk) 00:27, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

I would have thought the current vote on the World Cup photo was a good enough example. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 06:27, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

Just a quick comment about your question, I think it is important to note that there are numerous examples where images have been removed from archived articles following consensus to delete the image emerging at WN:DR. The suggestion that our archiving policy prevents us from changing images in archived articles only emerges when people want to attempt to bolster their opposition to a deletion nomination. Adambro (talk) 06:38, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

There are examples, yes. The more egregarious ones are not what is at issue here, just a general principle and one of the points where Wikinews is unique. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 08:39, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

JAnDbot

Please, first see Wikinews:Bot and then block: [6]. JAn Dudík (talk) 19:57, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

This was not highlighted in the WN:RC header. I noted there was a bot request, but at least it isn't flooding RC now. I'm sure we'll get it sorted and working. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 08:33, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Talk:MDS International Found in Comtempt of Court

Since it looks like the related article got deleted, could you consider deleting the unfree documents which you uploaded in relation to the article, Image:Mds award.pdf, Image:Mds attorney's fees claim.pdf and Image:Mds complaint.pdf, as they seem to no longer serve a useful purpose. Cheers. Adambro (talk) 23:10, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

Category:Requests for Unblock

I just reviewed and resolved most of the requests in this category. However, two of them are proxy-blocks. I do not have the tools to evaluate these. Since you blocked them, could you either refuse the requests or unblock, please. Secondly, I have noticed that these requests seem to flounder (some were really old). Should we add a DPL to WN:AAA so that we can address these in a timely manner? Cheers, --SVTCobra 23:28, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

Hi Brian. I noticed that Cspurrier (talk · contribs) blocked 78.31.67.68 as an open proxy today. So I decided to give the scanner a try. However, it came up empty ... no open ports. Also, that IP has no edits and no deleted edits. Was the block even appropriate? Or is there something I am missing? Cheers, --SVTCobra 00:23, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Try http://78.31.67.68 ;-) --Brian McNeil / ^talk 08:16, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

P.S. If you check RC really closely you could probably work out who was checkusered to find this. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 08:18, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Also, use the advanced scan and change to a "TCP connect()" scan in the drop-down next to the "do it now button". --Brian McNeil / ^talk 12:29, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

WN:RC

Can you please use the {{softredirect}} template instead?

The wikitext should read

{{softredirect|Special:Recentchanges}}

Thanks, b2xiao ^talk 15:01, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Interesting Audio from Stanford

I was surfing around on iTunes, and I found this lecture from Stanford at the Caros Kelly McClathy Memorial Symposium. Take a look at it sometime. Thunderhead 18:31, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

interview edit

I conducted the interview and noticed I had copied what the candidate said wrongly from the e-mail. Its on the collaboration page.--William Saturn (talk) 19:13, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

English

If you are referring to "supersede", I am quite sure that this is the preferred spelling in both British and US English, although "supercede" is considered a valid alternate spelling and also found in print. A search on BBC's website found 41 instances of "supersede" and 12 instances of "supercede". --SVTCobra 14:41, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

A statistic for you: US English speakers outnumber all others combined all others combined (strictly people who speak English as a first language). --SVTCobra 15:14, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

err where does it say that?? i didnt look too carefully so may have missed it though --MarkTalk to me 15:29, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

If you look at the "first language" column, I think the numbers speak for themselves. --SVTCobra 15:33, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

hmm maybes but if we look at the google results for the two different words, that gives the obvious answer. (dont start me on what lang americans speak :-p) --MarkTalk to me 16:49, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

I prefer the U in honour, apparently American English speakers don't. :P --Brian McNeil / ^talk 18:02, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

And just for laughs, I got this in my email the other day...

Message from the Queen To the citizens of the United States of America from Her Sovereign Majesty Queen Elizabeth II: In light of your failure in recent years to nominate competent candidates for President of the USA and thus to govern yourselves, we hereby give notice of the revocation of your independence, effective immediately. Her Sovereign Majesty Queen Elizabeth II will resume monarchical duties over all states, commonwealths, and territories (except Kansas, which she does not fancy). Your new Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, will appoint a Governor for America without the need for further elections. Congress and the Senate will be disbanded. A questionnaire may be circulated next year to determine whether any of you noticed. To aid in the transition to a British Crown Dependency, the following rules are introduced with immediate effect: (You should look up 'revocation' in the Oxford English Dictionary.) 1. Then look up aluminium, and check the pronunciation guide. You will be amazed at just how wrongly you have been pronouncing. 2. The letter 'U' will be reinstated in words such as 'colour', 'favour', 'labour' and 'neighbour.' Likewise, you will learn to spell 'doughnut' without skipping half the letters, and the suffix '-ize' will be replaced by the suffix '-ise'. Generally, you will be expected to raise your vocabulary to acceptable levels. (look up 'vocabulary'). 3. Using the same twenty-seven words interspersed with filler noises such as 'like' and 'you know' is an unacceptable and inefficient form of communication. There is no such thing as US English. We will let M*crosoft know on your behalf. The M*crosoft spell-checker will be adjusted to take into account the reinstated letter 'u' and the elimination of -ize. 4. July 4th will no longer be celebrated as a holiday. 5. You will learn to resolve personal issues without using guns, lawyers, or therapists. The fact that you need so many lawyers and therapists shows that you're not quite ready to be independent. Guns should only be used for shooting grouse. If you can't sort things out without suing someone or speaking to a therapist then you're not ready to shoot grouse. 6. Therefore, you will no longer be allowed to own or carry anything more dangerous than a vegetable peeler. Although a permit will be required if you wish to carry a vegetable peeler in public. 7. All intersections will be replaced with roundabouts, and you will start driving on the left side with immediate effect. At the same time, you will go metric with immediate effect and without the benefit of conversion tables. Both roundabouts and metrication will help you understand the British sense of humour. 8. The Former USA will adopt UK prices on petrol (which you have been calling gasoline) of roughly $10/US gallon. Get used to it. 9. You will learn to make real chips. Those things you call French fries are not real chips, and those things you insist on calling potato chips are properly called crisps. Real chips are thick cut, fried in animal fat, and dressed not with catsup but with vinegar. 10. The cold tasteless stuff you insist on calling beer is not actually beer at all. Henceforth, only proper British Bitter will be referred to as beer, and European brews of known and accepted provenance will be referred to as Lager. South African beer is also acceptable as they are pound for pound the greatest sporting Nation on earth and it can only be due to the beer. They are also part of British Commonwealth - see what it did for them. American brands will be referred to as Near-Frozen Gnat's Urine, so that all can be sold without risk of further confusion. 11. Hollywood will be required occasionally to cast English actors as good guys. Hollywood will also be required to cast English actors to play English characters. Watching Andie Macdowell attempt English dialogue in Four Weddings and a Funeral was an experience akin to having one's ears removed with a cheese grater. 12. You will cease playing American football. There is only one kind of proper football; you call it soccer. Those of you brave enough will, in time, be allowed to play rugby (which has some similarities to American football, but does not involve stopping for a rest every twenty seconds or wearing full kevlar body Armour like a bunch of nancies). Don't try Rugby - the South Africans and Kiwis will thrash you, like they regularly thrash us. 13. Further, you will stop playing baseball. It is not reasonable to host an event called the World Series for a game which is not played outside of America. Since only 2.1% of you are aware there is a world beyond your borders, your error is understandable. You will learn cricket, and we will let you face the South Africans first to take the sting out of their deliveries. 14. You must tell us who killed JFK. It's been driving us mad. 15. An internal revenue agent (i.e. tax collector) from Her Majesty's Government will be with you shortly to ensure the acquisition of all monies due (backdated to 1776). 16. Daily Tea Time begins promptly at 4 pm with proper cups, with saucers, and never mugs, with high quality biscuits (cookies) and cakes; plus strawberries (with cream) when in season. God Save the Queen!

SCNR. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 18:09, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

HAHAHA that pretty much sums it up brian :-p --MarkTalk to me 21:22, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

Elián González joins Communist youth group, AP says

Bloomberg wrote their article independently. Both the Wikinews article and the Bloomberg article reflects name reflects that the story originated from AP. Kingjeff (talk) 16:55, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

The Bloomberg report contains no original research or independent verification of AP's claim. This is "what AP says", and nobody else says it. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 16:58, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

WIKI NEWS : HOLY GRAIL IS IN ISTANBUL

I am a Turkish correspondent who talk to Mr. Ferhat Kanarya. I published his solution at my newspaper Aksam. This news is not a hoax. Regards, —Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.184.60.148 (talk) 21:06, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

It's crackpottery. He's claiming to have cracked a code that cannot be cracked due to insufficient cyphertext. If I make up a Ceasar cypher and encrypt "To be or not to be" then you only get the encrypted text there is insufficient to resolve the code. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 21:12, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

Vlaams Belang

Hi Brian, I think it is time to close this deletion request as delete. I just want to make sure you have had ample oppurtunity to copy and/or transfer the images to another server before I do so. Cheers, --SVTCobra 00:07, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

I've got them locally. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 06:29, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

195.229.236.214

I think your block for 195.229.236.214 was quite harsh considering he only replaced one comment. I also think that 195.229.236.214's edits may have been good faith as he changed the text of the comment, i is possible the were just trying to add their own score but they made a mistake. Anonymous101 (talk) 08:42, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

This is the second or third time I've had to fix the page after edits by that IP address. Check the history, they've done more than just edit my score. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 08:56, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

Rename request

Kindly, take a look here.--Mohamed0 (talk) 17:01, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

apologies

man i aint louisse ... apologies if i mixed up the words predecessor or successor, im just typing and typing ... trying my best to contribute and write —Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.104.157.99 (talk) 20:02, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

Interesting news story

Your comments to reporter James Keller were good. And they fit neatly as a preface to the entire report. -Edbrown05 (talk) 06:19, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

Thanks! Was a 'soft' interview. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 07:05, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

Rename request

Could you please take a look at my request here? Thanks -- Jorge Peixoto (talk) 21:26, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

Hi Brian, yep I know the article has a few holes in it. I'm trying to dig up the sources! As for the controversy, I had a lot more of it included, but removed because it seemed too biased. Thought it wouldn't pass the censors! Anyway, thenks for the advice! Neasa Neasabang (talk) 11:37, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

WN:YOURPHOTO

Hi Brian. You pretty much set up WN:YOURPHOTO, so I will ask you how it works.

I have sent an e-mail to a subject of a Wikinews article, asking them to e-mail and release under CC-BY-SA-3.0 images to photosubmissionwikimedia.org.

But what happens next? I asked them to CC me, if and when they send the e-mail. I presume that someone at the photosubmission address will upload it to Commons with an OTRS ticket, but how will I know when that happens? And how will I know what the file name is so I can include it in the article? Cheers, --SVTCobra 23:56, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

Let me know if/when you get the CC and I'll find whoever did the upload by emailing the OTRS mailing list. I only really copied this from Wikipedia. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 07:23, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

Well finally I got him to send an e-mail, but he sent it to me. I uploaded the photos and forwarded the e-mail to permissions-commonswikimedia.org, so all should go well. I BCC'ed you as well, but I don't think you need take any action. Cheers, --SVTCobra 19:44, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Rename request (User:Tomf688)

Hello. Could you please check this rename request? Thanks for your help. --Tomf688 (talk) 14:50, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

Cannot be done because there already is a SUL account Tom. The unification must first be undone. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 18:04, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

CHU for SUL

Can you please complete this CUH request for SUL? -- Spiderpig0001 (talk) 22:29, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

wikinewsie website css

Just a heads up the following css rule (from http://wikinewsie.org/theme.css ) causes it to fail validation:

 body {background-color:#FFFFFF;
	font-size:10pt;
	font-family:Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;
        margin-left:5;
        margin-right:5;
	margin-top:0;
	padding:0;
	}

It should have a unit on the margin-right and margin-left (px or whatever). Happy editing Bawolff ☺☻ 03:09, 8 July 2008 (UTC)

Trolling v joking

I would normally encourage a comment like that. Some may be offended, but hey, it's funny. I reverted because the user in question is just back from a trolling block that includes racism etc. He's basically out to be a pain. If you want, though, I'll reinstate that one as reasonably harmless. Should I? Blood Red Sandman ^{(Talk) (Contribs)} 20:06, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

Not if the user has a "previous". I didn't check their edit history, I just saw something I thought was relatively inoffensive toilet humour getting wiped. Final decision rests with you. In cases like that I'd go for showing that we can twist the comments into humour that 'backfires' on the OP. The end result of this is either the poster learns that certain jokes may not work as they intend because Wikinewsies have good comebacks, or - the bad option - they resort to cursing and swearing again and get a longer block. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 20:13, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

OK, I'll leave it as it is then, but I'll leave any more like that. Thanks, Blood Red Sandman ^{(Talk) (Contribs)} 20:18, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

Surely, by your logic, the right way to respond to the next one was not reversion, but "But, unfortunatly, you haven't gone yet"? Blood Red Sandman ^{(Talk) (Contribs)} 21:05, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

Er... Yeah, that would have worked. I zapped that one because it had nothing to do with the article as much as it being trolling. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 21:09, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

Can we just block again? It's not as if he doesn't know he's not wanted. Blood Red Sandman ^{(Talk) (Contribs)} 21:13, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

UK car crash in Leicestershire kills six

I have republished the article as I have explained why only four people are listed in the second last paragraph in the article. I hope you don't have a problem with this (if you do, revert). Thanks, Anonymous101 (talk) 20:22, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

No, as long as it explains away the other two. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 20:46, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

Outdated example?

Hi Brian, thanks for fixing up the piece I did on Dow Chemical. I wanted to let you know that I based the format on Heavy lift Delta IV rocket launch problems (from 2005), the example given on Wikinews:Writing an article. I also looked at some newer articles, and noticed that they didn't have inline citations, but decided I would go with them in based on the rocket launch example. If this older example is now different from the house style, could you (or someone) upload a newer example that reflects current policy? Thanks, Walkerma (talk) 14:37, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for highlighting that, I'll bring the subject up and see what people suggest. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 16:46, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Cheers! Walkerma (talk) 17:02, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Single source exception?

Why have you added the single source tag again? In this case Stars and Stripes is reporting on local news about the sentencing of the man who raped the young girl from Heidelberg. That is an exception under the tag. is there some category I need to add? 65.1.135.46 21:20, 13 July 2008 (UTC)

All stories are from a single publication - i.e. single source. If they are regurgitating other sources then track these down and you'll cease to have a single source article. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 21:23, 13 July 2008 (UTC)

The sources are not regurgitations. For searches on the convicted these are the only applicable articles that come up. That is my point here. The Stars and Stripes Europe publication carried the originals. 65.1.135.46 22:23, 13 July 2008 (UTC)

Then you have a single source and no independent verification. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 00:10, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Why does that tag list local stories as being an exception if it is not? 65.1.135.46 00:12, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

ufo article

Could you look at MUFON Releases Stephenville UFO Reports, Also Claim US Govt. Intimidation Of Witnesses. User asked for help, but I'm not really sure if sources are considered credible, or if it is publishable yet. Thanks. Bawolff ☺☻ 08:19, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Re.:MUFON

MUFON can be found here. It is a civilian organization that investigates any and all UFO incidents, be they really famous ones such as the 1997 UFO Incident at Phoenix, Arizona or some incident that no one has heard of yet, unless someone like me finds out about it and duly reports it, such as one that happened in Washington DC in 2002 in which Air National Guard planes tried to intercept a LARGE UFO that flew into restricted air space over Washington DC, or one that you may have seen, but you did not report at all (some one else did) due to ridicule. MUFON is www.MUFON.com . Hope this helps.65.173.105.27 19:45, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Catagories

Can something be done about these, templates?65.173.105.27 21:12, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the welcome

Thanks for the welcome, I've actually worked on a few articles over the last few days, my IP changes. I can't think of a good name to sign up for an account. Bull? It doesn't sound right. I don't suppose you have any ideas? 72.146.181.16 13:04, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

I had a suspicion you weren't a total noob, but most regulars don't track the /16 or /24 of good anon. contributors to guess history. I'm not very good at name suggestions, how about translating "Bull" into a different language like French or Spanish and using that? --Brian McNeil / ^talk 13:46, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

Wikinews interviews team behind the 2,000th featured Wikipedia article (FA)

Nice job! Did you let Jbmurray (talk · contribs) know yet? Probably best to drop a note at his Wikipedia talk page. Cirt (talk) 21:02, 18 July 2008 (UTC)

I will. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 04:04, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

Trolling

So questioning why the framework for an election was changed during the election amounts to "trolling/disruption". You were the one that brought up Zimbabwe. --SVTCobra 00:07, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

Yes. Get over yourself. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 01:04, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

Regarding your comments

Hi Brian,

after reading your comments on the ARBCOM elections from the past few days, I would appreciate it if you would put more effort into choosing your words. Now is not a time to be blunt, imho. It doesn't help to de-escalate the situation. You can still be catchy without being provocative, which is my personal feeling from your comments. I'm not saying this as some kind of arbitrator but as someone who means well with you.

Relax, have a Duvel!

cheers, --Steven Fruitsmaak (Reply) 17:15, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

I thought it was absolutely ridiculous that SVTCobra - a candidate - tried to overturn a decision of a member of the committee managing the election, and Adambro was just pouring fuel on the fire.

However, I will try to keep aloof from this although I would appreciate additional voices requesting Adambro strike his inappropriate comment from my voting section. Were I to take it personally, it is like going round a town during a council election and spray-painting "Nazi" on the posters of the candidates you dislike. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 17:23, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

Wikinews workflow

I do wonder if it might be more appropriate for discussions like [7] this to be carried about in the Wikinews namespace rather than on a user subpage. Whilst the extensive nature of the rest of the work you've done probably makes it sensible to have most of it on a subpage, I think that this would be better on the Water cooler. Adambro (talk) 16:38, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

I did comment that anyone who thought so should feel free to move it. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 16:59, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

Thanks

I appreciate that welcome message u sent me. Thanks, The Mind's Eye (talk) 19:36, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

Newsweek and letter

hey Brian, just on a very separate note: Did you forget a Newsweek issue along with a letter in a red envelop while you were in Wikimania in Bibalex?? Moushira (talk) 07:40, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

I responded to your email, this wasn't my stuff. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 08:50, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Heyo

Could you give a look-see here and explain to me what's the deal with the knock at the Jerusalem Post? For the life of me, that comment left me quite confused. 77.127.253.51 17:50, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

SVTCobra responded, the Jerusalem Post illustrated their article with a picture of mice when the story was about rats. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 20:33, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Usurpation of Existing Username

Hi Brianmc. I wonder if it is possible for you to help me. I have an SUL login name across 22 seperate wikipedia projects, and need to find out how to usurp my OLD username on here, User:Tmalmjursson in order to link it to my present account. The problem I have is that I have already (stupidly) started editing under the Username I want on here, User:Iceflow. Have I screwed myself royally?  :) Regards, Iceflow (talk) 16:06, 25 July 2008 (UTC) (aka: User:Tmalmjursson)

UBC Update

Did anything ever come of asking Jbmurray (talk · contribs) about help/participation from journalism students at the University of British Columbia in Wikinews ? Cirt (talk) 18:12, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

If the university has a journalism school, he has no contacts within it. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 18:19, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Oh, I see. I will try to do some more research on this angle and get back to you. Cirt (talk) 18:21, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Re: Featured Article on Wikinews

(copied over from my talk page on WP:) Marvellous! Thanks for telling me. --Jbmurray (talk) 11:27, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Ishmeet Singh

I noticed you deleted Ishmeet Singh as it has no context and is not news. I restored it as it was about a valid newsworthy event, it just needed a lot of improving. I also ask that you remove {{test}} from the talk page of the user who created the article, as it could be discouraging for a user who is trying to make helpful contributions. Thanks, Anonymous101^talk 15:44, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for changing it. Unfortunately, the message still mentions using content pages for testing. You might want to just replace it with {{subst:Hello}}. Anonymous101^talk 16:08, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

Hey!

Umm, That article u just commented on, would u mind looking it over and see if it is ready to publish. The writer asked me to, and I am up in the air on it. Thanks, The Mind's Eye (talk) 21:51, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

I guess i will go ahead and publish thanks. The Mind's Eye (talk) 21:55, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for your help

Thanks for [8] and especially [9]. I don't have time to make all the linked/associated changes with the move at the moment but if no one gets to it I will do it later. Cirt (talk) 12:38, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

With this being the "poor man's" version of my proposal I obviously have an interest in the wording on the templates being appropriate. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 12:39, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Well, though I think and hope differently about the potential impact of the changes, of course I welcome your edits and efforts and thank you for them. Cirt (talk) 12:43, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Yesterday I saw a demonstration of why this is so important. A user - who shall remain nameless - marked an article as ready, waited about an hour - hour-and-a-half then just published. It was about a further hour later that the same user noticed they'd mentioned the wrong continent in the story. That's a kinda big screwup. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 12:51, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Agreed. Cirt (talk) 12:52, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

{{Review}} in practice?

As I agree with the changes you made to {{Review}} (and this is a good example of where it is needed) what do you think should be done in the future about situations like this? [10] Cirt (talk) 13:17, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Automatically unpublish until competent notes are provided. Under no circumstances whatsoever should BrockF5 be going straight to publish - his English simply isn't good enough. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 13:51, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

I have moved the article back to review, it needs a damn good copyedit for a start. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 13:59, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Man decapitated on Greyhound bus in Manitoba

Sorry, I just wanted to post a quick lede. More information coming soon. Nutgraph there now. —Calebrw (talk) 20:51, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

OK, I'll put away the bullwhip and let you work at your own pace. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 20:58, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Neutrality and words to avoid

Best I'm aware, words like "claim" have a bit of a POV to them (suggesting that it's a claim against the general conception) and are under the "words to avoid" guidelines. I would suggest that you should consider renaming and replacing claim with "states"/"says" or something similar.[11] Cheerio. 77.127.253.51 21:09, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

More "straight to publish" stuff

[12] - Not sure how best to address these types of things going forward, if there is some unified way we should be dealing with this type of stuff. Cirt (talk) 03:18, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

Message from IRC User drivamgr2008Spri (User:Tmalmjursson)

Hi. This is a mass message to those I know on IRC from Wikinews and Wikinews EN. Please refer to my userpage for an important message concerning my IRC Presence. Thanks! Thor Malmjursson (talk) 14:09, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

Thanks!

I did come before, and I tried making an article, but I think it was deleted so uhhh yeah... I keep meaning to figure out how this place works, but you know, procrastination and all that... Naerii (talk) 16:48, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

re: Wikinews previews the 2008 Australian Football International Cup - Capitalisation

Thank you for the question. I believe the capalisation is appropriate as Australian Football International Cup seems to be the official name for the event. However, it probably is a good idea to slip rules inbetween Australian and football to stop confusion. Again thanks for bringing this up. -RockerballAustralia (talk) 22:42, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

Fifteen killed in Somalia bombing‎

If you have time, could you have a go at reviewing Fifteen killed in Somalia bombing‎. Thanks, Anonymous101^talk 09:53, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

This quote from BBC news indicated 1.5 million: "The UN says 1.5 million people have fled after recent fighting. " Anonymous101^talk 10:00, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

So it does, sorry! Can we actually find the UN report on this? It would be a great additional source. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 10:02, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

I'll have a look for the report. Anonymous101^talk 10:03, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

Your reverts at British doctor killed while on honeymoon

You have reverted twice at British doctor killed while on honeymoon. [13], [14] - the second time with no comment except: "revert". Please stop. If you wish to dispute the usage of the template {{Update}} - please instead open a deletion nomination at WN:DR. Cirt (talk) 21:28, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

I self-reverted on the article and opened a deletion discussion regarding whether or not to keep {{Update}}, at WN:DR. Cirt (talk) 21:38, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

I have reverted once, I am ideologically opposed to this bloody ugly template becoming commonplace. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 21:49, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

In any event, as I said, I have self-reverted, and you may wish to participate in the deletion discussion if you do not think the template should remain. Cirt (talk) 21:51, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

I note that you do not admit you were wrong to accuse me of reverting twice. You can either withdraw this allegation or stand by it. In the latter case, prove it. Show me - and everyone else - the diffs to back up your assertion. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 22:06, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

I will add to that a comment that is lost on many people, an initial action to undo something is not a revert. The above links show I removed something I disagreed with, and when it was reinstated I reverted. One revert. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 22:10, 3 August 2008 (UTC)

My apologies, I left the computer for a few hours after your last comment. I am sorry, you are indeed correct, your first edit was to undo my insertion of {{Update}} to the article, your second removal of the template was your first revert. Cirt (talk) 03:59, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

I am sorry

I am sorry for making a big deal about British doctor killed while on honeymoon/Template:Update. I should have just solicited community input right away and not reverted you. I hope you can accept my apologies about this.

I am very appreciative of your recent work to push us forward in quality improvements, even if I disagree with some of the details, I respect and admire your efforts and I hope you continue. Cirt (talk) 04:03, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

Hoax bot

I suspect the user which it is claimed is responsible for this bot might not be. Looking at their talk page on enwikip it seems they have been the victim of impostors on a number of occasions. Adambro (talk) 11:48, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

I think you're right based on the unblock request I declined. It's a troll in a tinfoil suit. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 13:38, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

WN:CHU

Bit of a backlog there. I've just put a request in and was hoping you'd have the time to do it. Thanks, LaraLove (talk) 13:10, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

I responded to your rejection of my request. Considering I've changed my name on en, meta, simple and have a pending request on commons, I realize that the name change is going to detach LaraLove from SUL. I'm not using that name anymore, so it doesn't matter. I need to unify this account. I also don't understand why WikiNews is unable to usurp names that have been automatically generated. This wasn't an issue on simple, where Jennavecia was automatically created upon my name change on en, as it was here, and I was able to usurp it with no issue. Jennavecia (talk) 15:23, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

Nit: the "n" in Wikinews is not capitalised. Now that I am aware you know of the consequences I will attempt the rename and ignore the dire warnings. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 15:25, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. Jennavecia (talk) 15:37, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

FlaggedRevs and Google News

It is entirely possible that you've written this before and I haven't seen itdue to my unfortunately decreased attention to Wikinews, and if you did I apologize, but I'm unclear how you exactly to envision FlaggedRevs to be working with Google News. Do you want only sighted or only reviewed articles to appear there, which Google gets from FlaggedRevs-compliant DPL? And what would happens to users who then arrive here? Would they only see the sighted/reviewed version, or the latest? Do I make any sense? :) --+Deprifry+ 17:35, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

I think you're - to some extent - as in the dark about FlaggedRevs as I am. DPL is now aware of it, and my understanding is that IPs (such as Googlebot) will never see unflagged revisions. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 17:51, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

FlaggedRevs

As you participated a lot in the discussion about FlaggedRevs, I wondered if you would tell me how I can review articles. Anonymous101^talk 18:31, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

Just seen that I can't review without the reviewer right. I though sysops were supposed to be allowed to review articles. Anonymous101^talk 18:59, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

As did I, but I don't think it will be much of a hassle to grant the right to sysops here. Thunderhead 19:19, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

In fact Sysops can give themselves the editor right Anonymous101^talk 19:22, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

We might want to go ahead and file a bug asking the devs to add $wgGroupPermissions['sysop']['reviewer']; and $wgGroupPermissions['sysop']['editor']; to auto-add admins. Thunderhead 19:27, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

Er, no? Let's see people get used to 'editor' status and move up to reviewer if we need it. Admins shouldn't be able to grant that priv because we give out adminship so readily. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 19:33, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

Flagged Revs

I like it, I really do. Thanks for all your hard work in pushing this forward.

I think sighted/reviewed/stable (marked by Wikinews:Editors) should be used to fight vandalism/spam mainly, and validated/validate (marked by Wikinews:Reviewers) should be used to control what appears on the Main Page. We may want to discuss setting up additional criteria, in addition to passing a {{review}}, for what then also appears on the Main Page. Cirt (talk) 00:18, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

We're pretty much on the same page as to how it should work then. The biggest problem was nobody read, or just as likely, understood the documentation. It needed switched on then played with. I take it as a given that you now see why I was pushing for factchecking and copyediting to be distinct stages. I'll write more later, but I just got a phone call that is going to gobble up most of my morning and the early afternoon. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 08:10, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

Bot username rename

Hi, I'd like my bot User:Computer to be renamed to User:タチコマ robot. This rename request is per my wikimedia wide bot username rename. I have decided to have a single username to more efficiently use SUL. Thanks.

• If this is not the right place to make this request, please move it to the right place.

-- Cat ^chi? 11:39, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

EMERGENCY WIKIBREAK

This user is currently dealing with REAL LIFE issues and is unable to respond to requests for an indefinite length of time. Please locate another Bureaucrat in the meantime (or whatever else you need. Cary Bass (talk) 20:17, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

hello. I just read about you on the comcom list whilst I was returning from holidays. I think of you. Anthere (talk) 22:15, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

I am still in the hospital, and will likely be so for another week. By a miracle my mailbox has not owverflown - but all I have done with it is clean out some junk.

What happened was I got a blood clot in my leg which required emergency surgery to clear this. The reason I am still in hospital is that in being very thorough over establishing why I got the clot a growth/infection was found in my heart and this required removed. You don't get out the next day after open heart surgery. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 14:12, 26 August 2008 (UTC)

Wow 0_0. I hope you quickly successfully recover from the surgery. Gopher65_talk 14:33, 26 August 2008 (UTC)

Dear Brian. Best wishes for a speedy recovery. --SVTCobra 23:39, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

Echoing the above - I hope you have a full and speedy recovery. Cirt (talk) 02:41, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

A date has been mentioned. Problem is, after they cleaned up the growth on the valve in my heart I came down with a secondary infection in my lungs. This is apparently quite common and can be something like the sniffles or a not 100% cleared infection taking advantage of your weakened state. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 11:32, 30 August 2008 (UTC)

Thank heaven you won't be besieged with unpaid hospital bills. Imagine what you'd be going through in the US....Cary Bass (talk) 18:37, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

Why wouldn't he have insurance if he lived in the US? --SVTCobra 18:56, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

And the service would proabably better\cheaper than the government healthcare. Anonymous101^talk 18:59, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

Woah, I'm just back, and just saw this. My sympathies are with you. Blood Red Sandman ^{(Talk) (Contribs)} 18:41, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

Anonymous101, the only two complaints I have over the care I have been given are (1) I am in a hospital in Wallonia, the primary language is French and English is poorly taught. In the Flemish region the primary langauge is Dutch, English is mandatory at school, and no TV is dubbed except pre-school cartoons. (2) Hospital food sucks.

The quality of medical care I have received has been outstanding, it is a myth perpetuated by profit-mongering American insurance companies that socialised healthcare is poor quality. I was in an operating theatre within four or five hours of admission and a very thorough investigation was carried out to establish why I ended up with a blood clot. You can have your 'EU socialist healthcare is a nightmare' preconception, and I'll have my 'US healthcare would have treated the clot, kicked me out, and I would have had to hope the next one wasn't in my brain'. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 15:12, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

It also a myth, perpetuated by left-leaning media, that health-care in the US is obsessed with squeezing out every penny of profit and that they just fix people up with the minimal amount of work and kick them to the curb. (Besides that doesn't maximize profits anyway) --SVTCobra 15:54, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

Brian, I am in the UK and have used the socialised health care system and I have used the socialised healthcare system. I'm not sure what it is like in Belgium but in hte UK the socialised healthcare is terrible IMO. Anonymous101^talk 17:19, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

Brian I am really glad you are getting good treatment and are well enough to complain about the hospital food. :) Here is some apple pound cake. Get well soon, Cirt (talk) 19:27, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

SUL

Hello ;). There is a new request here. Thanks in advance ;). --Lucas 08:43, 29 August 2008 (UTC)

Please read the above section and pester another B'Crat, I'm in hospital. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 11:29, 30 August 2008 (UTC)

Hello, welcome back online! You may need much more rest still but it is nice to see you around. --Aphaia (talk) 18:02, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Bob Barr article review

Brian, I wrote an article tonight on Bob Barr, a third party candidate for U.S. president. I believe it's ready to be published. Please review it when you can. Thanks.

Link: Controversy spreads over 'Snubgate'

--WNewsReporter (talk) 02:37, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

My wikinews email ...

Please send pass to calebrw at g mail (dot) com. If possible CalebWilliams or Caleb.Williams would be great as the account. —Calebrw (talk) 16:59, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

New polls show third party U.S. presidential candidates varying radically in popularity

Brian, could you do a peer review for the article above? Thanks. --WNewsReporter (talk) 18:48, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

I edited this and introduced enough material to consider myself biased. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 18:54, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

Please rename me

Hi, I have changed my username at my homewiki and want to to it here to. Please rename me to Calandrella. Here is confirmation. Thanks, Leo Johannes (talk) 19:18, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

Flagged revs question

On this page history, why did weren't my changes auto sighted as the usually are? I had to manually site the revision. Thanks, —Calebrw (talk) 21:31, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

You edited an unsighted revision. By default the new revision is also unsighted. Auto sighting is only when editing a sighted revision. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 22:14, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

Sorry Brianmc i know i have made some mistakes so far.

Just wanted to say sorry i really do get confused easily lol. --Confused (talk) 13:47, 14 September 2008 (UTC)

We all have to start somewhere, no need to apologise. / separated dates is a real headache from the U.S. using MM/DD/YY and most of the rest of the world using DD/MM/YY so in the dim and distant past Wikinews settled on spelling the month to avoid errors and confusion. The rest is just stuff you'll pick up as you go along so don't sweat it. Nobody will bite over genuine mistakes that you learn from. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 13:55, 14 September 2008 (UTC)

I understand the date thing now i think thanks... --Confused (talk) 13:59, 14 September 2008 (UTC)

Being here...

Well, it's a bit of frustration with the relatively massive coverage of the US elections and the dearth of coverage of the Canadian one. Plus I'm tracking the Canadian election anyway; might as well write a bit about it now and then.

As for the review process - any system which slows down article production I would generically be opposed to; not particularly strong opposition mind you, just sort of "I'd prefer not." I would think Google could use a feed of articles which are using the flagged revisions, which would eliminate the hurdle of "it must be thoroughly reviewed before publishing", but I don't know how the Google interaction is going.

I'm not fond of having comments pages - MediaWiki is just a terrible platform as a forum. But, if you're going to have the evil, the HYS question template is a great way to implement it and stimulate conversation. Great job on that! - Amgine | ^t 16:21, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

Wikimedia BeLux

Hi,

You are being accosted as a native of Luxembourg, and from looking at your user page someone who might be interested in this. Yes, I know, it says Belgium, but I'd like to be a little more realistic about potential numbers of members of a chapter for either Belgium or Luxembourg. I believe with both having multiple official languages, them being neighbours, and other organisations structuring as Belgium/Luxembourg combined, that BeLux has a better chance of building critical mass than just Belgium alone.

Even if you wouldn't be interested in seeing this changed to meta:Wikimedia BeLux you might can help out by suggesting some other Luxembourgers (is that the right term?) who might be interested. As a UK ex-pat living near Brussels I know Belgium has political headaches and a divide along linguistic grounds; I have a gut feeling that adding Luxembourg to the mix might help defuse this, get people to set aside their differences, and - hope springs eternal - work towards having a trans-national organisation that promotes Wikimedia in the two countries.

If you respond here, please drop me a note over on en.wikinews to prompt me to check here. --Brian McNeil /^talk 08:42, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Hello Brian,

I'm not sure what this is about and I was really about to take an extended wikibreak. But recognising the names of at least two current members I've decided I'll try to keep an eye on this 'project'. But I don't know how much time I can spend on this in the near future as I have a number of other plans for the next few months. Anyhow, maybe you or someone else could try and explain to me what you have in mind. In the worst case I can post a note at :lb about this to see whether anyone else is interested in participating.--Caranorn (talk) 21:23, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

Audio Wikinews page

Brian, I recently made an edit to the Audio Wikinews page in order for it to include a recording I made of the Sarah Palin email article. However, even though I edited in the recording, it doesn't appear on the page. Could you help me with this? Thanks. --WNewsReporter (talk) 18:52, 21 September 2008 (UTC)

Which audio page? I see nothing on WN:AUDIO. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 19:19, 21 September 2008 (UTC)

It's that page. I updated the "Spanair" article with a more recent one. I successfully made the edit, but it doesn't appear on the page. Click the "edit" button and you'll see the article I posted. --WNewsReporter (talk) 20:05, 21 September 2008 (UTC)

Sounds like something that happened with the leads taking their sweet time updating...try purging the page maybe? That s my guess otherwise I am at a loss. DragonFire1024 (Talk to the Dragon) 19:22, 21 September 2008 (UTC)

Lead Article 2

I tried to update Lead Article 2, but after I made the edit, the new story didn't appear on the front page. Can you help me with this? Thanks. --WNewsReporter (talk) 22:25, 24 September 2008 (UTC)

Never mind. it took a few minutes, but the story's up. Thanks anyway. --WNewsReporter (talk) 22:26, 24 September 2008 (UTC)

Block of CommonsDelinker

Do bear in mind that bots like this one run from the toolserver IP, so if you hardblock the bot it risks blocking all other bots that run from the toolserver. Could you lift the autoblock (#11250) that resulted from your block [15]? WjBscribe 13:24, 25 September 2008 (UTC)

Sorry about the autoblock! Would not have been a problem if someone hadn't been "overzealous" on commons. I'm afraid CommonsDelinker doesn't have a good reputation here - it is a very public face of Commons admins who don't look beyond their own project. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 13:30, 25 September 2008 (UTC)

Oh, and yes, I lifted the autoblock. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 13:31, 25 September 2008 (UTC)

Re:Masks

Those pictures featured, prominently, a design of a mask that is copyrighted. As you may know, we dont allow content that is not free in Commons, doesnt mind where it is used. Cheers, Gizmo II (talk) 20:39, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

Wikiaward

Sorry i just thought that i should of added myself as i saw 'Feel free to add yourself to this list in the appropriate place'. When i get 50 i will wait for the award.

Thank You, Chandlerjoeyross (talk) 10:28, 28 September 2008 (UTC)

Hawthorn wins 2008 AFL Grand Final

I have noticed you have reverted a edit I made to the above article. However, in making this revert, you do not reliese that other people take time to respond to emails, it takes time for the image to uploaded, and time for OTRS to respond. Therefore, I deem your revert to be deconstructive. Futhermore, a image is not substancial, and I can see no bad out of changing a image thats actually of the event, not a file photo. I request it is reverted, unless this reasoning is wrong. -- DizzyStar (talk) 03:51, 30 September 2008 (UTC)

The article is over 3 days old, most people who will read it have read it. WN:ARCHIVE might give some further clues on my reasoning. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 06:57, 30 September 2008 (UTC)

OJ Simpson found guilty in kidnapping, armed robbery case

Hi. As I understood the article it says that he was found guilty, but not that he was sentenced to any specific penalties. In the paragraph above the one I edited it says "could" as well, implying that he is not yet sentenced to a precise penalty. I might be wrong as in my country (Germany) the sentence is disclosed along with the announcement of guilt. Anyway nice day or night, depending on where you are (it's shortly after midnight here). Best wishes, John N. (talk) 22:12, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

Award

I award Brianmc the Wikinews Trophy for writing two excellent articles today Anonymous101^talk 13:50, 5 October 2008 (UTC)