User talk:David Gerard

This is a Wikipedia user talk page. If you find this page on any site other than the English Wikipedia, you are viewing a mirror site. Be aware that the page may be outdated, and that I may have no personal affiliation with any site other than Wikipedia itself. The original page is located at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:David_Gerard .

Past talk:
User talk:David Gerard/archive 1 (4 Jan 2004 - 31 Dec 2004)
User talk:David Gerard/archive 2 (1 Jan 2005 - 30 Jun 2005)
User talk:David Gerard/archive 3 (1 Jul 2005 - 31 Dec 2005)
User talk:David Gerard/archive 4 (1 Jan 2006 - 30 Sep 2006)

Please put new stuff at the bottom, where I'll see it. m:CheckUser requests (sockpuppet checks, etc) should go to WP:RFCU unless you're letting me know about a particular problem we've been tracking, in which case I look here far more often.

At present, I am attempting to write and add "content" to those "article" things which are apparently there for "readers," rather than doing a lot of Wikipedia admin work.

Hi! We welcome your opinion, or participation on Wikipedia:WikiProject Sexology and sexuality/WIP-image-guidelines where we are attempting to develop useful guidelines to help solve a variety of problems. Atom 15:09, 2 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

In the first sentence, shouldn't "the biased or malicious content" be "biased or malicious content"? Lou Sander 14:35, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

uh, duh! Thank you - David Gerard 14:57, 4 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Sad because it's probably required. - brenneman ^{L} 12:38, 5 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

You'll note the document is very harsh on wikilawyers - David Gerard 12:44, 5 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The nutshell you used at this page was out-of sync with recent changes to the policy. Also it contained more information than was in the policy box. I tried to reword it. However my version failed to demonstrate consensus, so I remove the nutshell to the talk page until we can develop a more acceptable version. Just wanted to keep you informed of what happened and why the nutshell is momentatrily missing.

As long as I am here . . . I know you read my attempt at impproving the Wikisource policy. If you cannot think of anything useful to say don't worry. But do you think my new draft was an improvement at all? Or did you find it worse than the current policy? Thanks for taking the time to check it out.--Birgitte§β ʈ Talk 18:24, 5 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, sorry. I suffered a rush of blood to the head and mass-restored deleted nutshells. I'll stop by the talk and apologise. This is what I get for not reading first. - David Gerard 20:14, 5 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

On your userpage, you reference a list of stewards for people to contact with checkuser requests. I went through and corrected any inaccuracies I found in m:Template:CheckUser list earlier today, so it should be accurate enough to refer to. If nothing else, the automatic links all are verified to be working just fine. :) ~Kylu (u|t) 05:11, 7 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

nominated for deletion. --Coroebus 16:17, 7 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Well done - David Gerard 22:00, 7 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I read your rationale on the talk page for this article, but I really just don't see the place for the article in the project. Therefore, I started the AfD process. In light of the attempt on your part to explain why you began the article, I felt I should notify you of the process so you may add your input in that forum. Erechtheus 00:55, 10 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

If the goal is to deprecate the term "vanity" within Wikipedia (which seems like a good idea based on your comments) I'd say a good place to start would be to rename "vanity guidelines" to "conflict of interest" or somesuch. Of course the page still needs a major rewrite, but it's a start. >Radiant< 11:00, 10 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah. Trouble is we already have one of those and the merge will be complicated. Yaaaaaaay! Thankfully it's pretty clear to all that calling something "vanity" is actually defamatory unless you can be sure they were actually responsible, and in the UK at least you'd actually have to be able to prove it. BEST AVOIDED, REALLY! - David Gerard 11:03, 10 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

No need to merge. C of I was a proposal of some sort with little interest, so I just moved it out of the way. I suppose we could update "personal attacks" and "civility" to mention this as well, but then that makes the likely fallacious assumption that people actually read those pages on a regular basis. The next best solution I can think of is WP:TROUTwhacking people who (ab)use the term. >Radiant< 11:26, 10 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

WP:NPA used to be really short. I wonder how long the sentence "You can call a spade a 'shovel', but don't call it a 'fucking shovel'" would last in the civility guideline. In any case, no-one points at them. Rather, they say "Assume good faith!" if you suggest an AFD nomination was clueless. Or maybe it's just me and I need to learn Smarmy Point Of View - David Gerard 11:37, 10 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Oh, I'm sure there's a vexlit somewhere that will respond that according to section 3 paragraph 8 of the AGF policy your complaint is improper and therefore considered vandalistic. Or somesuch. It's all those needless and misunderstood caveats that make the 'pedia such a confusing place, and you can't legislate Clue anyway (speaking of which, there's some talk on iirc the civility page to officially outlaw sarcasm). Well anyway, I did a google through wikispace and removed the term 'vanity' in a bunch of places, including a beginner tutorial. Hope it sticks. >Radiant< 12:18, 10 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

If you included a good edit summary and a talk page note, it should stick. Go back and check in case someone argues.

I can probably take credit for the outlawing sarcasm one - I blew my top at someone on WT:BLP and instead of calling him a blithering idiot quoted Uncyclopedia links. I suppose next time I should just go for it - David Gerard 12:23, 10 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I have observed that wtf in general is followed by fts, although it need not be. Metarhyme 01:48, 11 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I agree so much with your essay, which came like a breath of fresh air to me; and I was relieved at your contributions today to Wikipedia talk: Reliable sources (though I disagree with the singling out of one name).

I’m relatively new and (like your “Kid”) I’ve earnestly read the policies and foundation documents, none of which sanction the reverting of good-faith edits or the tyranny of consensus in the slightest: quite the opposite. I do not see why these reverters are so reluctant to engage in normal editing process, by which I mean constructively working on a policy or article through an evolving sequence of edits, a cooperative venture which in my opinion can be trusted to produce net improvements over time (though we will sometimes go one step back to go two steps forward). Editing is dynamic: even a good-faith bad edit can move things forward if it prompts a creative response from the next editors. Reverting, however, is reactionary, especially when it invokes the consensus of some witenagemot that once met in the hills. qp10qp 15:57, 10 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]