Iridescent

An administrator "assuming good faith" with an editor with whom they have disagreed.

Archives [Jan 06‑Oct 07] [Nov 07‑May 08] [Jun 08] [Jul‑Aug 08] [Aug‑Sep 08] [Sep‑Nov 08] [Nov‑Dec 08] [Jan 09] [Feb‑Apr 09] [May‑Jul 09] [Jul‑Oct 09] [Oct 09‑Apr 10] [May‑Jul 10] [Aug‑Oct 10] [Nov 10‑Apr 11] [May 11‑Apr 13] [May 13‑Apr 15] [May‑Aug 15] [Sep 15‑Jan 16] [Feb‑Apr 16] [May‑Jul 16] [Aug‑Sep 16] [Oct‑Nov 16] [Dec 16‑Jan 17] [Feb‑May 17] [Jun‑Oct 17] [Nov 17‑Jan 18] [Feb‑Jul 18] [Jul‑Oct 18] [Nov‑Dec 18] [Jan 19] [Feb‑Apr 19] [May‑Jun 19] [Jul 19] [Aug‑Oct 19] [Nov 19‑Jan 20] [Feb‑Mar 20] [Apr‑Jul 20] [Aug‑Oct 20] [Nov‑Dec 20] [Jan 21] [Jan‑Mar 21] [Apr‑May 21] [Jun‑Aug 21] [Sep‑Dec 21] [Jan 22] [Feb‑Mar 22] [Apr‑Jul 22] [Aug‑Nov 22] [Dec 22‑]

Happy New Year

		Happy New Year!
		Wishing you and yours a Happy New Year, from the horse and bishop person. May the year ahead be productive and distraction-free and may Janus light your way. Ealdgyth (talk) 14:37, 31 December 2023 (UTC)

Skunks in the doorway

In the early days of web commerce, Silicon Valley types told stories about the problem of a skunk in the doorway: If a skunk were standing in the doorway of a brick-and-mortar store, the store employees would notice that nobody was coming inside and would investigate why people were on the sidewalk but not coming in the door. Perhaps some supportive would-be customer would find a way to let you know that there was a problem, and if anyone managed to get past the skunk, it was likely to be mentioned in a small-talk kind of way. But in e-commerce, if there was a big, obvious, solvable problem, you might not find out about it.

I am here to ask a few talk page stalkers to please take a look at Wikipedia:Requests for comment/When there is no consensus either way and tell me if there's a skunk in the doorway. It's been listed as an RFC for two and a half days now, with zero responses. Yapperbot is no longer posting Wikipedia:Feedback request service messages, but I'm not sure that's a sufficient explanation for it going completely unnoticed. I can (and plan to) post the usual sorts of announcements, but I'd appreciate it if some folks would take a look and tell me if I've made it too complicated or irritating first. Thanks, WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:09, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

I noticed that in your signature in the RfC, it shows a timestamp but not your name. This (as you probably know) happens when you type five tildes instead of four. Maybe try re-signing with four tildes and see if that makes a difference? FWIW I think the fact that five tildes creates a name-less signature is a bug not a feature. Clayoquot (talk | contribs) 17:47, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

@WhatamIdoing Double checking, I noticed the same thing; you have a date, there's even fine print provided by a userscript that you created the page, but there's no signature.

@Clayoquot FWIW I think the fact that five tildes creates a name-less signature is a bug not a feature. I've used five tildes when noting when I've edited a talk page message. However, if this bug/feature were to disappear tomorrow, I wouldn't miss it much. I dream of horses (Hoofprints) (Neigh at me) 01:48, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

Fun fact: Unsigned RFC questions were required back in the day. I'm not sure that it makes any difference, but I can add my name later. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:07, 9 January 2024 (UTC)

The apparent death of User:Yapperbot, and consequently the Wikipedia:Feedback request service, is likely a significant source of the non-response. I might go ask the Wikipedia:Mass message senders to deliver a generic message to the FRS names for me. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:45, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

After the Deluge (painting)

Hey Iri, I see you made a stealth edit in December, so you might still be skulking around. I'm thinking of running this one at TFA sometime in April; give me a shout if you've got a better idea. I see above that you've been busy lately; hope you're busy and happy. - Dank (push to talk) 03:18, 6 February 2024 (UTC)

It's current on for the 27th. - Dank (push to talk) 23:05, 11 February 2024 (UTC)

Disputed non-free use rationale for File:Watts – Hope stamp Jordan 1974 low res.jpg

Thank you for uploading File:Watts – Hope stamp Jordan 1974 low res.jpg. However, there is a concern that the rationale provided for using this file on Wikipedia may not meet the criteria required by Wikipedia:Non-free content. This can be corrected by going to the file description page and adding or clarifying the reason why the file qualifies under this policy. Adding and completing one of the templates available from Wikipedia:Non-free use rationale guideline is an easy way to ensure that your file is in compliance with Wikipedia policy. Please be aware that a non-free use rationale is not the same as an image copyright tag; descriptions for files used under the non-free content policy require both a copyright tag and a non-free use rationale.

If it is determined that the file does not qualify under the non-free content policy, it might be deleted by an administrator seven days after the file was tagged in accordance with section F7 of the criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions, please ask them at the media copyright questions page. Thank you. Vanjagenije (talk) 23:57, 14 March 2024 (UTC)

To any talk page stalkers that are around, I (as a long-absent talk page stalker) only just noticed this non-free image deletion(of a stamp depicting the subject of the article), and am wondering whether it is worth contesting it? As far as I can tell from viewing the deleted version, the rationale was sound (not quite sure why it was nominated). Where is the best place to start here? The image was used in the Hope (Watts) featured article where it was commented out here. Maybe someone can also explain the removal of this image from the same article? As far as I can tell, what would be needed there is a separate non-free use rationale added to File:Old guitarist chicago.jpg? But whether that would be accepted is another matter (the differing viewpoints are whether a reader should be expected to click through to the article to see the image, or whether it is better for the reader to see the Picasso image within the article they are reading). Carcharoth (talk) 14:10, 14 November 2024 (UTC)

I don't have admin goggles, so I can't see the image or fair-use rationale in question, but from looking at the article WP:NFCCP#8 looks like the obvious issue – Non-free content is used only if its presence would significantly increase readers' understanding of the article topic, and its omission would be detrimental to that understanding. Given the very brief mention of the stamp, it's difficult to argue that illustrating it "significantly" increases readers' understanding of the topic. (The same argument would also apply to including an image of The Old Guitarist, if WP:NFC#UUI#6 didn't explicitly forbid this kind of use anyway.) Caeciliusinhorto-public (talk) 15:38, 14 November 2024 (UTC)

I can copy out the rationales for the stamp (image here) ("Author: original author unknown and not easily identified, copyright on textual elements will be held by Jordan Post. The central image is Hope by G. F. Watts (died 1904) and already in the public domain"; "Purpose of use: To illustrate that the image was still in popular circulation 70 years after the author's death; its use on Jordanian stamps is specifically discussed in the article" and "Replaceability: No, as it likely to be a copyrighted image and the purpose is to illustrate the image's use in the 1970s. As the graphic elements are already in the public domain, it is possible that the textual elements are below the threshold of originality."), but you are right that for the Picasso one, UUUI #6 does apply - for the record, I have always disagreed with that as articles should be self-contained (e.g. for readers who are reading an article off-line or a printed version). But I do get that some elements of NFC apply to the encyclopedia as a whole, and thus being able to refer to another part of the encyclopedia that contains the image is the line in the sand. Thank you for the advice. What do you think of the stamp rationale? Carcharoth (talk) 17:00, 14 November 2024 (UTC)

Like you, I'm not entirely sure that I agree that our policy needs to be as strict as it currently is. That being said, on the question of what policy is and how it's currently applied, I think that the deletion is reasonable. Possibly a case could have been made for keeping the image, but suspect if would have been deleted regardless.
The two main points I would expect to be made against any such case are: (1) "its use on Jordanian stamps is specifically discussed in the article" is overstating the situation rather. Its use on Jordanian stamps is briefly mentioned in the article; the hardline free content purist would ask what the illustration actually adds to a reader's understanding here. (2) "To illustrate that the image was still in popular circulation 70 years after the author's death": is it definitely the case that there are no possible free images which could illustrate the long-term influence of the painting? The majority of the section on §Later influence discusses its influence on Barack Obama, via Jeremiah Wright: there is certainly a free image of Obama delivering his 2004 speech on "The Audacity of Hope". Sure, it's a rubbish image, but a rubbish free image is by policy preferred to a good non-free one.
The remaining alternatives are, for my money: (1) add more sourced commentary about this stamp and write a Fair Use Rationale why makes a clearer case for the importance of illustrating that stamp specifically, (2) know enough about Jordanian copyright law to determine whether or not the stamp design is likely to still be in copyright, and if it's not upload it to commons (3) choose a different image for that section. Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 22:52, 14 November 2024 (UTC)

Impeccable logic. :-) May do number 3 at some point. Carcharoth (talk) 01:58, 15 November 2024 (UTC)

Brain trust: rollback rules

Hello, all, today I am looking at Wikipedia:Rollback. guideline. In particular, I'm looking at this language:

• Where the following text refers to "Standard" rollback, it means the usual form of rollback, which does not include the option to provide a custom edit summary. Standard rollback may only be used in certain situations – editors who misuse standard rollback (for example, by using it to reverse good-faith edits in situations where an explanatory edit summary would normally be expected) may have their rollback rights removed. Since rollback is part of the core administrator tools, an admin could be stripped of their administrative privileges entirely to remove those tools.
• Administrators may revoke the rollback user right or impose a block in response to a user who is persistently failing to explain their reverts, regardless of the methods or means that are used to perform the actual reversions. However, they should notify or warn the editor sufficiently first, and allow the editor the time and opportunity to respond and explain their reversions before taking any action – there may be justification of which the administrator is not aware (such as reversion of edits made by a banned user). Similarly, editors who persistently engage in edit warring – especially those who have a repeated history of doing so – may have their rollback permissions revoked, regardless of the methods or means that were used to engage in the behavior. Additionally, administrators who persistently misuse rollback may have their administrator permissions revoked, and solely in order to remove the rollback user rights from them (although, in practice, such cases would require the intervention of the Arbitration Committee).

I am curious about how we came to have a software-specific set of rules, namely: that if I want to revert an unwanted non-vandalism edit without an explanatory edit summary:

• I can click the MediaWiki rollback button, and I can lose access to MediaWiki rollback for failing to provide an edit summary, but
• I can click the Twinkle rollback button, and I won't lose access to Twinkle rollback for doing exactly the same thing.

In fact, if you misuse Twinkle rollback, you can lose access to MediaWiki rollback, but not, apparently, to the tool you were actually misusing.

Most of our rules are tool-agnostic, and I wonder whether this one is also meant to be tool-agnostic. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:57, 17 March 2024 (UTC)

@WhatamIdoing With Twinkle rollback, there's an AGF, "neutral," and vandalism option. On top of that, Twinkle provide an opportunity to explain your edits. MediaWiki rollback has neither of these features. I dream of horses (Hoofprints) (Neigh at me) 13:27, 18 March 2024 (UTC)

Since the page specifies that "standard" MediaWiki rollback does not allow a custom edit summary, I assume that the edit summary is available through some non-standard method (a gadget?).

It sounds like the actual rule is: If you persistently make high-volume unexplained (and non-obvious) reverts, we'll take away whatever tools are making it easy for you to do that.

But it should IMO apply to all the tools, not just to MediaWiki rollback. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:15, 18 March 2024 (UTC)

Also, does anyone remember how long it's been since the last admin was de-sysopped over this? WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:17, 18 March 2024 (UTC)

@WhatamIdoing Twinkle is the non-standard gadget ("non-standard" meaning, for the moment, "not being turned on by default"). It allows you to add a comment explaining the rollback; in fact, at leat with AGF rollback, it's required (not providing an edit summary stops the rollback). I dream of horses (Hoofprints) (Neigh at me) 16:01, 19 March 2024 (UTC)

TFA

story · music · places

Thank you today for After the Deluge (painting), introduced (in 2016): ""Bright rising sun illuminating the clouds over a featureless horizon" has become such a staple image since the advent of modern photography, it's easy to forget that it had to begin somewhere. Likewise, if George Frederic Watts is remembered at all nowadays it's as the painter of formal portraits of dignitaries and of earnestly portentious paintings with titles like Love and Death and The Slumber of the Ages, not as the painter of dramatic landscapes. After the Deluge is an explicitly religious painting, yet contains no religious imagery of any kind, and is an interesting snapshot of the transition between 19th-century symbolism and 20th-century abstraction. Because this has spent the last century in the backwater of Compton rather than in a high-profile institution like the Tate Gallery or the Yale Center for British Art, there hasn't been all that much written about this particular piece so the article is shorter than usual, but I believe this collates together everything significant that there is to say about it. And yes, I know it looks like I've accidentally cut-and-pasted a chunk of body text into the wikilink but Light and Colour (Goethe's Theory)—The Morning after the Deluge—Moses Writing the Book of Genesis genuinely is the name of Turner's painting of the same subject." - We miss you. Best wishes for whatever you do! -- Gerda Arendt (talk) 07:27, 27 April 2024 (UTC)

CfD nomination at Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2024 July 14 § Museum collections

A category or categories you have created have been nominated for possible deletion, merging, or renaming. A discussion is taking place to decide whether this proposal complies with the categorization guidelines. If you would like to participate in the discussion, you are invited to add your comments at Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2024 July 14 § Museum collections on the categories for discussion page. Thank you. Ham II (talk) 07:25, 14 July 2024 (UTC)

pictured

story · music · places

Today I had reason to look at 10 years ago, and saw a great pictured comment by you. Thank you for clarification in that matter and many others. We'd need more of it, but best wishes for what you do instead! -- Gerda Arendt (talk) 07:38, 18 October 2024 (UTC)