User talk:Pi zero/Archive 3

Please do not edit the contents of this page. It is for historical reference only.

---

A little help?

Could you please help me develop my latest article if at all possible? It's called Space Shuttle program in penultimate landing as Endeavour enters history books after 19 years. Please respond ASAP. --Rayboy8 (my talk) (my contributions) 19:11, 1 June 2011 (UTC)

I don't think I'll be able to get involved in this. Awfully sorry. --Pi zero (talk) 11:20, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

Can you please review the article? --Rayboy8 (my talk) (my contributions) 23:09, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

Thank you

Thank you for the copyediting help at Dan Savage wins Webby Award for It Gets Better Project, much appreciated. ;) Cheers, -- Cirt (talk) 15:54, 3 June 2011 (UTC)

Trump criticizes media bias towards Obama, especially during UK state visit

My apologies. I'm new here and therefore don't have a firm grasp on Wikinews policy. Could you please explain the problems with the YouTube video I cited? Ragettho (talk) 12:20, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

Sure. The simple rule of thumb is, never use YouTube as a source. First off, it's got no real quality control, so in general it can't possibly be a reputable news source. (There's an obscure exception, but imho best avoided.) But there's another, and much worse, subtlety that I had to investigate a while back to fully appreciate myself: when a video appears on YouTube that claims to be from a reputable news source, like MSNBC, it's probably pirated, which means we'd be committing a copyright violation ourselves if we use it.

I reckoned it pirated because

1. the YouTube account is obviously not official MSNBC ("unfair and unbalanced"),
2. the video has no ads in it —these sites always have ads you have to watch to view their video, it's part of earning their living and therefore they have a financial interest in going after pirates, and
3. the video has "LIVE" over it, looks to me like it's pretty clearly lifted off a live broadcast.
4. I didn't see a headline (unless I missed it); MSNBC would want to encourage people to go on to their site, and a headline would be part of that.

As I said, the simple rule is just don't use YouTube as a source. --Pi zero (talk) 12:49, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

Understood. Here are links to videos of the Queen's toast and the President's toast Ragettho (talk) 13:05, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

Thanks! I've looked through them, and observe that

• they verify much (but not all) of the old paragraph about the footage. I'll take another look at the written sources in case they happen to fill in any of the gaps.
• heh: no ads to speak of here. Perhaps there's something about footage of the Queen in the UK. The other evidence of piracy is certainly compelling, but, well, live and learn.

Thanks again! --Pi zero (talk) 14:13, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

No problem. I'm glad we were able to resolve this issue painlessly. To be safe, could you please take a look at Gay couple elected prom king and queen in Maine's Sanford High School and check the YouTube video I sourced? Ragettho (talk) 15:21, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

This seems a less clear-cut case. It was published by an oldtimer Wikinewsie. I wasn't able to find any evidence that the YouTube account is official, but it's awfully slick for an unofficial one. There is an article on the TV station's site with the same video (different ad), but a different headline. The article was published about five days ago, so is limited to archival edits. In the end, I made an edit proposing to switch to the station's article, but didn't sight it, with a long edit description. We'll see what happens. --Pi zero (talk) 17:25, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

Article wizard

This is starting to look pretty good. I'm unsure how you'd work on using JavaScript to jazz it up and have content put in as you go along; but, that's the obvious next step.

I appreciate what you're saying in the edit summary for the inv. pyramid page, but I'd struggle to see a way to trim that back. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 18:13, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

The technical challenges of a js version are formidable; I can't even prove it's feasible (though I have some ideas to pursue). And a purely non-js version would be needed anyway for graceful degradation, so I figured we should get on with it.

Yeah, the last panel is bursting at the seams. I'd been struggling with my notes, having trouble seeing it as a whole, and decided to put it on-wiki and let my mind relax for a bit. Then I can view it as a purely external thing. --Pi zero (talk) 19:08, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Interview sketch

I've put together a few questions on User:Ragettho/Interview proposal for National Archives Wikipedian in Residence. Feel free to add any other questions you might have. Ragettho (talk) 02:01, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

re Court rules Massey can appeal US restrictions in mine disaster investigation

Hi,

Somehow a sentence in the text was left out in subsequent revisions. So the whole pullquote is in the text. Hope you don't mind that I added it back. Best wishes, Mattisse (talk) 16:20, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

• Yeah, I missed that in reviewing. I sighted the replacement. I knew it was all correct. :p Blood Red Sandman ^{(Talk) (Contribs)} 16:34, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

It's a good quote; I'm glad to see it's squared now (and I'll try to remember to look for partials like that when double-checking long pull-quotes in future).

I'm limited in what I can verify for review on this article, since I can't access NYT. --Pi zero (talk) 16:51, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Just curious. Why can't you access the NYT? I get five free article views per week (I think that's the number.) I thought everyone did. Not you? Mattisse (talk) 17:13, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

My difficulties with NYT come and go; I usually don't even try anymore, tbh. They're probably some mixture of others on the same dynamically assigned IP address accessing NYT recently (thus using up weekly, or monthly or whatever it is, allotment), and my principled (not to say stiff-necked) aversion to allowing commercial news sites to set cookies on my browser. --Pi zero (talk) 17:46, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Answer to your question

Why would I do this?[1] Because Red Blood Sandman told me to. He said it was necessary to preserve the history of my article edits. Is there another way, so I all my edits and hard word on the article is preserved in the article? Otherwise it becomes a paste job. Since no one answered my question on how to do a merge, (I have no idea) and since you pointed out the critical time limit in a published article, I followed what advice I understood. No more was offered. Best wishes, Mattisse (talk) 08:10, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

The unpublished article gets redirected to the published one, so that the edit history of the unpublished one can be retained (as the history of a redirect) without anything but the published article being visible (by default) to the outside world.

Regarding the water cooler thread. I composed a post on how to do an edit merge, which took me a while because I was unsure what needed explanation. There was an edit conflict: you had posted saying (I thought) that you understood after all what you'd been told to do, and were going to do it. This left me even less sure of what, if anything, needed explaining; and I could imagine either endlessly revising my comment to try to catch up with an active water-cooler thread, or creating a three-legged race between my comments and your article revisions to do what you'd thought I'd intended to say. So I decided to say less rather than more. --Pi zero (talk) 13:47, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

Not significant

This is not a significant change.--William S. Saturn (talk) 19:09, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

It is. Copyediting counts as a "significant change", which is not allowed 24 hours after an article has been published. アンパロ ^{Io ti odio!} 19:11, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

And where is that stated?--William S. Saturn (talk) 19:12, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

It's not stated anywhere, it's common sense. Copyediting affects the original structure of the article, that's it. アンパロ ^{Io ti odio!} 19:13, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

"Minor corrections such as spelling are acceptable but the addition of information which alters the balance of the article should be reversed." - This has not been done.--William S. Saturn (talk) 19:14, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

There's absolutely no valid reason for the revert.--William S. Saturn (talk) 19:18, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

It wasn't an edit that would be allowed on an archived article. --Pi zero (talk) 19:24, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

The page is not archived. This is a late edit, it says in the directions: "copyedit as required".--William S. Saturn (talk) 19:26, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

We don't fiddle with the wording after the 24-hour post-publication horizon. The horizon was established at 24 hours by a consensus discussion on the water cooler; I'm thinking it was in the first half of 2010. This is the way other articles have been treated since then. The phrasing of WN:ARCHIVE is not precise, failing to make particularly clear where the line is, only describing bounds on both sides (fixing spelling is on one side of the line, adding new information is on the other side of the line); in my experience, we draw the line fairly close to the "fixing spelling" side of that band. --Pi zero (talk) 19:41, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

No information was added. What is the big deal? This is preventing the article from being improved.--William S. Saturn (talk) 19:48, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

Each news article is a snapshot in time. The time that it's a snapshot of has to have an end somewhere, and we've chosen to set that at 24 hours after publication. It seems there's a bit of a Catch-22 here, in that the less significant it is, the less of a problem disallowing it should be, and the more significant it is, the stronger the case for disallowing it.

You may wish to pose this as a question for community discussion on the policy water cooler, and perhaps get a larger sampling of perspectives on the matter. The article isn't going to be changing its status anytime soon, as it's well past the 24-hour threshold and several days away from being archived, so it seems to me there's comfortably time to invite other members of the community to weigh in. --Pi zero (talk) 20:20, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

Apology from Billim1

Sorry. I'll be more careful next time. Billim1 (talk) 18:55, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

reviewer, NARA advice, corrections

Hey Pi zero. Firstly, thank you so much for your vote of confidence during my reviewer nomination, and also for the advice and mentoring you had given me preceding that nomination! I look forward to working with you more. :)

Thanks for the astute comment you left on the Water cooler regarding my NARA article. It really is great food for thought, especially now when one of the persons quoted in the article raises concerns about the way her statements were used in the article. Your comment speaks to the importance of the balancing of two opposing interests: those of the source trying to communicate an idea, and those of the journalist trying to objectively disseminate that information to others. In this particular case, it seems that the balance may have been breached in some way, and I hope that the situation shall resolve itself shortly. Indeed, I've already left a comment on Talk:Wikinews interviews US National Archives Wikipedian in Residence, and I would appreciate your input. (or the input of anyone interested, for that matter) Regardless of the outcome, there certainly is much to learn from this incident. Cheers! Ragettho (talk) 03:47, 1 July 2011 (UTC)

Review

Could you take a look at Congressman Thad McCotter to run for U.S. President? It's very time-sensitive and hope it can be published as soon as possible. Thanks.--William S. Saturn (talk) 20:11, 1 July 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the review. I added two new sources.--William S. Saturn (talk) 00:38, 2 July 2011 (UTC)

It says on the source that he was elected in 2002, which means he would start his term in 2003.--William S. Saturn (talk) 01:08, 2 July 2011 (UTC)

Okay. --Pi zero (talk) 01:57, 2 July 2011 (UTC)

template problems for {{w}}

{{replied|User talk:Ragettho}}Ragettho (talk) 03:52, 2 July 2011 (UTC)

Review request

Can you please review South Sudan gains independence? I would be grateful if you could do that for me. --Rayboy8 (my talk) (my contributions) 23:08, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

Unfortunately, probably not; I doubt I'll be able to mount the time and intensity of mental focus. It's at least possible that, later this evening, I can take a look and maybe do some copyediting on it, but don't anticipate that would expand into a full review. Sorry. --Pi zero (talk) 23:45, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

Thanks!

Thanks for changing the headline on China’s consumer prices rise to a three-year high in June as food prices soar 14.4%. (I seem to have a problem with headlines!) Best wishes, Mattisse (talk) 17:53, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

sex and libertarianism categories

Hello. If I wanted to create a category on sex, would it be named "sex" or "sexuality"? Also, would the category be split between two parent categories — Health or Culture and entertainment — similar to what we did with the Royalty category?

Also, if we are to follow the decision to delete the "Conservatism" category, it would seem that Libertarianism also has to be deleted. But could we redirect the category to a "Libertarian Party" page instead?

Thanks in advance. I figured that you would be the expert on these matters. (i.e. expert on categories, but if you, good sir, are also the expert on libertarianism or sex, then I congratulate you on being a stud) =P Ragettho (talk) 20:57, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

Sex — Immediate reaction, I don't think we should have a category on sex; it would be fine-grained and encyclopedic (er, the category, that is). The category wouldn't be maintainable in the long run, because people wouldn't think of it when "cat'ing up" an article. If there is a way to make categories like that work, we haven't invented the techniques (and perhaps technology) for it yet.

Libertarianism —

• Although I imagine Libertarianism will eventually go away, I'm in no hurry about it. Partly that's because I'm moving very slowly and carefully ("deliberately") on major decisions about the category hierarchy; but also, Libertarianism is less urgently problematic than Conservatism: it's both better defined ideologically, and less mainstream, so its inclusion criteria are a critical bit less nebulous, making it more manageable.
• In the long run, I envision separate categories for individual political party organizations (most are specific to particular countries).
  • At the moment I'm just getting in to creating categories for legislative bodies; I wouldn't care to take on a second mega-task while I haven't even found my pace on the first one yet.
  • Perhaps —brainstorming— there'd be a higher-level Category:Libertarian parties, which would replace the current Category:Libertarianism.

--Pi zero (talk) 22:40, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

I'm fine with your approach to Libertarianism, but I disagree with you on Sex. I think a Sex category (or at least one under a different or more specific name) is viable for articles such as Study shows long-term couples more satisfied with relationships and sex lives. And I also think that this is an easy category to come up with when writing an article. Ragettho (talk) 01:15, 12 July 2011 (UTC)

I'll think on that overnight, and get back to you about it hopefully sometime tomorrow. Some careful planning at the outset might make a significant difference... --Pi zero (talk) 01:41, 12 July 2011 (UTC)

Question??

Hey, do you know why no one is reading China's consumer prices rise to a three-year high in June as food prices soar 14.4 percent? Can't figure it out. Thanks, Mattisse (talk) 21:45, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

(I think I figured it out!) Mattisse (talk) 21:48, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

Urgent review request

Could you please review News Corp withdraws BSkyB bid? It is a breaking news story --Rayboy8 (my talk) (my contributions) 14:43, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

Sorry. I blew it, I suppose, in that I should have used {{Under review}}. --Pi zero (talk) 17:18, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

WE NEED TO TALK...URGENT!

Please contact me..here or via email...kovalcj@gmail.com THANKS,,,DEMETRI 66.152.153.36 (talk) 13:36, 14 July 2011 (UTC)

You're welcome to say here what you have to say. --Pi zero (talk) 14:11, 14 July 2011 (UTC)

Review

Could you maybe take a look at Ron Paul announces he will not seek House re-election in 2012; will focus on U.S. presidential campaign? It may look like there's a great deal of sources to go through, but I assure you, the story is covered by the first and second. The third shows only the margin of victory in the 2010 race, the fourth shows the personal facts, the fifth shows the percentage won in the 1988 presidential election and the last discusses the nickname Dr. No. Thank you.--William S. Saturn (talk) 04:44, 15 July 2011 (UTC)

Bawolff Gone for a While

Bawolff is on vacation or something for nearly a month. Since he's on ArbCom right now I suspect that he wouldn't mind being renommed, if he were here. Can people be nommed in absentee? Gopher65_talk 15:59, 15 July 2011 (UTC)

Yup, I'd second it:). Gopher65_talk 14:37, 16 July 2011 (UTC)

Thanks

It appears I don't pay much attention. :p —Mikemoral♪♫ 19:46, 15 July 2011 (UTC)

No worries. :-)  --Pi zero (talk) 20:00, 15 July 2011 (UTC)

Request

Would you be willing to publish Obama raises $35M re-election funds from 244 campaign 'bundlers' as it is about to go stale technically, since William S. Saturn said he evaluated it as publishable? See Talk:Obama raises $35M re-election funds from 244 campaign 'bundlers'. He is being overly cautious (in my opinion) in not publishing it himself, since I asked him a question about the article. Best wishes, Mattisse (talk) 16:49, 17 July 2011 (UTC)

Sorry if I screwed things up by adding names to the article and the NYTimes source. I didn't realize you were editing it. Should I remove my additions? They really aren't necessary. Mattisse (talk) 18:25, 17 July 2011 (UTC)

Thanks so much for your careful work. I'm glad that you removed the new additions, as it was a misguided attempt on my part to keep the article from going stale and, IMO, actually detracted from the article. What's a few more names! Regards, Mattisse (talk) 20:40, 17 July 2011 (UTC)

I'm glad I could be of help. --Pi zero (talk) 21:02, 17 July 2011 (UTC)

re ArbCom nomination?

Thanks very much for the interest and the kind words about me, but I'm not interested in being a candidate this time around. Cheers, -- Cirt (talk) 14:13, 18 July 2011 (UTC)

Right-o. I figured it'd serve as a holding action till we heard back from you (and it did :-). --Pi zero (talk) 15:20, 18 July 2011 (UTC)

Please, leave me off this page, Wikinews:Arbitration Committee/2011 election/Nominations and voting, it messes up the Table of Contents as to how many candidates there are. -- Cirt (talk) 16:22, 20 July 2011 (UTC)

I was never "withdrawn", as I never accepted in the first place. Please, I request you just leave me off the page. Thanks. -- Cirt (talk) 20:52, 20 July 2011 (UTC)

A question

Hi, I have been working on the arrests etc in the phone hacking case, Arrests, resignations as probe into Britain's phone hacking scandal widens as you suggested on the Rebekah Brooks resigns from News International talk page. I am unsure what to do. Should it be under "Breaking news"? Developments seem to be happening quickly and there is still an article in the waiting-to-be-published queue relating to it, "News Corp's Les Hinton resigns". Best wishes, Mattisse (talk) 15:44, 18 July 2011 (UTC)

New news project

Hey apologies if this is inappropriate, but I'm working on a new collaborative journalism project. We have short news updates, combined with longer, more in-depth articles for context. The updates are posted by admins and the context articles are openly editable. We use a custom combination of wordpress and mediawiki. I was curious what some of the wikinews editors though. If you are interested in checking it out, please let me know. Josh

Lede

There is such a thing as a "proper" lede but sometimes proper is not always best. In this case Rebekah Brooks' arrest was the "kick off" event and was the first among a cascade of related events. Sometimes the lede needs to draw the reader into the article and not just list the events in a table of contents manner. Also, the death of an ill, drug and alcohol abusing person is unfortunately not unusual. And there has been no sources that I have found so far that seem to think it was connected, other than Hoare was a figure in the history of the scandal. Just my opinion. Best wishes, Mattisse (talk) 21:17, 19 July 2011 (UTC)

If you had one sentence to tell someone what the article was about, it would be actively deceptive to give them a sentence saying Brooks was arrested. That's what the first sentence should do. There's nothing in the nature of this article —I'm being specific here, not slavishly applying some rule— there's nothing in the nature of this article that constitutes a reason to undermine this valuable function of the first sentence. --Pi zero (talk) 22:10, 19 July 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for responding. A response is always appreciated. Regards, Mattisse (talk) 23:07, 19 July 2011 (UTC)

Sorry I couldn't respond sooner; when you left your note I was on a grocery expedition. --Pi zero (talk) 23:55, 19 July 2011 (UTC)

Odd

Its odd that all these people are appearing out of the woodwork to vote for arbcom canditates (and I can't find a single arbcom case here - where are they?) when rarely if even do any of the people running or voting ever write or review articles. What gives? What is the point of this project anyway? I truly don't get it or I wouldn't be asking. Is the point of this project to get elected to arbcom? Best wishes, Mattisse (talk) 23:02, 20 July 2011 (UTC)

Well, I'm sure you know BarkingFish, Diego Grez, dendodge, Pi zero, and Gryllida, since they're all fairly active on the project. Here are the others:

• Tom Morris is an occasional contributor, writing about 1 article a month on average.
• Skenmy isn't very active anymore, but he use to be.
• Brian New Zealand (not Brian McNeil, AKA Brianmc, that's someone else) has been on the project since pretty much the moment it was created. Here he is a Checkuser, Oversighter and Bureaucrat, and he's also an Admin on en.Wikipedia, as well as being active on several other projects. Because he's active on other projects, he doesn't spend as much time on en.Wikinews as he'd like to anymore, but he's still around, and still contributes in various ways.
• Bawolff doesn't write articles and never has. He also doesn't copyedit, and rarely reviews. This is because, to paraphrase him "I'm not a good writer". However, he maintains a great deal of Wikinews' behind the scenes custom tools and software. Many of the extensions, various tools, gadgets, and complex templates were created by Bawolff, and are upgraded and fixed by him as necessary. He's probably the single most indispensable person on the project.

Then there is me. I haven't been active for the past few months, but even when I was I rarely wrote articles, preferring to contribute in other ways instead (reviewing, copyediting, helping newbies along, etc). As I said in my ArbCom self-nom, I only ran this time around because (at the time) only 5 people were running for the six person committee, and that just wasn't enough.

As for what ArbCom is, it is Wikinews' Arbitration Committee. It exists to act as, essentially, a supreme court for the Wikinews community, acting as a final place to go if disputes can't be resolved in any other way. It's basically there to act as a babysitter if two people throw a tantrum at each other, and can't resolve their issue(s) by themselves in a civilized fashion. English Wikinews ArbCom has rarely been used, because most disputes can be solved in other ways. Gopher65_talk 23:32, 20 July 2011 (UTC)

If ArbCom is rarely used (and I haven't been able to find a single case) why are all these editors who do little if anything to contribute to the project on a consistent basis, all heated up and ready to run for and vote for Arbcom when they can't be bothered to contribute systematically to the project? Just wondering as it seems very peculair and really stands out when aricles (the few that are writton) go stale.Much more intrest in Arbcom canditatates than in actually contributing to the project. No wonder wikinews seems to be dying. Best wishes, Mattisse (talk) 00:41, 21 July 2011 (UTC)

First, don't ever criticize someone for having limited time to contribute to a volunteer wiki. That's an untenable (because fundamentally unfair) position to take. Sorry to be blunt. Both writing and peer-review are massive tasks, and people who care deeply about the project and donate all the labor they can, can easily not be in a position to write or review atm, but be able to reach the frankly much lower threshold to carefully think through an ArbCom vote.

ArbCom is sometimes used, but rarely for a full-blown case hearing. There have only been three in its history, two shortly after its creation and, last year, a smaller follow-up to one of those. It's believed, by me among others, that being secure in the knowledge that ArbCom is there, and that it has the authority to resolve disputes, makes situations less likely to escalate to a full-blown ArbCom hearing. The first two hearings established its authority. Arbs individually and collectively do perform less-than-full-blown-hearing dispute resolution from time to time. --Pi zero (talk) 01:48, 21 July 2011 (UTC)

Ah! That explains a lot. I have very limited time also. What makes you think I don't? So the fact that I pressure myself and take time out of my busy day to prioritize and contribute here actually puts me in a lower class and so I get a lecture. You have clarified much. Thanks, Mattisse (talk) 21:25, 21 July 2011 (UTC)

How much or little time you have for the project is irrelevant to the inappropriateness of your criticizing others for not having more free time than they do. Nor did I have any opinion about your time availability, nor did I speculate on it. And I see no reason you would think I had such an opinion; the source of your misapprehension is obscure to me. --Pi zero (talk) 22:46, 21 July 2011 (UTC)

Well, you have definitely clarified things. I will prioritize my time more appropriately as others have done. It certainly brings no respect here to actually write articles. That is clear. Thank you for setting me straight. I had some stupid idea of trying really hard to make this site work. I appreciate your honestly in setting me straight. Thanks, Mattisse (talk) 22:53, 21 July 2011 (UTC)

Writing articles earns respect. Insulting others for not having time to write articles does not earn respect. --Pi zero (talk) 23:05, 21 July 2011 (UTC)

I did not insult. I asked a question. You interpreted it as an insult, you go out of your way to put me in a bad light and so I get a lecture. I was being "sarcastic" which is fine in your book. Sorry that you didn't "get it". Mattisse (talk) 18:18, 26 July 2011 (UTC)

Actually, as is my wont, I go out my way to view you objectively, assessing your strengths and weaknesses with dispassion. Among the latter, I have come to appreciate increasingly of late that you under-perceive negative skew in your own comments. I attempted to offer a helpful remark in that regard yesterday, which is perhaps my own entrenched optimism at work since, for better or worse, perception threshold is generally almost impossible to address from the outside. Fwiw, it's here. --Pi zero (talk) 20:43, 26 July 2011 (UTC)

Talk:9/11 conspiracy theory goes to U.S. Court in Denver

Would you please explain policy and procedure on this issue? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Stapler80 (talk • contribs) 00:06, 22 July 2011

I've commented there. --Pi zero (talk) 00:15, 22 July 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for a unbiased review. I really appreciate that. What you said makes perfect sense. The other reviewers made no sense to me. Should I abandon the article? I have spent a lot of effort.Stapler80 (talk) 00:18, 22 July 2011 (UTC)

Yes, it should be abandoned. It's not going to work out, I'm afraid.

(BTW, if William S. Saturn is correct that you are the person the article is about, you do have a clear conflict of interest. But the article would not achieve publishability in any case.) --Pi zero (talk) 00:33, 22 July 2011 (UTC)

Do you think the level of civility was proper? I feel I have been bullied. I mean, it is hard for me to distinguish if your opinion is now based on the article or on the reaction of your peers and a posible fear on your part of hurting their sensibilities. They turned the conversation away from the article onto a suspicion of the author's identity. I see no clear consensus.

I don't think there's been a problem with incivility here. News requires predominance of candor and brevity, so neither of those should be taken as incivility. I've been working especially hard on my explanations in this matter, and if my explanations have been helpful to you, I'm glad.

I don't actually know why William S. Saturn believes you are the person in the article, so can't speak to that point atm, but my reviews of the article, and my advice, are not based on that. (I only mentioned it to offer a clarification of policy.)

And although I like to get along with people, I would choose, and have chosen, my principles over popularity. Wikinewsies do tend to be idealists (as do, I think, Wikimedians generally). -Pi zero (talk) 01:30, 22 July 2011 (UTC)

I placed a request for arbitration seeking community consensus. I am not sure a I made it the proper way. Would you please check if it was properly presented? And if there are anything I missed. Thanks Stapler80 (talk) 01:51, 22 July 2011 (UTC)

Actually, the page you edited isn't for community consensus, it's for the ArbCom, the court of last resort. So that page wouldn't properly be your next step anyway.

I'll be honest. Regarding the questioning of your identity, I see no case for you. Reviewers are responsible for protecting, among other things, the reputation of the project; and if we published an article somebody wrote about themself, that would severely damage our reputation. Some of us here choose to remain anonymous, for one reason or another; but if, say, I were to write an article and a reviewer had a credible concern that I might have a COI due to my real-world identity, I'd find a way to reassure them (and I'd find a way to do so without publicly revealing my identity).

As for incivility, I don't see it. Folks have criticized your work bluntly, and I've used a different style of criticism than some, but that doesn't make their style incivil, just abrupt. Ruthless criticism of one's work is in the nature of news writing. The assertions about you (that I've noticed) have been policy-relevant assertions regarding your identity; true or false, I don't see them as incivil.

I don't recommend pursuing this further; there's nothing useful to accomplish by it. But if you wish to do so, I'll consider what route would be best. --Pi zero (talk) 02:53, 22 July 2011 (UTC)

I concur with PiZero on this. The fact that you're saying a "theory" is going to court in the title is just the start of a downhill bob-sled ride into poor grammar, and non-news-style writing. A suspected Conflict of Interest is trivial in comparison to the other faults when I last looked at this, or the "dubious" emails to support it. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 09:29, 22 July 2011 (UTC)

I am not evil. I am not a conspirator. I forced the community to put aside personal attacks and achieve civility. The whole COI attack was abusive. The charge that "case is closed" was abusive. I feel vindicated by the Delete process. But I will pursue arbitration Stapler80 (talk) 20:26, 22 July 2011 (UTC)

┌─────────┘
Again, the ArbCom case was rejected. —Mikemoral♪♫ 20:38, 22 July 2011 (UTC)

Request

I request that you no longer defend the use of sarcasm. It is hostile and causes a poisoned atmosphere. See tht dictionary definition: [2] Sarcasm - "harsh or bitter derision or irony." also "a sharply ironical taunt; sneering or cutting remark: a review full of sarcasms." Mattisse (talk) 18:10, 26 July 2011 (UTC). I would think you would want to decrease the making of sarcastic remarks rather than defend them. Respectfully, Mattisse (talk) 18:15, 26 July 2011 (UTC)

Advice on photos for sex articles

Hey! Do you have any advice to give here? Ragettho (talk) 06:15, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

"The Senate, where support is stronger, is expected to take up the bill on Tuesday."

This is a direct quote from one of the sources in the article.

"The Senate, where support is stronger, is expected to take up the bill on Tuesday." from President Obama: Deal reached on debt crisis given as a source in the article.

I believe this is important because the article gives details of the expected House vote but not the Senate vote expected on Tuesday. It seems to indicate that the Senate has already voted, which is not true. Mattisse (talk) 13:52, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

The current version of that source does not contain such a quote, as best I can see; it's not in the text (sanity check: string search for keywords such as "Tuesday"), there's no next page, and the only video I see in it is Obama's statement. Perhaps you're looking at an earlier version of the page (or even inadvertently a different page)? (Both have happened to me, at one time or another.) --Pi zero (talk) 14:38, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

It is in the current version. That is where I got the quote. Doing a search for "Tuesday" doesn't work. You have to actually read the article. It is in a box near the bottom right, under August 1, just as it was before. The article has not changed. Mattisse (talk) 15:15, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

I see what happened. Sigh. It was in the <expletive deleted> Flash insert. After studying the sources on my laptop (from which I log in), I viewed them all from another computer that has additional software installed such as Flash (which I don't trust to install on my laptop) — but didn't notice the extra AP material that appeared on that source, only the Obama video. And then repeated the whole business for the one source when you said that was specifically where it was from. The clue to diagnosing the problem was that it was something that wouldn't turn up in a string search. --Pi zero (talk) 16:27, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

I should have realized that, as I first did a string search and couldn't find it. Since I knew I had seen it and approximately where, I reviewed the whole article. I will keep such problems in mind in the future. I did add a (rather poorly worded) sentence sourced to the text below the Flash, the says, more or less, something similar. As a matter of fact, the Senate STILL has not voted on the proposal! Respectfully, Mattisse (talk) 16:38, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

For my part, it'll be another item on my mental list of Things to Keep in Mind When Checking Sources. (Will think about whether some sort of bullet would usefully go on the Tips checklist.) --Pi zero (talk) 18:08, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

I believe, for AP, Google hosts copies of their reports. Those won't have silly flash bits but, will be reports that go away fairly quickly. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 18:12, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

thanks for review

Hey Pi zero. Thanks for your detailed review of Study observes masturbation and other sexual trends among US teens, especially for correcting my inaccuracies. Ragettho (talk) 03:54, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

Glad I could help. Language Log had yet another story about msm coverage of science just yetserday; such stories are both cautionary tales and invitations for us to prove we can cover scientific studies better than the msm. I try to pitch in on reviewing articles of that ilk when I (occasionally) can.

It didn't even register on me (believe it or not) until after publishing, when I noticed it getting nearly 400 hits in an hour, that that article may be another destined to keep drawing hits indefinitely after archiving, like Sexy video clips influence young girls more than boys, study shows (which at the moment I write this is actually our fifth most popular article). --Pi zero (talk) 11:52, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

Wonderful! I wonder if articles on scientific studies tend to get the most sustained traffic here on Wikinews. Looks this this phenomenon will have to be investigated further once we have more data to work with. If it is indeed the case that our more popular articles include scientific studies, then maybe that's exactly the type of articles we should be putting most of our efforts into. After all, we have to distinguish ourselves from the msm somehow...

An anon on the article's talk page just commented on the possibility of using a photo of someone actually masturbating. Despite the humor implied in his/her edit summary, I think it's still a question that deserves serious consideration. Should we, as part of our mission to educate the public, post a picture depicting sexual activity on articles about sexual health? The issue has been bugging me for the last few days, and I can't seem to arrive at a good answer just yet.

The Foundation's upcoming referendum on hiding culturally sensitive photos could not have been more timely... Ragettho (talk) 21:11, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

two source rule

Hey Pi zero. Where exactly is the two source rule codified in our policies? I can't seem to find the relevant page, and I'd like to include it when I write comments for the UOW student. Ragettho (talk) 00:35, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

• When I can't remember where something is, I look for it at WN:Tips on reviewing articles#Checklist, which has links to a lot of scattered stuff. The checklist was created by mining lots of pages for tidbits and preserving links to them.
• In this case, the link from there is WN:CG#What Wikinews articles are. Nuances of application aren't in evidence there; I have a feeling I've seen it somewhere else, which might or might not say more, but I'm not actually certain I did, let alone where it would be.
• It's also, of course, at WN:Article wizard/Sources.

--Pi zero (talk) 01:01, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, though it seems that my comments won't be necessary at this point. The writer has returned to respond to feedback. :) Ragettho (talk) 01:09, 13 August 2011 (UTC)

Breaking review

Could you please review Thirty injured as bus crashes in Belfast, Northern Ireland? It is a breaking news story. --Rayboy8 (my talk) (my contributions) 15:33, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

Probably not feasible for me in the near future. --Pi zero (talk) 17:03, 14 August 2011 (UTC)

Seeking help with publishing interview

Hi! I'm relatively new to Wikinews, and would like to seek some help on how to correctly publish an interview I have done via email with Chinese-American martial artist w:Alfred Hsing. On the help page I saw the instruction to send the notes to an administrator, is it also ok, if I send the whole email conversation to OTRS (I am also an OTRS-agent for huwiki)? Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Thank you in advance, Teemeah (talk) 04:20, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

In the meantime I did the article: Wikinews interviews Chinese-American martial artist Alfred Hsing. I tried reading every possible guideline, I hope I did everything right. Teemeah (talk) 05:55, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

If I may butt in, the transcript can be sent to scoop@wikinewsie.org - it's an accredited reporters' resource. OTRS won't be much good, because there are only about four active contributors - if that - who work on the Wikinews queue (including myself). DENDODGE George Watson 12:32, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

media ethics

Given the recent activity from UOW, perhaps a new category on media ethics is in order? Ragettho (talk) 04:34, 17 August 2011 (UTC)

We have Category:Journalism, and Category:Media. Media ethics sounds subjective, besides there being no need evident to me to elaborate that part of the hierarchy. That's my first reaction, anyway. :-) --Pi zero (alt acct) (alt talk) 11:32, 17 August 2011 (UTC)

Newsworthiness - golf articles

Hi,

I seem to struggle with, so to speak, finding a right hole for the key. The newsworthiness has been called again, but I am not sure where exactly I am missing the expectations as they are layed out in the wikinews guidelines. Am I too long with my news articles so the core news is being diluted ? Should I focus on the final day outcome and give up previous rounds ? Specifically, the one on the PGA Championship has got (as I see it) at least few points which are of some importance to the average reader following events on the professional golf tour: most obvious one - we have a winner of the final major of the year, then the streak of non-american winners of golf majors has been broken, Tiger Woods has failed in his attempt to return to the form he's been known before his injuries and private life issues, Keegan Bradley has won his first major title in his first major tournament appearance. This let alone calls for a news article on the event appear on wikinews. I tried, I failed, but I don't have the details where to improve, so I could learn by mistakes. Also, even if I try to improve it at this stage is it too late for it being approved anyway? It's already Thursday and the freshness will be an issue. Is it fair to say that it's lost ? With kind regards, Wmigda (talk) 18:50, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

I've no reason to think you did anything wrong on your latest article (Keegan Bradley wins his first major PGA title after playoff with Jason Dufner). A published Wikinews article is a collaboration between at least two people —an author and a reviewer— requiring considerable effort from each of those two collaborators. In recent days, we've had consistently more articles submitted for review than the available (volunteer!) reviewer time to review them. (In my own case, it hasn't helped that my laptop died horribly, and I spent about three days artificially prevented from helping at all with the growing backlog. But things like that are just details; review is a big job, and I can't hold it against any reviewer who doesn't have that much time and intense concentration available to volunteer at any given time.)

The freshness criteria, as described here (these days, my favorite description of those criteria), are to be satisfied by the article when it is reviewed, not just when it is written. You submitted the article in good time, when it was about a day old which is about as well as one usually does and is certainly plenty of time under any normal circumstances — but, in amongst the many other articles waiting for attention, no reviewer contributed the necessary other half of the publication process in time. If somebody had gotten to it, and done a full review a day or two earlier, it would (presumably) have been published.

I really hope you're not discouraged by this unfortunate incident. It's frustrating to reviewers when a submission fails because none of us were able to attend to it in time. -Pi zero (talk) 23:00, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for clarification of the process. I was convinced there are major flaws with the way I approach the task of writting of the news article - now I understand that it was just a matter of available reviewing resources. The next opportunity for sure will be the 2011 Solheim Cup matches, maybe I'll give it a try also for Solheim Cup teams' announcements. Wmigda (talk) 18:01, 19 August 2011 (UTC)

Wmigda, your efforts are appreciated - the biggest drawback at the moment is not having reviewers with subject knowledge and that shared interest. You're hitting the biggest challenge Wikinews has; how do we recruit new contributors, offer them competent reviews, and maintain quality. Please persist, and do pester those who've done other sports articles for help; where their time to review may be limited, they might be able to suggest additional data you can give on talk pages to speed the process. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 18:51, 19 August 2011 (UTC)

"severe policy violation: do not ever attempt to self-publish"

Really? When did that rule come in? I've self-published a few things before (not recently), with no complaints. Guinness2702 (talk) 18:45, 20 August 2011 (UTC)

I believe it was first put in place about the same time I first came here, late 2008. Flaggedrevs is used to enforce it (which is why your putting the {{publish}} tag on the article didn't actually cause it to be published), and it is the basis for our GNews listing.

I did recognize what you did as the act of someone who simply remembers how things worked pre-flaggedrevs, since I've made a point of learning about how things worked then. --19:02, 20 August 2011 (UTC)

Fairy nuff. And in a related story, I've updated the article now. If you have time/opportunity, please review it again. Thanks! Guinness2702 (talk) 19:36, 20 August 2011 (UTC)

Reviewed, and published. --Pi zero (talk) 23:53, 20 August 2011 (UTC)

RAF crash article "And"

I'm not going to get into a pointless argument or edit war about 2 brackets, but I was under the impression that it was not necessary to update articles if the source changes. (e.g. 3 of the 4 sources of the related crash story are no longer available - do we have to delete or update that article?). Is it really necessary to change the quote from the original in this case? Guinness2702 (talk) 22:21, 20 August 2011 (UTC)

I'm source-checking, and my checking based on what I have to work with. If information you wrote can't be verified, that information fails verification by the uninvolved reviewer (me). Once it's been reviewed, it's presumed to have been verifiable from the sources at the time of review. --Pi zero (talk) 22:28, 20 August 2011 (UTC)

Right. Sources only have to work up until the review is complete. After that if they're updated (or taken offline or put behind a paywall, as often happens to archived stories at major news orgs) it doesn't matter. Part of the reason why we do synthesis articles is to act as a non-paywalled repository of "what was thought at the time in the mainstream media". Gopher65_talk 22:59, 20 August 2011 (UTC)

Review confusion

Hi! I just noticed that my article has been reviewed Social networks asked to visit UK Home Office after riots by you and another user. It previously had two review 'flags' on it for some reason but now just one. Just new to wikinews but was wondering if the one flag should still be there preventing my article from being published? Thanks so much and aplogies if this is a silly question! —The preceding unsigned comment was added by AndreaUOW (talk • contribs) 00:03, 23 August 2011

The history of that article is confusing.

• Reviewer Phearson failed it on style, because the Sources section was seriously messed up. The biggest problem was, apparently, one of markup: The closing "}}" on each [of several] {{source}} template call[s] was missing.

Each reviewer, in each situation, has to decide which small problems to just fix, versus which problems should be thrown back to the author(s) by failing the article. There's a school of thought that says obvious problems should be fixed before submitting an article, so not to unnecessarily increase the reviewer's burden.

• Dendodge fixed the purely mechanical markup problem, noting in the edit summary that it was in fact easy to fix, and, having fixed that problem, resubmitted the article for review. Then Dendodge noticed and fixed a few other problems with the source citations.
• Phearson did some more cleanup on the article.
• I fixed some other problems in the Sources section.

Hope that helps clarify what was going on. --Pi zero (talk) 17:58, 23 August 2011 (UTC)

earthquake article

Would you mind performing an independent review of the earthquake article? I'm afraid I might have missed something as I kept reviewing revisions. Ragettho (talk) 19:14, 23 August 2011 (UTC)

Actually, the article has grown so much that a second review might be impractical. I took great care to check everything as I went along, so hopefully the article is ok! Ragettho (talk) 19:39, 23 August 2011 (UTC)

Ye-ah. I was just noticing that the sources section is about as long as the article text, and wondering whether there was any practical way to go about this. Compounding the problem, one source is in the WSJ, which afaik is a pay-per-view source and therefore officially unacceptable (disallowable?) per policy (my working theory is that many reviewers don't notice this because they're accessing the internet from institutions that subscribe...); and another source is in the NYT, which I think is officially still allowed but I haven't been able to access for a long time now so I simply don't attempt to review articles that use it. --Pi zero (talk) 19:52, 23 August 2011 (UTC)

Cisco counterfeit bust article

Made the story I had written about Chinese prisoners suing Cisco into a more timely story which incorporates the lawsuit of two men being sued for counterfeit Cisco products with networking in China. Would you please give your time to look at it more if you can. Hopefully this is more appropriate and newsworthy.

Cosmic_Gambit_UOW

Californian Model sues clothing chain.

Have given much attention to this article to fix all problems.

Would you give this a look to see if this has met the standards.

Cosmic_Gambit_UOW

SF shootings

Would you please give specific instances of where the info is not backed up by sources? I mean BRS gave two issues and I sorted 'em. I would love to know what else because it will not only help the article, but me to thrive too. Regards, Avenue X at Cicero (talk) 16:59, 24 August 2011 (UTC)

It took me a few minutes to locate the article (I've dealt with so many, lately, they're a bit of a blur). A rule I always follow is, when leaving a note about an article, always provide a wikilink to the article (a simple way is as the thread title).

Okay, we're talking about Two injured in parking lot shooting following Raiders–49ers game. :-)

When a reviewer suspects a basic problem, they'll likely go straight to the easiest way to check for it. Since BRS had said "the quotes aren't to be found in the sources" — not that certain quotes weren't, but that "the" quotes weren't. You'd removed a pull-quote; and you'd only changed one paragraph, in a way that added a quote. You removed the pull-quote (btw, {{QuoteLeft}} and {{QuoteRight}} are to be quotes that also appear in the article text), but I'd taken BRS's comment to be about all(?) of the passages quoted in the article text — anything enclosed in quotation marks. To check that, I did a string search in each of the three cited sources for "the victims are" (the start of the first quote), and "police are interviewing" (the start of the new quote you'd introduced after BRS's review). Neither string was found in any of the three sources, and I don't see any embedded video or the like in which such quotes might be hiding.

Hope that helps. --Pi zero (talk) 17:57, 24 August 2011 (UTC)

Well, they were in the earlier ref I added, but now since its gone, I've removed the quotes. How about now? Any probs that would stop the article from being published . Avenue X at Cicero (talk). 18:28, 24 August 2011 (UTC)

The problem was that the sources didn't verify the information. You removed the quotation marks.

• By removing the quotation marks, you are now presenting as your own, words that you apparently believe to be other people's. That's not kosher; if you don't want quotation marks, you shouldn't be using what you believe to be their exact words.
• on a quick check, it looks as if at least some of that information is not verified by the sources, regardless of whether or not it's somebody else's exact words. You'd want to check this and fix any problems found before asking a reviewer to dive into an exhaustive review.

Are you saying that one of the sources changed after you'd used it to write the article? (That's a familiar problem.) The article needs to be verified by the sources at the time it is reviewed; so if a source has changed, and you realize it, you want to identify as best you can all other things that are no longer verified by it, and fix those problems before asking a reviewer to do the exhaustive checking-against-the-sources that full review requires.

When a reviewer sets out to review an article, if they have reason to particularly suspect some particular fail-worthy problem, it's likely they'll look for that problem first, so as to save themselves time looking at other things when the article was going to fail on the other problem anyway. Given the review I just recently did of After Washington row, S&P replaces president, supposing the quotes issues had been resolved (which they haven't, yet), the next thing I would look for would be "copyvio" — passages too close to the sources. --Pi zero (talk) 20:08, 24 August 2011 (UTC)

Sorry for taking offense earlier

I think I mistakenly took criticism of the article and the reviewer as a criticism of myself. In my first experience at wikinews I was "yelled at" for trying to move an article while a person was editing it. In my second, an article I had worked on extensively was being criticized. I am a major contributor to Wikipedia and would like to contribute here more, but am finding it hard to make the switch in policies and beliefs held by both sites.Ryan Vesey (talk) 02:06, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

Appreciated. I'm glad you're taking an interest in Wikinews. And yes, there's a lot of culture-shear in moving between wp and wn; I started at Wikipedia myself, spending two years there before coming here. I quickly concluded everything I'd thought I knew about wikis didn't apply here. Wikinews is driven, in part, by mutual criticism: we criticize each other into improving, and have to do that without taking it personally. Which all of us sometimes struggle with. --Pi zero (talk) 03:15, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

So, I would at least appreciate some feedback on my article so far since it is the first article I created on my own. You don't need to promote it or anything. I was just hoping you could criticize it into improving :)Ryan Vesey (talk) 03:20, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

A few remarks.

• Without looking at the sources, the text looks quite good (keeping in mind, the massive effort of a full review is mostly the source-checking, for verification and copyright). Maybe I'm missing some glaringly obvious gaff, but if so... I'm missing it.
• The first source listed is in the WSJ. Now, this has been a bit of a pet peeve with me, mixed with a feeling I may be missing something (but I'm not sure what). Articles do sometimes get published here with WSJ sources. But there are two things I don't get about that. First, as far as I've ever been able to tell from their site, WSJ is a pay-to-view news source, and Wikinews policy explicitly says no pay-to-view sources (I believe the basic reason is that authors, reviewers, and everyone else should be able to check the sources, at the time of publication, without having to pay for the privilege). And second, if WSJ is pay-to-view, how come any reviewer (or author) ever fails to notice that? I've never been able to access a WSJ article on-line. My only tentative theory is that most reviewers are accessing the internet from institutional sites that subscribe to WSJ.
• The second source listed is in the NYT. It's my understanding that NYT is not pay-to-view, although the number of free accesses per day (or week, or something) is limited — but I, personally, haven't been able to access it for a long time now (a year or more?). Some technical problem, and I usually avoid it by simply letting someone else review articles that use NYT. Only... it's getting to be obnoxious enough that one of these times I may apply myself to resolving that technical problem so I can access NYT.

--Pi zero (talk) 05:09, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

Both of those seem odd to me because I have the ability to access and have never even thought of paying. Are you British by any chance? I have found numerous times on Wikipedia where I can see things that British people can't. I don't know if you have something like AGF here, but I guess you'll just have to take my word for it. In addition, hopefully the other sources cover the information well enough that if a reader cannot access one or two, they can still verify the contents. Ryan Vesey Review me! 05:15, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

I live in central Massachusetts. You'll have noticed, I'm puzzled too. I don't suppose you're accessing WSJ through UPenn?

No, we don't have AGF. And reviewers can't take author's word for what's in the sources. It's not just a matter of faith/intentions/honesty/the like, though that comes into it too; anyone can make mistakes, and one of the reviewer's functions is catching authors' mistakes. Also, independent review is at the heart of our reputation (a key project asset) — and it wouldn't be independent if the reviewer simply took the authors' word for it (no matter who the authors). --Pi zero (talk) 06:00, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

Nope, not accessing through UPenn, but I think I figured it out. I can only access the article because it is in the category "Latest headlines" Ryan Vesey Review me! 06:08, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

comments on earthquake article, workflow

Hey Pi zero! I saw your comments on Talk:Magnitude 5.8 earthquake in Virginia felt up and down U.S. east coast, Pentagon evacuated. Absolutely no need to fret, though — you were hardly being too strong, and I do acknowledge the truth in your statements.

On a related note, would you like to have automated assistance with the archiving of articles? I'm sure there's a way we can get a bot to do the work for you, leaving you time to do other work. Ragettho (talk) 04:32, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

Back before I took over as unofficial archivist, iirc my predecessor in that unofficial post was asked about automatic archiving, and opposed it on the grounds that a lot of archiving isn't mechanical. I now find myself agreeing; besides situations where one might deliberately procrastinate about archiving, archiving is also the moment to check for anything that should have been cleaned up before but wasn't. --Pi zero (talk) 04:59, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

Comments on the policy page acknowledged. :) I'll post a response next week. Ragettho (talk) 18:55, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

Sexual assault article

I believe I have fixed the problems you found in the article. Care to take another look? Ryan Vesey Review me! 18:32, 27 August 2011 (UTC)

I may have a chance to take a look in a few hours. I'm just finishing up a (somewhat unexpectedly) lengthy review, and then I've got to close the barn (there's a hurricane coming) and generally give myself a bit of down time. (I've decided the basic problem here is that we need to get the review queue under control, which will be sustainable once achieved; it got out of hand last week because I was out of commission for several days with hardware problems. So I've reviewed something like a dozen articles in the past day or so. I do need a bit of downtime. :-) --Pi zero (talk) 18:51, 27 August 2011 (UTC)

Ok, I'd love to contribute to Wikinews:Story preparation/Irene devastates Northeastern United States, but I will probably be on the way to Pennsylvania once it hits. Ryan Vesey Review me! 19:01, 27 August 2011 (UTC)

Regarding the information about Sankt Peter am Hart being in Braunau am Inn District, the fact that it is unsourced is another "culture clash" between here and Wikipedia. Normally, on Wikipedia, if something isn't likely to be challenged, it doesn't need a source. In addition, I can't use the (for me) normal system of in text citations. Ryan Vesey Review me! 23:31, 27 August 2011 (UTC)

Yup. Culture clash, all right. We strive to be the sort of reliable source that Wikipedia cites; the fact they officially don't recognize us as a reliable source doesn't factor into our striving. (I'd better not even start on why the non-recognition. :-)

The standard examples of common knowledge that can be assumed are that Dmitry Medvedev is President of Russia, and that Paris is in France. A high threshold. If one wants to use information found in a Wikipedia article, one goes about it by using trust-worthy sources provided by the Wikipedia article. Thought personally I don't think the district in this case is worth that much trouble. --Pi zero (talk) 00:19, 28 August 2011 (UTC)

Over 100K

It seems weird that an includeonly'd documentation page would be problematic. Surely a change to that isn't going to cause a mass update? I'd expect the parser not to look within the includeonly on {{Howdy}}.

Anyway, I'm done - I think. It could just do with tweaks to colourise the code and then all sighted. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 20:07, 28 August 2011 (UTC)

The documentation page isn't high-impact, only the page it's documentation for. (Check the count when viewing the doc page, and you'll get, I believe, 2.)

With luck, our power outage here will only last a day or two, and then I'll actually be here for more than a few minutes at a time. (So far, I haven't really looked at what you've been doing over there, just glanced very briefly and happened to notice the count could use updating. --Pi zero (talk) 21:24, 28 August 2011 (UTC)

Heh. No sooner said than outdated. We have our power back <knocks wood>. So now I get to play catchup. :-)  --Pi zero (talk) 22:18, 28 August 2011 (UTC)

Re. Welcome Message

Far as I can see, my attempt to repair the article on the former IMF president's rape case was rejected out of hand even though it was written from a reasonable perspective and was accurate. The revision approval process here has also been used to hide the many ways the article was updated after my edits, synchronise it with the Wikipedia version, and take account of one or two of the more trivial points I raised. Relevance of the changes seems to have vanished thanks to a conflict between concepts of page histories and of approved versions. So the rules on updating of articles don't apply when people play games with the approval system? Article now is not the version I edited in the first place, although it appears as such in the history, and the latest version sucked up a few small points from my version immediately after I'd posted (also not in the history, can only assume that this involves games with the timing of approval). Still disagree strongly with the bias in the article as it stands.

The whole thing also seems to have fed into a debatable (at best) ban on Wikipedia for me (ban for nothing). So is any nominal independence of the two sites long gone now? Why have Wikinews at all when the Wikipedia will now run coverage of (or more accuractely propaganda on) any subject within the remit of Wikinews that might also get page views on Wikipedia?Borgmcklorg (talk) 12:20, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you're saying. Perhaps you're getting confused between the Wikinews article and some article on Wikipedia? The two projects are extremely independent of each other. Our articles are snapshots in time and follow a news style; their articles seek over time to achieve encyclopedic content and encyclopedic style. Even NPOV manifests in a different form here than there.

The article now is exactly as it was just before you edited it. Although your edits were not overall consistent with our news style (notably, the first paragraph of a Wikinews article, called the lede, is very different from the first paragraph of a Wikipedia article), there was no need to get into that in my edit summary, because (due to the 'snapshot' nature of news) substantive changes are not made to a Wikinews article more than 24 hours after publication. After the 24 hour threshold, we would only —with community approval— issue a correction, which puts a glaring notice at the top of the article, still without changing the original text of the article.

I'm not following you about the Wikipedia ban thing. Are you saying that someone on Wikipedia used the rejection of your edits to that article here as evidence to support a ban there? --Pi zero (talk) 13:28, 30 August 2011 (UTC)

your note

Thanks for the heads up on my recent preliminary review comments. It's just that I haven't been watching Wikinews closely, due to other commitments. I'm glad to see that the reviewing queue has been completely cleared, though! :) Ragettho (talk) 02:45, 1 September 2011 (UTC)

Talkback

{{talkback|Talk:BCCI should be more accountable in its functioning, says Indian Sports Minister Ajay Maken}}--Vibhijain (talk) 12:57, 2 September 2011 (UTC)

Talkback

{{talkback|Talk:BCCI should be more accountable in its functioning, says Indian Sports Minister Ajay Maken}}--Vibhijain (talk) 13:12, 2 September 2011 (UTC)

OR Essay

I'm trying to think of a starting point for this. Not having much luck... --Brian McNeil / ^talk 08:32, 4 September 2011 (UTC)

WN:Water cooler/miscellaneous/archives/2011/May#Sensationalism vs the ease of on-the-spot_reporting

--Pi zero (talk) 12:41, 4 September 2011 (UTC)

libyan rebels story

could u help? --Dustbowlhero (talk) 21:45, 4 September 2011 (UTC)

Review request.....

Would you mind reviewing Texas A&M University to leave the Big 12 conference? ....it's getting quite stale.Bddpaux (talk) 20:12, 5 September 2011 (UTC)

I'll see if I can handle it later tonight, if no one beats me to it. Uncertainty is because I've been mostly out of action all day with a headache from, I believe, eyestrain caused by my new laptop. I've adjusted the font size, but my eyes are still recovering. --Pi zero (talk) 22:46, 5 September 2011 (UTC)

"Drought conditions..." article

Already beat you to it.....but I'm kinda tired.......I'll read more carefully tomorrow as those pre-pub changes are big "learning moments" for me!! ...particularly with copy-right and formatting-related stuff. And by-the-by, thanks for the stats stuff........and only moments after I told Shii not to come here looking for strokes!  :] Bddpaux (talk) 03:02, 7 September 2011 (UTC)

Tyler, Texas

....a category (only) is perfectly fine. Bddpaux (talk) 13:55, 7 September 2011 (UTC)

Water cooler

Would you mind looking at my "Briefs" question over at Wikinews:Water cooler/proposals? I've just been wondering........ Bddpaux (talk) 20:48, 8 September 2011 (UTC)

Reviewed article 'Threats to media in Zimbabwe'

You recently reviewed my article 'Threats to media in Zimbabwe', and said the use of the word 'threats' is bias. I have created a new article with a changed headline. However, for future reference, how do I change a headline without starting a whole new article? Thanks Cjfuow279 (talk) 06:13, 15 September 2011 (UTC)Cjfuow279

At the top of the page, there should be a bunch of tabs. On the far right among those tabs should be a down-arrow, which provides a drop-down menu of additional functions. For you, the only additional function provided will be "rename".

(If this isn't what the top of the page looks like for you, let my know.) --Pi zero (talk) 11:49, 15 September 2011 (UTC)

Thank you, found it Cjfuow279 (talk) 12:25, 15 September 2011 (UTC)Cjfuow279

Thank you so much for all the help you gave me with this article. I am so thrilled to be published, and it was a great learning experience. And I finally understand what you mean by misattributed sources :) Cjfuow279 (talk) 01:12, 18 September 2011 (UTC)Cjfuow279

Pi Zero, I understand that you have given much attention to my article, "FBI investigate hacking of NBC News Twitter account", but would appreciate if you could give it a moment of your time, have made a hard effort to put more of my own writing into it. Noticed there was comment about missing citations, hopefully this will have fixed this. Hardly much of the paragraph structure is the same, except for perhaps the two initial paragraphs, which I was led to believe were good. Would be appreciative if you could, understand the privilege too.

- Cosmic_Gambit_UOW —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Cosmic Gambit UOW (talk • contribs) 09:56, 16 September 2011‎

Overly 'harsh' reviews

This is partly aimed at you, partly at other reviewers...

Our Auzzie friends should not be failed over stuff we, as reviewers, can fix. Instead, put a critique in the hopefully passing review. If the same student comes back for subsequent articles having learned nothing, it will count against them on their course. The idea is to throw them 'in at the deep end' on a quality online publication, give very basic help, and demand they rise to the challenge.

We, the curmugeonly Wikinews 'greybeards' are here to teach. Mainly to teach that you never stop learning. Prof Blackall is already sizing up using Wikinews as coursework experience/training for would-be sub, and senior, editors. That means we need to knock people into shape as contributors, and grant them reviewer privs.

I'm sure you can work out where I see this leading. I'd love to see academia hijack Wikinews as a 'journalist bootcamp'... --Brian McNeil / ^talk 21:32, 16 September 2011 (UTC)

I agree. Wholeheartedly. We want to maximize how much the authors learn, which means demonstrating repairs when possible, and informative helpful review comments when repair is either beyond independent review or beyond the reviewer's time resources.

In recent weeks, I'm aware of having given one overly harsh review —which I deeply regret— when we'd had over twenty articles on the queue, and I was grinding the queue down to size. The situation was untenable; the size of the queue was both discouraging reviewers and making it impossible to find potentially publishable articles until after they'd gone stale, and the only way out was for the reviewer to leave an unusually high fraction of repair to the authors (but that one review was a bad call on my part). Even at the height of that mess though, as I recall, most of the articles I failed for staleness I also failed for some other serious problem, which I explained for the benefit of the author. Which is why it took me a couple of days to reduce the queue — even "hurrying" I was trying to look deeply enough at each to provide meaningful feedback so the author would get something valuable out of it.

In recent days, my biggest problem has been that I spend so much time on each article, trying to make it work or, at least, write comments that will be highly valuable to the author going forward, that the number of reviews I do ends up low. --Pi zero (talk) 22:46, 16 September 2011 (UTC)

Not that I've been asked to weigh in on this....but to just toss in my two cents....I think the Aussie student thing is awesome! I really do.....but I think they and all other people should be reminded.....this is a place where quality rules. I've sorta appointed m'self in recent days to be the renderer of "emotional first aide" when someone gets their feelings hurt. I've appreciated the reviews I've had here...and I'm trying VERY HARD to create an article/some articles that require very little cleanup by the reviewer. Journalism is not about Glory or that other stuff....it's about the truth is BIGGER THAN I AM. Not to mention....the written word (reviews) can seem overly harsh even when it wasn't intended to be. --Bddpaux (talk) 01:10, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

I've been meaning to thank you for those encouraging words to folks. Thank you!

We do want to nurture rather than discourage. Fixing as much as we can is teaching by demonstration, which works a lot better than just saying "needs to be more neutral and conform to our style guide". Although there's only been the one review where I felt I'd misstepped badly, it's not only in the outlying reviews that I've got room to improve my technique. --Pi zero (talk) 02:00, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

Esperanto

Hello there! Thank you for sparing some of your time to review that piece of news. I suppose you are right on a few issues there, although I think it does have some news relevance (less relevant articles on Esperanto have been published here, such as this one, particularly). I have waited a couple of days to see if it would be echoed by other news sources of English language, but unfortunately it didn't. Perhaps this would be fitting under a Wackynews story? Pikolas (talk) 03:09, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

It's interesting you find the Brita Kongreso article less relevant. I suppose I really don't understand the relevance of the Italian/Romanian article. My review comments did note that this needed to be explained better.

A really major problem is that no-one here is going to be able to read the Romanian sources. We can't publish what we can't review. We had another Esperanto-related article submitted in the past few weeks, and its sources were in a language none of us could read (at this moment I don't recall which language). Most stories about Esperanto are going to be like that: lacking English-language sources. That lack of English news coverage about such stories means we'd really like to cover them, if we could work out a way to review them; they're stories not covered by the English mainstream news media. The lack of English news coverage about such stories means the Esperanto community would, I imagine, like to see us cover them. But the lack of English news coverage about such stories also tends to cripple our ability to cover them.

I've wondered how we might get around this problem. Every once in a while we get a really interesting story for which English sources just aren't available, and we'd love to be able to review those. But so far, we haven't come up with a clever technique to make that work. --Pi zero (talk) 03:55, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

Oh, that's too bad, then. Well, it was worth a try, anyway. Thanks! Pikolas (talk) 00:14, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

Myanmar story

Pi Zero - thanks for the time you spent on editing my article. I realised after posting that many of the sources were perhaps originally derived from AP and that this might hinder my chance of getting published. Sorry for the hassle. I have found a new article by Todd Pitman http://www.forbes.com/feeds/ap/2011/09/19/general-as-myanmar-press-freedom_8689028.html (posted 1 hour ago) which provides further comment by the Committee regarding Myanmar's restrictions on journalists. Would adding this new information make the article publishable or would it be better just to leave it? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Amelialindsay (talk • contribs) 04:24, 20 September 2011

Alas, it might be best to leave it; take it as a learning experience and move on.

As far as freshness is concerned, new commentary does sound like new information come to light, which could give the story a new lease on life.

If it's all Todd Pitman, though, the sources still aren't independent. In theory one might find a genuinely independent source and weave material from it into the article, but in my experience, fwiw, it's generally much harder to fix these sorts of problems after they've already been written into the article.

And if the independent-sources problem were redressed, I for my part would still be uncomfortable about my level of involvement. --Pi zero (talk) 04:59, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

Murdoch story

Hi! Just replying in regards to you not being able to get to my Murdoch story tonight, no worries! Your doing good

Murdoch story

Good to see the Murdoch story up there, thanks heaps for your work! —The preceding unsigned comment was added by AndreaUOW (talk • contribs) 02:33, 24 September 2011

Nepal plane crash kills 19

Could you please review the article mentioned above? --Rayboy8 (my talk) (my contributions) 17:17, 25 September 2011 (UTC)

First radical life extension manifestation

Hello, thank you very much for giving advice. I was eager to inform public about this fact ASAP and was crazy about how to do it in a fastest way. I made the changes you advised (though sources are in Russian, there are lot of it and http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/First_in_the_history_manifestation_for_radical_human_life_extention Please help me to publish it. It is really very important issue, people should be informed about it, it is about their life and life of their loved ones.

There is error in URL (correct "extension" but not extention). So if it is possible to fix it, please help.

I made another "post-event" article http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/First_ever_manifestation_for_radical_life_extension_took_place If it is more correct (since the time has gone) to publish it, please do it. Thank you very much in advance

Hello, If there are no English sources yet for this article but any one can easily use google translate to check the Russian sources I have done it for your convenience:

http://translate.google.ru/translate?sl=ru&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=ru&ie=UTF-8&layout=2&eotf=1&u=http%3A%2F%2Fvz.ru%2Fnews%2F2011%2F9%2F23%2F524719.html

http://translate.google.ru/translate?hl=ru&sl=ru&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.dni.ru%2Ftech%2F2011%2F9%2F23%2F219308.html

Please help me to move forward with the publishing.

We're quite familiar with google translate. Automatic translation isn't reliable enough to support rigorous review. --Pi zero (talk) 14:01, 27 September 2011 (UTC)

You mean that Google translation does not give translation reliable enough to understand the meaning of the article? Any other automatic translation tools could be implemented as well! Overwise this really important article will be buried, please advise what to do if there are not yet English translations but electronic, but the news are big.

Hi!

Are you going to be the reviewer of Delhi earns 'UN carbon points' ? --Onewhohelps (talk) 15:25, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

I'm going to try to help, yes. (I'll feel bad if I can't.)

I'm not a fast worker, but I'm starting on it. --Pi zero (talk) 15:30, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

Thanks a lot for helping me, I do hope and am sure that with your input it will pass review this time. I'm guessing that it would be biased for you to pass it? Yes, I find that I don't get too much time so I rush it within 30-45 mins if I can. Anyway, thank you again. :) --Onewhohelps (talk) 20:46, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

You're naming the biggest problem with this. We're short-handed, so if I am too involved to review it myself, realistically it probably won't be reviewed, and will go stale on the queue and eventually be deleted (a slow, lonely end for an interesting article). I'm going to finish working on it (almost there) first, and then I'm going to go back to the edit history and look very, very carefully at what I've done, to judge whether I'm too involved to review.

Part of what makes this sort of editing take longer is, that I'm really working very hard to minimize how much I change. It's safer for me, as a reviewer, to delete things (words, phrases, or even sentences) than to rearrange things. Rearranging is less involving if the words are kept largely intact. And adding things has to be limited to pinpoint clarifications of what's already being said. All I can do for now is try to minimize my edits, and wait till I'm all done with the editing before worryingwhether it adds up to too much. --Pi zero (talk) 21:02, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

Please see my talk page. --Onewhohelps (talk) 21:54, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

Hi there, would you please update the image on the main page, I have put a picture of a Bombardier Delhi Metro Train instead now, IMHO it looks much better. Also there is another article to review. --Onewhohelps (talk) 11:42, 27 September 2011 (UTC)

This needs deleting. --Onewhohelps (talk) 13:00, 27 September 2011 (UTC)

Hi Pi Zero, when do you think the article will get reviewed? It has been over 24 hours now. Thanks :) --Onewhohelps (talk) 14:48, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

I left a note on the article talk page; should have left a note on user talk as well. The current form of the article doesn't jibe with the sources. If only some reviewer had managed to get to it within an hour or two after it was written, perhaps the sources wouldn't have changed and there'd have been no problem. I should also have taken it off the review queue for repairs when I discovered the problem last night, my time; not doing so that was my mistake, and I apologize for it. I'll take it off the queue new, because repairs really are needed. (I'm lobbying to have the word "fail" changed to "not ready", btw; there's simply no call for us to be using the impersonally harsh and deceptively final-sounding term "fail".) --Pi zero (talk) 15:12, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

nocat

Hi there, Do you have any idea about the nocat parameter in Template:Country Infobox. I want to translate the template into Persian but I didn't understand it's function. If its value is always {{{nocat|}}} as written on its documentation, why should we consider it a parameter not a constant!Any help would be appreciated! Americophile (talk) 22:26, 2 October 2011 (UTC)

{{{nocat|}}} is template markup code, meaning "the value of parameter nocat if specified, or blank if that parameter wasn't specified". So in effect, the calling template passes its nocat parameter to {{Country Infobox}}.

If a template adds categories to the page that calls it, the template usually takes an optional nocat parameter. If that parameter is non-blank, the template suppresses the categories it would otherwise add. This allows a page to demonstrate what the template looks like, without categorizing the demonstrating page.

In this case, {{Country Infobox}} is called by another template, and if categories are supposed to be suppressed, the other template receives a non-blank parameter nocat. So the other template has to pass that parameter on to {{Country Infobox}}, so that {{Country Infobox}} knows whether or not to suppress categories. --Pi zero (talk) 23:08, 2 October 2011 (UTC)

All eighteen people in Indonesia plane crash found dead

What is your opinion regarding this article? Is there any phrases that still infringe copyright?--Hallows AG (talk) 11:37, 3 October 2011 (UTC)

Not ready......

I've been somewhat off-project for a couple of weeks (just life and its ups-and-downs)... if I read correctly, it looks like "failed" has been removed as a word from the review template....am I reading that right? --Bddpaux (talk) 05:18, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

Yes. I raised it as a specific proposal at the proposals water cooler, Brianmc said something positive, there were no other comments, and after a while I was bold and did it. Haven't had any negative comments, yet. --Pi zero (talk) 12:28, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

Please update image

Hi, Please update the image here please? Also on the main page. Thanks. --Onewhohelps (talk) 08:56, 11 October 2011 (UTC)

Done --Pi zero (talk) 11:47, 11 October 2011 (UTC)

A one man writing squad!

Wish I knew how to give you an award or some thing. You are truly devoted to WikiNews. Aim to please (talk) 23:04, 11 October 2011 (UTC)

I'll consider than an award. Thanks. :-)  --Pi zero (talk)

Well, in light of all you do, this here's just a trivial little token.......but here 'tis, anyway!!--Bddpaux (talk) 01:34, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

		The Original Barnstar
		I, Bddpaux, hereby award you this barnstar for your continuous and professional input (and output!). Bddpaux (talk) 01:34, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for that, too. :-)  --Pi zero (talk) 11:17, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

lulz... very much a well deserved award! I'm impressed by your commitment to this project! :) Ragettho (talk) 17:06, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

Can you please review these articles?

Hi Pi zero, I'm sorry to be bothering you, but can you please review these articles?

• 28 dead in Papua New Guinea plane crash
• Clashes Between Syrian Troops, Defectors Kill 20
• Hedge fund executive gets 11 years for insider trading

Thanks in advance.--Hallows AG (talk) 12:17, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

Please understand, a full review is a big task. I've managed to do one review this morning (it's mid-to-late morning where I am now). I might be able to do another either this afternoon (i.e., before midnight UTC) or this evening (after midnight UTC). If I'm both lucky and especially full of energy today, it's remotely possible I might somehow manage to do both one this afternoon and one this evening. There are currently ten articles on the review queue; honestly, if I could fork myself about a dozen (better yet, two dozen) times, I'd like to review them all. --Pi zero (talk) 14:46, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

Hi

Hi, If you get a chance please have a look at Kenya troops enter Somalia in search of kidnappers and without reviewing just give me a few comments please as to whether it is better written than in the past? Please and thanks. :) --Onewhohelps (talk) 13:43, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

Well, at this moment you've got the wrong caption on the picture :-).

It doesn't look horribly ungrammatical, and it doesn't look below minimum length. :-) I'd have to start source-checking to know more, at which point I'd be reviewing. Which —with luck!— I'll find time to do sometime in the next few hours. --Pi zero (talk) 14:05, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

Thank you

Thank you for the reviews, I appreciate it. Hopefully, I'll be able to do some reviews in the near future.--William S. Saturn (talk) 04:40, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

Glad I could help. :-)  --Pi zero (talk) 11:28, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

Deletion requests

Hi, Please see some of the deletion requests that I have made. Thanks. --Onewhohelps (talk) 11:36, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

Took a look, deleted most. Thanks.

Note, Voluntary ISP censorship shouldn't have been tagged. Material with some problems doesn't get speedy-deleted; we try to provide helpful criticism, up to and including not-ready reviews (if it's submitted for review), and if not published it will generally be deleted as abandoned (except for some that get moved to an author's user space). --Pi zero (talk) 12:39, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

Gaddafi breaking news

Hi pizero, I am about to create an article about Gaddafi's capture, it may need quick review to be of interest? --Onewhohelps (talk) 12:31, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

There already is an article — always look in the newsroom before starting an article. I just not-ready'd that article for having no sources. Confirmation seems to be coming very sluggishly.

Note that breaking news has never been what Wikinews is best at; synthesis is inherently behind other services. --Pi zero (talk) 12:41, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

Please may you have a re-look at Gaddafi captured in Libya, I have completely re-written it, it is pretty basic but will develop as the story continues. --Onewhohelps (talk) 12:55, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

Update: Gaddafi is now reported to have been killed. I have renamed the article to Former Libyan leader Gaddafi is reportedly killed and updated some info--Hallows AG (talk) 14:10, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

He is actually now dead as per the BBC. Please put Former Libyan leader Gaddafi killed at the top of your review list as this actually is breaking news. By the way Hallows AG his name is Gaddafi not Gadhafi. Thanks. :D --Onewhohelps (talk) 14:45, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

Hi

Pizero, please may you take control of who can change the lead articles, User:Hallows AG seems to be removing the ones that I have written but instead of having a look at the popularity which should be done IMO, I think you need to take control, I will revert it once but afterwards myself and him will be edit warring and violating the three revert rule. I have no doubt that his comment will follow as he will be watching my contribs. Regards, --OWHMobile (talk) 22:34, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

I removing articles that you have made is purely a coincidence. By the way, take a look at this. The GP article is the most popular and he Gaddafi news story has more hits than the Saudi Arabia story.--Hallows AG (talk) 22:44, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

The word 'impoverished' is used in both sources, it just means poor. Do not revert as you are currently involved in an edit war. Also please use edit summaries so that fellow users know. -OWHMobile (talk) 22:50, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

Prioritizing of leads isn't written down, that I know of; it's always seemed more of a living tradition. We could always ask some of the oldtimers. (Yes, I know I look like an oldtimer, these days; of course, to me, an oldtimer is someone who was already well established here when I arrived. :-)  My understanding, fwiw: Popularity is certainly a consideration. Gravitas is generally considered, especially for Lead 1. And timeliness is important too (we are a news site, after all). I'd be hard put to articulate how these interact. At any rate, I can understand wanting to cycle in the GP article replacing the Gaddafi probe article. Replacing a newer lead with an older one would seem to require a somewhat bizarre set of circumstances. --Pi zero (talk) 23:38, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

Hi

Tom Morris said this wasn't news. --Onewhohelps (talk) 14:33, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

You, however, are not User:Tom Morris. --Pi zero (talk) 14:58, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

RE: Chinese girl injured in hit-and-run ignored by eighteen people dies

Apologies, then. The name made no sense before now, as "hit-and-run" is a noun, not a verb. Fox (talk) 02:45, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Fire article

Thanks for reviewing it! Sorry for not providing enough details of where the information came, I didn't have enough time, but I tried to do my best. Thank you again! Diego Grez (talk) 01:21, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Reply

Replied at my talk page. -- Cirt (talk) 20:09, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

2011 SEA Games - Football: Malaysia bounce back

Hello, Pi zero. I'm writing to seek help for my article titled as above. After your review, I still don't understand what should I do next. Please point out all my mistakes as I'm very eager to get things right and contribute to Wikinews. Thank you. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 02106YWY (talk • contribs) 14:59, 13 November 2011‎

If possible, I hope I'll have the chance to provide you with some solid feedback to help you improve. Unfortunately, because the particular article is no longer fresh, it can't be published in its current form; it would have to be updated somehow, probably by choosing a fresh news event and weaving material from the earlier article into the new one. I'm not sure how well that's likely to work with an article like this about a sports event; I'd have to think about that. Anyway, just because I'm removing it from the review queue (by giving it a non-passing review) doesn't necessarily mean I won't be able to give you further feedback on it. It does mean, of course, that articles that are still fresh get handled first. --Pi zero (talk) 19:38, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

My articles are considered Spam?

I am a real person how are my articles CONSIDERED SPAM?? are you kidding me? what is going on here? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Blytheclaire (talk • contribs) 02:43, 15 November 2011‎

That's a generic notice banner, and I agree it's doesn't fit the situation overly well. The speedy-deletion criterion is called "advertising or spam", and "advertising" is the more relevant of the two. Alternatively to deleting it, I had the option of instead tagging the article with {{notnews}} (which see), but I'd take that route only with something that wasn't so clear-cut. This was a repetition of a press release that's straightforward advertising. (We also don't publish press releases, BTW.) --Pi zero (talk) 10:56, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

EU increases 2012 budget by 2%

Could you please review this article for me? --Rayboy8 (my talk) (my contributions) 19:07, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

It may take me a while; it could easily pass midnight UTC, for example. I've got various tasks to take care of this afternoon my time, which will make it hard to immerse myself for review. But if no-one beats me to it, I will try to review it during my afternoon or evening. --Pi zero (talk) 19:26, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

Got to it before midnight after all. --Pi zero (talk) 22:57, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for your help Pi zero. I appreciate it. :) --Rayboy8 (my talk) (my contributions) 23:33, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

Question about article

Hello Pi zero, I'm (somewhat) new to Wikinews and recently wrote my first article, which was Modern Warfare 3 sells 6.5 million units, sets new record. I saw that you reviewed the article, saying that to refocus on a news event and it wasn't reviewed when it it was still fresh. I just wanted some suggestions on how to expand it so it can be newsworthy. Any help would be appreciated. Thank you. -- Luke (Talk) 17:10, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

Hi. I remember the article, as it struck me at the time as an unfortunate incident — you didn't submit it for review (either you forgot, or it didn't register on you there was an extra act necessary), and none of us noticed, to point it out to you. Had it been submitted at the time, I imagine I'd have considered its newsworthiness and —after mulling it over— would probably have allowed it as newsworthy; but, that didn't happen.

The message on the article tag, where it says to "refocus on a news event", is a generic message generated automatically whenever an article is reviewed as not-ready on the newsworthiness criterion. Sometimes an article can be saved by refocusing, but often not. It only works if another event comes along for which the earlier information can naturally be reused (in whole or in part). In this case, I doubt that will happen, though one might imagine ways it would. At a guess, I'd say it's unlikely this particular game will be central to another newsworthy event (the only reason it made the news services once was that Activision trumpeted the initial sales in order to boost further sales, which is why I would have hesitated before probably allowing it as newsworthy).

It's probably best —I realize this is probably pretty frustrating to hear— to let that article go, and move on to another. Long-time Wikinewsies realize that not every article works out, for one reason or another; but of course, when someone writes their first article, they've put a lot of work into it, and they don't have the weight of other past successes to balance things out if their first article doesn't succeed. We realize this is a problem, and the only answer we have so far is "help newcomers do better the first time, so their first article is more likely to succeed". And we're struggling with how to do that. I'd be interested to hear how the article ended up not getting submitted, for example. --Pi zero (talk) 18:27, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

New Jersey trial

I've been doing the research to dig up the original version of the source, eventually getting an old mirror. Details on the talkpage. Blood Red Sandman ^{(Talk) (Contribs)} 11:40, 24 November 2011 (UTC)

Colombian politician Luis Fernando Jaramillo Correa dies aged 76

Hi there,

I have read your comments and understand. I did not realise that Diego had retired. However if it's not to much trouble and you have enough time I would really appreciate it if you could review the article.

Many Thanks 94.193.106.240 (talk) 19:28, 25 November 2011 (UTC)

Diego has to go get educated, apparently, which is a wonderful thing, though we'll miss him here.

I appreciate your understanding. We'll see how things go. --Pi zero (talk) 21:00, 25 November 2011 (UTC)

A portrait of Scotland

That it? I expected it to need more copyedit work than just a few dabs! I just checked for any easily-found sources on wee Salmond doing the opening, so far none.

I'm now heading to the airport, and from there to GLAMsterdam. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 15:59, 1 December 2011 (UTC)

Distance from source

Just to clarify, what is the meaning of the term 'distance from source', that you have used for me several times? --Rayboy8 (my talk) (my contributions) 15:15, 3 December 2011 (UTC)

We tend to use "too close to source" as a much gentler (less emotionally charged) euphemism for "plagiarism". I've been trying intermittently, with rather limited luck, to write an essay on the subject, and thereby mostly heightening my appreciation of how difficult it is to explain clearly. My most recent incomplete/feeble efforts are at User:Pi zero/How to use sources without plagiary. Brianmc took a crack at the subject a while back at WN:Plagiarism, whose talk page makes imho interesting reading. --Pi zero (talk) 15:36, 3 December 2011 (UTC)

Thank you

I just wanted to thank you for all the informations you gave in your reviews, I found them very helpful and I hope to improve in the future. Unfortunately I couldn't find any new fact about this story so I'll just wait until there is any new update that could make the article ready for publishing.
Thanks again for your time
ps: what do you think is the best way to add more information in an article if they are not in the sources ? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Flameoffurius (talk • contribs) 16:32, 8 December 2011‎

Other than "obvious" facts — for which we've a high standard, the classic example is "Paris is in France" — if it's in the article, it needs to be sourced. If it's necessary to add sources, that's what's necessary. For example, Wikipedia is not itself an admissible source, but often it cites reliable sources from which its information is derived, and those sources can be cited here. The sources cited need to be reputable/trust-worthy; they don't always have to be news sites as such.

There were a couple of other issues with the article that I didn't mention in my review comments because I didn't want to distract from the biggest major points — and I figured the relatively lesser things should be within the purview of an independent reviewer to fix.

• The title would need to be less generic for publication — the first point made at WN:SG#Headlines is "Make them unique and specific".
• Claims of fact need to be attributed, and the article as revised was weak on that. It's another difference from encyclopedic content: an encyclopedia entry says what its author believes to be true, drawing from the sources; but a news article keeps careful track of what is certain enough to simply state (such as, 'this was announced at a press conference on Monday'), and all else should trace back to its source ("claims of fact", and opinions; here, the paragraph of stats on the exoplanet would be something to attribute, very easy to do if it's all from the Kepler team).

Glad to be of help. --Pi zero (talk) 22:44, 8 December 2011 (UTC)

For the first time...

Hi Pi zero, Jo napot kivanok,

Using Wiki can be quite intimidating for a new user. Considering the technical point of view, coming to wikinews may be a huge challenge even for an accomplished journalist. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 50.46.250.246 (talk • contribs) 06:39, 14 December 2011‎

The first community discussion I was in at Wikinews had to do with this, and we haven't stopped looking for ways to help since. I'm hoping to help, indirectly, by crafting some software tools that would greatly open up the range of possible techniques that could be brought to bear on it. Meanwhile, we try to be supportive, and do our best to help people learn their way around within the limitations of what our software can do. --Pi zero (talk) 11:49, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

Thank you Pi zero! While i did not have the stamina to delve into wiki myself, i strongly felt the need to encourage this poster. It seems to be a purely technical problem about posting links and formatting. This seems, for me at least, to be hard to overcame in spite of perseverance (you can probably tell from the way I post here).

Comment Whilst I agree with part of this 'complaint'/criticism, I – to some extent – believe an experienced journalist, with help and some perseverance, could readily overcome this. Being an experienced journalist would mean an individual knows the required inverse pyramid style of writing, will have notes of which articles they read as background/sourcing, and notes taken in the process of information-gathering where Original Reporting has taken place.

If these stated items are available, it is not outwith the remit of a reviewer to correctly format sources, perhaps prompt for original reporting notes to be added to an article's discussion page, and add relevant markup. Then, they would have an article they could sign-off. With regards to the referenced article, none of these criterion are met; and, prompting for original reporting notes resulted in a link to the talk page being added to the Comments page—the page for readers to discuss published articles.

Sadly, and Wikinews has direct experience of this, many of today's journalism graduates have—by the end of their studies—largely concluded their job is to provide commentary, not hard-facts news. What is more depressing is there are plenty of publications will happily employ them to write such "not-news" column-inch filler. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 17:22, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

Shouldn't it say "these criteria" instead of "these criterion"? I fail to understand the "not outwith the remit of a reviewer". I also fail to understand why a reviewer would not attempt to help a first time wikinews poster instead of posting commentaries that include the "non-news column-inch filler" wording —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 12.107.114.67 (talk • contribs)

I think pi zero will agree on the following reasons where/why we cannot help as you seem to think we should:

1. The sources you offered had absolutely no bearing on the content of the submitted article—in fact, some seemed gratuitous links to advertising material.
2. You provided no original reporting notes whatsoever. These should be things like "attended <event> ... listened to <person> say <whatever>"— none of this was present at all.
3. The submission was not in the form of a news article, it contained your point of view and did not clearly, and up-front identify what is/was news.

Thus there is no source material with which to provide any help.

My bemoaning the state of modern journalism is, if you re-read the remarks carefully, not directed at you personally. --Brian McNeil / ^talk 22:29, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

Unfortunately I am not the poster (if you re-read my remarks carefully).

Addressing your review of the Bhagavad Gita article

Hello Pi zero. Thank you for reviewing my first submission to Wiki News. I tried to address your points, please let me know if there are more. Regards, Cinosaur (talk) 19:06, 20 December 2011 (UTC)

Again, thanks for your painstaking (considering the moving target :) review of the news. I've learned a lot in the process and hopefully my future submissions will require less reviewing. I just want to suggest that a wikiling to {{w|Bhagavad Gita trial in Russia|a legal ban in Russia}} be kept in, to give readers a more detailed view of the story. Regards, Cinosaur (talk) 00:11, 21 December 2011 (UTC)

The placement of the sister links section has been a topic of discussion, in recent months. The current stylistic standard places it after the Sources section; other places suggested (that I recall) are before the Sources section, or as a right float below the infobox. I've been bending the rules just a bit, in that the section after Sources is really supposed to be called External links, but when it only contains sister links I've been calling it Sister links. --Pi zero (talk) 00:23, 21 December 2011 (UTC)

I guess I'm just dragging my Wikipedia baggage in here, but what's the difference between inline linking of, say, {{w|S. M. Krishna}} and {{w|Bhagavad Gita trial in Russia|a legal ban in Russia}}? Why the former gets wikilinked inline and the latter is placed under Sister links? Regards, Cinosaur (talk) 00:33, 21 December 2011 (UTC)

General-background wikilinks get inlined — people places and things (any of which could, in principle, eventually have Wikinews categories and thus local wikilink targets). Specialized articles get linked separately — Wikinews articles in a section Related links, sister links in a section External links (officially; as I said, I bend that rule to call it Sister links when all of them are within the wmf family). --Pi zero (talk) 01:27, 21 December 2011 (UTC)

Many thanks. Makes sense. Regards, Cinosaur (talk) 01:37, 21 December 2011 (UTC)

Vandalism help

Thanks. Turns out, it had a sock. -- Cirt (talk) 02:32, 21 December 2011 (UTC)

U.S. Congress reaches deal on payroll tax cut extension

Sorry about that. I've changed up the article a bit and added few additional sources for the quotes. Let me know if there are more issues. Thanks, Tyrol5 (talk) 03:24, 23 December 2011 (UTC)

Heesters

I'd love to help improve the article but I am not great at these things and English is not my native language. Maybe you would be so kind to have a look at the article?
To help you out, I've selected some English articles on Heester's passing:

• [3]
• [4]
• [5]
• [6]

I would be very glad if you could be able to improve the article. That is, unless it is to much work. I'd really hate for this to become stale, that would be an awful shame. If you are unable to help me out, never mind. Still thanks for your time! Mythic Writerlord (talk) 22:53, 25 December 2011 (UTC)

My difficulty is not that I'm unable or even unwilling to donate more work to helping, but that if I involve myself in writing the article, I'm then disqualified from reviewing it. --Pi zero (talk) 23:04, 25 December 2011 (UTC)

That's a good point you're making. I wonder though:

• Is the article really THAT bad, or was it the sources that made it unfit?
• Wouldn't adding reliable, English sources (which I just did) make it okay?

If not, when you think it should be rewritten or improved, besides the initial sourcing problems, maybe you could do it. But how big is the chance that another qualified reviewer would come along and review it within a couple of hours time? Mythic Writerlord (talk) 23:07, 25 December 2011 (UTC)

I'm going to see what I can do, without compromising my uninvolved status. --Pi zero (talk) 23:10, 25 December 2011 (UTC)

I am very thankful for your help already. And if you improving the article would in fact compromise your uninvolved status, then so be it. It's better then leaving the article in the state it is currently in, which will certainly result in it failing again when reviewed. It's pretty late out here in Germany, so I'm off now. Thanks a lot! Mythic Writerlord (talk) 23:13, 25 December 2011 (UTC)

Your review of the BG court article

Pi zero, thanks for your review of the Russian court rejects Church-inspired move to ban Hindu scripture. I tried to address your comments. I agree that the "Church-inspired" clause, albeit supported by reliable source, may read too strong in the heading, so will leave it up to your judgment. Regards, Cinosaur (talk) 23:54, 28 December 2011 (UTC)

I did away with the whole Church passage. Please see if it is more balanced now. Regards, Cinosaur (talk) 03:05, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

I'm going to need a good night's sleep before I'll be fit to review again; it's late where I am, and I got less sleep last night than I ought. Hopefully, nothing irl will prevent me from doing a review in the morning. --Pi zero (talk) 03:46, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for reviewing and publishing the article, Pi zero. Regards, Cinosaur (talk) 18:58, 29 December 2011 (UTC)