Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2018 September 4

Welcome to the Wikipedia Help Desk Archives
The page you are currently viewing is an archive page. While you can leave answers for any questions shown below, please ask new questions on one of the current Help Desk pages.

September 4

Separate articles for foreign subsidiaries

What would be the proper way for dealing with retailers like Costco and Best Buy with large Canadian presences. Would it be better to split the article (such as with Walmart Canada) or nest it as a section in the parent's company's article (such as with Lowe's#Canada). Thanks for your guidance! Daylen (talk) 04:39, 4 September 2018 (UTC) (Please ping me in your response)

This is a matter of editorial judgement. A separate article is warranted if the parent article is already too large and the subsidiary is separately notable. If only one of these two criteria is met, then reasonable editors may disagree, so if you think you have a borderline case, start a discussion on the parent's talk page. -Arch dude (talk) 05:08, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

Daylen, to expand a little, the subsidiary must meet the new notability guidelines for companies separately from its parent Jimfbleak - talk to me? 06:18, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

@Arch dude: They are borderline cases and I've had discussions and banners up on multiple pages for over a week with no responses. @Jimfbleak: If their Canadian businesses were independent, they would definitely meet the notability guidelines. Daylen (talk) 16:53, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

@Daylen: OK, it is time to be bold (WP:BOLD) and do what you think is best. However, there is no particular reason for consistency between the various companies in this regard. Try to make the decision in each case that results in the best and most useful encyclopedic organization. -Arch dude (talk) 17:03, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

Biography of Dito Ariotedjo always deleted for several times

To Whom it may concern,

Me and my friends actively had make several post on making biography of an inspirational youth from Indonesia. We had follow the guidelines but then it always been removed or deleted by the admin of wikipedia. Can you guys tells us what did we do wrong?. Because the content that we made is inspiriational for the youth of the world especially in Indonesia to get proactive in Politics in such a young age. So there will be no gap between youth and politics.

Thankyou — Preceding unsigned comment added by 103.119.52.6 (talk) 07:40, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

There has never been an article entitled Dito Ariotedjo on the English Wikipedia. If you are enquiring regarding id:Dito Ariotedjo on the Indonesian Wikipedia, you need to ask there, not here, but firstly read the reason at id:WP:KPC#A7. --David Biddulph (talk) 10:10, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

Former versions of my user page

Due to massive violation of WP:ANON in real life, please delete all former versions of my user page. In the German Wikipedia it has already been done (with few exceptions defined by me) On request I will send links to the ANON-Violation per mail.--Feliks (talk) 12:18, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

I have deleted your userpage and then restored the last version you edited. ~ GB fan 12:24, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

Getting Help

Re page Mahuika Crater, see recent changes How do I attract the attention of a competent user? User Primefac does not seem to understand the subject. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 58.165.198.47 (talk) 15:05, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

As Primefac said in the last revert edit summary the place to discuss this is at Talk:Mahuika crater. ~ GB fan 15:11, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

Publishing a Wikipedia Page

I have created a Wikipedia page and i cannot figure out how to publish it (make it live so it is searchable on Google, for example).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Npaulhunnighan — Preceding unsigned comment added by Npaulhunnighan (talk • contribs) 16:37, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

Npaulhunnighan There are several issues with the page you've created.

1. You have created it as your user page, which is a page intended to be used to introduce yourself to other editors. Such pages are not indexed by Google as they are not part of the encyclopedia.
2. What you have written would not be accepted as an article were it to be moved out of your userspace. It is written using promotional language and reads like an advertisement rather than an encyclopedia article. Were it to be moved to article space it would promptly be deleted or moved to draft space.

I suggest you either move it or ask me to move it to draft space. Once there you can work to tone down the promotional language and improve the references. When you think it's ready you can ask for it to be reviewed as part of articles for creation (AFC). Once AFC accepts it, it will be moved to article space, go through one last round of approval by new page review, and only then will Google index it. ~ ONUnicorn^{(Talk|Contribs)}problem solving 17:10, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

@Npaulhunnighan: your user page is not the place for a draft article: it's a place for info about you as a Wikipedia editor (WP:USERPAGE). See your first article to see how to proceed. PLEASE NOTE CAREFULLY: your subject must be notable by our definition, not yours, or your article will be deleted. However: you should first look at amd comply with WP:COI and WP:PAID. -Arch dude (talk) 17:19, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

what can i do?

i have been told that i cannot use personal knowledge in Wikipedia items. but what if there is a statement that i know to be incorrect and has no source cited?

example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skully_(game) i played the game skelly as a kid in 1950s Brooklyn New York. at that time we did not have "plastic milk bottle caps." milk came either in glass bottles with light cardboard stoppers covered by foil, or in quart-size cardboard containers. we had metal caps from soft drink bottles, which is what most of us used. also, the article states, "the first player flicks a cap poised between thumb and middle finger." first, this is very difficult to actually position; second, it is wrong. the caps were always - always - placed on the ground and flicked using the middle or index finger launched from behind ones thumb. since these assertions have no citations either, how should i correct them? please help me to be a good Wikipedia editor. thank you, mlc Mlcred (talk) 16:56, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

@Mlcred: Find a professionally-published mainstream academic or journalistic source on the topic, paraphrase a summary of it (with a citation at the end), and replace the old material with new material. Ian.thomson (talk) 18:12, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

I've removed the words "milk" and "plastic" since these would not have been available in the early days of the game. For variations of the rules, you need to find a good source as recommended above. You could discuss the rules on the talk page of the article. Dbfirs 21:04, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

@Mlcred: If you see text that has no citation, that is a problem whether it is correct text or incorrect text. All text outside the WP:LEADSECTION must be supported with citations to WP:Reliable sources. So if there is no cite, feel free to add this text

{{CN}}

which will show in the text. There are more bells and whistles available, such as adding a reason to the tag. For further documentation see Template:Citation needed. In addition, as shown in this list there are a ton of useful inline citations to cover other sorts of problems you may run across. Thanks for helping tune up our articles! NewsAndEventsGuy (talk) 21:58, 4 September 2018 (UTC) PS I just did that myself here, for example. NewsAndEventsGuy (talk) 22:06, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

Having trouble with infobox code

Whenever I remove the website field from the infobox on Gulf Oil, it automatically adds a website for one of the spin-offs. I can't seem to figure out where that is feeding from. I put a code spaceholder in it so that it won't show it, but would prefer that the website field not show at all since the article is about a company that no longer exists. Grk1011 (talk) 17:03, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

• It came from the wikidata item, imported from from the French article. I do not know how to fix this: It's like playing Whack-a-mole. -Arch dude (talk) 17:10, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

Thanks. I edited the wikidata. Couldn't figure out how to do an edit summary there, so hoping no one reverts me! Grk1011 (talk) 17:23, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

Duncan Regehr

I spent two hours correcting and adding links to Duncan Regehr’s wikipedia page, which is full of everything from inaccurate dates in his personal history to poor grammar to incorrect and obsolete links to pages no longer accessible or available. The changes remained on the page, and it was a very impressive page, until approximately 13:00pm this afternoon. Why were they reversed? The sources I used included references to his own book and interviews he took part in at YouTube and videos online available for everyone to watch. Oh. I removed The Witcher listing because other references to Duncan Regehr being involved in that project online are derogatory.

Your website is useless. Whoever constructed and maintains that page needs to learn how to read. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Wealhtheow210 (talk • contribs) 17:43, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

@Wealhtheow210: Here are your contributions. You did not edit the page from your account, which makes it harder for others to tell what you've done.

Going to the revision history for Duncan Regehr, there's a reversion with the edit summary reverting several edits that have replaced all (in-line) references with external links. while presumably done in good faith, this is not an acceptable format for wikipedia.

Re Your website is useless: No, the problem is you don't know what you're doing, as evidenced by the fact that you think that only one person maintains a given page. Perhaps you should try actually reaching the grapes before saying they're sour.

If you'd like to learn how things work instead of projecting your own failures onto everyone else, we have a tutorial. Ian.thomson (talk) 17:48, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

Now my comments have been deleted. If your website is going to allow anyone to publish anything, in proper format, without publishing all facts correctly and accurately, your website should not be allowed to exist online. The information currently published is poorly written, in some cases libellous and more often than not portrays the subjects of the wiki articles in derogatory ways. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Wealhtheow210 (talk • contribs) 18:05, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

@Wealhtheow210: Do you really think you're acting in a mature and rational manner? Do you really think that throwing tantrums is going to help anything? Have you even considered that maybe you're doing something wrong, and that you need to learn to try something differently? If you would calm down and pay attention, you could see here that the problem with your edit was that you were adding external links to the article in the wrong place and format. Ian.thomson (talk) 18:07, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

Help with Sources

I was hired by Gurnick Academy of Medical Arts to assist in getting their Wiki page published. They had previously hired a firm to accomplish this, however the process stalled after receiving the following response from Wiki: Comment: Please see WP:AUD: "attention solely from local media, or media of limited interest and circulation, is not an indication of notability; at least one regional, statewide, provincial, national, or international source is necessary." You have two good news sources ([1], [2]), but they are both local, you need something with a broader scope. State of Reform could potentially work but it's not clear that it's a reliable source. There's not much info on the website about the organization. Cerebellum (talk) 03:01, 5 February 2018 (UTC). For the record, there were five local sources cited. Also, no Wiki page currently exists for Gurnick.

Clearly the school lacks sources with broader scope and cultivating earned media for the express purpose of Wiki publication seems challenging.

Also, we are unsure why one of the sources - State of Reform - was questioned as reliable source when the organization covers federal healthcare policy, as well as numerous states’ health policy. The website is has robust content and the organization has an active social media profile. While there is not an “About Us” tab on the website, if you click the conference link you see the organization states the following: “Reforming health care takes more than just hard work. It takes a solid understanding of the legislative process and knowledge about intricacies of the health care system. That’s where State of Reform comes in. State of Reform pulls together practitioners, thought leaders, and policymakers – each working to improve our health care system in their own way – into a unified conversation in a single place. It is sure to be one of the most diverse gatherings of senior healthcare leaders in Southern California, and one of the most important statewide events in California health care.” The conference also has some big-name sponsors and the Regional Director, US Department of Health and Human Services, Region IX as the Keynote Speaker.

Questions:

Are paid media sources considered reliable sources? Do you have any advice on how to gain broader sources? Is it possible to resubmit State of Reform for reconsideration as a reliable source? Is there another angle here that we are missing?

Thank you.

Suzanneppalmer (talk) 17:46, 4 September 2018 (UTC)Suzanne Palmer

@Suzanneppalmer: As a paid editor, you must disclose your employment on your user page, per the terms of use.

The approach the organization has taken so far to "get" an article on Wikipedia has been fundamentally incorrect.

Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, not a directory, not a means of promotion. All we do here is cite, summarize, and paraphrase professionally-published mainstream academic or journalistic sources. Our articles on other organizations were written by volunteers on this site, not PR firms, not employees.

If you are going to try again with creating an article, here are the steps you should take:

1) Ensure that the topic's notability is attested by discussions of it in several reliable independent sources.

2) Gather as many professionally-published mainstream academic or journalistic sources you can find.

3) Focus on just the ones that are not dependent upon or affiliated with the subject, but still specifically about the subject and providing in-depth coverage (not passing mentions). If you do not have at least three such sources, the subject is not yet notable and trying to write an article at this point will only fail.

4) Summarize those sources left after step 3, adding citations at the end of them. You'll want to do this in a program with little/no formatting, like Microsoft Notepad or Notepad++, and not in something like Microsoft Word or LibreOffice Writer. Make sure this summary is just bare statement of facts, phrased in a way that even someone who hates the subject can agree with.

5) Combine overlapping summaries (without arriving at new statements that no individual source supports) where possible, repeating citations as needed. Again, make sure the combined summaries are just a bare statement of facts. Avoid editorializing.

6) Paraphrase the whole thing just to be extra sure you've avoided any copyright violations or plagiarism. Again, bare facts that someone who hates the subject can agree with.

7) Use the Article wizard to post this draft and wait for approval.

8) If the article is approved, use edit requests on the article's talk page to suggest expansion using sources you put aside in step 2 (but make sure they don't make up more than half the sources for the article, and make sure that affiliated sources don't make up more than half of that).

9) Never directly edit the article again, only use edit requests.

Doing something besides those steps typically results in the article not being approved, or even in its deletion, or possibly in your account being blocked. Ian.thomson (talk) 18:04, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

@Suzanneppalmer: As usual, Ian covered it well. To reply to your question about "State of Reform", we have a specific definition of "reliable source": see WP:RS. -Arch dude (talk) 18:23, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

References to the Biblical Rebekah in Genesis

The name Rebekah is repeatedly misspelled as Rebecca . I don't wish to make all these corrections. Please have all References to "Rebecca" changed to "Rebekah". — Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.186.6.103 (talk) 21:49, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

See WP:COMMONNAME. Ian.thomson (talk) 21:50, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

The article Rebecca has a note down to the alternate spelling in English as well as the spelling in Hebrew (רִבְקָה). Rebecca (given name) specifically references the use of the transliterations into English in various bibles. The group most knowledgeable on the transliteration is probably Wikiproject:Judaism. And in some cases figuring out the most common name can be tough for words from Semetic languages like Hebrew. (Hanukkah is my favorite this issue).Naraht (talk) 14:10, 5 September 2018 (UTC)

Glen Affric

Ref number 70 is actually from the UK Daily Express (not the Daily Mail). I did not make this mistake, I have merely noted it. Could you please amend this mistake? Thanks203.132.68.1 (talk) 23:13, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

 Done, Eagleash (talk) 23:28, 4 September 2018 (UTC)