Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2023 March 26

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March 26

Citation copying won't work

Hello, I am an editor for 2023 FIBA 3x3 Asia Cup, I've been trying to fix a duplicate reference on [1] and [2], but no matter what I try it just won't work, please help me! ~With regards, I followed The Username Policy (Message Me) (What I have done on Wikipedia) 01:38, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

@I followed The Username Policy:  Fixed in this edit. GoingBatty (talk) 02:01, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

Thank You So Much, it was driving me crazy, for some reason it works in the edit preview but not in the published version, I didn't know you had to set it for the second ref. ~With regards, I followed The Username Policy (Message Me) (What I have done on Wikipedia) 01:10, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

@I followed The Username Policy: I also removed url-status from refs with no archive-url. – _•Raven  ^.talk 02:05, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

Article naming issue

I'm working on articles about Polish statistical systems (TERYT, TERC, BREC, ULIC) and I have an issue with naming them. Let's take TERC as an example:

• The most commonly used name is the acronym, however there are multiple uses for TERC already, and therefore TERC cannot be used.
• The article could be titled by its full Polish name, which would be System identyfikatorów i nazw jednostek podziału administracyjnego, which is rarely used and against WP:USEENGLISH.
• Another solution would be to name the article by the translated Polish name, which would be System of identifiers and names of units of territorial division, however this name is almost never used in relation to TERC.
• The article could be named by something like TERC (Polish statistical system), but this is against WP:NCA.

Other wikis that have an article about TERC use just TERC as it is the most common name, however none of them have an article on Telomerase RNA component, which is another use for TERC.

The systems' acronyms are sometimes derived from Polish, such as SIMC (System identyfikatorów i nazw miejscowości). SIMC already has an article, titled by its Polish name.

What would you suggest doing? PRmaster1 (talk) 12:13, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

If it's known by it's acronym, then use that. You then need to find a suitable disambiguation, (statistics system) is reasonably close I'd say. Lee Vilenski ^{(talk • contribs)} 12:19, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

Political orientation

I have noticed that there seems to be a marked left-wing orientation within Wikipedia (in the United States, it corresponds to the Democratic Party). I would like an explanation as to whether this is really the case, or whether it is just my impression; furthermore, I would like to know, with proof, whether Wikipedia, according to its own laws, can have political orientations, or must, by necessity, always be neutral. I repeat: it would seem, in my opinion, that there is a not inconsiderable left-wing political orientation here on Wikipedia. JackkBrown (talk) 13:24, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

Putting "left wing" and "US Democratic Party" in the same sentence leaves me giggling. --ColinFine (talk) 14:46, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

JackkBrown This sort of discussion is probably better suited for the Village Pump. Users are not expected to leave their political affiliations at the door, so to speak, but are expected to civilly collaborate to achieve consensus. Having a neutral point of view is different from being without bias, which is impossible. We all have biases, as do independent reliable sources. Sources are presented to readers so they can evaluate and judge them for themselves as to bias and other factors in determining what they think. If an article seems to have too much of a slant, please discuss it on the article talk page. 331dot (talk) 13:32, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

I'll add that Wikipedia does not equivocate if reliable sources do not, for example with how the January 6 United States Capitol attack is described, or Joe Biden being found to be the winner of the election. 331dot (talk) 13:35, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

It can be argued that Wikipedia, as whole, is a socialist idea. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 08:17, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

I wouldn’t say socialist, but rather progressive or liberal (in the original, Locke-ian meaning of the term).

Wikipedia, as a political project, can fit in an egalitarian public education program à la Jules Ferry with a strong socialist tint. But it can also fit in libertarian framework of "everyone can learn how to swim, you only sink if you deserve it". (Also, Jules Ferry was hardly a socialist, but I disgress.)

I agree that in practice it attracts editors leaning left, but that’s only because information-control authoritarianism is a right-wing value in today's Western culture. That was not always the case (see, for instance, the USSR in the 1980s and 1990s). [EDIT: seems contentious, but I have no intention of arguing that point]

Tigraan^{Click here for my talk page ("private" contact)} 11:03, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

"information-control authoritarianism is a right-wing value in today's Western culture" - really? The whole woke cancel culture is usually associated with the left. Martin of Sheffield (talk) 13:49, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

Tigraan This is almost certainly not the forum for working this out, but since you made the statement: 1) Was it not Biden who wanted to create some "disinformation" watchdog office that correctly-thinking Americans objected to as an un-American ministry of propaganda worthy of Lenin or Stalin or Mao? and 2) is it not the Dems in government who are working with the social media to govern what ideas may and may not be discussed--on the theory that social media are not bound by that pesky Freedom of Speech clause that so-hinders Big Brother from telling us what's good for us to believe? Uporządnicki (talk) 15:43, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

Should an article about people objecting to (say) Rhubarb, be titled "Rhubarb protests" or "Anti-rhubarb protests"?

Someone has changed the name of article 2023 Israeli anti-judicial reform protests to 2023 Israeli judicial reform protests. Which name better fits Wikipedia's article naming conventions? Thanks Misha Wolf (talk) 14:10, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

I would go with whatever reliable sources use (WP:COMMONNAME) — PerfectSoundWhatever (t; c) 18:03, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

By and large, coverage in reliable sources uses neither of these terms. Misha Wolf (talk) 18:20, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

What do they use? — PerfectSoundWhatever (t; c) 19:09, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

All of the following terms are in use by reliable sources to describe what the government is doing: judicial changes, judicial overhaul, judicial plan, judicial reform, judicial reforms, judicial system overhaul, justice reform, legal overhaul, legal reform and legal reforms. When writing about protests, the prefix "anti-" is sometimes linked with one of these terms and sometimes not. Misha Wolf (talk) 17:17, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

Of course any protest is likely to be anti something, so the prefix may be redundant. Which is anti-judicial, the protests or the reform? —Tamfang (talk) 22:37, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

Why not simply 2023 Israeli protests (already a redirect)? Shells-shells (talk) 23:46, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

There are 9 months left in 2023. How do we know the Israelis won't be protesting something totally different next week? For example, the 2020 anti-mask anti-COVID lockdown protests in the United States could have conceivably been titled "2020 US Protests" - until George Floyd was killed and the U.S. started protesting something else. ~ ONUnicorn^{(Talk|Contribs)}problem solving 14:09, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

I think that we'll leave the title as is for now. It's part of a trio of closely related articles and it's best if their titles use matching terms:

• 2023 Israeli judicial reform
• Reactions to the 2023 Israeli judicial reform
• 2023 Israeli judicial reform protests

Misha Wolf (talk) 15:00, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

Template:WikiProject Antigua and Barbuda template task forces not being added

I have been working on Template:WikiProject Antigua and Barbuda, and while the first five task forces I have added to the template have been working fine, the last two are not showing up in the required categories needed section, and when I add those two task forces to a page, those two task forces do show up in the parameters, but to not add a category to the page, and do not show the task force label on the template. CROIX (talk) 16:20, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

@CROIX: Hi there! There are many redlink categories listed at Template:WikiProject Antigua and Barbuda that need to be created. If this doesn't answer your question, then I suggest you ask at Template talk:WikiProject Antigua and Barbuda and provide specific examples of the page names and which categories aren't listed as you expect. Hope this helps, and happy editing! GoingBatty (talk) 04:51, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

@GoingBatty While this did not answer my question, I thank you for helping anyways. However, the template talk at the WikiProject Antigua and Barbuda is largely inactive and not really reviewed by anyone but myself. Are there any other help forums available that I can ask questions at? CROIX (talk) 20:25, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

The two missing task forces in this template are these, while the task forces do appear in the template parameters while being inserted, the task forces and associated categories do not show up when the template is inserted into a talk page relating to that task force. An example can be seen at Freetown, Saint Philip's talk page.

|tf 6=
{{{saintphilip|}}}
  |TF_6_LINK          = Wikipedia:WikiProject Antigua and Barbuda/Saint Philip  |TF_6_NAME          = Parish of Saint Philip task force  |TF_6_IMAGE         =   |TF_6_PORTAL        =   |TF_6_QUALITY       = yes  |tf 6 importance={{{saintphilip-importance|}}}  |TF_6_ASSESSMENT_CAT= Parish of Saint Philip articles  |TF_6_MAIN_CAT      = Parish of Saint Philip task force articles  |TF_6_HOOK = {{WPBannerMeta/hooks/qualimpintersect|class={{{class|}}}|importance={{{saintphilip-importance|}}}|category={{{category|}}}|ASSESSMENT_CAT=Parish of Saint Philip articles|BANNER_NAME=Template:WikiProject Antigua and Barbuda|UNASSESSED_APPENDIX=-Class|SUPPRESS_NA=yes}}{{WPBannerMeta/hooks/cats|category={{{category|¬}}}|cat 6={{{needs-image|{{{image-needed|{{{needs-photo|}}}}}}}}}|CAT_6=Wikipedia requested photographs in the Parish of Saint Philip, Antigua and Barbuda}}
|tf 7=
{{{barbuda|}}}
  |TF_7_LINK          = Wikipedia:WikiProject Antigua and Barbuda/Barbuda  |TF_7_NAME          = Barbuda task force  |TF_7_IMAGE         =   |TF_7_PORTAL        =   |TF_7_QUALITY       = yes  |tf 7 importance={{{barbuda-importance|}}}  |TF_7_ASSESSMENT_CAT= Barbuda articles  |TF_7_MAIN_CAT      = Barbuda task force articles  |TF_7_HOOK = {{WPBannerMeta/hooks/qualimpintersect|class={{{class|}}}|importance={{{barbuda-importance|}}}|category={{{category|}}}|ASSESSMENT_CAT=Barbuda articles|BANNER_NAME=Template:WikiProject Antigua and Barbuda|UNASSESSED_APPENDIX=-Class|SUPPRESS_NA=yes}}{{WPBannerMeta/hooks/cats|category={{{category|¬}}}|cat 7={{{needs-image|{{{image-needed|{{{needs-photo|}}}}}}}}}|CAT_7=Wikipedia requested photographs in Barbuda, Antigua and Barbuda}}

CROIX (talk) 20:29, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

@CROIX: I confirmed the task forces don't appear at Talk:Freetown, Saint Philip, but don't see any issues in the template code. If you don't receive an answer from another editor here, you could try Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Templates. GoingBatty (talk) 14:08, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

Template:WPBannerMeta § Task forces → WPBannerMeta can accommodate up to five task forces...

—Trappist the monk (talk) 14:26, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

@Trappist the monk However, more than five task forces can be added through the use of hooks (Template:WPBannerMeta § Task forces), this template uses hooks. Have the hooks not been used properly? CROIX (talk) 19:31, 29 March 2023 (UTC)

Must not be ... {{WikiProject Antigua and Barbuda}} passes a variety of parameters including |TF_6_HOOK= and |TF_7_HOOK= with their assigned values to {{WPBannerMeta}}. In {{WPBannerMeta}} there is no reference to {{{TF_6_HOOK}}} or {{{TF_7_HOOK}}} so those parameters and their assigned values will be ignored by {{WPBannerMeta}}. The 'hook' documentation, like most template documentation, is woefully inadequate and I'm not all that interested in figuring out what it means or how it works. You might ask the editors who have contributed significantly to {{WPBannerMeta}} and {{WPBannerMeta/hooks}}. If you figure it out, improve the documentation.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 19:57, 29 March 2023 (UTC)

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

Good evening. Is there a specific reason why the Italian language Wikipedia page on Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (https://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolfgang_Amadeus_Mozart) is so much longer? Mozart is one of the most influential figures in all of music history, it seems strange to me that in the world's best Wikipedia (i.e. this one, en.wiki), the page has far fewer bytes of writing. JackkBrown (talk) 19:46, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

@JackkBrown: Nobody has chosen to expand it. Wikipedia is crowdsourced by volunteers whose work is loosely co-ordinated at best, with each volunteer doing whatever work they wish to do. Feel free to work on the Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart article. -Arch dude (talk) 20:03, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

@JackkBrown: Note also that a number of headings in our Mozart article are followed by "See also" and "Main article" lines, indicating that some aspects of Mozart's life are treated in separate articles here (perhaps because of splitting from the main article). I haven't looked at both articles in detail, but it could be that the Italian WP discusses everything about M.'s life in one article, whereas we do it in multiple articles. Deor (talk) 23:44, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

Former cricketer Elias Constantine

I would like to provide a picture of Elias Constantine. I am his daughter, Aurelia Constantine. How can I go about doing that? Thanks. Cricketgirl868 (talk) 21:21, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

Hi Cricketgirl868. Before you do anything else, please read through Wikipedia:Conflict of interest. Please understand that I'm asking you to do this for reference purposes only, not because you've done anything wrong. Being new to Wikipedia, there are probably lots of things about it that you're unfamiliar with and that page will help you get up to speed on some of them that relate to your situation. As for adding a photo to Elias Constantine, a lot of how that can be done depends upon the photo itself and its copyright status. If this is a photo that you yourself took, please take a look at Wikipedia:Donating copyrighted materials#Donating your photographs for some general information on options that are available to you; as it states on that page, such an image is probably better uploaded to Wikipedia's sister project Wikipedia:Commons. If this situation applies to you, please clarify and someone will be better able to help you. On the other hand, if the photo was taken by someone else or you don't know who took the photo, then things become more complicated. Generally, under the copyright laws of most countries like the US, the person taking a photo is considered to be its copyright holder and only the copyright can given the consent that Wikipedia needs to be able to host the file. In this case, the more information you can provided about the provenance of the photo, the easier it will be for someone to try and help you sort things out. If the photo is currently available somewhere online, then providing a link to the url address where it can be seen would also be helpful since whoever else is using it may have provided some informtation about its provenance. -- Marchjuly (talk) 21:40, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

@Cricketgirl868: The advice above is entirely correct, but let me insist on one thing regarding copyright: if you don’t know who took the photo, it’s probably not ok.

Yes, even if it’s a very old photo. Copyright is full of specific details but in many instances it expires 70 years after the death of the photographer (not after the photograph was taken). You don’t know who the photographer is? Too bad, unless your jurisdiction has a specific provision for orphan works.

If you think that’s crazy long, well, I agree, but you should take that with your local politician and ask them to change copyright law. Tigraan^{Click here for my talk page ("private" contact)} 11:26, 28 March 2023 (UTC)

Draft:Los Angeles FC 2

Can somebody move this page back to the mainspace? It was originally in the mainspace until User:Onel5969 moved it as a draft. The team actually starts play today, so it has relevance..

Roberto221 (talk) 21:51, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

 Courtesy link: Draft:Los Angeles FC 2.   Roberto221, did you read the "declined" notice at the top of the draft? Maproom (talk) 22:33, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

Hello, Roberto221. In order for Draft: Los Angeles FC 2 to be accepted as an article, it needs to include enough citations to suitable sources to establish that the club meets Wikipedia's criteria for notability. It does not do so at present (none of the sources cited has significant coverage of the club, and all four seem to derive their information from MLS Next Pro, and so are not independent.

It is quite likely that suitable sources do not yet exist, i.e. it is TOOSOON.

As for when they are starting play: There is no deadline in Wikipedia. ColinFine (talk) 22:33, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

A physician in Argentina

I was not sure if Wikipedia along with many other wonderful sources of information would be able to help me contact a very renowned physician in POSADAS MI SSIONES ARGENTINA. HE WAS THE HEAD OF THE PLASTIC SURGICAL SOCIETY OF LATIN AMERICA...HEIS EXPERTISE WAS BURN PATIENTS WHICH VERY FEW SURGEONS HAVE EXPERTISE IN. I MET HIM MANY YEARS AGO AND HE WAS A VERY KIND BENEVOLENT PHYSICIAN WHO WAS CALLED IN TO HELP PATIENTS IN IMPOSSIBLE SITUATIONS I LIVED IN NEW YORK AT THE INTERESTED AND HE WAS THERE SO OFEN AS WELL MANY OTER PLACES THROUT THE WORLD. WE WERE VERY GOOD FRIENDS HE WOULD STAY WITH MY FAMILY WHEN HE WAS HERE.I ALSO KNOW A PATIENT THAT I WANTEDI TO SPEAK TO HIM ABOUT. AGAIN HIS NAME.. DR LEON BUCHUK in POSADAS MISS MARY ELLEN SEEKAMP (talk) 22:48, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

MARY ELLEN SEEKAMP Please turn your caps lock off when posting, it is seen as yelling. We can't help you with contacting an article subject or other individual, sorry. 331dot (talk) 22:50, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

There is no article in English Wikipedia about, or mentioning, this person. A websearch found only one result, which was a location and address entered on a map service called vymaps.com, which unfortunately is blacklisted by Wikipedia so I cannot post a link to it. If you websearch on "Leon Buchak surgeon" (or doctor, or Dr) you may find it, or you could search on the map service yourself.

Since this information is published (and you could have found it yourself) I see no reason not to give it to you, on the understanding that Wikipedia's reasons for blacklisting it may include malware on it: we'll see if other editors here disagree and remove it. I have no idea whether the map location and address is still current (perhaps it's old and the Doctor has moved, or retired, or died), but you could at minimum write to the address given, and perhaps use it to help find further information.

Please also note that this Helpdesk, as it states at the top of the page, is intended only for help in editing Wikipedia. In future, please post factual queries not about Wikipedia on one of the WP:Reference desks. Hope this helps. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 90.205.101.197 (talk) 04:15, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

Curiosity

A curiosity: how come the articles in this encyclopaedia (which I consider the best version in the world) tend to be less long than those in Italian, but have more sources? JackkBrown (talk) 23:07, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

JackkBrown. Because that is the way that the volunteer editors in the English Wikipedia (and the Italian Wikipedia) have freely chosen to write and reference the articles. There is no formal coordination whatsoever between the two projects. Cullen328 (talk) 23:54, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

Why are you asking this question multiple times? See #Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart above where you were told the same thing. Star Mississippi 00:40, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

It depends which pages you compare. Special:Statistics currently says Content pages 6,635,398, and Words in all content pages 4,325,192,319. The average is 4,325,192,319 / 6,635,398 = 652 words per content page. it:Special:Statistics gives 884 546 844 / 1 804 067 = 490. If you try to compare specific articles then there may be differences in how much related material has been placed in other articles. Wikipedia:Wikipedia records#Languages says: "Language with the highest percentage of featured articles: Italian Wikipedia (3.7%)." But each language decides its own featured article criteria and processes so it's hard to compare. Many languages don't even use the concept. PrimeHunter (talk) 01:04, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

Each Wikipedia project has its own policies and guidelines, and has its own community enforcing them. This is one reason that articles found on other language Wikipedia's aren't automatically considered OK to be translated into English for English Wikipedia as explained WP:OTHERLANGS. Different language Wikipedia articles also aren't necessarily direct translations of one another; so, the Italian Wikipedia article might've been developed completely independently of its English Wikipedia counterpart. It's possible that some of the content found in the Italian Wikipedia article was also once in the English Wikipedia article, but subsequently was removed because it wasn't deemed appropriate for English Wikipedia. You can try checking Talk: Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (including any archives) to see whether this has been discussed before. If you don't find anything, maybe scan through the article's page history to see if any major expansions made to the article ended up being subsequently reverted. You can also start a discussion about this on the article's talk page and see with others familiar with the subject matter might have to say. -- Marchjuly (talk) 01:37, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

@JackkBrown Another possibility is that things might be describable in fewer words in English than in some other languages. I have noticed this just by reading the back of a can of air freshener sold in the US (Glade, or Lysol, for instance). There are instructions and warnings in a couple of languages, and they say the same thing, but the English takes fewer (and shorter) words. A friend who translates English into French, as a job, says this happens between English and several other languages. Apparently, translators call this phenomenon "translation bloom". I predict that in the Wikipedia articles, the words aren't exactly the same, but English might be more concise than Italian. Just a thought. David10244 (talk) 07:58, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

English is one of, if not the, largest languages in terms of vocabulary. As David10244 indicates, many other languages have to use phrases where English uses a word. Consider potatoes = "pommes de terre" (lit: apples of the ground) or railway = "chemin de fer" (lit: horse road of iron). Also note that the French uses "horse road OF iron" whereas the English equivalent is "iron horse road", one word less. Martin of Sheffield (talk) 08:19, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

Not really important here, but "chemin de fer" translates literally as "path/road of iron", not "horse of iron". "Horse" is "cheval". Random person no 362478479 (talk) Random person no 362478479 (talk) 08:50, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

Oops, good catch. Martin of Sheffield (talk) 09:38, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

"Chemin de fer" is the correct translation of "railroad". However, I immediately understood "cheval de fer" (horse of iron) to mean "locomotive". It might be because of this film, I am not sure that it is all that common. Tigraan^{Click here for my talk page ("private" contact)} 12:22, 29 March 2023 (UTC)

Possibly it.wp prefers to consolidate pages where en.wp prefers to rely on links to smaller pages? —Tamfang (talk) 22:17, 27 March 2023 (UTC)