Kevin Baas

About the memo article

I left a comment on the talk page Talk:Secret Downing Street Memo leaked. I'm hopeful that your work will salvage the article, but I wanted you to know that copy/paste from Wikipedia is generally not looked well upon in part because Wikinews is under a Public Domain licensure, while Wikipedia is under GFDL. - Amgine/^talk 23:32, 27 May 2005 (UTC)

Unfortunately, not really. Both the CC and GFDL require that derivative articles use a compatible licensure, and PD is not compatible that way. And, of course, you can't speak for any other editors. Basically, it's not a problem in this single instance. But if a lot of people copied the current events articles from Wikipedia to Wikinews then it could be a problem. That's why it isn't looked at too highly; we don't want it to become our habit.

<evil grin> On the other hand, if you'd like to build all your fabulous investigative reporting here, Wikipedia can copy it from us! - Amgine/^talk 04:27, 29 May 2005 (UTC)

Nice job

Good job on the French story - I was delighted that my template got used; the story preparation process worked very well. However one small thing to remember in future - when an event happens that we have prepared for on the preparation page (such as the actual results coming out) you should click the move page icon rather than simply creating the new article by cut and paste. So in future you should move Wikinews:Story preparation/France [says no to EU Constitution to France says no to EU Constitution. → CGorman (Talk) 14:00, 30 May 2005 (UTC)

An important detail

The two articles need new leads.

What the lead needs to do is compress, into one or two sentences, Who did what which makes this *current* news. This is a major inconvenience, I know, but as they stand at the moment they don't address why this is news *now*. You may want to check w:inverted pyramid on WP for help on this. - Amgine/^talk 17:59, 30 May 2005 (UTC)

Very Impressed

Kevin, Once I read your "We the People" comments (e.g."We ARE the People!) That is an advantage that no other medium can provide; that is our unique and defining virtue.")on your user page I immediately formed the opinion below which is today stronger than ever that;

Wikinews desperately needs you.

I am very impressed with your contributions to both stories and organization. I am worried that as so often happens in any enterprise, the fast rising stars "burn out" and become no more than a shooting star with little lasting impact. This usually happens when the fantastic energy level of the newcomer bangs up against the slower moving structure of the collective organization.

Which is why I say "Wikinews desperately needs you, now and in the future."

I urge you to just relax with this platform a bit, slow down , and just concentrate on the stories for awhile; which are, after all, the product.

As long as the structure allows good and interesting stories to go forward; even in a rough form; that is the most important thing in my opinion; at least for the time being. For example, "Secret Downing Street Memo leaked" article which you worked on, is a great article in my opinion.

The other thing which is just my own opinion is that our readers may largely consist of people who are looking for substance rather than style or literary qualities and that today wikinews is the best place to find substance...and the small % of readers who are going to be turned off by the odd grammatical or style error can go back to the NY Times. We'll keep the other 98% OF "THE PEOPLE"...we'll be the people's news source.

But as I say,

Kevin Baas, Wikinews needs you. Please be sure to manage your involvement in such a way where you don't burn out.Paulrevere2005 15:54, 1 Jun 2005 (UTC)

You have my respect

I want to say I have the utmost respect for you. You have done a good job on designing your workflow proposal and have stuck to your guns on the matter on the Water cooler in a cool, calm manner. I'm also very impressed that you invited the community to make input. I was a total idiot, frankly, to fly off the handle when I first commented (as a result of your invite). I know that I'd have been quite upset if I'd have been in your shoes. So, again, sorry! Dan100 (Talk) 22:49, 3 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Modification of Stage tags

I took the liberty of modifying the stage tags, and I hope no one has any objections to them now. NGerda 19:30, Jun 4, 2005 (UTC)

Cool. Kevin Baas^talk 19:36, 2005 Jun 4 (UTC)

Dutch

Kevin Baas, that´s a Dutch name, isn´t is? -- Redge (Talk) 12:37, 6 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Yep. Kevin Baas^talk 14:52, 2005 Jun 6 (UTC)

Template:Torture infobox

Kevin, I've edited this template, and also proposed some more changes on the talk page. Please take a look. - Borofkin 00:56, 7 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Research

Hi Kevin,

thanks for the link, this is a good starting point for further research. You're very focused on DPL; Gabriel Wicke's RSS extension is far more advanced, but is currently a bit buggy. I hope Gabriel will fix it, he developed it under contract for Kennisnet but now seems to have lost interest in it (perhaps they paid him already); a general problem with paid development.--Eloquence

This is the first time i've herd of Gabriel's RSS extension. I'm assuming it's linked into categories? I'm interested in knowing more about it. Kevin Baas^talk 03:30, 2005 Jun 8 (UTC)

Yes, it works with categories. First, you can get a feed for a single category like this:

http://en.wikinews.org/w/index.php?title=Category:Published&feed=rss

Secondly, you can embed the latest news from a category or several categories like this:

<catnews> Published limit=5 datelevel=4 </catnews>

It's possible to combine categories with a logical OR, but not with a logical AND. The main bug is that changing any category in an article resets the timestamp of all categories. Gabriel fixed this, but Brion reverted it because it caused other problems. It's now fixed again in 1.5, but the whole extension only works with 1.4.--Eloquence 20:47, 8 Jun 2005 (UTC)

this same timestamp fix may be useful for the DPLs: someone on watercoolor/proposals complained that the order jumps around everytime someone edits a page in the category. Kevin Baas^talk 05:17, 2005 Jun 9 (UTC)

Hey Kevin... there's vandalism afoot. Any chance you could keep an eye on Recent Changes and revert anything untoward if you see it? - Borofkin 08:06, 10 Jun 2005 (UTC)

np. Kevin Baas^talk 08:10, 2005 Jun 10 (UTC)

Kevin; Where are you? Downing St. Memo story is getting more powerful.

I miss your work. Paulrevere2005 12:55, 16 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Check this out please

check these out

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20050618/ap_on_bi_ge/credit_cards_breach_26

versus

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20050618/ap_on_bi_ge/credit_cards_breach

The top is the earlier story on yahoo news; the lower is the later one TO WHICH PEOPLE ARE REDIRECTED IF THEY CLICK ON EARLIER STORY LINKS, JUST AS WITH THE TOP SOURCE ON SATURDAY'S WIKI ARTCLE ABOUT THIS EVENT!

IMO we are witnissing a very primitive attempt at an important cover-up. The first AP story said that CardSystems' Friday statement was

"vetted by the FBI". "The company said it was told by the FBI not to release any information to the public; its statement Friday had been vetted by the agency."

The FBI vetted statement is the very statement that said the FBI told them not to advise the public about the cards being compromised.

Now unless we believe that Cardsystems is so stupid and reckless as to falsely accuse the FBI of putting customers' accounts at risk AND THEN to lie and say the FBI vetted the statement making that accusation; then this recent story is simply a lie and a cover-up..which I think it obviously is.

This link [[1]]shows that some of the links to the original AP story titled "40M Credit Card Accounts Could Be Affected" have been redirected to the later AP story titled "MasterCard: 68,000 Customers at High Risk". The later story reassures customers and has an FBI spokeswoman contradicting Friday's statement by cardsystems. The FBI spokes person even says the information should have been released;

The new version says;

"CardSystems' chief financial officer, Michael A. Brady, said Friday that his company was "blindsided" by the MasterCard release, adding that his company was told by the FBI not to release any information to the public.

Antle(FBI SPOKESPERSON) said MasterCard was obliged to its customers to release the information and was not told by the FBI to keep the security breach private.

McCarley said the FBI did ask CardSystems to not release details that might compromise the investigation - but she denied that the FBI had asked the company to not disclose that the intrusion occurred.

"I'm not sure where they got that impression," she said, adding that it was important for the public to be warned so card holders can be more careful while checking their statements."

The new version leaves out the reference to the Friday statement by CardSystems having been vetted by the FBI.

I think that the FBI actually broke some laws when they told CardSystems not to tell the public about the compromising of the cards; ESPECIALLY some European laws (lots of those cards are likely owned by Europeans) and now the FBI is shitting all over themselves trying to cover it up.

I think there is 1 hell of a story waiting here about this "cover up" and I think the people at Cardsystems might be willing to be interviwed about this. Paulrevere2005 05:00, 19 Jun 2005 (UTC)

DynamicPageList update

Thanks for the nice ideas. Just wanted to let you know that the DPL has been updated. See m:DynamicPageList for documentation. -- IlyaHaykinson 27 June 2005 05:01 (UTC)

Proposed workspace - I like!

I think the workspace you've been working on is a huge improvement. But the discussion bit seems to have disappeared. Can I submit my support for it in any way? ClareWhite 29 June 2005 12:12 (UTC)

Tags

I love the work you've done on our article tags, they're fanstastic! Dan100 (Talk) 2 July 2005 17:15 (UTC)

Nice Job! It's so much more pleasing now. Thank you so much! --RossKoepke 2 July 2005 20:32 (UTC)

Karl Rove

I see you are setting up a story with the latest breaking on the Rove story. Do you think the Karl Rove named as source of Plame leak story I worked on last nite should go headlined with a brief reprt before the 'Background' section? Or should we perhaps merge them for one longer story? -Edbrown05 3 July 2005 15:00 (UTC)

Thought you may have missed it in the list. I must go now, so I leave it to you. Frankly, I need a break from the issue after working with it last nite! Best Regards. -Edbrown05 3 July 2005 15:05 (UTC)

Re:translation review

You wrote:But some of the information was ambiguous to me... Take a look at the article now: New denunciations of Brazilian deputy and evidence make things difficult for Lula. Is it clear now or is it still ambiguous? Explain it to me. --Carlosar 4 July 2005 01:02 (UTC) I have added another source (in English) from Reuters. Maybe that can help.

You wrote: Also, one can't say objectively that that is the reason its directors resigned, this needs to be attributed to a source.

President Lula said that the enterprise should be investigated and because of him the directors resigned. Did you understand? Could you add this information? Thanks.--Carlosar 4 July 2005 03:13 (UTC)

HTML comments in Template:New page

Hi,

I think we should try to avoid too many instructions within the new page template. HTML comments of the type "cite sources below", right above a section entitled "sources", might just cause additional confusing. Also keep in mind that we have Template:New article intro, which is shown above the edit box. I think we should try to give a concise explanation there, rather than clutter up the edit box with instructions.

Here's an idea, for example: An image that shows the contents of the edit box, with numbers on it labeling the main elements. A thumbnail of this image could be in the intro, with a link to a detailex explanation.--Eloquence 5 July 2005 01:28 (UTC)

Category:Religion in Canadian MP crosses from Conservative to Liberal party

What was the reasoning behind adding Category:Religion in Canadian MP crosses from Conservative to Liberal party (a 1½ month-old story) which has nothing to do with religion as far as I can see? The move was clearly about the budget vote and, tangentially, Stronach's inability to get along with Harper. DoubleBlue (Talk) 5 July 2005 23:42 (UTC)

Thank you for your response. I have been watching Wikinews for only brief moments per day for the last month or two and had not noticed the addition of the "church and state" issue section. Your reasoning for adding old stories to it is sensible.

I don't agree with this particular story, however, as I certainly don't see any religious aspect to it. All the other stories matching politics and conflicts and religion look reasonable. Since you don't object and I stand against including the Stronach story, I will remove Cat:Religion.

Cheers, DoubleBlue (Talk) 6 July 2005 15:55 (UTC)

Amendment

Hey, not to be a jerk, but in the July 15, 2005 Karl Rove story, it's "amendment", not "ammendment". I fixed it but it was a repeated mistake so I figured I'd leave you a message. - McCart42 (talk) 17:04, July 15, 2005 (UTC)

Valerie Plame was a covert CIA agent, GOP rejects bill

Hi Kevin Bass! First off, I owe you an apology for putting in and later removing an inflamatory remark**on the discusion page -Edbrown05 18:46, 15 July 2005 (UTC)**. I was diligently working on the Wilson fire Rove story when I took a break and scanned your story. Be aware that at that point in time I believed the work I was doing was already pretty far behind the Breaking news point. Then I suddenly saw in your story, "George W. Bush refused to reaffirm his pledge to fire... " and I freaked out!! Thinking I missed something.

My only objection without having read any further into the existing story except to know that you reverted my edit is this: I find the quote very {{misleading}}. Bush simply refuses to comment when there is an on an ongoing investigation. If you read the MediaWatch source you may find it interesting.

I was fascinated with the ammendment part of the story. That is why I enjoy this site so much, I probably never would have known. Thanks!

I'd like to speak with you again on this after I read the rest of the story. Please respond here when you are ready, I will respond. -Edbrown05 17:55, 15 July 2005 (UTC)

Unfortunately I have to leave pretty soon to catch a bus. Kevin Baas^talk 18:00, 15 July 2005 (UTC)

I just looked at your article, and a related one. I see you're covering this too. Nice.

The top new part about rove testifying is from the journal sentinel article. rove, expectedly enough, was rather circumlocutory in his testimony, but he makes clear that he knew plame was a cia agent before talking with cooper, and does not make clear whether or not he knew this before novak told him.

I've been adding this to the bush adminstration handling of pre-war intelligence category, and including the {{pre-war intelligence infobox}} tag to news related to the w:Yellowcake forgery. The category is used in an issue dpl i made on the politics and conflicts page. I encourage you to use the cat and infobox on related stories. If you get your article done sone, I'd suggest publishing it, then unpublishing mine and republishing mine, to keep them in chrono orderr in the dpl's. Kevin Baas^talk 18:07, 15 July 2005 (UTC)

I examine your story to see what you mean about categories, but I am pretty dumb on these DPL things. I may have to have you do it if I get anywhere with the stuff I got up there. Can you help me with it. IRC maybe. Please reply one way or another here so we can keep this in one place. -Edbrown05 18:18, 15 July 2005 (UTC)

just put {{pre-war intelligence infobox}} at the top, and [[category:Bush administration handling of pre-war intelligence]] at the bottom. Kevin Baas^talk 22:16, 15 July 2005 (UTC)

Plame story redirects

Maybe you were busy ATT, but you left the redirects to the story a complete mess. Sinreg, Stevertigo 00:22, 16 July 2005 (UTC)

Waxman

Hey Kevin, as I'm sure you noticed, the story is drawing fire. I didn't add anything to the Rep. Waxman stuff, but I believe it needs context and explanation. What is he? I assume democrat. I don't get a hit at Wikipedia cuz I don't know his full name. Let's get a wiki posted up in the first sentence.

I'll work on the rest but please do assist there with anything you got. -Edbrown05 18:55, 16 July 2005 (UTC)

P.S. Let's discuss here :)

Glad you got on that! -Edbrown05 17:22, 17 July 2005 (UTC)

Abuse of Admin powers

Hello. After having read your posts on the Watercooler, may I suggest a few things?

• Admin abuse is a serious offense. If you believe that an admin is abusing his or her powers, it may be more effective to address this issue on the Wikinews:Administrators page, since more admins read changes to that page more often than they read the Watercooler. There you can:

1. under the Admin action required portion, ask for an admin action to be reverted by another admin.
2. start a Requests for de-adminship vote to remove the person's admin status.

• Disputes with admins. Being human, Wikinews admins will make mistakes. It may be more fruitful if you use their User talk:Xxxxx page to address an issue before going to the community for resolution. This may:

1. allow an admin to justify his or her actions, citing wikiproject policy.
2. additionally it may provide a more speedy resolution to your problem, and/or;
3. avoid hurting feelings/causing unneeded animosity in the community, and/or;
4. show the community that you took a constructive or collaborative approach to resolve an issue before resulting to a more drastic action. It may improve your credibility among folks who don't know know you well by helping you not appear to be rash in your actions if and when you ask the community for disciplinary action.

Other than that, thanks for volunteering to make sure all administrators do follow the rules and do not abuse their powers. -- Davodd | Talk 15:56, 23 July 2005 (UTC)

Story...

LMAO! This is hilarious! article start. But....that's really not publishable you know... :-P ----RossKoepke^Talk 16:14, 31 July 2005 (UTC)

....Damn. The mainstream media is undescribable sometimes. Honestly. "Angelina Jolie forces breakup, steals Bradd Pitt!" :-( But hey I did wake up to a good laugh this morning from you, makes my day a lot better, thanks. :) ----RossKoepke^Talk 16:18, 31 July 2005 (UTC)

Iraqi constitution story

Hi Kevin. I know that story changes gears at least three times. What's the worst point going on in that. It was moved to the Lead while I was buzy and preoccupied, so I'm afraid that it's been left it alone. -Edbrown05 04:13, 14 August 2005 (UTC)

Abuse of Admin Powers

you did it again! Kevin Baas^talk 23:26, 16 August 2005 (UTC)

You are going to have to be more specific and less vague. If I made a mistake, I can;t fix it because I have no idea what you are talking about. -- Davodd | Talk 01:35, 17 August 2005 (UTC)

If you are referring to my deletion of a story you started on August 14 that I deleted on August 16 called "RNC pays legal bills for officials pleading guilty to election fraud in GOP's favor," then it's deletion was justified as more than one news day passed between creation and deletion. It had no reportage content at all. It was merely a list of external links. Please read What Wikinews is not - #3: ...Wikinews is [not] ... a repository of links. You may also want to read Wikinews:Speedy deletion guide #4: Very short articles with no context qualify for speedy deletion. If you think the story is a valid article, I suggest you re-start it and put fingers to keyboard and actually write content for it instead of posting an article that merely directs reader off the WN site. -- Davodd | Talk 02:02, 17 August 2005 (UTC)

ya, i got to work too, so when i find something good, i'll get back to it, but if someone else takes a grab at it, that's what wikis are for. if it is sitting there too long, that's what "abandoned articles" are for, and i'd have no problem if you listed it on there. At the same time, i'd have no problem if someone (besides you) listed it for speedy deletion, and hence you deleted it. howvere, lacking an article sitting as an abandoned article for a reasonable duration, or it being listed on speedy deletion, there is no justification. And btw, this is a story like the downing street memo, in that we can sit on it for a month and it will still be "breaking news" when it's published. thanks to the liberal media. Kevin Baas^talk 04:00, 17 August 2005 (UTC)

Wikinews articles - unlike Wikipedia - are not "works in progress." For stories which may take more than a few hours to write to completion, feel free to write them in a user subpage, such as: User:Kevin_Baas/New Article. Then upon completetion, you can simply RENAME the subpage to a new headline when it is ready for publishing. This should solve two issues you may be having: 1. Empty articles being deleted by admins, and 2. Allow you adequate time to work on a complex story without fear of other people coming in an mucking up the process. -- Davodd | Talk 19:20, 17 August 2005 (UTC)

How about I do what you suggested, except I do it in a shared workspace, such that everyone can help write the article? Otherwise, i'd have to go around leaving notes on everyone's user talk pages about where the article is, and everyone else would have to do the same. I think the same could be accomplished if we had some sort of central category for these things, oh wait, we do! Kevin Baas^talk 00:12, 18 August 2005 (UTC)

Try putting the {{evergreen}} tag on it. This will flag it as a slowly-developing story and list it on the public Workspace as such. -- Davodd | Talk 00:31, 18 August 2005 (UTC)

Yeah - I made it. It is obvious from our conversation that there needs to be a category between developing and prepared story. ;-)-- Davodd | Talk 02:08, 18 August 2005 (UTC)

College article

I replied to your comment here: College article. --Christopherlin 20:43, 4 September 2005 (UTC)

Heads up

re; the info-box you worked on.[2] Neutralizer 04:00, 30 October 2005 (UTC)

• You might want to take a look at the current version of the infobox and pending discussion. I seem to have problems conveying my point of view. Howeve, maybe that does not match the original intention of the infobox or the reasons to get it undeleted. Input and feedback is appreciated. --vonbergm 05:53, 22 November 2005 (UTC)

Template:Politics and conflicts:Ongoing events

Are you committing to maintaining this template? - Amgine | ^talk 22:18, 23 November 2005 (UTC)

Page ratings

I just saw the to-do list on your user page. Page ratings have now been implemented, so that can be crossed off your list:). Gopher65_talk 13:46, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

And yes, I realize you haven't edited since 2005. But meh, letting you know can't hurt. Gopher65_talk 13:47, 21 June 2010 (UTC)