Wikipedia talk:WikiCup/Archive/2009/7

Ice Age

Since we're heading for a mini ice age perhaps we ought to wrap the Cup up now while we're all still breathing? ;) --candle•wicke 18:58, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

Ice age? I wish! I'm melting right now. We're having a mini heatwave right now, and the temps have been hitting 90-100 deg F. It's 8pm and its still 76F. California is going to have an awfully hot summer this year, and it will be unbearable :( Matthewedwards :  Chat  02:30, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

Shut UP. :-) The Upper Peninsula had a snowstorm on Friday; 5 inches of snow fell in Marquette, 14 in Iron River, and 17 in Watersmeet...it has also been below freezing since then. :((( —Ed 17 ^{(Talk / Contribs)} 02:38, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

I'm 5 degrees north of watersmeet and we had some unusually cold weather in that last winter, including inches of snow which took days to melt. Must raise a glass to the Gulf stream ϢereSpielChequers 08:07, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

Indicate wildcards?

Could the results page also indicate who are the current wildcard entries? So we can see who would make it to the next round as of now; this would help those of us who are just trying to make it as a wildcard rather than a pool leader :) Perhaps wildcards could be shaded in a different color, or just add an asterisk or something. Gary King (talk) 00:59, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

I imagine that would be inconvenient as it would be changing all the time? --candle•wicke 17:16, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

The newsletter indicates who are in the wildcard positions. In addition, the scores keep changing, but they are also updated on the scores page. Wildcard spots are just like pool leader positions; they both change but it helps to know where we stand. Gary King (talk) 17:27, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

I keep an Excel spreadsheet that shows me the pool leaders, the six wildcards, and a few people "on the bubble". Since I have to update it manually, I only do so once every day or so, but if you'd like I can e-mail it to you as an attachment every evening. Useight (talk) 22:19, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

I'd rather just watchlist a page that does it automatically. It seems like something that could be automated; it just needs to be setup once, then it doesn't need to be modified again. Gary King (talk) 22:27, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

Well, yeah, watchlisting an automically-updated page would be vastly superior; I'm just making do with what I have. Useight (talk) 23:40, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

One possibility - if the bot can be coded to do this - is to have pool leaders and wildcards in green, everyone else in yellow. It fits in with the colour scheme already used. (green/red) Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 22:51, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

Oh. Colour scheme. Green/red. --candle•wicke 12:40, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

On the main page here: Green for active, red for withdrawn/eliminated. Add in yellow for "Not at the moment doing well enough to move on to the next round, and... Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 18:35, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, I was very vague. I was just involved in an exchange with another user whereby the other party labelled such a colour combination as "vomit". I find its use here amusing as a result. :) --candle•wicke 21:11, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

To Useight above - yes please, I'd love an email copy :) And to Gary, "just trying to make it as a wildcard" :P and :P. I'm sure you have the FA/GA queues simply stuffed with nominations. When those babies start to come through, I know I'll be eating your dust. Unless I can get my hands on whatever awesome magic 'shrooms the amazing Sasata has been imbibing, I'm history! Paxse (talk) 18:01, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

LOL! I just write about them... Psilocybin's not conducive to good work habits... uhh... not like I would know or anything :) Sasata (talk) 20:00, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

Nope, I have nothing in the works right now. I've got one FAC at the moment, and nothing else that I'm working on; the FAC isn't looking too good, anyways. Gary King (talk) 18:11, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

How do we know you're not pulling a fast one? ;) --candle•wicke 21:12, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

Next year

I think next year's WikiCup should have 130 participants. That means we could have 26 pools with 5 members each. Then top 100 scores advance to into 20 polls with 5 user in each. The top 64 scores advance to a 64 team single elimination knockout tournament. We can make the period one week instead of four weeks. The format could go as this:

1. Jan. 1 to Feb. 27 first round

2. March 2 to April 28 second round

3. May 1 to May 7 third round (knockout tournament begins)

4. May 8 to May 14 fourth round

5. May 15 to May 21 Fith round

6. May 22 to May 29 Quarterfinals

7. May 30 to June 4 Semifinals

8. June 13 to June 20 Finals and Bronze medal game

I have allowed a few days for scoring and bracketing. Here is the template (I am sorry that it is is too long)

Collapsed for readability

{{64TeamBracket-with-3rd}}

Leave Message ,Yellow Evan home , User:Yellow Evan/Sandbox

Wouldn't the Top 64 advance rather than the Top 100? Another note is that it would be difficult to get many GA/FA in only a seven day period. I think this would make mainspace points worth relatively more (which would be good for me, actually). Perhaps mainspace points would have to be removed, though, for this style of WikiCup. Useight (talk) 16:00, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

Although I do like the bracket style. Useight (talk) 16:04, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

I don't understand why mainspace points would have to be removed. They are part of the fun and the point of increasing content. --candle•wicke 17:37, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

This style would completely remove the whole point of creating featured content, etc. as those, especially FACs, can take about a month to pass FAC. Gary King (talk) 17:45, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

Mainspace points wouldn't have to be removed, I'm just saying that they'd be worth relatively more because it would be difficult to consistently get a GA on a weekly basis as opposed to rolling up 300 mainspace edits weekly. The advantage would tip more to the mainspacers than the featured creators, and as such, perhaps those who create FAs would cease doing that and focus on regular mainspace points, since they are guaranteed to count as points within a week. This somewhat defeats the purpose of the Cup. If mainspace points were removed, though, this wouldn't occur. Although there would possibly be plenty of matchups that ended up being 30-0. DYKs are also easier to get within a week so there would also be an advantage there. So simply put, mainspace and DYKs are much easier to get within a week, so having such short rounds would give an advantage to those who work in those areas. I'm not saying this can't be rectified in some way, that's just the way I see this playing out. Useight (talk) 17:58, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

Why would they have to be worth more? What would be wrong with smaller point numbers in pools? Everybody would still be getting the same points. --candle•wicke 02:09, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

Maybe I'm still not explaining properly what I'm thinking. Something like this: if the round is only seven days and User:ABC focuses solely on mainspace while his opponent, User:XYZ, focuses solely on getting a single article to FA, User:XYZ may not be able to get it to FA in that small window of time and end up with very few points. Meanwhile, User:ABC was able to rack up a fair amount of mainspace points because they are scored nearly instantly. User:XYZ would have ended up with more points if he could have gotten that article to FA, which our example user would have had the round been longer. Therefore, on Day 1, both users have 0 points; on Day 7, ABC has ~10 and XYZ has ~5; on Day 14 ABC has ~20 and XYZ has ~35, for example. What I'm saying is that the guy who solely focuses on mainspace will take an early lead and then will be overtaken by the guy doing featured content. Hence, on shorter rounds, it increases the chance that the mainspacer will win, as the featured guy didn't have enough time to get the article to FA. Useight (talk) 17:29, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

YellowEvan, I've hidden the template for easier navigation. Hope you don't mind.  GARDEN  13:43, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

Another possible format:

Tournament runs from Jan 1-Dec 31. Entry possible at any time. Limit entries to some arbitrary # if desired, or not. Point system essentially the same as it is now (with probable tweaking of point values based on consensus and result analysis of this year's event). Have a number of shiny awards available, eg.

• Grand Prize: most points accumulated in year; 2nd, 3rd
• Individual awards for most FA's, GA's, DYKs, etc.
• "Iterim" awards, i.e. most points accumulated in 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th quarters
• ... and others depending on your imagination

The idea is to increase participation and motivate more editors to further contribute to encyclopedia; no-one is eliminated, so contributions continue throughout the year. If the bot can be made to count the points, why not have a few hundred competitors - more competition, more motivation, more fun! Sasata (talk) 18:23, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

If we had a year-around WikiCup it would become boring. However, we can have individual awards. Leave Message ,Yellow Evan home , User:Yellow Evan/Sandbox

I don't like the original idea in this thread, at all. It's too much like a sports contest- the short rounds aree not good, the large amount of hoping no one "good" is in your group is counter productive- it seems to be all game and no content. Sasata's idea is far better, because it avoids those pitfalls, but may be a little dull- it's much more passive and casual than the current format. J Milburn (talk) 18:45, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

Ok, I guess the idea of a year-long sustained hardcore effort of encyclopedia writing might be intimidating (boring) for some. How about instead, the winner is the one who tallies the most points in any 3-month period during the year? That way the competition is still open to all, all year long, and allows anyone to participate, regardless of their time restrictions (holidays, school, etc.) Sasata (talk) 19:33, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

As a fencer, I see a compromise idea. The first round would last for a few months, same as we have now. However, the second round would have something like a pool of 16, as shown below.

	First round					Quarter-finals					Semi-finals					Final
	1
	16
	8
	9
	5
	12
	4
	13
	6
	11
	3
	14
	7
	10
	2
	15

Each round would last for 2 weeks, meaning it would take 8 weeks to complete the second round. This is a compromise between the two, and seems to be the best idea in my opinion. What do others think? Xclamation point 18:54, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

I don't mind this being all year at all. It's what I do anyway. I presumed anyone who wanted to be included in this was willing to spend time creating and improving content? Why would that change on the other side of the year? --candle•wicke 02:11, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

I'm sort of opposed to the basic knockout idea, as we saw in Round 1, it's mainly luck of the draw as to when you will be knocked out. For instance, someone with 300 points (a handsome total which may be a lot more than anyone else) could be against the likes of Durova or Theleftorium (sorry for not namechacking anyone in particular here, only an exmaple) who can easily surpass 500 in one round. See what I mean?  GARDEN  13:43, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

2 weeks is ridiculously short. A round needs to last at least a month. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 14:02, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

I wanted to make each round one week at one point in time. Garden, Let's just say Hurricanehink was playing me. This would make a challenge for the users like me. The problem with a year-around wiki cup is it no longer special. Next year we will open 260 slots. As a compromise, we will have three rounds of pools one with 260 user another with 130 users another with 100. Each round of polls is 2 months long. Then we start a 64 team single elimination knockout tournament. For the tornament each round can be to weeks. We can have mainspace edits with 1 point. We can also have individual awards. Also, If we are going to have 200 more users than this year we can start sign ups in May 1 instead of October 1. Lastly, if an FA gets nominated during the Semifinals but passes during the finals 30 points could still be given for the final round.Leave Message ,Yellow Evan home , User:Yellow Evan/Sandbox

As long as the rounds prior to the tournament-style are long enough to achieve accurate seeding, something like this might be feasible. Useight (talk) 17:31, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

I think that the current format is fine; there is no way content builders could win in the style of tournament you guys are proposing. FACs take a minimum of two weeks to pass. GANs? Who knows. Could be a day, could be two months. —Ed 17 ^{(Talk / Contribs)} 01:05, 27 April 2009 (UTC)

Yes, and remember the purpose of this is to build content through encouragement, i.e. making it fun (presumably). If the format threatens that then it has the potential to turn into some sort of cut-throat contest where some of the most suitable contributors are axed before they can get started. --candle•wicke 21:08, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

Hopefully, the judges will do accurate seeding. No one is going to get axed. Also, we can create another rule the FA/FL needs to pass during the two weeks. Leave Message ,Yellow Evan home , User:Yellow Evan/Sandbox

TFA

Do we get points if one of our FAs appears on the main page as TFA? — Rlevse • Talk • 20:45, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

No, because that doesn't really have anything to do with how good your content building is.  GARDEN  20:58, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

(ec)There is no system in place for it, and I would strongly oppose one being put into place. It takes work to get an article to featured status (or to get it to high enough quality for a DYK or ITN) but it takes no skill for it to appear as TFA- it's just a time-sensitive article that happened to already be featured, or a random featured article. J Milburn (talk) 21:00, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

Not to mention that, while FAs and FPs mainpage, FSes, FLs and FPOs don't. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 21:05, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

Wait wait, maybe we should give points for TFA and POTD! Cackles evilly, rubs grubby hands, stacks the Picture of the Day queue. Durova^Charge! 15:28, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

O_O —Ed 17 ^{(Talk / Contribs)} 21:47, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

Idle question

Which flag do you represent, and why did you choose it? Durova^Charge! 03:22, 20 April 2009 (UTC)

• (Starting this off) I represent Mexico because San Diego is awfully darn close to Mexico. Durova^Charge! 03:22, 20 April 2009 (UTC)

  Not because San Diego has basically become Mexico? : D Ottava Rima (talk) 03:24, 20 April 2009 (UTC)

  • Sí, naturalmente. Durova^Charge! 03:34, 20 April 2009 (UTC)

• Maryland because my ancestors founded the state. The Vatican was taken, so I had to go with the second best thing. Ottava Rima (talk) 03:24, 20 April 2009 (UTC)
  • Did they select the state flag too? It's a beauty. Durova^Charge! 03:28, 20 April 2009 (UTC)
    • In a way, yes - I'm related to the Calvert family, the Carroll family and the Bowie family (and, via that, most of the old families). The flag is the Calvert family coat of arms along with George Calvert's mother's coat of arms. The two images were brought together after the Civil War while a Bowie was governor. So, there is a lot of familial connection. :) Ottava Rima (talk) 03:53, 20 April 2009 (UTC)
• Vanuatu, because the Matthew Island belongs to it. Matthewedwards :  Chat  03:38, 20 April 2009 (UTC)

I have the (at least initially) highly-coveted US flag. During sign-ups, the third individual in the list, I forget who it was, had the US flag, so I just grabbed some other one. But then that individual withdrew from the list and I happened to see it at the right time and make the switch to the US flag. That's my story. Useight (talk) 04:15, 20 April 2009 (UTC)

Mine is weird. Couldn't think of a good one to chose so I stopped and just said something. I chose Japan on the spot because I like Japanese women and that is what popped in my head.--WillC 04:28, 20 April 2009 (UTC)

Mine was Eritrea (in the since deleted Judge's Pool) because I chose it while playing Championship Manager 2007 for my manager nationality as it is the most unknown place I could see on the list with the game. Fact.  GARDEN  12:10, 20 April 2009 (UTC)

I chose Rapa Nui because it is one of the most amazing places I've been to and a significant part of my early Wiki life. I feel my POV is too strong on at least four of the major disputes there to edit the articles much; but I could at least fly the flag. Also until you look close you might think it was a smile. ϢereSpielChequers 12:22, 20 April 2009 (UTC)

The flag is pretty damn awesome.  GARDEN  12:23, 20 April 2009 (UTC)

• I chose Poland because Italy, the country where the majority of my family is from. I've seen pictures and videos of Poland, and it looks very quaint and a great place for European culture. Meetare Shappy ^Cunkelfratz! 12:30, 20 April 2009 (UTC)
• Someone stole my one... I hadn't expected it to be in such high demand but there you go. I noticed Denmark was free, it was a similarly small(ish) country and it came up in some conversation or other in the same room as me on the day I chose it. --candle•wicke 12:53, 20 April 2009 (UTC)
• Cambodia, because sometimes, it looks just like this. Paxse (talk) 14:46, 20 April 2009 (UTC)

  

  • That is fairly stunning... --candle•wicke 15:02, 20 April 2009 (UTC)
• I chose the Isle of Man because I wanted something local to me in Cumbria, and Lancashire, England and Scotland were already taken. I should have gone for the UK... J Milburn (talk) 15:55, 20 April 2009 (UTC)
• I lived in Wales for several years, and fell in love with it. It's a beautiful country. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 17:05, 21 April 2009 (UTC)
• I chose England because it's the most amazing country in the world! (Because I live there - that's what makes it great =P ). Dendodge _T\^C 19:03, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

• Michigan was mine because I live there (even if it is a crappy state educationally and economically speaking...you know what scares me? How this doesn't mention that Michigan has the highest unemployment of all 50 states). There was no flag for Superior (proposed U.S. state); that was disappointing. :-) —Ed 17 ^{(Talk / Contribs)} 19:20, 22 April 2009 (UTC)
• I chose the Philippines...though born outside the nation, one of my parents is Filipino, and I take some pride in my ancestry. Spencer^{T♦Nominate!} 14:53, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

Do you happen to speak Tagalog? I lived in the Philippines for a couple of years, but I'm slowly forgetting the language because I never get a chance to use it. Useight (talk) 15:02, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

Very, Very, Very Little. Limited to less than 20 words/phrases. Pop over to Wikipedia:Tambayan Philippines, where you'll find many editors who would love to practise with you. Spencer^{T♦Nominate!} 21:52, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

A silly question

For those of you who don't know this already, I run a fully disclosed second account called Hamlet, Prince of Trollmark. He does useful content work within his specialized areas of interest and he has recently earned a featured picture (it's about trolling of course). He has a second featured picture candidate in progress (about socks) and a DYK in progress (also about socks). Would it be possible for dear Hamlet's content contributions to count toward my score, or is he just a useless drama sock as far as the WikiCup is concerned? Durova^Charge! 17:33, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

Hi Durova, unless the bot is willing to make special arrangements for socks of Royal yarn I'm afraid the answer is the bot will only count mainspace edits from one account per contestant. Presumably as Hamlet is royal you would like the bot to count his mainspace edits instead of yours? ϢereSpielChequers 21:45, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

I think that she is asking if the FP credits can be added to her score, not the mainspace points. (right?) —Ed 17 ^{(Talk / Contribs)} 21:46, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

Mainspace edits are difficult to amalgamate in particular, but FPs etc under alt accounts would be easy enough, just add to your submissions page.  GARDEN  22:05, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

No need for his mainspace edits. Thanks about the featured credits. :) Durova^Charge! 02:39, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

I don't know, should we really be allowing some very fishy trolling to be used to get points? Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 12:31, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

If all goes well, my first three featured credits may display properly captioned "trolling", "sock", "puppet". Ought to upload and nominate the third: a delightful burlesque. Regards! _Hamlet, Prince of Trollmark^{bugs and goblins} 14:34, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

ITN

Do Wikinews articles count for ITN points? Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 12:06, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

Doesn't appear so, but that would be a good idea in my opinion. –Juliancolton | ^Talk 14:40, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

But Wikinews isn't ITN... that is a common misconception... the alternative would be to go over to WP:ITN/C where points galore are usually available. --candle•wicke 19:52, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, but this is Wikipedia:WikiCup. Contributions should probably be focused here, thanks.  GARDEN  20:09, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

Can you imagine what this Cup would look like if the featured pictures Shoemaker and I earn at Commons counted here? ;) Durova^Charge! 18:14, 9 May 2009 (UTC)

Yes, it would look like a bunch of bloody bodies, some burning buildings, and an angry mob complaining about unfairness. :P Why not just take the images and have a dual Pedia and Commons image contest after? Ottava Rima (talk) 18:18, 9 May 2009 (UTC)

SMOOCH Durova^Charge! 19:16, 9 May 2009 (UTC)

Mr (or Mrs?) Shoemaker is always welcome to create and update articles from the suggestions list at WP:ITN/C if they wish. They too usually involve lots of bloody bodies, some burning buildings and an angry mob complaining about unfairness. --candle•wicke 19:02, 9 May 2009 (UTC)

Mr, thank you. I have a beard. Anyway including my commons FPCs would only get me 455 more points this round (I had a set of 8 pass there that didn't pass here because MER-C arguably worked to sink it a little bit. Piffling! Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 19:24, 9 May 2009 (UTC)

Sasata's strange edits

Look at these and you will see that some edits are done at least 1 per 4 seconds. They look like bot edits. Many, many pages created within a matter of seconds. Many pages updated. This has to be script done. This is not content editing in any kind of regard and is really gaming the system. This shows that the user has 6891 mainspace edits since the beginning of 2006. In the past month and 10 days the user made 4,500 edits (over 100 per day without sleeping and not using huggle). So, for the other three years the user made 2,300 edits. This is really gaming the system and needs to be addressed. Then we have users like Paxse whose contribs include things like orphan tagging that is script assisted, but not marked minor or as a script. These are items that are supposed to be worth 1/10th of a normal edit for a reason. Ottava Rima (talk) 01:13, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Also, this type of edit shows up often in Sasata's edits. Its a blank edit that acknowledges the page was added to a project. This is normally accomplished via a talk page, but is done in a way that earns him .1 point per action. The contrib log above has a long list, and this happens often. So, these edits shouldn't even be worth the .01 of a minor edit. Ottava Rima (talk) 01:17, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Well, per Help:Minor_edit#When_not_to_mark_an_edit_as_minor, added or removing a template should not be marked as minor, but using scripts....Useight (talk) 03:38, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

And editing a page without doing anything but putting in the edit summary that it was added to a project? I've never seen that one before except there. :) Ottava Rima (talk) 03:39, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Sasata and Paxse notified about this discussion. —Ed 17 ^{(Talk / Contribs)} 03:50, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Hi Ottava, thanks for the analysis of my editing behavior. I guess I must be doing something right if another competitor takes the time to scrutinize my edits and claim I'm using a script "to game the system". To reply to your concerns, I'm not using any script (and do not have the programming-savvy to do so). If you were to analyse my edits more deeply, you would see that after my "fast" edits, there is a 10-15 minute lag time before the next set of fast edits. This is me clicking open new tabs, copying and pasting, and modifying text in the new open tabs. I batch save all the tabs, this saves a few seconds and minimizes wasted mouse movement - optimization of clicking habits and mousing distance is necessary when performing a highly repetitive task for 6–8 hours at a time. Many years of time wasted playing 3rd person shooter games has given me the ability to mouse and click at a pace that makes even fellow gamers envious; here I'm simply translating that "skill" to Wikipedia, by creating stubs on fungal taxa, and adding templates and categories. Does massive stub creation count as content editing? Opinions seem to be polarized on that matter. Shortly after I started this process, I received a couple of messages admonishing me for creating these stubs, but I also received even more barnstars and complimentary messages for the work I was doing. You seem to be in the former camp, but that's ok with me - you're entitled to your opinion; I personally believe the encyclopedia benefits in the long run. Regarding the specific example you claim as a "blank edit", if you look a bit more carefully, that blank edit is actually a page creation. I simply copy-pasted the wrong line into the edit summary – pasted "added to WikiProject Fungi" instead of "Created Fungal taxon page" – I'll blame that to the late hour and the fact due to my inherent obsessive-compulsive behavior, I tend to do this activity until I literally can't keep my eyes open anymore. FWIW, another competitor went through all of my contributions (i.e. the 1000+ stubs I've created in the past few months) and simply added the category "Fungus stubs" to every one, thus gaining the same amount of points I did for creating them in the first place. I didn't think he was "gaming the system", rather, I thought he was a clever competitor who thought of a category I had forgot to add in, and the end result of his gnomish editing is that someone in the future will find these articles more easily because they are properly categorized.

Whether edits should even be counted as 0.1 points is another topic for discussion (again). I don't think they should be, as I insinuated in the previous discussion on this matter. Sasata (talk) 04:06, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

I'm not seeing that gap of 10-15 minutes; looking through your last set of "added reference" the biggest gap is 5, unless I missed something. However, I also don't see what you're doing as "gaming the system" or whatever. If I could figure out how to get the information off those source articles, I'd be helping you complete these many fungi-related articles, but I'm having more fun with my NFL articles, anyway. I did notice, though, that after this mysterious clever competitor starting adding the fungus stub category you started including it in your page creation, thus simultaneously thwarting him and saving him from such a boring task. Useight (talk) 04:29, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

I guessed at 10-15 minutes, I suppose I'm more manic than I thought... time loses significance when eyes are glued to the screen in a caffeine-induced orgiastic copy/paste clicking frenzy. Under the current scoring system, there's several 100's of points available to anyone who wants to go through Category:Stub-Class_Fungi_articles and add the category "Fungus stubs". I'm done the A's. :) Sasata (talk) 04:46, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Man, I hear you on that losing track of time thing, that's why I have a "website meter" that keeps track of how many websites I open. For the curious, it's about 1000 a day; that would be a lot higher if I wasn't working 40 hours a week. And I may take you up on that stub sorting, after I take care of the 1974 NFL season. Useight (talk) 04:53, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

I find your explanation hard to believe based on my experience at Wikiversity with a content creating bot that acted in the same way. I would link, but the pages were deleted so the pattern will not be visible to non-admin. He edited about 7,000 times in 40 days. This is a high mark for hugglers. Ottava Rima (talk) 14:55, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

7,000 edits in 40 days is definitely attainable, that's 175 a day. I averaged 200 completely manual edits daily this past February because I was unemployed and out of school, so I edited about 8 hours a day. However, I was not able to edit at a per minute rate that Sasata sustains. Useight (talk) 15:16, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

I find your persistent bad faith accusations hard to believe, but I guess that goes with the territory. I'll do another 500-1000 edits later tonight to give you a fresh set of data to analyse. Sasata (talk) 15:40, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Re-read what Assume Good Faith means. It does not mean that clear problems should not be discussed. It means that we should assume that you, in some way, want to help the community. AGF would mean to think that your gaming of WikiCup is done with good intentions and not to try and hurt others. That is it. Ottava Rima (talk) 15:46, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Looking at your link above you already admit that edits like this would probably be problematic, so your own words, applying to you, are enough to show a problem with your actions: "the awarding of points for mainspace edits will encourage me to go through the ridiculous process of adding one or two sentences at a time". That is half of what you are doing. Ottava Rima (talk) 15:49, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

I agree, something should be done about my behavior. I just spent the past 2 hours gaining 30 Cup points, not by adding any content, but by cleaning up errors and adding categories to another user's script-created stubs. All that was required was making approximately 1800 mouse clicks, 600 pastes, and 1200 single key presses, as well as ignoring my three young children who wanted to play with their daddy. "Think of the children" Sasata (talk) 19:00, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

An easy solution is to count ONLY those edits which add say 1k of text. Nergaal (talk) 04:29, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Agreed, I completely support this idea. Sasata (talk) 04:46, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Err, 1k of text is an awful lot for a single edit. Moreover, I'm not sure if it would be possible for the bot to detect that. –Juliancolton | ^Talk 15:51, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

How about capping the available points for mainspace edits in any one round at 100 or 200 points? Sasata (talk) 16:14, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

I would be against changing the rules in the middle of the Cup, let alone in the middle of a round. I do note, though, that of the 30 editors still competing, only thre have 200+ mainspace points and only five have 100+. For full disclosure, I am one of the three. Useight (talk) 16:40, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Oh goody, an unprovoked assault on my editing. "...orphan tagging that is script assisted, but not marked minor or as a script." Them're fightin' words Ottava. How about trying the AGF route before leaping to Defcon 1? I do use scripts - reftools, DYKcheck, and popups. I use no scripts for other purposes - neither huggle nor twinkle nor AWB nor the mis-named "Friendly" shall inhabit my machine. Heard of tabbed browsing? Clever invention, allows you to open ten articles for editing at once and play with them at your leisure. Very handy for repetitive maintenance tasks. Just go along the whole line tagging, stub sorting, fixing etc. to your hearts content. Then when you're done just move from tab to tab clicking "Save Page." This appears in the logs as multiple edits per minute when each page saves. However, if you look a little more closely, it can be two, three, five or ten minutes between each block of articles. That's something to look for next time you are scrutinising someone's contributions. So, that takes care of "script assisted." On to "but not marked minor." As mentioned above, adding or removing templates from an article should not be marked as a minor edit. So, what exactly is this thread supposed to achieve? Do you hope to discourage Sasata from creating any more new articles? Damn it, we should be thanking him, not giving him the third degree. Do you want my mainspace points? Hell, they're yours. I really don't give a damn. I'm hoping to stay in the competition because it motivates me to expand neglected articles and run 'em at DYK. Meanwhile, if my edits seriously offend you in some way - have the courtesy to leave a message on my talk. Paxse (talk) 17:00, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Seeing as how there is scripts that handle orphan page tagging, I find it unlikely that you just went around yourself, found orphaned pages, and tagged them. Adding original research, orphan pages, lack of citation, etc, templates is not content building. Adding categories is not content building. This was a competition about building content, not going around performing gnome work that could be completed by a bot contest. Ottava Rima (talk) 17:09, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Relax ppl ! This CUP is just for fun... enjoy doing things than fighting on it -- Tinu Cherian - 18:29, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

True, but he is dominating so we have to whine. :) But yeah, I just wanted answers because it was a major "wtf" increase that put the huggling edits of last round to shame. Ottava Rima (talk) 18:55, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

Newsletter

Sorry, but there'll be no newsletter this week due to other commitments for myself and iMatthew's illness. Sorry if you were looking forward to it, but I'll tell you the current standings anyway...

Pool leaders

Pool A: Shoemaker's Holiday (460)

Pool B: Mitchazenia (216)

Pool C: Theleftorium (315)

Pool D: Candlewicke (458)

Pool E: Durova (409)

Pool F: Sasata (822)

Wildcards

1. Paxse (287)
2. Rlevse (284)
3. Scorpion0422 (264)
4. Useight (263)
5. Wrestlinglover (229)
6. Ottava Rima (217)
7. ThinkBlue (169)
8. the_ed17 (165)
9. Juliancolton (122)
10. Ceranthor (107)

Apologies again.  GARDEN  08:35, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

Pointless boasting

Today I received my two hundredth featured picture promotion at English Wikipedia. :) Durova^Charge! 04:12, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

/me slaps Durova.

Just kidding. ;) Many congratulations to you, and I hope you keep up the great work you are doing! —Ed (Talk • Contribs) 05:47, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

One user's nomination of several hundred thousand million DYKs in one go^* quickly opened up that aspect of the competition – Sasata is in second place now!!! :-O – and gave said user their one hundredth DYK^** but they forgot (or maybe purposefully neglected) to pointlessly boast. :) To you sir/madam I say, well done; having tried to nominate one FP recently, I know of the difficulties involved!
(*figures may be a slight exaggeration, user totally can't count. **user estimates #100 to be the eleventh of the set.) --candle•wicke 09:32, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

My 16 part hook was still better. Also, it was on traditional encyclopedic topics, so ha on you! Ottava Rima (talk) 13:58, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Tut, please stick to the facts and maintain a non-biased view. Any encyclopedia can benefit from a broad range of information on topics such as comedy, cuisine, fashion, sport and television – and one simply can't have enough health spas. I now have to slap this section with several tags as it has fallen out of line with policy. --candle•wicke 15:49, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Oh, yeah! Well, uh, I'm going to be the only individual to get through the second round on pure mainspace! Wait, am I doing this right? Everyone has featured content but me. :( Useight (talk) 16:22, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Congratulations Durova! :) TheLeftorium 16:36, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

(Glowing smile) Thank you all very much! Useight, want to collaborate on something? GIMP is free... ;) Durova^Charge! 16:52, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Let's save that for round three, when I need it more. I'm pretty sure I'll be eliminated in the next round, anyway; tougher competition coupled with more time constraints on my end will spell the end for me. Useight (talk) 17:12, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

I too have had nothing featured... --candle•wicke 17:16, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Oh yeah? Featured pictures? Anyone can do that. I'm the only one with a featured portal, so I win. By dee fault. The two sweetest words in the English language. J Milburn (talk) 17:24, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Looked at WP:FPOC recently? (Also, 70 FPs here =) ) Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 17:27, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

And, come to think of it, I helped out a bit on the Fungi portal, content-wise. You didn't help out on the Opera portal, so, presuming it passes, I win =P Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 17:30, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Ah, but you're wrong there, because... Erm... I have more DYKs than you. Which decides in a tie-break situation. Everyone knows that. J Milburn (talk) 17:32, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Hmm. 3 DYK? I can beat that easily enough. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 17:39, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

70 FPs? I can beat that easily enough. ;) J Milburn (talk) 17:43, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Oh, good! We could use antoher nthusiastic contributor! Contact me, I'll liknk you to some excellent raw scans at the LoC or supply you with some of the many in my collection I haven't gotten to yet. It's wonderful of you to volunteer, especially such a major commitment! Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 17:47, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Oh, erm, well... J Milburn (talk) 17:48, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

How about Gustav Doré or Louis Huard to start? Interesting imagery, not too hard to clean. Good introduction. Contact me on IRC (or Skype, if you'd rather: Account shoemakers.holiday ) Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 18:04, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

In all seriousness, I would like to try for some FPs some time, but it would be as a photographer, rather than a restorer. I'll leave that to the experts! J Milburn (talk) 18:07, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Bah! Like I've had any actual training in this? Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 18:14, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Newsletter for this week...

...should be done tomorrow. :D  GARDEN  21:53, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

... woohoo (I will be gentlemanly and ladily in all of this by replying) --candle•wicke 22:39, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Thank you. --candle•wicke 15:35, 18 May 2009 (UTC)

Pleasure :D  GARDEN  15:37, 18 May 2009 (UTC)

Can't we just end the round now, while I'm still in the wildcard? –Juliancolton | ^Talk 16:23, 18 May 2009 (UTC)

Nooooooo :D  GARDEN  18:46, 18 May 2009 (UTC)

Cursory note

Just letting you know that you've only got ten days left in this round before we close submissions for paperwork and stuff. I'm pretty sure that FAC and GAN are longer to complete than this time period allows so get your DYK and ITN nominations in sharpish :) Good luck to all.  GARDEN  08:40, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

Unreviewed GANs will count for the next round, right? TheLeftorium 13:29, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

Yes, if you get through that is ;)  GARDEN  08:27, 20 May 2009 (UTC)

Just keep those ITN nominations coming... oh. Yeah. Right... --candle•wicke 23:47, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, it usually helps when you have 5 unreviewed GANs and nobody reviewing them at all.3 1/2 years of Mitch32 23:51, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

Happy 3 1/2 years! :) I think it would be best just to sort out all this here and now so please clarify the DYK position as well when answering the question about GANs. It would probably be best just to clarify in a YES/NO fashion if all unreviewed nominations of any kind do count in the next round. --candle•wicke 01:30, 20 May 2009 (UTC)

I believe this has been answered many times already. All nominations count for the round they passed in, no matter which round they were nominated in. Considering my recent GA reviews, I'll probably pull out another if this ever gets reviewed. Plus I would like to tie for most passed FLs during this round, so here is hoping that List of PWG World Champions passes soon.--WillC 01:57, 20 May 2009 (UTC)

Considering that both FL directors are in this, that might not have been the smartest thing to say. -- Scorpion⁰⁴²² 03:09, 20 May 2009 (UTC)

You are right, but I take chances. You wouldn't be mean to me would you? *grins*--WillC 03:30, 20 May 2009 (UTC)

@Scorpion - not a threat is it?! :P  GARDEN  08:27, 20 May 2009 (UTC)

To clarify

User:Juliancolton/Blink Clear enough?  GARDEN  08:30, 20 May 2009 (UTC)

User:Juliancolton/Blink or pretty colors would have made it clearer! –Juliancolton | ^Talk 08:42, 20 May 2009 (UTC)

Thar u goez. weburiedoursecretsinthegarden 09:56, 20 May 2009 (UTC)

ARGH! J Milburn (talk) 15:59, 20 May 2009 (UTC)