User talk:Guettarda/Archive19

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Archives: Archive 1 (August 29, 2004-March 3, 2005) - Archive 2 (March 11, 2005-March 28, 2005) - Archive 3 (March 28, 2005-April 17, 2005) - Archive 4 (March 20, 2005-June 6, 2005) - Archive 5 (June 6, 2005-July 4, 2005) - Archive 6 (July 4, 2005-July 26, 2005) - Archive 7 (July 30, 2005-September 26, 2005) - Archive 8 (September 27, 2005-October 13, 2005) - Archive 9 (October 14, 2005-November 18, 2005) - Archive 10 (November 18, 2005-February 12, 2006) - Archive 11 (February 12, 2006-February 17, 2006) - Archive 12 (February 18, 2006-February 26, 2006) - Archive 13 (February 26, 2006-May 13, 2006) - Archive 14 (May 13, 2006-July 31, 2006 ) - Archive 15 (July 31, 2006-September 20, 2006) - Archive 16 (September 20, 2006-October 30, 2006)- Archive 17 (October 30, 2006-January 13, 2007) - Archive 18 (January 13, 2007 - May 21, 2010) - Archive 19 (May 2010 - May 2012) - Archive 20 (December 2009 - present) Current

Edit

Are you even listening to me?

WikiProject Algae

WikiProject Algae was started as a meeting space on Wikipedia for improving the taxonomic representations of the groups of organisms called algae. Please join other editors at the talk page (Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Algae) to discuss a higher level taxonomy for algae to be used on Wikipedia. --68.127.232.132 (talk) 19:17, 11 January 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for joining the project. I think that if we can get a small group of editors who are willing to define a taxonomy from the literature it will be a learning experience for everyone, including, eventually, the readers. You write well and are doing an excellent job with your articles on palm species. You obviously are at home extracting information from the technical literature and distilling it for a nontechnical audience, the primary quality needed for writing an encyclopedia. --68.127.232.132 (talk) 19:39, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for the kind words. Much appreciated. Guettarda (talk) 19:57, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

Deletion of Puerto Rican images

As you all know, certain situations among which are included my personal health, have led me take a leave of absence from Wikipedia, however I believe that the idea proposed by Angusmclellan is an excellent one. Instead of nominating Puerto Rican related images by the masses, the images which have problems will first be listed in the page which I just created: Wikipedia:WikiProject Puerto Rico/Images with problems. We will be given more then sufficient time as a "team" to find sources and make what ever fixes need be in order to keep them from being deleted. This is a Wiki-community team effort regardless of who uploaded the image. I ask all those who really care about the images related to Puerto Rico to post the link "Wikipedia:WikiProject Puerto Rico/Images with problems" in your "watchlists". Tony the Marine (talk) 01:33, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

I've added it to my watch list, and I will do whatever I can to help. Guettarda (talk) 01:47, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

Behe Cites

Thank you for taking the time to dig up the references. Are you planning on integrating them into the article sometime soon? JPatterson (talk) 17:16, 12 February 2010 (UTC)

Still working on tracking down supporting refs. Feel free to incorporate them as you see fit. I think a substantial reworking of the article is necessary; I'm not too attached to the current text. Guettarda (talk) 17:20, 12 February 2010 (UTC)

I'm afraid that any changes I make at this point will be viewed with suspicion. I'd like to see the BLP issues resolved in a timely fashion but would prefer someone else raise their hand. JPatterson (talk) 18:00, 12 February 2010 (UTC)

More specifically....

The logging/deforestation/forest management conundrum came out of a GA review I am doing here --> Talk:Illegal logging in Madagascar/GA1 - what do you reckon the best name and scope for this one is? Casliber (talk · contribs) 22:45, 1 March 2010 (UTC)

Ugh, what a mess. The article, I mean. Hmmm... Guettarda (talk) 00:54, 2 March 2010 (UTC)

Erythrina velutina

Can you shed some light on Erythrina velutina (a leguminous tree)? It's probably going to make a good DYK, but I can't figure out some basic botanical aspects, like its distribution. I asked Cas (User talk:Casliber#Erythrina velutina), but he said I'd better ask you. Ucucha 20:24, 18 March 2010 (UTC)

My first thought was - yes, I've handled the herbarium sheet at TRIN (ie, National Herbarium of Trinidad and Tobago). Which led me down the wrong path, since I assumed it was native. Anyway, Legume Web says native to Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Venezuela, and Hispaniola; introduced in the rest of the Caribbean, Uganda and Sri Lanka. I find the record as "native" in Hispaniola dubious; my guess would be that Liogier called a naturalised species native but we can't really say so. Guettarda (talk) 23:28, 18 March 2010 (UTC)

Tropicos has a nice list, but they just list collections/references, don't distinguish native from introduced, nor to they try to be comprehensive. Guettarda (talk) 23:30, 18 March 2010 (UTC)

Via the Legume Web page - Biodiversity Heritage Library; scroll down to "Flora of Jamaica, containing descriptions of the flowering plants known from the island" - mentions it was collected in Jamaica by Sloane - presumably Hans Sloane, who wrote a flora of Jamaica in the 1690s. That's a pretty early introduction. Guettarda (talk) 23:36, 18 March 2010 (UTC)

Thanks, that's some good stuff. I wonder how it got to Uganda and Sri Lanka. It's apparently also found its way to Brisbane, Australia, as that is where the picture on the article was taken, but I haven't been able to find a reference for that. I'll expand the article with these data—I'll probably have access to most of the refs listed. Ucucha 00:23, 19 March 2010 (UTC)

What do Uganda, Sri Lanka and Brisbane have in common? :) Guettarda (talk) 01:10, 19 March 2010 (UTC)

It's not colonized the sea too, has it? Ucucha 01:12, 19 March 2010 (UTC)

The spread along colony lines is fascinating though - I wonder whether someone has written a paper on it. Casliber (talk · contribs) 02:23, 19 March 2010 (UTC)

There's a book called Gardens of Empire that I once flipped though that talked about the role of botanical gardens in spreading plants throughout the Empire. There's also the role of the St. Vincent botanic garden in the introduction of crops, including breadfruit, to the Caribbean. Although Bligh failed on his first attempt to bring breadfruit to St. Vincent, he succeeded the second time. And then there's theft of rubber from Brazil, something that's still a sore point between the British and Brazil. I suspect that there's a lot written about this actually...sure there are some great articles in there ;) Guettarda (talk) 03:39, 19 March 2010 (UTC)

I got a bit more and nominated it at DYK. We could get a better hook, though, and the article could use some further expansion. Ucucha 18:07, 20 March 2010 (UTC)

Talk:Abortion–breast_cancer_hypothesis#Mixed_results_in_Lead

Well, no good deed goes unpunished. :) Given your focused/solid comments recently, could I ask for your input on this matter? Its my opinion, that when the NCI workshop findings are given appropriate context the ABC hypothesis article will be near FA quality. - RoyBoy 15:10, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

Wikiquette alert

I filed one if you'd like to comment. Cla68 (talk) 05:02, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

You know, if you'd just asked I would have happily struck the word "worthless" - not only is it a rather unkind thing to say about someone's contribution, it also wasn't the word I had intended to use. It's easier to talk to people first, especially for something this trivial. Guettarda (talk) 13:55, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

If it was the first time that I had seen you talk to people this way I would have done that. I've never seen Tillman talk to someone on an article talk page the way that you were talking to him. We need to reach a compromise on how to word the added text and commented on each other that way will not help facilitate that. Cla68 (talk) 22:32, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Wikipedia is a project to write an encyclopaedia. We can handle good-faith disagreements over content and POV. Most of the time we can handle POV pushing. But people who misrepresent sources seriously undermine the credibility of the project. What compromise do you propose - we'll let people make up a few quotes, but not others? We'll allow a few made up facts in each article, but not too many? Is that what you're saying? Guettarda (talk) 23:01, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Please make your own proposal on the article talk page about how you think the material in the NYTimes and Discover should be represented in the article. Cla68 (talk) 23:03, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

No, seriously - what sort of compromise are you talking about? I'm trying to understand where you're coming from. Guettarda (talk) 23:05, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

If you don't like Tillman's or my proposed text, then you propose your own. We then either accept your proposal or make a counter-proposal. As so on until we all agree and then add the text to the article. Please make a proposal of what you think the text should say that summarizes what the NYTimes and Discover articles are saying. Cla68 (talk) 23:08, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

We'll never get anywhere if we just repeat the same actions, over and over. The normal way of doing things doesn't work when you have people who are willing to misrepresent sources. You don't think my approach is appropriate - you reported me to WQA this morning, after all. Do you have an alternative? I'm very interested alternative strategies for dealing with this sort of a problem editor. Let's deal with this first. Guettarda (talk) 23:32, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

If you think there is a problem with an editor, the editor behavior dispute resolution process is separate from the article talk page discussion. You know this. Now, please go make a proposal for the text on the article talk page. If you don't, then I assume you're leaving it up to the rest of us (which right now appears to be Hipocrite, Tillman, and myself) to decide on the text that will be added. Cla68 (talk) 23:44, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

The first stage in dispute resolution is polite discussion on the other editor's talk page, as has been pointed out to you, Cla. You seem to be in a rush to include dubious material in the bio, something that will have to be reviewed. . . dave souza, talk 23:52, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Cla68, please review the conservation. You took me to task for the way I reacted to Tillman's behaviour. If you take issue with the way I responded, I can only assume that you can see a better way to deal with editors who misrepresent sources. If you think my reaction was not up to par, then I can only assume that you have a better way of dealing with behaviour like that, and I am asking you to share. If you found my way of dealing with Tillman's behaviour so objectionable that you complained to NW, you files a WQA and you took me to task here, I am baffled why you are so unwilling to share suggestions for doing this better. How do you deal with editors who misrepresent sources?nts

Not that I have any stake in this argument, but NYTimes and Discover are not considered primary sources. We've finally eliminated blogs as sources within the TC project, per wikipedia standards, and I thought the same was now true within the global warming set of articles. A recent event could merit the use of a newspaper/magazine source until some primary source, such as a research paper or book refereed by a university, comes out. It would certainly be better than a blog. And research papers/books can take years to publish. Which article did this involve? Now that I see which article this involves, I see why disputes would come up. Some of her recent research has been divisive within the tropical cyclone community, and involves global warming. Wouldn't that article require that tag people have been recently placing on global warming articles? Nevermind, it has the appropriate probation tagging. Thegreatdr (talk) 23:38, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

<ec> Talk:Judith Curry, and note that the NYT source is a blog, albeit one that qualifies under WP:SPS in my opinion. It would be a primary source to the extent that it's being used as a source of Curry's essay on communicating more with "skeptics". . . dave souza, talk 23:50, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Does anyone else see the irony of Cla68 filing a WQA for one editor pigeonholing another, given his views toward what he calls the "GWcab"? Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 01:54, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Illegal logging in Madagascar

I have had a go trying to whittle down the prose but it is heavy going - see para 4 in the History section now, do you think it is heading in the right direction? All help needed on this one as I do think it is a worthy subject matter to write about, just needs doing in the right way. Casliber (talk · contribs) 02:13, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Re: Good to see you

Guettarda! I meant for so long to respond to this, but I wanted to write a detailed response and so kept putting it off. I have only popped into Wikipedia intermittently, though I still read articles all the time. Thank you for your kind messages. I'm hoping to do some occasional editing and hope to run into you more often. — Knowledge Seeker দ 05:43, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Re: Hello, world!

And thank you, Guettarda, my old friend. Things are very well! — Knowledge Seeker দ 06:16, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Fred Singer

I see that you have been very active on the Fred Singer article since SV expanded it. Have you stopped to thank SV for expanding it? I'm going to go do that on her talk page right now and invite you to join me. I think the Singer article now has a chance for FA consideration and future display on the main page. This is a good thing when an article is improved so dramatically, wouldn't you agree? Cla68 (talk) 15:43, 23 May 2010 (UTC)

Done. Cla68 (talk) 15:46, 23 May 2010 (UTC)

Really, Guettarda. Anytime that youre're ready please extend some thanks. I'm waiting. Cla68 (talk) 06:41, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

@ Cla68, for some unaccountable reason your nice note to SlimVirgin forgot to remind her to extend thanks to Guettarda for patient and helpful work in resolving the obvious problems with her changes. Please ask her that before badgering Guettarda again. And, oddly enough, you seem to have forgotten to give such thanks yourself.

@ Guettarda, many thanks for your work in helping to improve this bio. Hope others will join you in talk page discussions to get full consensus on changes as they develop. . . dave souza, talk 07:44, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

WikiCup 2010 May newsletter

We are half way through round 3, with a little under a month to go. The current overall leader is Sasata (submissions), who has 570 points. He leads pool C. Pools A, B and D are led by Hunter Kahn (submissions), Sturmvogel_66 (submissions) and White Shadows (submissions) respectively. Anything you worry may not receive the necessary attention before the end of the round (such as outstanding GA or FA nominations) is welcome at Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews, and please remember to continue offering reviews yourself where possible. As always, the judges are available to contact via email, IRC or their talk pages, and general discussion about the Cup is welcome on the WikiCup talk page.

Two of last year's final 8, Theleftorium (submissions) and Scorpion0422 (submissions), have dropped out of the competition, saying they would rather their place went to someone who will have more time on their hands than them next round. On a related note, a special thank you goes to White Shadows (submissions) for his help behind the scenes once again. There is currently a problem with the poster, perhaps caused by the new skin- take a look at this discussion and see if you can help. The competition has continued to tick over well with minimal need for judge intervention, so thank you to everyone making that possible. Good luck to all! If you wish to start receiving or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn, Fox and The ed17 20:49, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

Collapse...

Please see this suggestion. Assuming Slim agrees, are you ok with it? --Stephan Schulz (talk) 23:55, 31 May 2010 (UTC)

Moot. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 00:07, 1 June 2010 (UTC)

The Gore Effect AfD

You previously commented on Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:Marknutley/The Gore Effect (2nd nomination). A new version of the article has been created in article space at The Gore Effect and has been nominated for deletion. If you have any views on this, please feel free to comment at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/The Gore Effect. -- ChrisO (talk) 08:11, 9 June 2010 (UTC)

Estimates

Well, they are, in fact, estimates, in the same way that int num = random.Next(12450.78); is an estimate of the shortest distance in miles from me to any other person on the globe. It's not a very good estimate, but it's an estimate. Hipocrite (talk) 14:35, 9 June 2010 (UTC)

Objections to evolution

Do you think its ready? And if so would you like to co-nominate? - RoyBoy 03:26, 10 June 2010 (UTC)

Not while there's an editor taking issue with the neutrality of the article. Better to let that issue run its course first. Guettarda (talk) 03:33, 10 June 2010 (UTC)

Reverts

[1] Please clearly mark your reverts. And why have you put a BLP tag on an article which is not a blp per talk here [2] and here [3] mark nutley (talk) 19:56, 14 June 2010 (UTC)

Sorry, I had no idea how that happened. Probably related to the e/c. Though, of course, given the past edits, it's appropriate, and you really should stop removing it. Had I realised you removed it, I would have reminded you that someone under probation about adding references to articles is probably not the best person to make such a about something like that. Guettarda (talk) 20:00, 14 June 2010 (UTC)

Dembski

Hello, Guettarda. You have new messages at EBY3221's talk page.
You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

"pretending that publicly available info was somehow secret"

What are you talking about? I politely asked him a question about his history of socking, which he has freely acknowledged. Please retract your bad faith assumption. ATren (talk) 19:56, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

No, you didn't "politely ask" - you repeatedly hounded him. That might be justifiable if you thought he was hiding something (not OK, but perhaps justifiable). So the only way to assume good faith on your part would be to assume that you were asking about something that wasn't publicly available. Anyone assuming good faith on your part, as I'm sure Lar did, would be misled into thinking that you were talking about something that was secret. If you were talking about this, then you created the impression that something easily accessible though a search was secret. Or are you talking about something else? Guettarda (talk) 20:07, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

"Hounded?" I asked him a question, he said he'd respond to "functionaries" by email. Not knowing what he meant by "functionaries", I emailed him, he didn't respond. I notified him of the email, he said he'd ignored it. So I asked him a different set of questions on his page, and he responded, with a blunt request for me not to edit his talk page anymore, so I haven't. End of story.

Regarding what I was talking about -- I was referring to his disclosed socks, which he'd referenced in recent discussions. I looked on his userpage, found no note of it, so I poked around history a bit, and didn't find it. Is it so unreasonable for me to ask him a simple direct question rather than dredge through five years of edits? None of this is out of bounds, you know it, and your response is uncalled for. The section is closed, so I consider this matter closed, but please be more careful in the future. ATren (talk) 20:16, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

Yep, hounding. Demanding that he list all other accounts? And when he declined, badgering him at least 3 more times (email, prod on his talk page about the email, and then a long list of questions). Yeah, hounding.

Beyond that though, people are expected to show a reasonable amount of initiative to figure things out for themselves before badgering others to do their homework for them. It's not unreasonable to expect someone to know what functionaries are. And if you don't know - well, you could always try WP:Functionaries. It's not like someone is asking you to "dredge through" every page on Wikipedia. And there's a search engine for Wikipedia too. It takes less effort to "dredge through" search results than it does to badger another editor. Guettarda (talk) 20:42, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

There is nothing wrong with asking another editor first. And FWIW, I asked him a different question the second time. In fact, addressing the editor personally and politely before seeking help elsewhere is encouraged. You're criticisms are groundless. This will be my last comment on this here, but if you continue to make these accusations I will escalate. ATren (talk) 20:52, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

I'm sorry that you feel that way but no, you were not "polite", and yes, if you don't know a common term like "functionaries" and can't be bothered to look it up, you have no right to blame other people. You may believe that other people are obliged to answer the questions you can't be bothered to look up for yourself. But that doesn't make it so. Guettarda (talk) 22:30, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

Please note

Wikipedia talk:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Climate change/Workshop#Discuss proposals, not content ~ Amory (u • t • c) 19:21, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

Climate change arbitration

Hi, I have requested that your name be added to the list of involved editors in the climate change arbitration case, as you have been a major editor in the topic area. --JN466 14:56, 24 June 2010 (UTC)

Why? Because you don't believe the committee when they say Preparation of a formal list of "parties to the case" will not be required. In previous cases of this complexity, extensive discussion about who is or is not or should be or should not be a party has often become the focus of controversy, sometimes to the detriment of the parties' focusing on the merits of the case itself. As long as all editors whose conduct is being reviewed are notified of the case, and the decision makes it clear which editors are affected by any sanctions, it does not ultimately matter whether a given editor was formally named as a "party" or not.? If you don't trust the committee to stand by its word, I don't see what you expect to gain by adding that. Weird... Guettarda (talk) 15:01, 24 June 2010 (UTC)

Hide the decline video

Dunno if it's gone or not. My browser doesn't support that. But Newsbusters supposedly embeds it. They're also "kind" enough to post the lyrics. -Atmoz (talk) 15:41, 27 June 2010 (UTC)

Looks like it's gone. The embedded video says that the video has been removed, and if you look up M4GW's channel on YouTube, they have a "Hide the Decline II" video among their uploads, but not the first one. Guettarda (talk) 15:48, 27 June 2010 (UTC)

Well, we have an article about a video that no longer exists that at one point claimed that a scientist made up data and advocated he be sent to prison. But it's okay since Watts thought it was funny. -Atmoz (talk) 15:53, 27 June 2010 (UTC)

If you put it like that, it's an indisputable "keep". Well then, I'm off to vote. Guettarda (talk) 16:06, 27 June 2010 (UTC)

Climate change moving to Workshop

This Arbitration case is now moving into the Workshop phase. Please read Wikipedia:Arbitration/Guide to arbitration#Workshop to understand the process. Editors should avoid adding to their evidence sections outside of slight tweaks to aid in understanding; large-scale additions should not be made. Many proposals have already been made and there has already been extensive discussion on them, so please keep the Arbitrators' procedures in mind, namely to keep "workshop proposals as concise as reasonably possible." Workshop proposals should be relevant and based on already provided evidence; evidence masquerading as proposals will likely be ignored. ~ Amory (u • t • c) 20:37, 28 June 2010 (UTC)

I mentioned you on the ArbCom CC case workship page

here [4]. It involved me alleging you committed some misconduct, but I said I didn't see enough of it to make your behavior worth an ArbCom sanction. Others (including ArbCom) may disagree, and you should know it's there in any event. -- JohnWBarber (talk) 01:04, 30 June 2010 (UTC)

WikiCup 2010 June newsletter

We're half way through 2010, and the end of the WikiCup is in sight! Round 3 is over, and we're down to our final 16. Our pool winners were Ian Rose (submissions) (A), Sturmvogel_66 (submissions) (B, and the round's overall leader), ThinkBlue (submissions) (C) Casliber (submissions) and TonyTheTiger (submissions) (D, joint), but, with the scores reset, everything is to play for in our last pooled round. The pools will be up before midnight tonight, and have been selected randomly by J Milburn. This will be the toughest round yet, and so, as ever, anything you worry may not receive the necessary attention before the end of the round (such as outstanding GA or FA nominations) is welcome at Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews, and please remember to continue offering reviews yourself where possible. As always, the judges are available to contact via email, IRC or their talk pages, and general discussion about the Cup is welcome on the WikiCup talk page.

Though unaffiliated with the WikiCup, July sees the third Great Wikipedia Dramaout- a project with not dissimilar goals to the WikiCup. Everyone is welcome to take part and do their bit to contribute to the encyclopedia itself.

If you're interested in the scores for the last round of the Cup, please take a look at Wikipedia:WikiCup/History/2010/Round 3 and Wikipedia:WikiCup/History/2010/Full/Round 3. Our thanks go to Stone (submissions) for compiling these. As was predicted, Group C ended up the "Group of Death", with 670 points required for second place, and, therefore, automatic promotion. This round will probably be even tougher- again, the top two from each of the two groups will make it through, while the twelve remaining participants will compete for four wildcard places- good luck everyone! If you wish to start receiving or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn, Fox and The ed17

If you have a couple minutes...

Wikipedia:Featured list removal candidates/List of Testudines families/archive1 needs a few fixes (see The Rambling Man's comments). If you get the chance, can you take a quick peek? Thanks, Dabomb87 (talk) 20:02, 1 July 2010 (UTC)

Please retract

Guettarda, this is incorrect on multiple counts, as I describe in my reply. I am requesting that you retract it. ATren (talk) 20:22, 14 July 2010 (UTC)

I'm curious - are you saying that you reverted an edit you didn't understand, without bothering to educate yourself about the topic? That would appear to be highly disruptive. Guettarda (talk) 01:47, 15 July 2010 (UTC)

AfD nomination of Jonathan Wells (intelligent design advocate)

An article that you have been involved in editing, Jonathan Wells (intelligent design advocate), has been listed for deletion. If you are interested in the deletion discussion, please participate by adding your comments at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Jonathan Wells (intelligent design advocate). Thank you.

Please contact me if you're unsure why you received this message. Wolfview (talk) 12:17, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

WikiCup 2010 July newsletter

We are half-way through our penultimate round, and nothing is yet certain. Pool A, currently led by Sasata (submissions) has ended up the more competitive, with three contestants ( Sasata (submissions), Sturmvogel_66 (submissions) and TonyTheTiger (submissions)) scoring over 500 points already. Pool B is led by Casliber (submissions), who has also scored well over 500. The top two from each pool, as well as the next four highest scorers regardless of pool, will make it through to our final eight. As ever, anything you worry may not receive the necessary attention before the end of the round (such as outstanding GA or FA nominations) is welcome at Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews, and please remember to continue offering reviews yourself where possible. As always, the judges are available to contact via email, IRC or their talk pages, and general discussion about the Cup is welcome on the WikiCup talk page.

Planning has begun for the 2011 WikiCup, with open discussions concerning scoring and flags for next year's competition. Contributions to those discussions would be appreciated, especially concerning the flags, as next year's signups cannot begin until the flag issue has been resolved. Signups will hopefully open at some point in this round, with discussion about possible changing in the scoring/process opening some time afterwards.

Earlier this round, we said goodbye to Hunter Kahn (submissions), who has bowed out to spend more time on the book he is authoring with his wife. We wish him all the best. In other news, the start of this round also saw some WikiCup awards sent out by Suomi Finland 2009 (submissions). We appreciate his enthusiasm, and contestants are of course welcome to award each other prizes as they see fit, but rest assured that we will be sending out "official" awards at the end of the competition. If you wish to start receiving or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn, Fox and The ed17 22:39, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

I know it's summer...

...but stay cool. If you know what I mean. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 14:30, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

105 °F (41 °C) and humid today. Yeah, thanks. No worries, it's not even on my watchlist. Guettarda (talk) 14:51, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

Speech

This humble servant would like to share this speech made before the Commission of the Latino American Museum, with his friends: http://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=423585291337 Tony the Marine (talk) 23:48, 12 August 2010 (UTC)

A request

I have a request, can you please delete everything I have in the view history here, here, here and here, and there's quite a lot things. I'm very sorry for that and I do not want that to be there. If you could just delete it or completely erase the view history, I will be very grateful to you. Thank you. Corey.7.11.1992 7:20, August 26, 2010 (UTC)

RfC: Partisan sources

I have proposed an edit for the mainspace of an important Wikipedia policy, the Wikipedia:Identifying reliable sources policy. Essentially, I believe that some sources are so partisan that using them as "reliable sources" invites more problems than they're really worth. You've previously participated in the RfC on this subject, or another related discussion indicating that you are interested in this important policy area. Please indicate here whether you support or oppose the proposed edit. The original discussion is here. Thanks. Phoenix and Winslow (talk) 02:03, 29 August 2010 (UTC)

Wisteria floribunda

Hi Guettarda, in case this isn't on your watchlist at present; and in case it hasn't already been reverted by the time you see this...:

I noticed this edit, and wanted to find out from a biologist (I'm not a biologist) who has made at least one edit on it, if it is legit information. As a non-biologist, some of the terminology used looks iffy to me—But what do I know? Please take a look. Thanks, Hamamelis (talk) 09:26, 31 August 2010 (UTC)

WikiCup 2010 August newsletter

We have our final eight! The best of luck to those who remain. A bumper newsletter this week as we start our home straight.

• Pool A's winner was Sturmvogel_66 (submissions). Awarded the top score overall this round, Sturmvogel_66 writes primarily on military history, favouring Naval warfare.
• Pool B's winner was Casliber (submissions). Awarded the top score for featured articles this round, Casliber writes primarily on natural sciences, especially botany and ornithology.
• Pool A's close second was Sasata (submissions). Awarded the top score for featured pictures this round, Sasata writes primarily on natural sciences, favouring mycology.
• Pool B's close second was ThinkBlue (submissions). Awarded the top score for good articles and topics this round, ThinkBlue primarily writes content related to television and film, including 30 Rock.
• The first wildcard was TonyTheTiger (submissions). Awarded the top score for did you knows and valued pictures this round, TonyTheTiger writes on a number of topics, including baseball, American football and Chicago.
• The second wildcard was White Shadows (submissions). Someone who has helped the Cup behind the scenes all year, White Shadows said "I'm still in shock that I made it this far" and writes primarily on Naval warfare, especially U-boats.
• The third wildcard was Staxringold (submissions). Awarded the top score for featured lists and topics this round, Staxringold primarily writes on sport and television, including baseball and 30 Rock.
• The fourth wildcard was William S. Saturn (submissions). Entering the final eight only on the final day of the round, William S. Saturn writes on a number of topics, mostly related to Texas.

We say goodbye to the six who fell at the final hurdle. Geschichte (submissions) only just missed out on a place in the final eight. Resolute (submissions) was not far behind. Candlewicke (submissions) was awarded top points for in the news this round. Gary King (submissions) contributed a variety of did you know articles. Suomi Finland 2009 (submissions) said "I'm surprised to have survived so far into the competition", but was extactic to see Finland in the semi-finals. Arsenikk (submissions) did not score this round, but has scored highly in previous rounds. We also say goodbye to Ian Rose (submissions), who withdrew earlier this month after spending six weeks overseas. Anyone interested in this round's results can see them here and here. Thank you to Stone (submissions) for these.

Signups for next year's competition are now open. Planning is ongoing, with a key discussion about judges for next year open. Discussion about how next year's scoring will work is ongoing, and thoughts are more than welcome at Wikipedia talk:WikiCup/Scoring. Also, TonyTheTiger is compiling some information and statistics on the finalists here- the final eight are encouraged to add themselves to the list.

Our final eight will play it out for two months, after which we will know 2010's WikiCup winner, and a variety of prizes will be awarded. As ever, anything you worry may not receive the necessary attention before the end of the round (such as outstanding GA or FA nominations) is welcome at Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews, and please remember to continue offering reviews yourself where possible. As always, the judges are available to contact via email, IRC or their talk pages, and general discussion about the Cup is welcome on the WikiCup talk page.If you wish to start receiving or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn, Fox and The ed17 23:10, 31 August 2010 (UTC)

Common names

I would like to work on the common names article without creating World War 3 and would greatly value your input on this page please? Granitethighs 22:17, 3 September 2010 (UTC)

Climate change exaggeration

Climate change exaggeration was a red link until today. (see history) It should have been deleted as recreation of deleted content: see Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Climate change exaggeration. Moving to user space was an option.

I again ask you to delete and salt the redirect and tell the crowd at Wikipedia talk:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Climate change/Proposed decision#ScienceApologist redirect of new CC article that they can stop arguing. -- Petri Krohn (talk) 13:28, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

I read your response and it makes sense. I do however suggest that you protect the redirect to prevent recreation of deleted content. -- Petri Krohn (talk) 14:22, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

the Public Policy Initiative Assessment Team wants You!

Hi Guettarda, I got your name from the Editorial Team participant list, and wanted to tell you that we will be testing out assessment metrics in the Wikiproject: United States Public Policy, and I was hoping you would be interested in assessing articles with the Public Policy Initiative. There is more info about assessment on the 9/13/2010 Signpost. If you're interested or just curious you can sign up on the project page or just contact me. Thanks! ARoth (Public Policy Initiative) (talk) 22:28, 16 September 2010 (UTC)

Re: Coatracking

The problem here is that it's almost impossible to write a biography of a scientist that doesn't end up being a coatrack of one sort or another.

I'm not sure if that's what you meant to say. I've written and contributed to many scientist bios, and I don't think any of them are coatracks. Take a look at Thomas D. Brock for an example. Viriditas (talk) 01:34, 20 September 2010 (UTC)

Sorry for the delay in responding. "Coatrack" might be a little hyperbole, but yes, the Brock article does suffer from some of these problems. I didn't know enough about Brock, so I had to do some digging.

The part of Brock's work that receives the most coverage in the article is his discovery of T. aquiticus and its role in PCR. The problem here is that the relationship runs the wrong way - Brock's discovery was important to the discovery of Taq, but the discovery of Taq and PCR weren't really key elements of Brock's intellectual contribution. Brock is more important to PCR than PCR is to Brock. While there isn't an awful lot about Taq and PCR in the article, there isn't an awful lot in the article.

The info about T. aquaticus and PCR should be in the article. It's important. But it's overweighted. And will be overweighted unless someone writes a book-length bio of Brock. That's the problem - we can only write what sources say, and sources tend not to do a very good job of weighing someone's contribution to their field. At least not while they're still active.

To explain what I mean a little better - I looked through Brock's pubs on Web of Science (came up with 214, not certain all are by him, but most are). He has 13 papers that are cited more than 100 times; two of them are mentioned in the article - the discovery of T. aquaticus (cited 365 times) and the 1985 Science paper "Life at high temperature" (cited 151 times). There's no mention of his top cited paper on the discovery of Sulfolobus (Brock TD, Brock KM, Belly RT, Weiss RL (1972). "Sulfolobus: a new genus of sulfur-oxidizing bacteria living at low pH and high temperature". Arch. Mikrobiol. 84 (1): 54–68. doi:10.1007/BF00408082. PMID 4559703.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)) which is cited am amazing 594 times. Nor is there mention of his work on the discovery of Filipin (that paper's only cited a modest 61 times).

Just looking through these top 13 papers there is a good bit of work on anaerobic microbiology (sulphur reducing bacteria, anaerobic methane oxidation) and a good bit on cyanobacteria and algal photosynthesis (including a 1981 paper in Ecological Modelling on "Calculating solar radiation for ecological studies" which is cited 146 times). Now, while it's easy enough to skim his contributions and come up with a sense of his contributions, that runs a huge risk of OR. But if we write based on sources, even in the case of someone like this who's really known for his science, not his politics, the end product is slanted. Because the sources are liked to be slanted, likely to be interested in not so much the totality of someone's contribution, but rather, the way that person's contribution links to what they're interested in talking about. Guettarda (talk) 14:49, 21 September 2010 (UTC)

But none of this is coatracking, Guettarda. I understand and acknowledge your points, but you must also look at the secondary sources about Brock to see that he is most known for his discovery of T. aquiticus and its role in the development of PCR. A good example of coatracking would be if I was to try and take the issue of intellectual property, and discuss it in terms of Brock's discovery, and the profit that was reaped from applying T. aquiticus to PCR. Did Yellowstone see any of this money? No, but Brock's article isn't the place to discuss that issue. That's an example of coatracking. Viriditas (talk) 03:10, 25 September 2010 (UTC)

Disinterested

The Shorter Oxford seems to suggest that the main meaning discussed in Webster is considered obsolete in British usage, and that disinterested is "now always" used in the sense of "Unbiased by personal interest." The usage with the sense of "uninterested" used to be marked as "? Obs" (probably obsolete) and the update section of my 1988 reprint of the Shorter Oxford deletes that "? Obs" annotation and indicates that this usage is now considered to be a loose or imprecise usage.

In view of the differing and shifting usages it's as well to use another word. --TS 12:19, 24 September 2010 (UTC)

Independent review

Hi, nothing has happened at this article for about 6 weeks. Perhaps time to move/merge/delete it? --Crusio (talk) 11:02, 29 September 2010 (UTC)

Yes, most definitely. Guettarda (talk) 11:36, 29 September 2010 (UTC)

Note

Responding to off-topic discussions in any way only encourages them, so it would be helpful to refrain no matter how good your intentions.[5] Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 18:08, 30 September 2010 (UTC)

WikiCup 2010 September newsletter

We are half-way through our final round, entering the home straight. TonyTheTiger (submissions) leads at the time of writing with 1180 points, immediately followed by Sasata (submissions) with 1175 points. Sturmvogel_66 (submissions) closely follows in third place with 1100 points. For those who are interested, data about the finalists has been compiled at Wikipedia:WikiCup/History/2010/finalists, while a list of content submitted by all WikiCup contestants prior to this round has been compiled at Wikipedia:WikiCup/History/2010/Submissions. As ever, anything contestants worry may not receive the necessary attention before the end of the round (such as outstanding GA or FA nominations) is welcome at Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews, and please remember to continue offering reviews yourself where possible. As always, the judges are available to contact via email, IRC or their talk pages, and general discussion about the Cup is welcome on the WikiCup talk page.

Despite controversy, the WikiCup remains open. Signups for next year's competition are more than welcome, and suggestions for how next year's competition will work are appreciated at Wikipedia talk:WikiCup/Scoring. More general comments and discussions should be directed at the WikiCup talk page. One month remains in the 2010 WikiCup, after which we will know our champion. Good luck everyone! If you wish to start receiving or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn, Fox and The ed17 23:04, 30 September 2010 (UTC)

I never understood why they have these bots doing mass deliveries of great slabs of text to talk pages all the time. Wouldn't it be more economical to post a link to the notice so people who want to read it can go there? User talk pages wouldn't get so cluttered up that way. --TS 23:10, 30 September 2010 (UTC)

Actually I care almost enough to skim it. TTT's in the lead, followed by Sasata. Would never bother to click a link. Though I only get this newsletter because (a) it's quarterly (iirc), and (b) it's not annoying enough to unsubscribe. That said, I would never subscribe to the Signpost, even though I do care enough to read it. But delivery to everyone else spams my watchlist, I don't need to subscribe.

As for clutter on talk pages - long, long talk pages are a way of saying that you're too cool to archive your pages, you're above this silliness that is the social side of Wikipedia. :) Guettarda (talk) 23:27, 30 September 2010 (UTC)

Triniiii

Nice! Do you live in Trinidad? I'm living in America, family moved here when I was 6 years old. So I'm more Americanized than Trinidadian (sadly). I want to go back to Trini one day, especially for the food. Its unmatched by any other food I've tasted here...

Are you familiar with the trini YouTube comedian, "Buhwamoder"?

http://www.youtube.com/Buhwamoder

Avindra talk / contribs 03:25, 4 October 2010 (UTC)

Offtopic, but thanks for the clarification at TS's page. I was gradually working that out, it felt unbearably tedious to put together diffs and it does seem to be working out. Of more immediate concern, KDP's suggested voluntary agreement seems to have been stalled by Risker being too busy, and is now rather urgent, have made a suggestion. Your thoughts on this would be appreciated. Thanks, dave souza, talk 22:57, 9 October 2010 (UTC)

Re: Hi

Hi Guettarda -yes, I'm back, though not as active as I used to be (at least, I try not to be!). It's good to know I'm remembered :) I had a bad start to the year and left WP, but was laid up with a broken ankle for a while and came back to relieve a bit of boredom while I was stuck at home. I do need to wean myself off a bit again though. Hope things are fine with you in the Caribbean! Grutness...wha? 18:27, 9 October 2010 (UTC)

RFAR

Yes your right, my bad. There are alot of them. Im not suprised i got one or two mixed up. Many Thanks :) Seddon ^talk|^WikimediaUK 23:17, 9 October 2010 (UTC)

Ecology

I want to congratulate you on your work with ecology, a page where bafflegab needed serious, careful, countermeasures, which you are providing. Thanks! I've backed out one of your changes, though, because "The processes that influence ecological phenomena vary through space and time and are sensitive to the scale at which they are examined." is rather unfortunate wording. It's not the processes themselves that vary, but the perception of the processes that our tragically limited intellects impute. Back to you. Best regards, Nadiatalent (talk) 14:05, 11 October 2010 (UTC)

Thanks very much. And yes, I know that sentence had problems...my initial attempt at simplification dropped 'scale' all together, but it needed to be there. I realised after I re-introduced "scale" that the sentence no longer made sense. But it was bed time :)

User:Thompsma's re-write was a labour of love, but the writing style leaves some to be desired. After spending years wanting to re-write that article, but never being able to figure out how to start on something so massive, I really admire what he did. That said, I have strong opinions of my own about what should be in the article, how it should be presented, and how things should be weighted. Guettarda (talk) 15:56, 11 October 2010 (UTC)

Sounds excellent. As a non-specialist I've often found literature and text books about ecology to be unnecessarily dense. You're leading the way in public education. Nadiatalent (talk) 17:28, 11 October 2010 (UTC)

I believe it's a defensive mechanism. The accusation that ecology is a 'soft science' stings because it's gets at our own insecurities about our field. To make matters worse, you have people who see ecology as just common sense. Everyone sees nature, and to some extent, we all have an instinctive understanding of it. Using language that is inaccessible to the uninitiated allows you to hide behind a sense of false rigour. Or, as my brother once said, engineers won't take you seriously if they can understand you. Of course, in my opinion, if you want to impress on people how difficult a field ecology is, all you need to do is to communicate the complexity of it in simple language. They may doubt that anyone can do what you claim you're trying to do. But at least they won't dismiss it as common sense. Guettarda (talk) 17:55, 11 October 2010 (UTC)

The accusation that ecology is a 'soft science' is appalling. I've personally seen devastating results on a student who suffered the pressure to study medicine rather than ecology because medicine is 'hard' science. She most definitely should have followed her own inclination. Medicine is not for everyone.

I've taken two courses in ecology and don't expect to take any more. One of them was boring, and the other dreadful, but the dreadfulness was undoubtedly due more to the teachers than to the discipline. The boringness, however, is a quite interesting problem. I had the privilege to know a great ecologist, the late Robert L. Jeffries, and I felt that it would have been impossible for me to study with him because I didn't have enough background to know whether I was fully understanding what he wrote. He wrote difficult text in the usual style for ecology, so the effect was that I didn't know whether it was inherently boring, or whether I was misunderstanding it. In conversation, however, he was fascinating. He explained that it is still a puzzle without enough convincing evidence one way or the other, whether an ecosystem with high connectivity is more or less vulnerable than one with low connectivity. I've mentioned this to a few biologists at different times, all of whom have been surprised, even stunned, firstly that the answer isn't known, and secondly that ecologists dare to try to answer such an enormously important question. I think that what I'm trying to say is that ecologists might get more attention by leading with the huge questions, rather than with the gritty little ones like how many different ways can be devised to give an approximate measure of something, like leaf area of a forest.

If you want to send me a list of pages that you care a lot about, I could add them to my watch list. Can't promise to read anything critically, but I can look at matters arising from changes, or anything else that I do seem to have enough background to follow. Nadiatalent (talk) 21:01, 12 October 2010 (UTC)

Ping

Please check your e-mail. ScienceApologist (talk) 17:44, 12 October 2010 (UTC)

Christopher Monckton, 3rd Viscount Monckton of Brenchley

There's damned little discussion on the talk page of this article, but you and I and Dave Souza seem to be the only recent commenters who aren't about to be topic banned. Please take a look at my proposed content on climate change, which is very provisional. I've also notified Doc who is providing BLP guidance. --TS 21:10, 12 October 2010 (UTC)

Oh, now that all the disruptive editors are banned I'm sure that there will be a veritable flood of established editors interested in crafting a well-balanced, NPOV article. I think we should wait for them to come to the assistance of the article. Guettarda (talk) 04:40, 13 October 2010 (UTC)

The way I see it, the topic really isn't that hugely controversial; the on-site dynamics have made it appear much bigger and more hairy than it is. The most difficult articles are the biographies and we can probably clean those up without serious controversy now.

This is less like topics such as Eastern Europe or Palestine where there are endless supplies of partisans with sharply bifurcated views, more like a topic such as dog breeding where a few strong personalities warp space around them until arbcom removes them.

If you look at the headline article on global warming, it's actually very stable and the talk page seldom contains much more than fluff from casual readers who can't fathom why it doesn't read like a blog or doesn't contain the latest item of misreported news. That's what all of the topic should look like in six months time, except that most of the other articles get far less footfall so their talk pages and editing histories should be correspondingly smaller.

I don't think the kind of fractious personality who has been attracted to this topic can thrive well with discretionary sanctions in place. This time next year, if I'm right, we'll all be shrugging in amazement that the editing of these articles was ever considered controversial. Tasty monster (=TS ) 06:58, 13 October 2010 (UTC)

I think you missed the sarcasm Tony. That's the problem with phone browsers, they don't all you to peek at links without clicking through. The claim was made by lots of people that WMC's behaviour was the thing that kept good editors away from the articles. Similarly, the arbcomm's chose to ban everyone who cares about these articles. Presumably they have a backup plan for when these articles stagnate?

With regards to Monckton's bio - I rather doubt anyone knows what his opinions really are. Doc and Off2riorob are advancing a position that's based on a false premise - the premise that these people have a coherent position that can be presented. In almost every case, there's no such thing. So what's left to do? (A) "That's the case because I say so"? (B) "We will reconvene in two months after you have learned enough about the topic that we can have a conversation"? Either approach is a recipe for an argument. Not the first time I've found myself stuck like this. Could write an article on global warming skepticism and point them to it. But that would just be a combination of (A) and (B), with the added problem of dealing with people calling it OR and SYNTH.

Anyway, I trust that the arbcomm has a plan to solve these problems. It's somewhere in the PD. I'm sure it is. Guettarda (talk) 20:49, 13 October 2010 (UTC)

I was well aware of the link to the "cargo cult" article. My opinion differs from yours, I think, in that I see no reason for pessimism (on the contrary I can be quite a little Pollyanna!) I don't think the articles are likely to stagnate.

I also disagree on Monckton, a little bit. His views are coherent in the sense that they all tend to support his overarching conspiracy theory, and also in the sense that they "hang together" with an internal logic.

It's likely that a good critique of the consistency of Monckton's views could be made. After all that's a very important tool in science, showing that some of an opponent's views lead to a contradiction or that he hasn't accounted for universally accepted facts that would tend to invalidate them. However I don't think you simply mean that. Monckton's views appear to be coherent enough to enable him to present them to naive or like-minded lay audiences in a way that impresses and instils severe doubts about climate science. Tasty monster (=TS ) 00:41, 14 October 2010 (UTC)

GJP

Thanks for yr note on GJP, which I've answered on my talk page. Seems to me the whole thing is pretty complicated and messy, and that if people want to deal with it they should deal directly with the big kahunas who run Wikipedia, while small fry like myself can go back editing articles on el trains. ScottyBerg (talk) 22:31, 14 October 2010 (UTC)

Main page appearance

Hello! This is a note to let the main editors of this article know that it will be appearing as the main page featured article on November 3, 2010. You can view the TFA blurb at Wikipedia:Today's featured article/November 3, 2010. If you think that it is necessary to change the main date, you can request it with the featured article director, Raul654 (talk · contribs). If this article needs any attention or maintenance, it would be preferable if that could be done before its appearance on the Main Page so Wikipedia doesn't look bad. :D Thanks! Tbhotch^{Talk C.} 04:34, 26 October 2010 (UTC)

Ficus aurea is a tree in the family Moraceae that is native to Florida, the northern and western Caribbean, southern Mexico and Central America south to Panama. The specific epithet aurea was coined by English botanist Thomas Nuttall who described the species in 1846; older names applied to this species have been ruled invalid. Ficus aurea is a strangler fig; seed germination usually takes place in the canopy of a host tree and the seedling lives as an epiphyte until its roots establish contact with the ground. It then enlarges and strangles its host, eventually becoming a freestanding tree in its own right. Individuals may reach 30 m (100 ft) in height. Like all figs, it has an obligate mutualism with fig wasps; figs are only pollinated by fig wasps, and fig wasps can only reproduce in fig flowers. The tree provides habitat, food and shelter for a host of tropical lifeforms including epiphytes in cloud forests and birds, mammals, reptiles and invertebrates. F. aurea is used in traditional medicine, for live fencing, as an ornamental and as a bonsai. (more...)

ethnicity

Do you still have an interest in this topic? If so, your views might help the discussion now occuring here Slrubenstein | Talk 12:48, 28 October 2010 (UTC)

WikiCup 2010 October newsletter

The 2010 WikiCup is over! It has been a long journey, but what has been achieved is impressive: combined, participants have produced over seventy featured articles, over five hundred good articles, over fifty featured lists, over one thousand one hundred "did you know" entries, in addition to various other pieces of recognised content. A full list (which has yet to be updated to reflect the scores in the final round) can be found here. Perhaps more importantly, we have our winner! The 2010 WikiCup champion is Sturmvogel_66 (submissions), with an unbelievable 4220 points in the final round. Second place goes to TonyTheTiger (submissions), with 2260, and third to Casliber (submissions), with 560. Congratulations to our other four finalists – White Shadows (submissions), William S. Saturn (submissions), Staxringold (submissions) and ThinkBlue (submissions). Also, congratulations to Sasata (submissions), who withdrew from the competition with an impressive 2685 points earlier in this round.

Prizes will also be going to those who claimed the most points for different types of content in a single round. It was decided that the prizes would be awarded for those with the highest in a round, rather than overall, so that the finalists did not have an unfair advantage. Winning the featured article prize is Casliber (submissions), for five featured articles in round 4. Winning the good article prize is Sturmvogel_66 (submissions), for eighty-one good articles in round 5. Winning the featured list prize is Staxringold (submissions), for six featured lists in round 1. Winning the picture and sound award is Jujutacular (submissions), for four featured pictures in round 3. Winning the topic award is Sturmvogel_66 (submissions), for forty-seven articles in various good topics in round 5. Winning the "did you know" award is TonyTheTiger (submissions), for over one hundred did you knows is round 5. Finally, winning the in the news award is Candlewicke (submissions), for nineteen articles in the news in round three.

The WikiCup has faced criticism in the last month – hopefully, we will take something positive from it and create a better contest for next year. Like Wikipedia itself, the Cup is a work in progress, and ideas for how it should work are more than welcome on the WikiCup talk page and on the scoring talk page. Also, people are more than welcome to sign up for next year's competition on the signup page. Well done and thank you to everyone involved – the Cup has been a pleasure to run, and we, as judges, have been proud to be a part of it. We hope that next year, however the Cup is working, and whoever is running it, it will be back, stronger and more popular than ever. Until then, goodbye and happy editing! If you wish to start receiving or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn, Fox and The ed17 03:06, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

WikiCup 2010 Ribbon of Participation

		The WikiCup 2010 Ribbon of Participation
		Awarded to Guettarda, for participation in the 2010 WikiCup. J Milburn, Fox and The ed17 08:57, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

It's raining thanks spam!

• Please pardon the intrusion. This tin of thanks spam is offered to everyone who commented or !voted (Support, Oppose or Neutral) on my recent RfA. I appreciate the fact that you care enough about the encyclopedia and its community to participate in this forum.
• There are a host of processes that further need community support, including content review (WP:GAN, WP:PR, WP:FAC, and WP:FAR). You can also consider becoming a Wikipedia Ambassador. If you have the requisite experience and knowledge, consider running for admin yourself!
• If you have any further comments, input or questions, please do feel free to drop a line to me on my talk page. I am open to all discussion. Thanks • Ling.Nut (talk) 02:22, 3 November 2010 (UTC)

Ficus aurea

Always nice to see a plant article on the main page. Well done! Melburnian (talk) 07:01, 3 November 2010 (UTC)

Yes, good job. Viriditas (talk) 07:14, 3 November 2010 (UTC)

Thanks :) Guettarda (talk) 02:52, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

BK

See Talk:Bounty_Killer. Cheers! :) BillMasen (talk) 17:56, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

Bounty Killer

Are you online? If so, can you please delete the Bounty Killer page so I can undo the move made by BillMasen? That is an unacceptably bold and erroneous move. I have CSD'd the redirect page. His comment about what WP policy is in general is a ludacris one and purely subjective. smooth0⁷0₇ (talk) 01:55, 17 November 2010 (UTC)

Re: Napsman

Hey who ever this may be. You guessed correct. I am a current Napsman in upper 6 at Naparima College as of Sept. 2010. Upon scrolling through some wikipedia pages over that past few weeks I decided to look up Naparima College and lo and behold I was astounded at the information available. Even though it may have been basic information, it was more that I had anticipated. Upon this I have taken it upon myself to use my advantage of being a current student at the school to update the article with the most current information that I have available along with some pictures. I am having difficulty though..at the moment with the names of the different buildings that have been on the school's campus in the past. If you can help me with this section of the article labelled as 'Campus' it would be greatly appreciated. May I assume that you yourself are a past 'Napsman'? KirtZJ (talk) 05:40, 17 November 2010 (UTC)

Happy Thanksgiving

Happy WHAT? It sure ain't happy for me!

Happy Thanksgiving Tony the Marine (talk), 25 November 2010

Merry Christmas

I'm wishing you a very Merry Christmas. I haven't spoken to you in a while but I hope everything is going well for you. A little Trini-Soca Parang tune for you. Play De Soca Parang -- CaribDigita (talk) 14:51, 25 December 2010 (UTC)

Thanks! And Merry Christmas to everyone else who watches this page! Guettarda (talk) 15:00, 25 December 2010 (UTC)

"Nice"

I realized that I hadn't heard from you in quite some time (ie, saw you on my watchlist), and I began to grow a little concerned whether you were still editing Wikipedia. Lo and behold, what do I find when I take a look at your contributions but you busily working away in the mainspace.

It's "nice" to know that I associated 'activity' on Wikipedia with 'showing up on the usual dramaspots'. Thanks for giving me a bit of a fresh perspective. Best, NW (Talk) 06:31, 31 December 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for noticing I was missing. I did pretty much quite editing between the close of the arbcomm case and the start of the Christmas vacation. In part because I was frustrated with Wikipedia, and in part because I had enough work to do that I had a hard time justifying the time I spent on Wikipedia. But yeah, editing is far more fun when you stick to the mainspace and avoid the drama spots (until and unless they land in your lap). That said, we need people with the stomach for those areas. I think. If everyone left them alone, would a handful of people run roughshod over the project, or would they just write policies that people ignored? Guettarda (talk) 15:55, 31 December 2010 (UTC)

Ellis Clarke

Hey ... I think the death of the man who oversaw the transition of T&T to a Republic - having been last Gov-Gen and then first President - belongs as an In the News item. I see you did a lot of fixing/cleaning, but I have no fricking clue how to get it on the ITN page .. even the instructions I found are about as clear as a pint of Guiness. (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 15:59, 31 December 2010 (UTC)

I think we're still a little short of Wikipedia:In_the_news#Deaths - specifically, they want "at least a paragraph of prose" about his death. I suppose we need to track down statements from important figures about his death. Beyond that, it's just a matter of posting a short blurb on Wikipedia:In the news/Candidates. Will get to work on it. (I was wondering about ITN last night, but I got side-tracked and never got back to it). Guettarda (talk) 17:48, 31 December 2010 (UTC)

Welcome to the 2011 WikiCup!

Hello, happy new year and welcome to the 2011 WikiCup! Your submissions' page can be found here and instructions of how to update the page can be found here and on the submissions' page itself. From the submissions' page, a bot will update the main scoresheet. Our rules have been very slightly updated from last year; the full rules can be found here. Please remember that you can only receive points for content on which you have done significant work in 2011; nominations of work from last year and "drive-by" nominations will not be awarded points. Signups are going to remain open through January, so if you know of anyone who would like to take part, please direct them to Wikipedia:WikiCup/2011 signups. The judges can be contacted on the WikiCup talk page, on their respective talk pages, or by email. Other than that, we will be in contact at the end of every month with the newsletter. If you want to stop or start receiving newsletters, please remove your name from or add your name to this list. Good luck! J Milburn and The ed17 12:57, 1 January 2011 (UTC)

Belated Happy New Year wishes!

It is so good to see you "back in the saddle". I always feel like my back is covered better on articles relating to Trinidad when you are on deck - thanks for that. I send you and yours warmest greetings from a very hot tropical Queensland and wish you all a healthy, productive and joy-filled year. Cheers, John Hill (talk) 11:42, 9 January 2011 (UTC)

Thanks John. And all the best to you as well! Guettarda (talk) 13:59, 10 January 2011 (UTC)

Use of administrator tools on climate change alarmism / denial pages

On the climate change alarmism talk page on the climate change denial talk page, you have shut down an ongoing discussion about improving one or both pages, with the comment "not the place to complain about other articles" and a soapboxing notice. On the alarmist page there are statements that could be categorized as complaining about the denial page, but there is also a rationale explaining why this was done. Do you find that rationale lacking in some way, or had you not noticed it? On the denial page, I can not find anything that implies any complaint about any other page.

Is there a Wikipedia policy saying we are not allowed to discuss whether another page on a similar topic handles a controversial issue better than the current page?

I would also be interested in which portion of the no soapboxing policy you believe has been violated and which participants you believe did the violating. If it was me, I would ask you to please follow http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Dispute_resolution#Discuss_with_the_other_party rather than using administrative tools to block a discussion about improving the page without any prior discussion. If someone who clearly wants to improve the page is, in good faith, in violation of a policy, shouldn't that person be told about the policy and given a chance to voluntarily change his behavior?

I would also ask you (without implying any wrongdoing or making any accusations) to please review whether you might possibly be using administrative tools in a content dispute where you are a party, given your long history of involvement in various content-related issues in the general area of AGW. Again, this request for a self-assessment in no way implies any wrongdoing on your part. Guy Macon 11:50, 10 January 2011 (UTC)

(a) I did not use admin tools. The logs are public, and as you can see, I have only used admin tools twice in the last 3 months - on Deforestation and on Guyana, both times to deal with excessive vandalism.[6] (b) I asked you here what your comments had to do with improving the article. You ignored my question. I asked again here. (c) there are statements that could be categorized as complaining about the denial page, but there is also a rationale explaining why this was done - what difference does that make? The talk page of the alarmism article exists to discuss improvements to that article. That's the only reason it exists.

Look at your comments on that page.

1. It seems to me that this page and Wwikipedia:Climate change denial describe two extreme ends of a spectrum of political opinions, and that some aspects the two articles should mirror each other. If we apply widely different standards to the two articles - especially if we label one as denigrating/insulting and not the other - it seems to me that we are allowing a non-neutral POV to creep in.[7]
   • To begin with, it's premise on the idea that the pages should mirror each other. Yet you reference no policy or guideline which says that they should. It's a general meta comment - there's no explanation of what you think was wrong with that page. It looks like a "WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS"-like argument.
   • You provide no evidence that widely different standards are being applied.
   • Nothing in there is actionable. Without explaining what you think is wrong with that article, there's no way anyone can do anything. And you have made no attempt to fix the problem yourself.
2. Yes. I have read both articles carefully. Is it your contention that climate change denial is about actions while climate change alarmism is not?[8]
   • Still nothing actionable, still a meta comparison. Not what that page is for.
3. ScottyBerg asked if you meant that there were POV problems with the alarmism article. Your response: No I didn't.[9]
   • That appears to be the end of the discussion. If you don't have a problem with the article, it's an inappropriate use of its talk page.
4. Finally, you respond with this. To begin with, it's far too similar to this, which suggests you are simply soapboxing. Setting that aside for the moment
   • Wikipedia:Climate change alarmism deals with a term that is widely considered to be an insult, especially by those who are labeled with the term.
     • To begin with, there's no such page. Why are you using the "Wikipedia:" prefix? Anyway, it's a general comment on the article, it proposes no change and details no shortcomings.
   • Wikipedia:Climate change denial deals with a term that is widely considered to be an insult, especially by those who are labeled with the term.
     • Irrelevant. Doesn't belong there.
   • The two pages are written according to completely different standards.
     • Irrelevant.
   • This difference show me that we (meaning Wikipedia as a whole) are allowing a non-neutral POV to creep in. Nobody has presented anything close to a good argument for treating the two subjects so differently. Mostly the issue is ignored and the subject changed, occasionally an attempt is made to claim that alarmists are good/excusable and denialists evil/inexcusable.
     • You've already said that you don't think the alarmism article suffers from this problem, so it's irrelevant.
   • It may be that Wikipedia:Climate change alarmism is perfect and Wwikipedia:Climate change denial is completely out of line. It is the different standards that are applied to the two pages that show that one or the other (or possibly both) have a POV problem.
   • It may be that Wikipedia:Climate change denial is perfect and Wikipedia:Climate change alarmism is completely out of line. It is the different standards that are applied to the two pages that show that one or the other (or possibly both) have a POV problem.
   • In my personal opinion (and I may be wrong) it is Wikipedia:Climate change denial that is out of line. I don't think I am wrong about the double standard, but I may be wrong about which page should be changed. Thus I have no specific changes to propose here. (Emphasis added)
     • The comment I bolded says it all. If you have no specific changes to propose, why are you on that page?
   • On the Wikipedia:Climate change denial there are several editors who think it is just fine the way it is, and have been vigorously defending that position, sometimes with battlefield tactics and a notable lack of assuming good faith. If they are right, then it is Wikipedia:Climate change alarmism needs to be changed so that the same standards are applied to both.
     • That isn't the place to complain about problems on another page. WP:3O and WP:RFC are.
   • It would be very rude and a clear violation of Wikipedia policies to come to the conclusion in point 8 above - on another talk page - and then just make major edits to Wikipedia:Climate change alarmism without any discussion on this talk page. Thus this discussion exists.
     • Puts the cart before the horse. If some sort of a discussion resulted in a conclusion that would impact that alarmism article, then a link to that conclusion could be used to explain changes. But policy is policy - you won't change policy through a discussion on the denial article. Guettarda (talk) 13:58, 10 January 2011 (UTC)

Re: "I did not use admin tools. The logs are public, and as you can see, I have only used admin tools twice in the last 3 months - on Deforestation and on Guyana, both times to deal with excessive vandalism", I am confused. Normally, I would have posted the following to the Comparison with Climate Change Denial page section of Talk: Talk:Climate change alarmism:

"Guettarda‎‎ made the following argument on his talk page: 'Puts the cart before the horse. If some sort of a discussion resulted in a conclusion that would impact that alarmism article, then a link to that conclusion could be used to explain changes' and referred me to WP:OSE. This convinced me that I should not have opened this discussion here, and that my rationale for doing so was flawed. I am withdrawing based upon his advice, and I thank him for clarifying the rules for me."

But, of course, there is a notice there that says "The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it", so I cannot post the above as I normally would.

If an ordinary editor had put up such a notice, I would have deleted it and referred that editor to [ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Dispute_resolution#Discuss_with_the_other_party ], but in this case the other editor is an Administrator. Whether or not putting up that notice is using administrative tools, it sure looks like something that I cannot treat the same way I could if a non-administrator put it up. Am I mistaken? Should I treat notices by administrators as I would notices by ordinary Wikipedia editors unless there is some extra wording saying that the notice is an official administrative act?

I am not trying to be difficult or engage in Wikilawyering here. I really do want to follow the guidelines, but I am confused as to how to properly do so.

I am also confused as to why [ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Dispute_resolution#Discuss_with_the_other_party ] does not apply here. If you had simply made the above rather compelling argument (preferably on my talk page) I would have immediately been convinced and would have closed the discussion. I am really not such a bad fellow, and I am completely open to being corrected, but you have to talk to me. It feels to me like everyone editing that is on a hair trigger because of things that happened long before I joined the discussion. Guy Macon 15:54, 12 January 2011 (UTC)

I made two attempts to discuss the issue with you: here, and here. Guettarda (talk) 16:15, 12 January 2011 (UTC)

Both of which I answered to the best of my ability. Then you cut off the conversation instead of following [ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Dispute_resolution#Discuss_with_the_other_party ] and discussing the issue further. And you have not answered the good-faith questions I asked above. Guy Macon 20:41, 12 January 2011 (UTC)

Answered? Not that I can tell. Which part of your responses did you intend to answer the question of what changes you proposing? Please use diffs. And note that diffs should not have spaced before them, while links to Wikipedia pages should not include full urls. Guettarda (talk) 21:11, 12 January 2011 (UTC)

It appears that you have no intention of answering my question, so I will do my best to answer it myself through my ow research, and treat your notice as I would one from any other ordinary editor. I am also unwatching this page. Guy Macon 04:16, 13 January 2011 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but I am utterly baffled. I tried to discuss the issue with you, but got no answer, and you ask me why I did not discuss the matter with you. As I explained to you, I did attempt to discuss the matter with you. I raised the matter twice. As far as I can determine, you did not respond to my attempts to discuss the matter with you. If it wasn't obvious, my response to your question of why I did not discuss the matter with you is: I tried, but you did not respond.

Now you claim that you did respond to me. As far as I can tell, you did nothing of the sort. That should have been obvious from what I said. Having carefully analysed every word of your comment, right here, on this very page, there's no point in making further attempts to parse what you are saying. So I asked that you show me what you mean. And your response is to storm off in a huff. OK. You have wasted far too much of my time already. Which, perhaps, was your intention to begin with. Guettarda (talk) 06:59, 13 January 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:WikiProject Creationism/Archive1

I've been doing some housekeeping on Wikipedia:WikiProject Creationism, and noticed this archive, created by yourself some 4 1/2 years ago. Given that (i) it's not generally Wikipedia's practice to archive non-talkpages & (ii) most of the information contained in it seems to be largely redundant, I was wondering if I could interest you in {{db-author}}ing it. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk^(P) 08:43, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Edit warring on James Tour

You're seriously edit warring to keep controversial BLP information in an article instead of discussing it first? --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 19:45, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Controversial? It has been tagged by the ID WikiProject since June 21, 2007 without a complaint. Guettarda (talk) 20:22, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Guettarda, keep your cool. Looks like they're trying to hit you full bore. We've heard from Lar and Cla68 today; when will LHvU show up? Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 23:26, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

A friend of mine once said, 'when people gossip about me behind my back, I become important in their lives. And me, and barely even know they exist'. The hilarious bit about this is that is that I'm trying to avoid whitewashing the creationist's views from the article. If I were a partisan, and "activist", I'd want to make sure that there was no association between Tour and ID. I suppose if you see everything as a battleground, you interpret everything through that lens. Sad really. Guettarda (talk) 02:28, 20 January 2011 (UTC)

Happy Birthday!

Thank you very much! Guettarda (talk) 01:11, 26 January 2011 (UTC)

WikiCup 2011 January newsletter

We are half way through round one of the WikiCup. Signups are now closed, and we have 129 listed competitors, 64 of whom will make it to round two. Congratulations to The Bushranger (submissions), who, at the time of writing, has a comfortable lead with 228 points, followed by Hurricanehink (submissions), with 144 points. Four others have over 100 points. Congratulations also go to Yellow Evan (submissions), who scored the first points in the competition, claiming for Talk:Hurricane King/GA1, Miyagawa (submissions), who scored the first non-review points in the competition, claiming for Dognapping, and Jarry1250 (submissions) who was the first in the competition to use our new "multiplier" mechanic (explanation), claiming for Grigory Potemkin, a subject covered on numerous Wikipedias. Thanks must also go to Jarry1250 for dealing with all bot work- without you, the competition wouldn't be happening!

A running total of claims can be seen here. However, numerous competitors are yet to score at all- please remember to submit content soon after it is promoted, so that the judges are able to review entries. The number of points that will be needed to reach round two is not clear- everyone needs to get their entries in now to guarantee their places! If you are concerned that your nomination will not receive the necessary reviews, and you hope to get it promoted before the end of the round, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews. However, please remember to continue to offer reviews at GAC, FAC and all the other pages that require them to prevent any backlogs which could otherwise be caused by the Cup. As ever, questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup and the judges are reachable on their talk pages, or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start receiving or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn and The ed17 22:34, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

Vote in WP:CRIC

There has been a issue in WT:CRIC that needs your vote. Thanks --ashwinikalantri ^talk 06:42, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia Ambassador Program

Hi Guettarda! In case you hadn't seen it much yet, I wanted to let you know about the Wikipedia Ambassador Program, and invite you to apply for the role of Online Ambassador. We're looking for friendly Wikipedians who are good at reviewing articles and giving feedback to serve as mentors for students who are assigned to write for Wikipedia in their classes. I'd think you'd make an excellent mentor.

If that sounds like you and you're interested, I encourage you to take a look at the Online Ambassador guidelines; the "mentorship process" describes roughly what will be expected of mentors during the current term, which started in January and goes through early May. If that's something you want to do, please apply!

You can find instructions for applying at WP:ONLINE.

Cheers--Sage Ross - Online Facilitator, Wikimedia Foundation (talk) 17:30, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Yeah, we've come a fair way with the other side as well. It's a bit of a mess right now (we'll be doing some better information architecture soon), but you can check out Wikipedia:Ambassadors/Resources#Course_and_assignment_design. And if you're interested in doing an assignment that's part of the Wikipedia Ambassador Program, let me know and we can talk about what makes sense for you.--Sage Ross - Online Facilitator, Wikimedia Foundation (talk) 18:02, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Berlinski

FYI, the IP in question based on the comments on the talk page appears to be banned User:Moulton. I've removed his comments on the talk page. It may make sense to block the IP address. JoshuaZ (talk) 03:01, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

Missed out on most of the excitement, I see. Thanks for seeing about that. How have you been? Enjoying the weather? Saw more snow in each of the last two snowstorms (and colder weather!) than I did the entire time I was in Michigan this Christmas - though, unlike most years, we stayed in eastern MI, not making it to Grand Rapids or Traverse City, which is where we usually see most of our MI snow. Guettarda (talk) 23:07, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

WikiCup 2011 February newsletter

So begins round two of the WikiCup! We now have eight pools, each with eight random contestants. This round will continue until the end of April, when the top two of each pool, as well as the next 16 highest scorers of those remaining, will make it to round three. Congratulations to The Bushranger (submissions) (first, with 487 points) and Hurricanehink (submissions) (second, with 459), who stormed the first round. Casliber (submissions) finished third with 223. Twelve others finished with over 100 points- well done to all of you! The final standings in round one can be seen here. A mere 8 points were required to reach round two; competition will no doubt be much more fierce this round, so be ready for a challenge! A special thanks goes, again, to Jarry1250 (submissions) for dealing with all bot work. This year's bot, as well as running smoothly, is doing some very helpful things that last year's did not. Also, thanks to Stone (submissions) for some helpful behind-the-scenes updating and number crunching.

Some news for those who are interested- March will see a GAN backlog elimination drive, which you are still free to join. Organised by WikiProject Good articles, the drive aims to minimise the GAN backlog and offers prizes to those who help out. Of course, you may well be able to claim WikiCup points for the articles you review as part of the drive. Also ongoing is the Great Backlog Drive, looking to work on clearing all of the backlogs on Wikipedia; again, incentives are offered, and the spirit of friendly competition is alive, while helping the encyclopedia is the ultimate aim. Though unrelated to the WikiCup, these may well be of interest to some of you.

Just a reminder of the rules; if you have done significant work on content this year and it is promoted in this round, you may claim for it. Also, anything that was promoted after the end of round one but before the beginning of round two may be claimed for in round two. Details of the rules can be found on this page. For those interested in statistics, a running total of claims can be seen here, and a very interesting table of that information (along with the highest scorers in each category) can be seen here. If you are concerned that your nomination will not receive the necessary reviews, and you hope to get it promoted before the end of the round, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews. However, please remember to continue to offer reviews at GAC, FAC and all the other pages that require them to prevent any backlogs which could otherwise be caused by the Cup. As ever, questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup and the judges are reachable on their talk pages, or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start receiving or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn and The ed17 23:43, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

WikiCup 2011 March newsletter

We are half way through round two of the WikiCup, which will end on 28 April. Of the 64 current contestants, 32 will make it through to the next round; the two highest in each pool, and the 16 next highest scorers. At the time of writing, our current overall leader is Hurricanehink (submissions) with 231 points, who leads Pool H. Piotrus (submissions) (Pool G) also has over 200 points, while 9 others (three of whom are in Pool D) have over 100 points. Remember that certain content (specifically, articles/portals included in at least 20 Wikipedias as of 31 December 2010 or articles which are considered "vital") is worth double points if promoted to good or featured status, or if it appears on the main page in the Did You Know column. There were some articles last round which were eligible for double points, but which were not claimed for. For more details, see Wikipedia:WikiCup/Scoring.

A running total of claims can be seen here. However, numerous competitors are yet to score at all- please remember to submit content soon after it is promoted, so that the judges are able to review entries. The number of points that will be needed to reach round three is not clear- everyone needs to get their entries in now to guarantee their places! If you are concerned that your nomination will not receive the necessary reviews, and you hope to get it promoted before the end of the round, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews. However, please remember to continue to offer reviews at GAC, FAC and all the other pages that require them to prevent any backlogs which could otherwise be caused by the Cup. As ever, questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup and the judges are reachable on their talk pages, or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start receiving or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn and The ed17 00:57, 1 April 2011 (UTC)

WikiCup 2011 April newsletter

Round 2 of the 2011 WikiCup is over, and the new round will begin on 1 May. Note that any points scored in the interim (that is, for content promoted or reviews completed on 29-30 April) can be claimed in the next round, but please do not start updating your submissions' pages until the next round has begun. Fewer than a quarter of our original contestants remain; 32 enter round 3, and, in two months' time, only 16 will progress to our penultimate round. Casliber (submissions), who led Pool F, was our round champion, with 411 points, while 7 contestants scored between 200 and 300 points. At the other end of the scale, a score of 41 was high enough to reach round 3; more than five times the score required to reach round 2, and competition will no doubt become tighter now we're approaching the later rounds. Those progressing to round 3 were spread fairly evenly across the pools; 4 progressed from each of pools A, B, E and H, while 3 progressed from both pools C and F. Pools D and G were the most successful; each had 5 contestants advancing.

This round saw our first good topic points this year; congratulations to Hurricanehink (submissions) and Nergaal (submissions) who also led pool H and pool B respectively. However, there remain content types for which no points have yet been scored; featured sounds, featured portals and featured topics. In addition to prizes for leaderboard positions, the WikiCup awards other prizes; for instance, last year, a prize was awarded to Candlewicke (submissions) (who has been eliminated) for his work on In The News. For this reason, working on more unusual content could be even more rewarding than usual!

Sorry this newsletter is going out a little earlier than expected- there is a busy weekend coming up! A running total of claims can be seen here. If you are concerned that your nomination will not receive the necessary reviews, and you hope to get it promoted before the end of the round, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews. However, please remember to continue to offer reviews at GAC, FAC and all the other pages that require them to prevent any backlogs which could otherwise be caused by the Cup. As ever, questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup and the judges are reachable on their talk pages, or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start receiving or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn and The ed17 19:20, 29 April 2011 (UTC)

Melicoccus bijugatus

Well pardon me, I thought I was correcting my omission by moving the information to the genus page. Nadiatalent (talk) 12:06, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

Which is why I posted a section on the talk page. It's very frustrating when people won't use them and i'm just sick to death of people reverting when a simple discussion could sort things out. One of many reasons why I barely edit any more. Figure at least on plant articles I could hope for a more polite standard. Guettarda (talk) 12:11, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

Please consider the possibility that I did not see your edit on the talk page. Please consider the possibility that a person might work through their watch list in chronological sequence. Signing off all pages where I see your edit tag. Nadiatalent (talk) 12:15, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

Sorry, really shitty day :( Guettarda (talk) 20:44, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, apology accepted. Nadiatalent (talk) 20:50, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

I've reported you here for no personal attacks

Feel free to disprove the charge. And no, accusing somebody of having "utter contempt for Wikipedia rules" isn't an example of a self-attack.Sleetman (talk) 23:31, 15 May 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for saving me the trouble of raising your conduct at ANI. Guettarda (talk) 23:36, 15 May 2011 (UTC)

Yeah, that ANI was lame. Talk about WP:BOOMERANG. OrangeMarlin ^{Talk• Contributions} 00:34, 16 May 2011 (UTC)

Jonathan Stephen

Although you voted to delete at this AFD [10], I hope that you will take another look now that I have added references to the article.I.Casaubon (talk) 22:24, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

Jeremy Taylor (writer)

This is a very curious AfD for me. I'm usually a bit of a hardliner when it comes to hewing as closely to the guidelines as possible, but I'm getting a general sense from what little I can see on GNews, AfD comments from well-respected editors, and the clear sincerity of the article's author, that it'd be very much to the project's benefit to find some sourcing for this article and see if it can't be kept. To that end, and having just read your last edit to the AfD, do you think this is something worth flagging for the Article Rescue Squadron's attention? I admit to having displayed what an ARS member might typify as "deletionist" tendencies in the past -- a description I disagree with -- so this is...certainly the first time I've considered flagging something for rescue. Do you have an opinion? ɠǀɳ̩ςεΝɡbomb 02:50, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

On one hand, it would be nice to see some more people trying to hunt down some references. On the other hand, I've seen ARS rescues turn into clashes of personality. I suppose I lean towards notifying them - if you think it might be helpful then, sure, please do. Guettarda (talk) 03:38, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

Aye, I decided against going the ARS route. That often seems to end up getting very heated. As I just indicated in the AfD, I reached out to DGG to see if he might have any luck digging up offline sourcing, and he's agreed to look into it. He did a great job finding sourcing for another recent AfD that ended in Keep (after looking a bit like a no-consensus), and he's obviously helped with a number of cases of borderline/questionable notability in the past (even if he's not someone with whom I always agree), and I think he's more likely to contribute strong, relevant sourcing than a full-on ARS parade. We'll see what he turns up. ɠǀɳ̩ςεΝɡbomb 14:24, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

WikiCup 2011 May newsletter

We're half way through round 3 of the 2011 WikiCup. There are currently 32 remaining in the competition, but only 16 will progress to our penultimate round. Casliber (submissions), of pool D, is our overall leader with nearly 200 points, while pools A, B and C are led by Racepacket (submissions), Hurricanehink (submissions) and Canada Hky (submissions) respectively. The score required to reach the next round is 35, though this will no doubt go up significantly as the round progresses. We have a good number of high scorers, but also a considerable number who are yet to score. Please remember to submit content soon after it is promoted, so that the judges are able to review entries. Also, an important note concerning nominations at featured article candidates: if you are nominating content for which you intend to claim WikiCup points, please make this clear in the nomination statement so that the FAC director and his delegates are aware of the fact.

A running total of claims can be seen here. If you are concerned that your nomination will not receive the necessary reviews, and you hope to get it promoted before the end of the round, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews. However, please remember to continue to offer reviews at GAC, FAC and all the other pages that require them to prevent any backlogs which could otherwise be caused by the Cup. As ever, questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup and the judges are reachable on their talk pages, or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start receiving or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn and The ed17 23:28, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

Watchlist Velocity

Thanks for this speedy vandalism revert. --Uncle Ed (talk) 18:33, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

You're welcome Ed. Guettarda (talk) 19:03, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

Ad hominem

I replied on my talk page, if you're interested. Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 06:04, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

TPG and the role of administrators

It's a wiki. Anyone is free to undo an edit. But no one has, suggesting my edit was good.
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
Guettarda, in this edit here [11] you have archived an active thread I was participating in with the statement, If you can't produce a source to support your claims, you're just soapboxing, which is an abuse to talk page. While that thread was arguably heading off topic, what is certain is that it is an abuse of talk page guidelines and your role as an administrator involved in the discussion to unilaterally archive a thread and demand discussions terminate on your terms. Would you be so kind as to undo this please? Alex Harvey (talk) 14:46, 28 June 2011 (UTC) Erh? There is nothing administrator specific about archiving a thread? And neither is there any "abuse of talk page guidelines" in doing so. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 16:09, 28 June 2011 (UTC) ...and, like on any thread (in say WP:ANI even), the discussion has gone beyond usefulness - or is discussing the topic, rather than discussing improving the article, it can be either be archived or in fact deleted in many cases. soapboxing should be deleted ratehr than hatted anyway. (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 16:20, 28 June 2011 (UTC) As I said below Alex - it's a wiki. The page in question isn't protected. Heck, it isn't even semi-protected. I wasn't using admin tools and I wasn't enforcing an AE decision. As an involved editor there is no way I would use admin tools on that page except maybe to clean up a cut-and-paste move. If you're accusing me of abusing my access to admin tools, I find your accusation baffling. Guettarda (talk) 20:31, 28 June 2011 (UTC) As for the very idea that there is some sort of " admin authoritah" - sorry, I don't believe in that myth. I'm an editor that the community decided, six years ago, wasn't likely to screw up the use of a few extra editing tools. No one elected me to any position of power or authority. Guettarda (talk) 20:48, 28 June 2011 (UTC) Your soapboxing accusation... -- at Talk:Hockey stick controversy‎ is, in my opinion, out of line. This started as an essay with serious suggestions for improving the article. I remarked in the essay that I would suport any suggestions added to the article with RS's. I later remarked that personal problems would seriously restrict my Wiki volunteer time for the foreseeable future. I invite you to remove the hatnote, and further remark that what I see as your (often) aggressive, abrasive editorial style doesn't help matters. --Pete Tillman (talk) 16:54, 28 June 2011 (UTC) (talk page stalker) ... you did note the conversation directly above this, right? (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 17:34, 28 June 2011 (UTC) It's a wiki. Don't like my edit - undo it. As for my "aggressive, abrasive editorial style" - Pete, I'm tired of your bullshit. OK. When you've gone more than a few days without abusing talk pages, then come and talk to me about my style. The problem here is the substance of your edits. Guettarda (talk) 20:29, 28 June 2011 (UTC) Guettarda, editors are not in fact allowed to revert other editor's talk page changes in the climate change area, as you know, just as you are not allowed to delete another editor's comments or archive conversations you don't like. This reminds me of that favourite tactic of another very disruptive, now topic banned, editor. I also don't appreciate your personal attacks in the talk page, and given that you are administrator, I'll be more than happy to report this if this bullying continues. Alex Harvey (talk) 15:13, 29 June 2011 (UTC) Umm, Alex, before you make up more claims, I'm still waiting on you to either provide a supporting diff for where I misused my admin tools, as you claimed in the previous section, or retract your accusations, per Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Climate_change#Casting_aspersions. Editors are not in fact allowed to revert other editor's talk page changes in the climate change area - after you have either provided supporting diffs, or retracted your claim, please provide a link to support this claim. I also don't appreciate your personal attacks - making false accusations of personal attacks is, itself, a personal attack. And I expect that you either support your accusations with diffs, or retract them. I'll be more than happy to report this if this bullying continues - rather amusing, given your string of apparently false accusations against me. Given your threats and bluster and your attempts to browbeat me on my talk page, I think "bullying" applies better to your actions than mine. Please WP:BOOMERANG. Note that until you either provide a supporting diff or retract your accusations, you are no longer welcome to post on this page. Guettarda (talk) 18:42, 29 June 2011 (UTC) Guettarda, mind WP:BAIT please. Also point #7 here is worth reflecting upon. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 01:48, 30 June 2011 (UTC) Thanks, Boris. Cheers, Pete Tillman (talk) 14:15, 30 June 2011 (UTC) Fascinating Pete. So you're admitting that you're only here to try to provoke me into doing something stupid? And here I was trying to figure out if there actually was a good-faith explanation for what you were doing. Guettarda (talk) 14:26, 30 June 2011 (UTC) Um. Perhaps read Boris's post again? And WP:AGF. Best, Pete Tillman (talk) 19:33, 30 June 2011 (UTC) Sorry, yep, you're right - Alex is the one who talked about personal attacks, not you. It's really not fair to Alex to confuse him with you. So, I see you aren't here to try to explain your use of Wikipedia to engage in character assassinations on identifiable living people. Then what the hell are you doing here? I figured from my comment above that people like you are not welcome here until they change their ways. I have no problem with standard issue POV pushers. Your behaviour though, I'm not willing to tolerate. Over a year ago I pointed out to you that your editing leaves a lot to be desired. In the interim I have seen no indication that you have made any attempt to improve your behaviour. Rather than turn over a new leaf, you have now escalated to using Wikipedia to smear Pachauri...and claim that you have the right to do so. As an eternal optimist about human behaviour I am willing to believe that you can reform. But given your track record, proof is needed. If you can go for an extended period without pushing unsourced claims, engaging in smears, and making false claims about sources, you're more than welcome here. Until such time though, you are not welcome on my talk page. Simple enough? Guettarda (talk) 21:33, 30 June 2011 (UTC) Observation: Based on his contribution history"Alex Harvey" appears to be a SPA intent on disrupting the climate change-topic area. He's done little else. Viriditas (talk) 23:45, 29 June 2011 (UTC) I decided to strike the last comment I made; perhaps Boris has a point. Alex Harvey (talk) 15:50, 1 July 2011 (UTC)

WikiCup 2011 June newsletter

We are half way through 2011, and entering the penultimate round of this year's WikiCup; the semi-finals are upon us! Points scored in the interim (29/30 June) may be counted towards next round, but please do not update your submissions' pages until the next round has begun. 16 contestants remain, and all have shown dedication to the project to reach this far. Our round leader was Casliber (submissions) who, among other things, successfully passed three articles through featured article candidates and claimed an impressive 29 articles at Did You Know, scoring 555 points. Casliber led pool D. Pool A was led by Wizardman (submissions), claiming points for a featured article, a featured list and seven good article reviews, while pool C was led by Eisfbnore (submissions), who claimed for two good articles, ten articles at Did You Know and four good article reviews. They scored 154 and 118 respectively. Pool B was by far our most competitive pool; six of the eight competitors made it through to round 4, with all of them scoring over 100 points. The pool was led by Hurricanehink (submissions), who claimed for, among other things, three featured articles and five good articles. In addition to the four pool leaders, 12 others (the four second places, and the 8 next highest overall) make up our final 16. The lowest scorer who reached round 4 scored 76 points; a significant increase on the 41 needed to reach round 3. Eight of our semi-finalists scored at least twice as much as this.

No points were awarded this round for featured pictures, good topics or In the News, and no points have been awarded in the whole competition for featured topics, featured portals or featured sounds. Instead, the highest percentage of points has come from good articles. Featured articles, despite their high point cost, are low in number, and so, overall, share a comparable number of points with Did You Know, which are high in number but low in cost. A comparatively small but still considerable number of points come from featured lists and good article reviews, rounding out this round's overall scores.

We would again like to thank Jarry1250 (submissions) and Stone (submissions) for invaluable background work, as well as all of those helping to provide reviews for the articles listed on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews. Please do keep using it, and please do help by providing reviews for the articles listed there. However, please remember to continue to offer reviews generally at GAC, FAC and all the other pages that require them to prevent any backlogs which could otherwise be caused by the Cup.

Two final notes: Firstly, please remember to state your participation in the WikiCup when nominating articles at FAC. Finally, some WikiCup-related statistics can be seen here and here, for those interested, though it appears that neither are completely accurate at this time. As ever, questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup and the judges are reachable on their talk pages, or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start receiving or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn and The ed17 23:32, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

Something caught my eye

This edit [12] changed a redirect around.. I looked through the short edit history and saw your edit summary. The contributor has very little edit history for such a strange change so it drew some flags. Cheers.. - 4twenty42o (talk) 19:18, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

accusations of lying

Guettarda, in this edit you accused me of lying [13]. Since I have no idea what you are talking about I invite you to explain. If you can't substantiate this, please strike it. Thanks. Alex Harvey (talk) 16:15, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

Seriously Alex...you need to read the article talk page before coming here. Are you saying that you missed this? Did you really write this without reading what I said? Please read WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT. Guettarda (talk) 17:01, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

Just to point the obvious for any bystanders, asking for honesty in representing sources is not an accusation of lying. Alex appears to misunderstand what he's reading. . . dave souza, talk 17:11, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

In my opinion, if you're writing an encyclopaedia, misrepresenting sources is far worse than lying, since it actually undercuts the credibility of Wikipedia as a source of information. Sadly, too many people seem to miss that point. Guettarda (talk) 17:18, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

Absolutely, the Wikipedia:Jagged 85 cleanup is striking evidence of that problem. While Alex's misrepresentation of sources may well be unintentional, his determination to repeatedly push his own views and his original research is tendentious and unacceptable. . . dave souza, talk 17:25, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

So are you going to provide relevant diffs, i.e. the diffs where I allegedly misrepresented a source? No, of course you aren't, because I haven't misrepresented any sources. It is just another gratuitous personal attack. Alex Harvey (talk) 17:33, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

Alex, I posted the diffs on the talkpage almost 14 hours ago. And I posted a link to that diff here. I clearly explained your misrepresentation of Weart. Your response here: I haven't misrepresented any sources is entirely untrue.

Since your only response has been WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT, you are no longer welcome to post here. Guettarda (talk) 19:18, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

Speedy deletion nomination of File:GeorgeMaxwellRichards.jpg

A tag has been placed on File:GeorgeMaxwellRichards.jpg requesting that it be speedily deleted from Wikipedia. This has been done under section F7 of the criteria for speedy deletion, because it is a non-free file with a clearly invalid licensing tag; or it otherwise fails some part of the non-free content criteria. If you can find a valid tag that expresses why the file can be used under the fair use guidelines, please replace the current tag with that tag. If no such tag exists, please add the {{non-free fair use in|article name that the file is used in}} tag, along with a brief explanation of why this constitutes fair use of the file. If the file has been deleted, you can re-upload it, but please ensure you place the correct tag on it.

If you think that this notice was placed here in error, contest the deletion by clicking on the button labelled "Click here to contest this speedy deletion," which appears inside of the speedy deletion ({{db-...}}) tag (if no such tag exists, the page is no longer a speedy delete candidate). Doing so will take you to the talk page where you will find a pre-formatted place for you to explain why you believe the page should not be deleted. You can also visit the the page's talk page directly to give your reasons, but be aware that once tagged for speedy deletion, if the page meets the criterion, it may be deleted without delay. Please do not remove the speedy deletion tag yourself, but don't hesitate to add information to the page that would render it more in conformance with Wikipedia's policies and guidelines. Diego Grez (talk) 21:51, 10 July 2011 (UTC)

Intentional obtuseness

Regarding your remarks here. I share your suspicions. Miradre's initial entry to this article was an absolute garbage heap of SYNTH built upon the thinnest of pretexts to sources that merely mentioned the book. In answer to earlier charges this is a SPA, the user maintained that he/she is an experienced user who adopted the sock legitimately, for discretion to edit the controversial stuff. (This has been an alibi used with some frequency by more than one obvious sock showing up in the aftermath of the arb comm decision). If so, the user is expediently shifting guises. One moment uncannily proficient and electrically fast with even the tricky stuff like templates, leaving bold edits in article after article faster than I could manage on a basic vandalism watch--and the next, a complete buffoon about core policies like WP:OR, WP:NPOV, and WP:V? It feels like gaming to me. Professor marginalia (talk) 06:04, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

Lewontin's Argument

Fllowing the recen [14] our participation in the dicussion about the title and scope of the article will be apreciated.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 01:07, 30 July 2011 (UTC)

WikiCup 2011 July newsletter

We are half way through the penultimate round of this year's WikiCup; there is less than a month to go before we have our final 8. Our pool leaders are Adabow (submissions) (Pool A, 189 points) and PresN (submissions) (Pool B, 165 points). The number of points required to reach the next round is not clear at this time; there are some users who still do not have any recorded points. Please remember to update your submissions' pages promptly. In addition, congratulations to PresN, who scored the first featured topic points in the competition for his work on Thatgamecompany related articles. Most points this round generally have, so far, come from good articles, with only one featured article (White-bellied Sea Eagle, from Casliber (submissions)) and two featured lists (Hugo Award for Best Graphic Story, from PresN and Grammy Award for Best Native American Music Album, from Another Believer (submissions)). Points for Did You Know and good article reviews round out the scoring. No points have been awarded for In the News, good topics or featured pictures this round, and no points for featured sounds or portals have been awarded in the entire competition. On an unrelated note, preparation will be beginning soon for next year's WikiCup- watch this space!

There is little else to be said beyond the usual. Please list anything you need reviewing on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews, so others following the WikiCup can help, and please do help if you can by providing reviews for the articles listed there. However, please remember to continue to offer reviews generally at GAC, FAC and all the other pages that require them to prevent any backlogs which could otherwise be caused by the Cup- points are, of course, offered for reviews at GAC. Two final notes: Firstly, please remember to state your participation in the WikiCup when nominating articles at FAC. Finally, some WikiCup-related statistics can be seen here and here. As ever, questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup and the judges are reachable on their talk pages, or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start receiving or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn and The ed17 11:33, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

WikiCup 2011 July newsletter

The finals are upon us; we're down to the last few. One of the eight remaining contestants will be this year's WikiCup champion! 150 was the score needed to progress to the final; just under double the 76 required to reach round 4, and more than triple the 41 required to reach round 3. Our eight finalists are:

• Casliber (submissions), Pool A's winner. Casliber has the highest total score in the competition, with 1528, the bulk of which is made up of 8 featured articles. He has the highest number of total featured articles (8, 1 of which was eligible for double points) and total did you knows (72) of any finalist. Casliber writes mostly on biology, including ornithology, botany and mycology.
• PresN (submissions), Pool B's winner and the highest scorer this round. PresN is the only finalist who has scored featured topic points, and he has gathered an impressive 330, but most of his points come from his 4 featured articles, one of which scored double. PresN writes mostly on video games and the Hugo Awards.
• Hurricanehink (submissions), Pool A's runner-up. Hurricanehink's points are mostly from his 30 good articles, more than any other finalist, and he is also the only finalist to score good topic points. Hurricanehink, as his name suggests, writes mostly on meteorology.
• Wizardman (submissions), Pool B's runner-up. Wizardman has completed 86 good article reviews, more than any other finalist, but most of his points come from his 2 featured articles. Wizardman writes mostly on American sport, especially baseball.
• Miyagawa (submissions), the "fastest loser" (Pool A). Miyagawa has written 3 featured lists, one of which was awarded double points, more than any other finalist, but he was awarded points mostly for his 68 did you knows. Miyagawa writes on a variety of topics, including dogs, military history and sport.
• Resolute (submissions), the second "fastest loser" (Pool B). Most of Resolute's points come from his 9 good articles. He writes mostly on Canadian topics, including ice hockey.
• Yellow Evan (submissions), who was joint third "fastest loser" (Pool A). Most of Evan's points come from his 10 good articles, and he writes mostly on meteorology.
• Sp33dyphil (submissions), who was joint third "fastest loser" (Pool B). Most of Phil's points come from his 9 good articles, 4 of which (more than any other finalist) were eligible for double points. He writes mostly on aeronautics.

We say goodbye to our seven other semi-finalists, Another Believer (submissions), Piotrus (submissions), Grandiose (submissions), Stone (submissions), Eisfbnore (submissions), Canada Hky (submissions) and MuZemike (submissions). Everyone still in the competition at this stage has done fantastically well, and contributed greatly to Wikipedia. We're on the home straight now, and we will know our winner in two months.

In other news, preparations for next year's competition have begun with a brainstorming thread. Please, feel free to drop by and share any thoughts you have about how the competition should work next year. Sign ups are not yet open, but will be opened in due course. Watch this space. Further, there has been a discussion about the rule whereby those in the WikiCup must delcare their participation when nominating articles at featured article candidates. This has resulted in a bot being created by new featured article delegate Ucucha (talk · contribs). The bot will leave a message on FAC pages if the nominator is a participant in the WikiCup.

A reminder of the rules: any points scored after August 29 may be claimed for the final round, and please remember to update submission pages promptly. If you are concerned that your nomination, be it at good article candidates, a featured process or anywhere else, will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews. However, please remember to continue to offer reviews at GAC, FAC and all the other pages that require them to prevent any backlogs which could otherwise be caused by the Cup. As ever, questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup and the judges are reachable on their talk pages, or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start receiving or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn and The ed17 00:01, 1 September 2011 (UTC)

Interview with Wikimedia Foundation

Hi Guettarda, I hope you're well. My name is Aaron and I'm one of the Storytellers working on the 2011 fundraiser for the Wikimedia Foundation. For this year's campaign, we're interviewing as many of the very active and productive Wikipedians as we can to broaden the range of appeals we run come November. I very much appreciate the thoughts about Wikipedia and its supporters that you included on your user page, and I would like to know if you would be willing to speak with me further about this, as well as your experiences using and editing Wikipedia? If so, I'll ask you your personal story and I'll ask you some general questions about Wikipedia. Please let me know if you're interesting by emailing amuszalskiwikimedia.org. Thanks! user:Aaron (WMF)

WikiCup 2011 September newsletter

We are on this year's home straight, with less than a month to go until the winner of the 2011 WikiCup will be decided. The fight for first place is currently being contested by Miyagawa (submissions), Hurricanehink (submissions) and Sp33dyphil (submissions), all of whom have over 200 points. This round has already seen multiple featured articles (1991 Atlantic hurricane season from Hurricanehink and Northrop YF-23 from Sp33dyphil) and a double-scoring featured list (Miyagawa's 1948 Summer Olympics medal table). The scores will likely increase far further before the end of the round on October 31 as everyone ups their pace. There is not much more to say- thoughts about next year's competition are welcome on the WikiCup talk page or the scoring talk page, and signups will open once a few things have been sorted out.

If you are concerned that your nomination, be it at good article candidates, a featured process or anywhere else, will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews. However, please remember to continue to offer reviews at GAC, FAC and all the other pages that require them to prevent any backlogs which could otherwise be caused by the Cup. As ever, questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup and the judges are reachable on their talk pages, or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start receiving or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn and The ed17 12:38, 1 October 2011 (UTC)

Moving Burma to Myanmar - ongoing poll

This is to let you know that an ongoing poll is taking place to move Burma to Myanmar. This note is going out to wikipedia members who have participated in Burma/Myanmar name changing polls in the past. It does not include banned members nor those with only ip addresses. Thank you. Fyunck(click) (talk) 20:55, 21 October 2011 (UTC)

WikiCup 2011 October newsletter

The 2011 WikiCup is now over, and our new champion is Hurricanehink (submissions), who joins the exclusive club of the previous winners: Dreamafter (2007), jj137 (2008), Durova (2009) and Sturmvogel_66 (2010). The final standings were as follows:

1. Hurricanehink (submissions)
2. Sp33dyphil (submissions)
3. Yellow Evan (submissions)
4. Miyagawa (submissions)
5. Wizardman (submissions)
6. Casliber (submissions)
7. Resolute (submissions)
8. PresN (submissions)

Prizes for first, second, third and fourth will be awarded, as will prizes for all those who reached the final eight. Every participant who scored in the competition will receive a ribbon of participation. In addition to the prizes based on placement, the following special prizes will be awarded based on high performance in particular areas of content creation. So that the finalists do not have an undue advantage, the prize is awarded to the competitor who scored the highest in any particular field in a single round.

• The Featured Article Award: Casliber (submissions), for his performance in round 2. Hurricanehink (submissions) matched the score, but Casliber won the tiebreaker.
• The Good Article Award: Yellow Evan (submissions), for his performance in round 4.
• The Featured List Award: Miyagawa (submissions), for his performance in round 4. PresN (submissions) matched the score, but Miyagawa won the tiebreaker.
• The Recognised Topic Award (for good and featured topics): PresN (submissions), for his performance in round 3.
• The Did You Know Award: The Bushranger (submissions), for his performance in round 1.
• The In the News Award: Candlewicke (submissions), for his performance in round 1.
• The Reviewer Award (for good article reviews): Wizardman (submissions), for his performance in round 3.

No prize was awarded for featured pictures, sounds or portals, as none were claimed throughout the competition. The awards will be handed out over the next few days. Congratulations to all our participants, and especially our winners; we've all had fun, and Wikipedia has benefitted massively from our content work.

Preparation for next year's WikiCup is ongoing. Interested parties are invited to sign up and participate in our straw polls. It's been a pleasure to work with you all this year, and, whoever's taking part in and running the competition in 2012, we hope to see you all in January! J Milburn and The ed17 00:40, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

2011 WikiCup participation

Awarded to Guettarda for participation in the 2011 WikiCup.

It was good to have you on board this time around- we hope you enjoyed the competition! In case you are interested, signups for next year are open. Thanks, J Milburn and The ed17 20:43, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Straw poll on fate of Evolutionary Biology article

Hi, this is to notify you that I have started a more indept discussion about whether the Evolutionary Biology article should be restored and in what form exactly. Please see Talk:Evolutionary_biology#Restoration_of_Evolutionary_biology for the discussion. -- Kim van der Linde ^{at venus} 03:42, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

2012 WikiCup

Hi! As you've previously expressed interest in the competition, I'm just letting you know that the 2012 WikiCup is due to start in less than 24 hours. Signups are open, and will remain so for a few weeks after the beginning of the competition. The competition itself will follow basically the same format as last year, with a few small tweaks to point costs to reflect the opinions of the community. If you're interested in taking part, you're more than welcome, and if you know anyone who might be, please let them know too- the more the merrier! To join, simply add your name to Wikipedia:WikiCup/2012 signups, and we will be in touch. Please feel free to direct any questions to me, or leave a note on the WikiCup talk page. Thanks! You are receiving this note as you are listed on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. Please feel free to add or remove yourself. J Milburn (talk) 01:46, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

WikiCup 2012 January newsletter

WikiCup 2012 is off to a flying start. At the time of writing, we have 112 contestants; comparable to last year, but slightly fewer than 2010. Signups will remain open for another week, after which time they will be closed for this year. Our currrent far-away leader is Grapple X (submissions), due mostly to his work on a slew of good articles about The X-Files; there remain many such articles waiting to be reviewed at good article candidates. Second place is currently held by Ruby2010 (submissions), whose points come mostly from good articles about television episodes, although good article reviews, did you knows and an article about a baroness round out the score. In third place is Jivesh boodhun (submissions), who has scored 200 points for his work on a single featured article, as well as points for work on others, mostly in the area of pop music. In all, nine users have 100 or more points. However, at the other end of the scale, there are still dozens of participants who are yet to score. Please remember to update your submission pages promptly!

The 64 highest scoring participants will advance to round 2 in a month's time. There, they will be split into eight random groups of eight. The score needed to reach the next round is not at all clear; last year, 8 points guaranteed a place. The year before, 20.

A few participants and their work warrant a mention for achieving "firsts" in this competition.

• 12george1 (submissions) was the first to score, with his good article review of Illinois v. McArthur.
• 12george1 (submissions) was also the first to score points for an article, thanks to his work on Hurricane Debby (1982)- now a good article. Tropical storms have featured heavily in the Cup, and good articles currently have a relatively fast turnaround time for reviews.
• Sp33dyphil (submissions) was the first to score points for a did you know, with Russian submarine K-114 Tula. Military history is another subject which has seen a lot of Cup activity.
• Sp33dyphil (submissions) is also the first person to successfully claim bonus points. Terminator 2: Judgment Day is now a good article, and was eligible for bonus points because the subject was covered on more than 20 other Wikipedias at the start of the competition. It is fantastic to see bonus points being claimed so early!
• Speciate (submissions) was the first to score points for an In the News entry, with Paedophryne amauensis. The lead image from the article was also used on the main page for a time, and it's certainly eye-catching!
• Jivesh boodhun (submissions) was the first to score points for a featured article, and is, at the moment, the only competitor to claim for one. The article, "Halo" (Beyoncé Knowles song), was also worth double points because of its wide coverage. While this is an article that Jivesh and others have worked on for some time, it is undeniable that he has put considerable work into it this year, pushing it over the edge.

We are yet to see any featured lists, featured topics or good topics, but this is unsurprising; firstly, the nomination processes with each of these can take some time, and, secondly, it can take a considerable amount of time to work content to this level. In a similar vein, we have seen only one featured article. The requirement that content must have been worked on this year to be eligible means that we did not expect to see these at the start of the competition. No points have been claimed for featured portals or pictures, but these are not content types which are often claimed; the former has never made a big impact on the WikiCup, while the latter has not done so since 2009's competition.

A quick rules clarification before the regular notices: If you are concerned that another user is claiming points inappropriately, please contact a judge to take a look at the article. Competitors policing one another can create a bad atmosphere, and may lead to inconsistencies and mistakes. Rest assured that we, the judges, are making an effort to check submissions, but it is possible that we will miss something. On a loosely related note: If you are concerned that your nomination, be it at good article candidates, a featured process or anywhere else, will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews. However, please remember to continue to offer reviews at GAC, FAC and all the other pages that require them to prevent any backlogs which could otherwise be caused by the Cup. As ever, questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup and the judges are reachable on their talk pages, or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start receiving or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn and The ed17 00:06, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

Creationism and ID categories

Creationism and Intelligent Design are inherently religious beliefs and should not be categorized as "denialism" as this violates WP:NPOV. Would you categorize the articles on magic and theism with "denialism"? Placing that category there is basically just a slap in the face.--The Devil's Advocate (talk) 18:13, 23 February 2012 (UTC)

We don't censor content because it might upset someone. Please see WP:NOTCENSORED. If you have a better argument, one that is based on policy, please use the articles' talk pages. Thanks. Guettarda (talk) 18:45, 23 February 2012 (UTC)

Gleick bit at my talk page

The title my IP visitor used hadn't really registered; I've changed it. Thanks for bringing to my attention. Best, Pete Tillman (talk) 18:51, 24 February 2012 (UTC)

DYK for Pictetia

The DYK project (nominate) 02:25, 28 February 2012 (UTC)

WikiCup 2012 February newsletter

Round 1 is already over! The 64 highest scorers have progressed to round 2. Our highest scorer was Grapple X (submissions), again thanks mostly to a swathe of good articles on The X-Files. In second place was Tigerboy1966 (submissions), thanks an impressive list of did you knows about racehorses. Both scored over 400 points. Following behind with over 300 points were Ruby2010 (submissions), Cwmhiraeth (submissions), Miyagawa (submissions) and Casliber (submissions). February also saw the competition's first featured list: List of colleges and universities in North Dakota, from Ruby2010 (submissions). At the other end of the scale, 11 points was enough to secure a place in this round, and some contestants with 10 points made it into the round on a tiebreaker. This is higher than the 8 points that were needed last year, but lower than the 20 points required the year before. The number of points required to progress to round 3 will be significantly higher.

The remaining contestants have been split into 8 pools of 8, named A through H. Round two will finish in two months time on 28 April, when the two highest scorers in each pool, as well as the next 16 highest scorers, will progress to round 3. The pools were entirely random, so while some pools may end up being more competitive than others, this is by chance rather than design.

The judges would like to point out two quick rules reminders. First, any content promoted during the interim period (that is, on or after 27 February) is eligible for points in round 2. Second, any content worked on significantly this year is eligible for points if promoted in this round. On a related note, if you are concerned that your nomination, be it at good article candidates, a featured process or anywhere else, will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews. However, please remember to continue to offer reviews at GAC, FAC and all the other pages that require them to prevent any backlogs which would otherwise be caused by the Cup. As ever, questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start receiving or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn (talk • email) and The ed17 (talk • email) 23:58, 29 February 2012 (UTC)

Piltdown man

Would you take a look at the last edits by Hans schultz (who you reverted at Nebraska man)? Looks like he's trying to make a comment on something here. Thanks. Dougweller (talk) 21:42, 3 March 2012 (UTC)

I do believe you're right :) Guettarda (talk) 01:07, 4 March 2012 (UTC)

DYK for Arthur Roy Clapham

The DYK project (nominate) 16:03, 16 March 2012 (UTC)

DYK for Arthur Tansley

Thanks from the wiki and me Victuallers (talk) 17:14, 27 March 2012 (UTC)

Thank you! Guettarda (talk) 17:34, 27 March 2012 (UTC)

DYK for William Gardner Smith (botanist)

Panyd^{The muffin is not subtle} 16:03, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

Thank you! Guettarda (talk) 16:11, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

WikiCup 2012 March newsletter

We are over half way through the second round of this year's WikiCup and things are going well! Grapple X (submissions), of Pool B, is our highest overall scorer thanks to his prolific writings on television and film. In second place is Pool H's Cwmhiraeth (submissions), thanks primarily to work on biological articles, especially in marine biology and herpetology. Third place goes to Pool E's Casliber (submissions), who also writes primarily on biology (including ornithology and botany) and has already submitted two featured articles this round. Of the 63 contestants remaining, 15 (just under a quarter) have over 100 points this round. However, 25 are yet to score. Please remember to update your submission pages promptly. 32 contestants, the top two from each pool and the 16 next-highest scorers, will advance to round 3.

Congratulations to Matthewedwards (submissions), whose impressive File:Wacht am Rhein map (Opaque).svg became the competition's first featured picture. Also, congratulations to 12george1 (submissions), who claimed good topic points, our first contestant this year to do so, for his work on Wikipedia:Featured topics/1982 Atlantic hurricane season. This leaves featured topics and featured portals as the only sources of points not yet utilised. However, as recent statistics from Miyagawa (submissions) show, no source has yet been utilised this competition to the same extent it has been previously!

It has been observed that the backlogs at good article candidates are building up again. While the points for good article reviews will be remaining constant, any help that can be offered keeping the backlog down would be appreciated. On a related note, if you are concerned that your nomination, be it at good article candidates, a featured process or anywhere else, will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews. As ever, questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start receiving or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn (talk • email) and The ed17 (talk • email) 23:18, 31 March 2012 (UTC)

Dispute resolution survey

Dispute Resolution – Survey Invite Hello Guettarda. I am currently conducting a study on the dispute resolution processes on the English Wikipedia, in the hope that the results will help improve these processes in the future. Whether you have used dispute resolution a little or a lot, now we need to know about your experience. The survey takes around five minutes, and the information you provide will not be shared with third parties other than to assist in analyzing the results of the survey. No personally identifiable information will be released. Please click HERE to participate. Many thanks in advance for your comments and thoughts. You are receiving this invitation because you have had some activity in dispute resolution over the past year. For more information, please see the associated research page. Steven Zhang DR goes to Wikimania! 11:57, 5 April 2012 (UTC)

Ecology

Thank you for the B star.

Re see aso note: creating that page was on the ToDo list. Im afraid i ddidnt get around to creating it then. It still on the ToDo list. it will be created.DrMicro (talk) 12:03, 6 April 2012 (UTC)

WikiCup 2012 May newsletter

We're halfway through round 3 (or the quarter finals, if you prefer) and things are running smoothly. We're seeing very high scoring; as of the time of writing, the top 16 all have over 90 points. This has already proved to be more competative than this time last year- in 2011, 76 points secured a place, while in 2010, a massive 250 was the lowest qualifying score. People have also upped their game slightly from last round, which is to be expected as we approach the end of the competition. Leading Pool A is Cwmhiraeth (submissions), whose points have mostly come from a large number of did you knows on marine biology. Pool B's leader, Grapple X (submissions), is for the first time not our highest scorer at the time of newsletter publication, but his good articles on The X-Files and Millenium keep him in second place overall. Miyagawa (submissions) leads Pool C, our quietest pool, with content in a variety of areas on a variety of topics. Pool D is led by Casliber (submissions), our current overall leader. Nearly half of Casliber's points come from his triple-scored Western Jackdaw, which is now a featured article.

This round has seen an unusually high number of featured lists, with nearly one in five remaining participants claiming one, and one user, Muboshgu (submissions), claiming two. Miyagawa's featured list, 1936 Summer Olympics medal table, was even awarded double points. By comparison, good article reviews seem to be playing a smaller part, and featured topics portals remain two content-types still unutilised in this competition. Other than that, there isn't much to say! Things are coming along smoothly. As ever, if you are concerned that your nomination—whether it is at good article candidates, a featured process, or anywhere else—will not receive the necessary reviews, please list it on Wikipedia:WikiCup/Reviews. Questions are welcome on Wikipedia talk:WikiCup, and the judges are reachable on their talk pages or by email. Good luck! If you wish to start or stop receiving this newsletter, please feel free to add or remove yourself from Wikipedia:WikiCup/Newsletter/Send. J Milburn (talk • email) and The ed17 (talk • email) 23:32, 31 May 2012 (UTC)