Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2010 September 28

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September 28

how can I view the arbitrator and checkuser mailing lists?

this is not a productive discussion
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
Resolved  – This is in all likelihood not a legitimate request for help; and answers have been provided. Doc9871 (talk) 03:59, 28 September 2010 (UTC) without becoming an arbitrator or a checkuser, i mean. i wuld like to read the things they r talking about, and i believe it should be public knowledge, so please explain where i can read this info.--Bad edits r dumb (talk) 23:42, 27 September 2010 (UTC) The short answer is: you cannot, nor should you be able to. Arbitrators and CheckUsers handle a lot of sensitive information, and they need to be able to discuss it in private. It is so difficult to become an Arbitrator or checkuser precisely because they handle this kind of information; it would defeat the purpose of having private mailing lists if you could read them. However, the Arbitrators and Checkusers do release some portions of this information, from time to time; enough to fulfil the purpose of having such information. You can read Arbitrators' comments and reports at WP:ARBN and WP:RFAR, and Checkusers' comments at WP:SPI. Intelligentsium 23:51, 27 September 2010 (UTC) ok but i wanted to read the mailing lists but if i am not allowed due to matters of privacy and things like this, i understand, but still i am disappoitned because i really really wanted to read them :-(--Bad edits r dumb (talk) 23:54, 27 September 2010 (UTC) also, wut if they r talking about me behind my back and saying rude things (e.g., Bad edits r dumb is dumb). Don't I have a right to know?--Bad edits r dumb (talk) 23:55, 27 September 2010 (UTC) You mean, what if the Arbitrators and Checkusers are talking about you behind your back and saying rude things about you on their private mailing list? I think you misunderstand how much trust the community must show in a user, for that user to become a Checkuser or Arbitrator. It is several times more difficult than becoming an administrator, perhaps even more so than becoming a bureaucrat. It is exceedingly unlikely that these users would be discussing you behind your back (unless they suspect you of sockpuppetry or an equally serious offence, of course), and even if they are they would not be so coarse as to say you are "dumb" (I realise you are only using this as an example, but still). If someone wanted to make rude comments about you behind your back, they could do it without being an arbitrator or Checkuser. Intelligentsium 01:22, 28 September 2010 (UTC) To even be considered to be added to it, or view the archives you have to be 1.) 18+, 2.) Identified to the WMF, and 3.) a checkuser or part of arbcom, in my understanding. Pilif12p :  Yo  01:27, 28 September 2010 (UTC) Ladies and Gentlemen, I would recommend saving your breath here. "Bad edits r dumb" thinks he's being cute and funny, but he's really just wasting your time for his own amusement. What editor refers to themselves in the third person, as in, "Please do not threaten Bad edits r dumb."? He's perfectly capable of typing normally, and is observed by many to exhibit "trollish" behavior with his comments and refusal to act like a "normal" editor. Don't feed him. Doc9871 (talk) 03:35, 28 September 2010 (UTC) OK I am sorry for ask this very dumb question. I tried to ask in a serios manner, but maybe it sounded too much troll-like and dumb.--Bad edits r dumb (talk) 05:04, 28 September 2010 (UTC) Fantastic. Keep fighting vandalism, and be as "irreverent" as you want with your humor: but please don't waste serious editor's responses to questions as absurd as the one you asked. WP is not a joke... Doc9871 (talk) 05:13, 28 September 2010 (UTC) Actually, you have proven via your latest efforts, the high level of experience and competence you show (when you want to), as well as your own issues (which overlap this) concerning your old account, that you are fully aware of all of this, and are thus wasting the HelpDesk's time. ROBERTMFROMLI TALK/CNTRB 05:20, 28 September 2010 (UTC) But i sed i was sorry for my action. i just dont like it when the ArbCom talks abt me behind my back, that's all but maybe i should have kept this concerns to myself.--Bad edits r dumb (talk) 05:30, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

Hiding feedback box

Howdy all. Is there any way I can hide the feedback boxes? Like the one shown on this page? Perhaps via my skin css?--Rockfang (talk) 00:16, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

You can add div.article-assessment-wrapper { display:none; } to your skinfile. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 12:46, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

Thank you. That worked wonderfully.--Rockfang (talk) 13:55, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

EN.wikipedia.org Appearance after Log in

Hi!

Before I log on en.wikipedia.org in the page appears in its new design, with the search field on the top right and the rest of the new features, but AFTER I log in it appears in its old design, with the search field on the left.

This happens with Mozilla Firefox 3.6.10, Opera 10.62 and Microsoft Internet Explorer 8.0.6001.18702.

This does NOT happen on de.wikipedia.org, fr.wikipedia.org or ro.wikipedia.org after I log in there.

Why is that so and how can I remedy it?

Thank You very much!

All my best!

The new features must be turned off for you. Consider clicking the "New Features" link next to your username if you want to switch to Vector. The Utahraptor^{Talk to me}/_{Contributions} 00:31, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

Alexandra Powers Photos

A photo of Alexandra Powers is needed on her wikipedia page. Would any of this pictures be acceptable?: http://www.aveleyman.com/ActorCredit.aspx?ActorID=14027 http://www.tvspielfilm.de/stars/star/alexandra-powers,1571496,ApplicationGallery.html?page=5 http://www.flixster.com/actor/alexandra-powers Please let me know if any of these photos are acceptable for her wikipedia page. Thanks! Neptunekh2 (talk) 00:44, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

I'm sorry but no, they wouldn't. #1 and #3 look like a screen shots of a film and therefore the copyright would be owned by the production company of the film. And #2 is probably a promotional photo from a film or TV series and again would belong to the production company. You might have better luck with getting a photo for the article if you were to write to Powers directly or her manager. You would need to explain that the image would need to be released under a free license. Dismas|^(talk) 03:57, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

Search Flickr for images with the keywords: Alexandra Powers under these licenses: cc-by or cc-by-sa finds nothing promising, unfortunately. Note that very few Wikipedia articles need photos; photos are merely nice to have in most cases. Wikipedia has a common problem with the lack of freely-licensed photographs of celebrities. Often we can only show candid photographs of poor quality, since most of the professional-quality photographs of celebrities will be under copyright. I would like to see copyright law abolished. I'm surprised the political right doesn't embrace this as a core value, as it would shrink the size of government needed to cook up and administer copyright laws. --Teratornis (talk) 08:52, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

Historical building

Am I allowed to create a page for the historical building I live in? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Bluehaus (talk • contribs) 01:12, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

If the building is notable, and you can find reliable sources, then an article can be written about it.--Rockfang (talk) 04:15, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

Tell us the name of the building so we can give it the Google test (a sufficient but not necessary indication of notability). --Teratornis (talk) 08:54, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

PROBLEM IN ACCESSING TO THE TAGGED SITE OF ICONS - FRIENDS, MESSAGES

Hello customer service,

Please check the problems -

When I open the email, and click the icons of friends, messages - shows -

Waiting for yahoo.search - sorry, the page you were searching could not be found - and then it shows - click onto the tagged site, login - and then shows - YAHOO! 404 - page not found.

I wish to inform the customer office at the help desk on the tagged site BUT could not even ACCESS TO THEM AND INFORM THEM!

PLEASE LET ME KNOW HOW TO CONTACT THE HELP DESK AT THE TAGGED SITE & IT DOES NOT GET INTO THE HELP DESK WHEN CLICK ON IT.

Thank you. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 119.74.177.150 (talk) 06:30, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

Sorry, you found the wrong place. This is the help desk of Wikipedia, an online encyclopedia. You need to find the help desk for the service that is giving you trouble. --Jayron32 06:34, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

Cool signature trick--how to do it

Hello everyone on the Help Desk. Many years ago, I saw a Wikipedia editor who had a special signature and the signature did not link DIRECTLY to his user page--I think maybe it was a redirect or something that goes to his user page. The point of this is so you could look at the "Wut links here" special feature and it would just show the times that people are talking ABOUT you but it won't include all the times you signed your signature. I am probably not explaining this very well, but I would like to implement this, because I LOVE to know when people are talking about me, but when I click on What links here, it mostly shows when I signed my name on vandals pages when I was warning them. How do I do it, and is it allowed? OK, thx for your help.--Bad edits r dumb (talk) 07:36, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

Per WP:SIGNATURE, a signature must link to either an editor's user page or talk page. Many signatures link to both. I'm not sure that what you are asking would be allowed. Mjroots (talk) 07:43, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

Is this a guideline or a policy and how strictly is it enforced? Again, this was several years ago but it was a very respected editor who used to do this, but maybe it was before WP:SIGNATURE was written.--Bad edits r dumb (talk) 07:54, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

WP:SIGNATURE says at the top:

• "This page documents an English Wikipedia behavioral guideline."

I have no idea how strictly it is enforced. WP:IAR implies you can break any rule on Wikipedia as long as you can convince the rule enforcers you are improving the encyclopedia. (If a rule is a policy, that probably means almost nobody can justify breaking it. If it's a guideline, then maybe a few users can justify breaking it.) How would doing what you want to do improve the encyclopedia? How would adding a nonstandard and potentially confusing (to other users) link to your signature be better than just adding the link to your user page? Any link on your user page is reachable from your signature, with an extra click. Speaking for myself only, I can't imagine why Wikipedia allows users to customize their signatures - it would never have occurred to me to add such a feature, not when there are so many more useful things Wikipedia users can do with their time. --Teratornis (talk) 08:43, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

I may be listed as a guideline, but it is de facto a policy. It is implemented quite strictly when breaches are discovered. The reason for this is that not having any links to a user page or talk page makes communication with that editor that much harder. I agree that there are some ghastly signatures, but as long as they conform with the guideline, I'll defend an editors right to use a custom sig until such time as consensus changes and outlaws them (which'll probably be about the 12th of Never). Mjroots (talk) 08:25, 29 September 2010 (UTC)

You could probably comply with the guideline by linking to your user-talk page directly, and your userpage via a redirect (which you should place in your own userspace, to avoid cluttering up any other part of the wiki). --ais523 13:12, 30 September 2010 (UTC)

My comapny would like to be part of Wikipedia

Dear Wikipedia representative,

I am writing to you on behalf of my company (TechTeam Global) to ask a basic question.

We would like to be part of your site to facilitate information gathering when users surf on the Internet to retrieve news/info about us.

We are leaders in Service Desk Outsourcing with a global foot-print.

How can I create a page about us?

Should we sak special permissions?

Please let me know

Thank you

Giuseppe Bellia

Marketing Project Manager TechTeam Global —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.41.54.253 (talk) 12:36, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

Hi, welcome to wikipedia. I have left a list of links on your talk page http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk%3A69.41.54.253 that should help to explain how to get started at Wikipedia. I strongly suggest that you give the areas around Conflict of Interest, Notability and Neutral Point of View particular attention - Being as you are a representative of a company that wants to create an article about that company. Darigan (talk) 12:52, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

See also Wikipedia:FAQ/Organizations. PrimeHunter (talk) 13:13, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

Confused

Earlier this month I found a Page that listed all the pages that had notability issues and it was was organized by month the tags were put in place. Does any body know where that is? I want to help with the back log and can't find it The Resident Anthropologist (talk) 13:02, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

Here's one! Dismas|^(talk) 13:06, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

And the parent cat. Dismas|^(talk) 13:07, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

thanx!The Resident Anthropologist (talk) 13:14, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

error

hi would like to know how an artical can be changed if it is wrong. well just one part on the artical says out of 6 children one is deceased which is not true all 6 are alive. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 139.80.123.42 (talk) 14:11, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

Click the "edit" link on the article and change the text or tell us which article it is and we can edit it. -- kainaw™ 14:16, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

And make sure you have a reference or two to support your changes. – ukexpat (talk) 14:51, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

Awareness Ribbons

I see that the American Heart Association Ribbon isn't included on he awareness ribbons page list. How can I get it added to the page? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 165.214.4.21 (talk) 14:37, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

It appears you mean List of awareness ribbons. Can you link to a page with information and image of the ribbon? I couldn't find it. PrimeHunter (talk) 17:40, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

I could not find Shannon Grove in the deletion log

I put an article up on Shannon Grove, a candidate for California's 18th Senate District. Because she is the only viable candidate, she will be the State Senator come January. My article disappeared. I checked the deletion log and there was nothing. I redid a shorter version of the aricle unde myspace. Why, even though I put my article into the area where you are supposed to put it until it is reviewed, why was I not notified? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Linda robinett (talk • contribs) 14:45, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

The deletion log entry reads:

• 15:10, September 27, 2010 Bearcat (talk | contribs) deleted "Shannon Grove" ‎ (Blatant advertising)

Please read WP:SPAM and WP:POLITICIAN - candidates for office, unless they are otherwise notable, are not notable merely because they are candidates. – ukexpat (talk) 14:49, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

The "article" simply said that she exists and that she is a candidate for this senate seat; then listed her campaign website URL. That is neither assertion nor evidence of any kind of notability. As a biography of a living person, it would have been deleted anyway, since it was unsourced. --Orange Mike | Talk 14:53, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

You saved it at Shannon Grove which is in the mainspace encyclopedia where real articles are. It was tagged with {{New unreviewed article}} in {{New unreviewed article|source=ArticleWizard|date=September 2010}} but that doesn't prevent deletion of inappropriate articles. You later created User:Linda robinett/Shannon grove which is in your userspace and gives you more freedom to work on drafts. PrimeHunter (talk) 17:26, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

Create a page about my company

Hi I would like to create a page about my company, an advertising and marketing agency. Do you have directions that you could supply me with so I can create a page? Appreciate any help.

Best,

Marisa Marcus —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.238.25.236 (talk) 15:30, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

It's a complex business and the company may not meet Wikipedia's notability criteria, but in any event see WP:YFA, but before that please read WP:FAQO, WP:CORP, WP:SPAM, WP:RS and WP:COI. WikiCompany may be a better outlet for you. – ukexpat (talk) 15:42, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

Just to explain the acronyms: YFA = Your first article, FAQO = FAQ/Organizations, CORP = Notability (companies and organizations), SPAM = Spam, RS = Identifying reliable sources, and COI = Conflict of interest. -- Bk314159 (Talk to me and find out what I've done) 00:14, 29 September 2010 (UTC)

Unable to edit Reference List

Computer Appliance Wiki Page. I select Edit Reference section and don't understand what I am looking at. —Preceding unsigned comment added by RoyKok (talk • contribs) 17:55, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

The references are not actually listed in the reference section. Instead, they are listed in the body of the article (where you see the superscript numerals). You'll need to edit the sections where the superscripts appear in order to edit the references. TNXMan 18:23, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

See more at Wikipedia:Referencing for beginners. PrimeHunter (talk) 22:53, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

Autoconfirmation

How do I know if my account is Autoconfirmed or not? Is there a way to check it? Sneharaj27 (talk) 18:46, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

If I'm not mistaken, your account will be autoconfirmed in about thirty minutes. It kicks in after four days and ten edits. TNXMan 18:54, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

Yes, the account creation is here. Special:Preferences should now show "Member of groups: Autoconfirmed users, Users" for you. PrimeHunter (talk) 22:51, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

Using an image with full permission of the image's owner

I have attempted four or five times to upload an image for inclusion in an article which I have written and uploaded. All of the information in the article is used with the full permission of the person about whom the article was written. The image comes from this person's website, and again is used with her full permission.

As noted, I have uploaded the image a number of times, each time adding more information in the image's description to indicate that the image is being used with the full cooperation and permission of the subject of the image. However, the image still does not appear on the page. What have I done wrong or neglected to do?

The page is Raquel Bitton, and the image's final name (after numerous uploads) is Raquel_Bitton_Singing.jpg. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Ddruker (talk • contribs) 19:04, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

I've updated the page for you a little indicating the source of the image. There are two places you can read more about getting the image released for Wikipedia use - this page and this page. If you have any questions after reading those, please feel free to post here again. TNXMan 20:00, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

Note though that a release solely for use on Wikipedia is not sufficient. It must be a release for all purposes, otherwise the image will be tagged for deletion as it will not meet any of the non-free use criteria. – ukexpat (talk) 20:07, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

Fair Use Question

If I wanted to use a screenshot of a computer program under fair use, would I have to be the one who took the screenshot, or could I find a screenshot online and use it? Similarly with using the DVD cover of a movie for identification, would I actually have to take the picture of the dvd cover, or could I find one online (eg. from Amazon if they are selling the dvd)? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Spines11 (talk • contribs) 20:49, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

The photographer who took the picture would be the copyright holder of that photograph, seems to me. You cannot just assume that the image online is not copyrighted. The burden is on you to create your own fair use image. --Orange Mike | Talk 21:01, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

What about an official picture of the DVD cover from the studio? And with regards to a screenshot, does the screenshot count as a derivative work even if the screenshot of the program would be the same no matter who took the screenshot? Spines11 (talk) 21:08, 28 September 2010 (UTC)Spines11

It seems there was already a discussion a while ago about using images taken from amazon. A line put in some of the fair use rationales of images from amazon reads "Derived from a digital capture of the album cover (creator of this digital version is irrelevant as the copyright in all equivalent images is still held by the same party). ". The old page about using images from Amazon can be found here: Wikipedia_talk:Images_from_Amazon.com. So, it seems that digital scans and such of album or book covers are fine to take from Amazon. However, I'm still unsure about computer screenshots. Spines11 (talk) 21:38, 28 September 2010 (UTC)Spines11

The copyright experts hang out at media copyright questions so you may be better off asking there. However, there is a template for non-free screenshots, see {{Non-free software screenshot}}, and for non-free DVD covers, see {{Non-free video cover}}. The non-free use rationale template for the latter is {{film cover fur}}. – ukexpat (talk) 01:09, 29 September 2010 (UTC)

If you post a question there, be prepared to wait a few days for an answer. I've asked a few questions there and I think my quickest response was at least 48 hours after I asked. Dismas|^(talk) 02:16, 29 September 2010 (UTC)

Well that depends on who's logged in and watching that page . – ukexpat (talk) 14:47, 29 September 2010 (UTC)