User talk:Wareh

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Thanks

Hi Wareh and thanks for assisting with Greek text. Much appreciated. One thing though - what's wrong with hemichous? My lexicon doesn't have either hemichous or hemichoun but it does have chous. I tried to follow your suggested link but I couldn't see the relevance. I'm pretty sure it's hemichous.Lucretius (talk) 01:18, 14 March 2008 (UTC) Actually, I've just noticed your list of contributions. You're The Dude when it comes to classicism and I'm keeping your discussion page on my watchlist for whenever I need help. Hope that's OK! I'll accept your advice about hemichoun. I guess it must be listed somewhere on that page of inscriptions you cited. Lucretius (talk) 01:40, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

I'm glad I was able to help! Hemichous seems logical (prefix + chous), and I left it in as the English term because this is more often used in scholarly writing (often Latinized to hemichus in German). However, our actual Ancient Greek texts show, not masc./fem. hemichous, but neuter hemichoon (contracted in Attic Greek to hemichoun). This can become obscured because many of the forms that actually show up are ambiguous (the plural form is always hemichoa, neuter, but that by itself doesn't prove anything about the singular; chous also shows a mixture of forms, with third declension choes showing up in the plural). After some initial hesitation, I realized that to write Greek ἡμίχους would be to perpetrate a fiction, since I can't find any solid evidence that such a masc./fem. form was ever used in any Ancient Greek literary text or inscription. The inscription whose URL I mentioned in my edit summary includes the text ἔλαιον χοῦς ἡμίχουν, "olive oil, a chous and a half": here the masc./fem. nominative chous appears right next to the neuter nominative hemichoun, so that sealed the deal for me. Until proven wrong, I'm maintaining that there is no solid evidence for a Greek word hemichous, despite the fact that moderns have adopted this as a translation of hemichoun. All this is admittedly complicated and tedious, but, bottom line, I'm pretty sure I made the right call. For what it's worth, there is one Googleable scholarly reference to "hemichoun" as an adopted English term, but this isn't the norm, so let's not add reforming English usage to our agenda here! Wareh (talk) 02:19, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

That's amazing scholarship. I hope it's not all from memory! It takes me many encounters to remember a word and life isn't long enough for me to manage what you managed just now. But I'll keep plodding along at my own pace. Thanks Dude. Lucretius (talk) 03:04, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

Sorry for performing necromancy on this section (not that it was dead, mind)! Hesychius has "<ἡμίχους>· μέτρον μεδίμνου <εἰκοστὸν> τέταρτον" which would translate to "hemichous. measure of medimnus - 1/24", I believe? Take a look if you'd like and enlighten us! 3rdAlcove (talk) 01:46, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

That appears to be quite right. In Latte's edition, which I can check via TLG (no app. crit.), ἡμίχους is printed without angle brackets (are you using them just to indicate a lemma?). So, without checking a proper edition of Hesychius, it does look like this throws a wrench into what I said, especially because many of LSJ's citations are ambiguous oblique forms (this is at least true of the Aristotle and Hippocratic passages). I suppose we can say that both nominative forms are attested, and that it remains to study the evidence of nominative forms carefully enough to state a preference for any given purpose. Wareh (talk) 14:25, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

I had a look at Hesychius (and the Stephanus Thesaurus Graecae Linguae, London 1825, vol. VII, col. 10552d). Here's my take. As a lexicographer, perhaps Hesychius is giving the lemma for the adjective meaning "holding or consisting in half a χοῦς" (naturally, Hesychius would be interested in the word as parallel to δίχους, ἑξάχους etc.). The take of LSJ, giving the lemma ἡμίχοον, would be that in practice this adjective is used only in the neuter, with the noun μέτρον or ἀγγεῖον understood. (Do we have to take Hesychius as saying "a ἡμίχους is a μέτρον," or could it be, "ἡμίχους: said of a μέτρον / in the neuter to indicate a μέτρον...."?) Anyway, perhaps one can dig up an actual unambiguously masc./fem. (and substantival) usage; meanwhile Hesychius' lemma doesn't seem much of a substitute for one "in the wild." Wareh (talk) 19:50, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

Greek text

Hi again Wareh! I've been scouring the web for some hours trying to find any freely available copies of poems by Alcaeus. All I could find was about 6 fragments, which didn't look very impressive to me compared, for instance, with fragments by Archilochus. If you can direct me to a web site with Alcaeus odds and ends, that would be much appreciated. It would be nice if Wiki had its own copy of poems by seminal Greek masters like Alcaeus, especially since the number of fragments is quite small. But that would need somebody to sit down for some hours and type them up using whatever program or code is used for Greek with breathings, accents etc. Not that I am hinting at anything. Just dreaming. The cost of texts is prohibitive and these poems, or what's left of them, should be as freely available as the air we breathe. Lucretius (talk) 07:50, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

The best online collection of Alcaeus' texts (in Unicode) is E. Gottwein's. The only supplement to this collection I found by checking with my usual sources & methods was fr. 42 (greek-language.gr). (The less prohibitively priced source for all the fragments in Greek and English is the Loeb Classical Library: Greek Lyric, vol. 1, ed. David Campbell, ISBN 0674991575.) Best wishes for your work in the cause of freely available Greek! Wareh (talk) 18:45, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for this help. I took a copy of the Gottwein fragments. Loeb has already profited from my interest in Greek but I'll probably end up buying a combined Sappho/Alcaeus text anyway. In the meantime, Cheers. Lucretius (talk) 00:10, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

Template

Yes, I see your point. I'll avoid putting the date in further sep entries.--Aldux (talk) 14:32, 30 April 2008 (UTC)

please note

User:Bbpowell now redirects to User:Wakantanka. 04:11, 15 May 2008 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Akhilleus (talk • contribs)

Wow, I'm surprised to see an account so plausibly purportedly belonging to a scholar with some reputation trolling so desperately as to insist Greg Nagy's work is "wild and of no lasting value" and betraying anxiety over who is an "important scholar." It would seem appropriate to revert any of his edits, e.g. the latest one to Homer, on principle (how can a scholar attached to particular and controversial views be the one giving important overviews of encyclopedic consensus their cast?). Let me know if more active involvement on my part would be helpful. Wareh (talk) 14:10, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

Yes, it's very strange. If he were willing to set his idiosyncratic opinions aside, Wakantanka could be a valuable contributor, but he seems to be here to promote his own ideas and pursue petty grudges. It makes me wonder if he is who he claimed to be; I would prefer to think it's an impersonator, rather than someone whose work I've found enjoyable (though often implausible). --Akhilleus (talk) 18:38, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

Well, you could always send the real Barry Powell an email inquiring whether he's aware of a possible defamatory impersonator. The idea did cross my mind, but I chickened out; it would be awkward if the answer were, "Yes, that's me." Wareh (talk) 02:42, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

Iesous!

Conscript Fathers, brought to you by Doug Coldwell. --Akhilleus (talk) 01:56, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

More detail: I've redirected Conscript Fathers to Roman Senate; you can find Doug's text at this version. Perhaps the most exciting feature of that article is footnote 21, a citation to this distinguished scholarly text.

Doug seems to have been led to the patres conscripti through his reading of Valerius Maximus. --Akhilleus (talk) 03:35, 2 July 2008 (UTC)

Image:CSLEmperorRiverbank.jpg

Yes, I think you're right. I really wasn't happy with the reduction, but the image editing program I use doesn't give me a good idea of what a reduced image will look like until it's already uploaded so by the time I saw the damage it was a bit late. Right now, the image page gives me a 779 × 600 preview image, and I have to click on it to see the full 6,624 × 5,100 image. The preview size is perfectly adequate for seeing the difference, so I'm going to re-reduce it to that size. Part of the point of fair use reductions is to use a resolution that's lower than the original but nevertheless retains its educational value, so I don't think this will be a problem. I'll leave a brief explanation on the image's talk page so there's a record of why it will be larger than most fair-use reducitons. (And oh, by the way, you don't have to be an admin to revert a new image upload, so long as the old version hasn't been deleted yet. I left the message directed to an admin as that would be who would delete the old large version, but I think this is a good example of when non-admin editors like ourselves should just be bold :-) ). --Icarus ^(Hi!) 03:39, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

I have to ask...

Adams House? Kafka Liz (talk) 23:57, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

Yep, that's me! But you...? Wareh (talk) 19:40, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

Email. :) Kafka Liz (talk) 21:57, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

Aristophanes

Hi again Wareh! I'm gearing up to do some editing of Aristophanes and his plays, hopefully linking them together in a meaningful way. The articles are badly in need of development. I notice that Aristophanes includes citations to Inscriptiones Graecae as well as other scholarly sources, listed in the body of the text. I wonder if you could fix these citations so that we all know what they mean and so they don't clutter the text? Some have me stumped. I don't yet know how much editing I'll do in those articles but they are screaming for improvement and I can't stick my fingers in my ears forever. Lucretius (talk) 00:30, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

Yes, I'll try to help out with this. The first things I notice are that Aristophanes doesn't link Inscriptiones Graecae, and that Inscriptiones Graecae in turn does not link the Packard Humanities Institute's Searchable Greek Inscriptions. So something can be done to make these references more informative to the uninitiated (though we'll have to see if it's as easy to find English versions). Less clutter? I'm not sure how that would happen--do you mean that your preference is to move it all into footnotes? Wareh (talk) 14:48, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

All the above - illucidate for the uninitiated and unclutter the main text by moving to the footnotes. It's not clear to me for example which collection of fragments is signified by some of the citations, though a bona fide scholar might know. I suspect these citations were copied from a book and I wouldn't be surprised if some of them are miscopied. I think the creation of relevant links would be a great solution. Lucretius (talk) 22:21, 5 December 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for the help with those citations. My edit will include mention of Araros but the other 2 sons of Aristophanes could be imposters - they don't appear in any of my books (a modest collection!) but even OCD doesn't mention them. If I can find a scholarly text that posits them as his sons, I'll keep them, otherwise I must expose them on the cold mountainside, for the foxes to gnaw. Lucretius (talk) 00:25, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

Well, they are named in ancient sources, however obscure those may be. I no longer have the texts in front of me--unfortunately, I've left them in the office to which I won't return until the new year (I'd like to take another look at e.g. Eubulus test. 4 in this connection)--but the 1911 Britannica article had no compunction naming them all three as Aristophanes' sons (and more recently see Ian Storey's introduction to the 2000 Hackett edn. of Clouds, p. xviii), so I think it's more a matter of obscure information than of gravely doubted information. Exposure could be going a bit too far! Wareh (talk) 00:39, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

Hi again Wareh - sorry not to have replied sooner as I only just today discovered the comment posted above. Thanks muchly for the advice and espeshally for the link to Storey's intro to Clouds as this will help me greatly to pad out my little store of citations for Aristophanes AND it contains some juicy new bits of info that I'll begin squeezing into the larder as soon as I can. You'll be pleased to know that some gentle Maenads discovered the two 'bastard' sons of Aristophanes on the mountainside and they have returned them to me for inclusion in the article because apparently they're about as genuine as any sons of Aristophanes these days can be. So I'll reinstate your missing citations. On the other hand, I still have doubts about one of the sons and maybe he won't make it after all (experts can't agree on his name). I expect the article will include a section on the transmission of manuscripts and hopefully you might find some time to write that up as it's a scholar's territory. I'll attempt it myself otherwise, if I can locate enough info on the web. Lucretius 121.222.60.247 (talk) 01:14, 3 January 2009 (UTC)

new WP:RDREG userbox

This user is a Reference desk regular.

The box to the right is the newly created userbox for all RefDesk regulars. Since you are an RD regular, you are receiving this notice to remind you to put this box on your userpage! (but when you do, don't include the |no. Just say {{WP:RD regulars/box}} ) This adds you to Category:RD regulars, which is a must. So please, add it. Don't worry, no more spam after this - just check WP:RDREG for updates, news, etc. flaminglawyer^c 07:10, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

Flagged Revs

Hi,

I noticed you voted oppose in the flag revs straw pole and would like to ask if you would mind adding User:Promethean/No to your user or talk page to make your position clear to people who visit your page :) - Thanks to Neurolysis for the template   «l| Ψrometheăn ™|l»  (talk) 07:11, 8 January 2009 (UTC)

Re: Undeletion request: Nicholas Harpsfield

Hop! As you'll notice the article is erm.... extremely short, I hope you'll be able to enhance it! Thanks for your help in improving Wikipedia! -- lucasbfr ^talk 08:29, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

Your concern at Jimbo's talk

Hi Wareh, I write this here, since I think Jimmy Wales must get annoyed by the amount of orange bars he sees daily. What you write about 10 steps forward, 1 back, is something I have said many times in the past. Same for what you wrote about "the ignorant stumbling on an article and getting hooked". I believe that's how this project works and that it works.

Actually, I am cautious about introducing FR in its strictest sense myself. It is hard to judge from the experience at the German wiki, since little can be said yet what happens with the total activity and the quality of that activity, except that it did not cause big changes in the short term. The only thing they seem to agree on is that at the introduction of FR, there was an sudden short-lived increase in the amount of new accounts created. I had a chat with people from the Polish wiki a month ago, and they said the same, independently from the Germans. It could be that the introduction of FR stimulates long term IP-users to create an account.

My own guess about the influence of FR is at the moment: I think IP-users and newbies usually do not know their edits are invisible to others (though this will naturally be explained at some help page that newbies don't read). The ones that want to see their edits on another computer are either vandals that want to have a laugh again, or users that care for their work and want to see it again. The last group will probably contain those that "stumble on an article and get hooked". They would continue editing in a situation without FR: they care so they come back. With FR installed they will eventually get a "trusted" status and have their edits visible for all, but before that time, there is a chance they find out their edits are invisible to others and get disappointed. Especially IP-users that use more than one IP, because they will never get the trusted status, no matter how long they contribute. (this is all just a guess)

The only way in which FR can be introduced successfully is when it is accompanied with a better welcome / information campaign for our newest users. They should get information on their TP's, but we also should create new manuals and help pages. The objective should be 1) to encourage IP-users to create an account and explain them that by doing so, they can eventually get a trusted status and have their work immediately visible to everyone; 2) to explain new accounts why their edits are not visible on other PC's and when they will get a trusted status. In doing so, we could reduce the chance of disappointment en perhaps raise some understanding among IP- or new users why their edits are invisible on other PC's. Regards, Woodwalker (talk) 13:47, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

Thank you for your thoughtful comments. I think that it's possible that established users of Wikipedia, who understand how everything works, sometimes underestimate the value of the contributions that come from outside their own circle. In my own area of expertise, some of Wikipedia's articles are getting impressive enough that the scenario of uninitiated experts deciding to test the validity of our project by attempting to introduce corrections and improvements is quite real. I guess I just value knowledgeable content so highly above everything else that, in comparison, the amount of vandalism we have here seems a minor issue--I'd go so far as saying an issue not worth confronting with any risky experiments. This, I suspect, is the significant difference between our perspectives (and of course I understand that reasonable people will disagree about such questions). I certainly maintain strongly my view that we should work on getting over our anxiety & embarrassment over vandalism that gets briefly disseminated to the world. I think it shows an insecurity, when we are entitled instead to feel we can expect anyone (right up to the greatest subject experts, the journalists who write for the greatest newspapers, etc.) to understand what Wikipedia is, how it accomplishes the great things it does, and how the inevitable vandalism is part of that. To the extent that mainstream journalistic & academic critics fail to understand that, I think that they are failing a test that they would pass if they were more reasonable & intelligent. Thus I believe their criticisms are doomed to carry less & less weight by the natural progress of the Wikipedia, until even our own nervous Nellies will realize that we should not steer a different course in response to them. In any case, what you've told me about the anon IP's instant gratification has helped me adopt a more resigned attitude towards what is starting to seem like an inevitable experiment. Wareh (talk) 16:03, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

Three cheers for The Dude! That's a great reply. Lucretius (talk) 22:50, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

@Wareh: you are absolutely right, there is a substantial group of IP-edits which are (probably) made by experts or specialists. We should do our utmost best to keep these anonymous editors from being discouraged. If you allow me to give my guesswork on this: I think it is a group that won't be easily discouraged by invisible edits, for two reasons: 1) they have a busy life and do not edit every day. When they return their edits will have been flagged and there isn't a problem of invisibility (on other PC's); 2) they are probably a group that is most receptive to an information campaign.

I like your idea that critics in the press and education fail to understand how Wikipedia works. I feel that way too. What does this mean about FR? I think we should be careful not to sell our hen with golden eggs to a butcher, so to speak. The dilemma we face is whether FR is a sacrifice of Wikipedia's principles, or rather an improvement to the system.

As I said I'm not sure about the answer yet. Statistics say little, because there is no way yet to measure the quantity of new quality content. The amount of new articles or edits per day, they tell us nothing about the quality of new content. As a former admin on the Dutch Wikipedia, I can only advice you from my own experience with "patrols": they are a huge success. Patrols (the predecessor of FR) allow us to have a small red exclamation mark with every edit by IP- and new users in a list of recent changes. The marks also show in the difflinks. "Trusted" users (more than 100 edits) can remove the mark when the edit is not vandalism. I find that less vandalism goes unnoticed on the Dutch Wikipedia.

FR is something of an update to this system of patrols. There are some technical improvements: no limits to the "backlog" of untrusted edits, new users can be monitored longer, the option to have different types of "flags", etc. I would heartily recommend this for the English Wikipedia. Then, there is the additional option to have some edits made invisible (except to the users that made them). That's the thing I feel uncertain about. Woodwalker (talk) 08:02, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

It's that "additional option" that drives all my concern, too. Wareh (talk) 13:56, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

trochee edit

Hi Wareh. Thanks for keeping an eye on the Aristophanes article. I'm a bit puzzled by your latest edit. Long lines of tetrameters in the plays do include trochaic metre (in fact trochaic is more common in Aristophanes than anapestic). The section then goes on to talk specifically about anapests because the passage includes a quote in anapests. So, if there is a problem in the text, it's not in the broad definition of long lines to include trochees - as far as I know. Could you find some other way to address your concerns, so that we can retain the reference to trochees? Lucretius (talk) 00:00, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

You've been doing far too much for me to begin to "keep an eye" on it--I just happened to notice this one edit, and it struck me that maybe you were just tacking on "and trochees" to text that had really been written for anapests. I'm all for as inclusive coverage as possible, but as I read it the description of your paragraph applied more completely to the use of anapests in comedy than to trochaic tetrameter. I also hesitated at the idea that the reader should be presented them both as members of a category of "verses of 7-8 feet," as that seems incidental. For example, what part of the account you give applies to the trochaic tetrameters spoken by Pisetaerus and Euelpides at Birds 268 ff.? It's not an agon or parabasis. I suppose it's accurate enough (for Aristophanes: not for Greek comic verse more broadly) if you add a "mainly," "mostly," or "especially" in the right place. So feel free to switch it back, maybe with a bit of qualification. Wareh (talk) 01:08, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

I used the vague term 'long lines of 7 to 8 metrical feet' in imitation of Barret/Somerstein, who talk vaguely about 'long lines'. It's an elastic term which pretty well suits the elastic nature of A's approach to writing. He sometimes veers into tetrameter or some version of it for no obvious reason, as in the Birds passage you mention. Why does a canary sing endlessly one day and only a few trills the next day? Because it feels like it, I guess. So words like "mainly" "mostly" and "especially" are needed to cover the cracks in the Old Comedy genre and even then exceptions will still peep through. But there are also times when the anticipated form actually sheds light on his larger meanings and that's why I think it's important to classify his verses and dramatic elements even if sometimes he throws away the rule book (if he ever had one). It's a balancing act. I appreciate others keeping an eye on it, just in case I've overstated or understated something. Anyway, I'll revert to the original draft and then try fine-tuning or smudging the phrasing, either to get it right or else to avoid the impression that I've got it horribly wrong Lucretius (talk) 03:12, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

That seems fine; though my own readerly disposition disinclines me to work with a theory of random veering, I don't have any better positive statement to offer here & now. I trust you know I highly approve of your enlightening readers about the properties of Greek poetry--heck, I just wrote Aeolic verse myself! Wareh (talk) 03:34, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

I wouldn't attempt an analysis as detailed as that in a million years. Fortunately, I don't have to in an overview of Aristophanes. Feel free to write an article on Aristophanic poetry and I'll link to it! Lucretius (talk) 04:03, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

Ha, better not try that. Unfortunately trochaic (Greek meter) and anapestic (Greek meter) are perhaps the two most gaping holes in Wikipedia's treatment of the subject. Wareh (talk) 04:15, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for your latest edit. It's a great little contribution with a nice reference to back it up. I smoothed over the English (you obviously wrote at speed, on trochaic feet perhaps). I changed 'trecho=to run' to 'trechein=to run' on the assumption that you wrote that at speed too (but from past experience it occurs to me now that maybe your phrasing was designed to accommodate some kind of scholarly scruple I'm not aware of). Regarding your earlier comment about Birds, it occurs to me now that there is no opportunity for a real agon in that play, and Memory prompts me to add that there's no real parabasis either (though Memory has a mind of her own and sometimes lies). So the trochees there are probably because Aristophanes couldn't relax with the idea of a trochee-free zone. That's my guess. Lucretius (talk) 23:54, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

Hi again, Wareh. Regarding my comment above, why rely on Memory (always so unreliable) when there are overviews like this [1] freely available on the web? If only we had scholars like this guy working here at Wiki! How much could be achieved! Incidentally, I came upon this pdf by a process of random veering. It works for ants, it works for philosophers, and it's the principle according to which most of us live, I think.Lucretius (talk) 23:36, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

Tee hee. Well, there's too much to be done around here, but we're getting there. Wareh (talk) 03:44, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Broken redirects

So, I am not crazy. There seems to be an intermittant problem that causes redirects created by page moves to not act like redirects: they don't put you where you should be, they show up on short pages, etc. Why? How is this fixed? Carlossuarez46 (talk) 00:00, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

I have no idea--I just observed the problem. But now there's an answer that it will have to be fixed in a future software update. I'll take that poster's advice and list the problem at WP:VPT, so maybe it will get fixed quicker. Wareh (talk) 00:13, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

P.S. I see you fixed it yourself by removing the space after redirect. Who knows why that works, but it seems to have done the trick at all the cases mentioned at Wikipedia talk:Redirect. Wareh (talk) 00:21, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

Voodoo is powerful medicine.... If you'd like to help out at Special:Shortpages it'd be appreciated (I've cleared up to 29 bytes). :-) Carlossuarez46 (talk) 00:56, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

zillions of petruccis

[2]. Where else has this brilliant theoretician made his mark, I wonder? --Akhilleus (talk) 04:26, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Wow, that's shameless. Apparently Petrucci stories were also essential reading to supplement The Daily Telegraph and BBC Radio 3 too (I've just removed the spam, found via linksearch. Wareh (talk) 04:36, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

I always forget about that linksearch tool. Surprisingly, there weren't that many links to Perdika Press; I had removed a couple yesterday, and just removed some from Anna Akhmatova and English poetry. Thing is, I'm almost convinced that this press has some standing in the world of contemporary poetry in the UK; Petrucci's awards, for instance, are not very distinguished, but help to form the resume of someone who looks like a minor poet who might make it into an anthology or two. But the spamming and puffery has to stop. --Akhilleus (talk) 04:44, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Ah, that explains the removal from the Radio 3 page. True enough, he was the first (only?) Poet-in-Residence to the station, but I didn't consider the fact interesting enough to mention it anywhere in the article. I wondered why it had cropped up as an External Link .... the appointment didn't make much of a stir anywhere. He may have been an R3 contributior at some point along with, well, zillions of others. Ioan_Dyfrig (talk) 14:39, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

I deleted the Petrucci article under G11 as I think it "would need to be fundamentally rewritten to become encyclopedic". Tinkering with the use of adjectives and adverbial phrases, while steps in the right direction, didn't address the underlying problem that this was clearly promotional material. If I were Mr Petrucci I would have been embarrassed to see such an article about myself and seeing it become a point of contention and ridicule would have been even more distressing. I think the kind thing to do was to remove the article. I hope we can put this behind us, zillions and all. Haukur (talk) 15:49, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Archilochean?

I've borrowed MacDowell's metrical analysis for the The Wasps. It's a brilliantly annotated text but he gives one metre (archilochean) without identifying the foot or metron. He says it's rare but you might have some idea how to put its shoes on. I took a guess and structured it like a set of rearranged anapests or dactyls. If you could check that out, and maybe fix anything that could be better put, I would again be much obliged. Lucretius (talk) 06:01, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

I've given the article archilochean a major expansion to address this. Wareh (talk) 15:56, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

font for metrical notation?

Hi Wareh, I was just looking at Archilochean, a useful little article, and I was wondering if you knew of a font that displays the metrical notation in a more usable way--for me, the longs and shorts are displaying as superscripts, and two longs in a row get combined into a superscripted em dash. --Akhilleus (talk) 19:12, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Hmmm, that's unfortunate, and it would cause trouble with my contribution Aeolic verse as well. (By the way, I just expanded that article after your comment.) I display articles in Gentium, using this style sheet, and, while I can complain that the symbols are smaller than I'd like, I don't get the problem with the longs running together (except while editing the Wiki source code). Wareh (talk) 19:15, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Actually, I only noticed Archilochean because of the section above on your talk page (so call me a Wiki-stalker, I guess). I was just poking around the unicode charts and found the following symbols in the 23D0 range ("Miscellaneous technical"): ⏑⏒⏓⏔⏕⏖Were you using those, or something different in Archilochian? --Akhilleus (talk) 19:26, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

I found this handy Unicode value lookup, so I can report that I've been using ׯ˘ = 00d7, 00af, 02d8 (the first stolen from math, the others listed as modifier symbols, which may explain why they are too small and not perfect for this purpose; but then Macron#Technical_notes seems to assure me that I chose rightly for the macron, which is particularly frustrating, because that's the one that doesn't work for you!). Your breve is 23d1, and it is bigger and better on my display (I had thought those codes were "private use" for the TLG-savvy in specialist fonts like New Athena Unicode, so I'm pleased to see that in fact they are part of the current standard), but there's no macron in your list, and this official code chart doesn't have one in that range. Bottom line, (1) my only reservation about switching to the 23d1 breve is that it may not work for people without as many Classics-oriented fonts as I have; (2) what on earth is one supposed to use in Unicode for a free-standing (not combining) macron. As for stalking me, I can only thank you for that! Wareh (talk) 19:46, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

More on macrons: the TLG seems to have decided in 2003 (current?) that the best choice to render the Betacode for "non-combining macron" is U+2013, the "en-dash." (But then the non-combining breve is given in that document as U+2692, the hammer and pick, so this is manifestly a kludge). The n-dash may be more consistently designed in all fonts to avoid run-together (I don't know: it's certainly a falsifiable claim!). Here's a spondaic hexameter with en-dash: –––––––––––– (with my U+00AF, which someone on the web calls "the spacing clone of the macron," that's ¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯, which on my display has more space between the marks). Wareh (talk) 20:07, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

By the way, since I see you're trying my style sheet, I should point out that ⏑⏒⏓⏔⏕⏖ are not in Gentium. I'm not sure what font you have that supports them (or for that matter, what font my browser resorts to to display them), but they are all in NAU, and all but the last (Doppelbrevia) are in Old Standard, which has been a good find for me. Wareh (talk) 20:28, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

In many of my fonts, the first spondaic hexameter looks like a solid line (e.g. Optima, Trebuchet MS). The second looks like a series of superscript dashes with a very small amount of space in between. In some fonts (e.g. Arial Unicode MS), both hexameters are solid lines, or nearly so.

It seems that I only have two fonts on my system that contain ⏑⏒⏓⏔⏕⏖ — Aegean and Apple Symbols--either the browser or the operating system substitutes missing symbols so smoothly that I didn't even notice. I think you're right that switching to the 23d1 will not work for many Wikipedia users, and the symbols currently in use in Archilochian are probably the best option since a certain percentage of users are only going to have manufacturer-installed fonts on their system.

The metrical symbols in the 23D0 range have their own problems. – ⏔ / – ⏔ / – // ⏔ / – ⏔ / – ⏔ / – × looks ok, using an en dash, the anceps you've been using, and regular slash marks. But – ⏖ – ⏖ – ⏑ // ⏑ – ⏖ – ⏖ – × strikes me as quite ugly with all the breves below the level of the en dash. --Akhilleus (talk) 00:08, 13 March 2009 (UTC)

Hm. It seems that New Athena Unicode has the 23d1 at a different height than Aegean, and once I installed NAU, – ⏖ – ⏖ – ⏑ // ⏑ – ⏖ – ⏖ – × looks fine. --Akhilleus (talk) 00:26, 13 March 2009 (UTC)

Dio

Hey there! I'm not participating, but I thought you might have an opinion on this issue. Rock on, bro. Kafka Liz (talk) 16:58, 14 March 2009 (UTC)

The digamma affaire

Hi Wareh, it was requested to me to modify the digamma SVG file (Digamma_uc_lc.svg), so I make a new lower-case shape. I would like to know if now it is correct or, if not, were I can improve it. Thanks in advance, cheers, F l a n k e r (talk) 13:37, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

Understood, I've tried to make a closer shape to the Times New Roman illustrated in Digamma2 (Ϝϝ).png, using the dimensions of the Times Greek. I hope it is better now (don't forget to clear the cache :)). Tell me what do you think about. F l a n k e r (talk) 14:57, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

Thanks, you're welcome! --F l a n k e r (talk) 19:42, 18 March 2009 (UTC)

Harpsfields

Thanks for those articles. It was on my mind to do something about them, but right now I'm concentrating on the 17th century. Charles Matthews (talk) 09:17, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

You're welcome. Thanks for noticing! Wareh (talk) 20:10, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

No flagged revisions category up for deletion

The category associated with the no flagged revisions userbox you have placed on your user page is up for deletion at Wikipedia:Categories_for_discussion/Log/2009 April 23#Category:Wikipedia users who oppose Flagged Revisions and you are invited to share your opinions on the issue. Alansohn (talk) 05:26, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

Cinesias

Hi again Wareh! I'm now editing The Birds (play) and one of the characters is the dithyrambic poet Cinesias but, as you will see if you follow the link, somebody has merged this Cinesias with the Cinesias in Lysistrata. Are you able to create separate articles or maybe rewrite the article to include the poet? I ask you because I know you are into foundation-building here at Wiki and all I have as a reference for Cinesias is Aristophanes and the OCD. If you haven't time or inclination, no matter, I'll just sidestep the problem. Lucretius (talk) 03:02, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

It is not right for the two to share an article. The thing to do is simply edit the page "Cinesias" so that it's an article on the dithyrambic poet (just a stub citing OCD for now, if necessary), not a redirect. The only article linking to either page is The Birds (play), so you don't have to worry about breaking or redoing any links. Your two sources can be supplemented with Smith's Biographical Dictionary (public domain). Author of an Asclepius, considered a practitioner of the New Music (as Philoxenus of Cythera, Timotheus (musician)). Perhaps I can look in Campbell's Loeb (vol. 5) and Dunbar's commentary for more. Wareh (talk) 03:23, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

Thanks again. I'll have a go at this. Lucretius (talk) 04:01, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

Your article contribution

Hello, I have sent you an e-mail regarding one of your article contributions. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 130.234.178.143 (talk) 19:33, 20 May 2009 (UTC)

Minor edits

Thanks very much, both for the helpful information and for the very kind way in which you conveyed it. While I love working on Wikipedia articles, I am obviously not an experienced editor in the "professional Wikipedian" sense, and I am often unsure where to draw the line on "minor" edits; I will try to internalize the rules in the page you link to. It's nice to know somebody is paying attention to the quality of my work! Languagehat (talk) 17:36, 4 June 2009 (UTC)

The Decameron

If I could excuse myself, I would like to ask if you have read the Decameron. I was looking at the one sentence summaries on the Summary of Decameron tales and thought you might be able to help me in fixing it. Thank you for any reply. With best intent, --15lsoucy (talk) 02:07, 1 August 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, but I have little if any memory of the tales. I wish I were better able to help. I guess I'm due to read some Boccaccio! Wareh (talk) 03:01, 1 August 2009 (UTC)

That's perfectly fine. Thank you for your help. --15lsoucy (talk) 21:22, 1 August 2009 (UTC)

Tiberius Claudius Nero comment

Oh dear. I see what you meant now. I had changed "may refer to" to "may refer to several ancient Romans, including" because the latter implies that there may be others out there not included. There was an indignant objection that this was not "standardized." Which is obviously more important than helping people find what they need. Cynwolfe (talk) 19:47, 16 September 2009 (UTC)

Good point

I agree with your issue of the red link (choral poetry). Sorry about that. ReadQT (talk) 18:30, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

Qoppa and Sampi

You made archaic qoppa more prominent. Thus if you insist on archaic emphasis, please do the same with sampi. To do this, simply restore this reverted set of edits, or tell to Future Perfect at Sunrise to not interfere with restoring of these edits. 93.190.218.146 (talk) 17:44, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

Please see my comment at Template talk:Greek Alphabet. There is no reason to follow the policy, "Archaic forms are always preferred to later forms" or vice versa (leaving aside how to apply such labels). These are articles on Greek letters in general, not on Greek letters in any one given period. Therefore, the emphasis should be on the most widespread, familiar, and notable letter forms, and these are ϡ and ϙ for sampi and qoppa. Wareh (talk) 17:46, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

Reason to follow policy "Archaic forms are always preferred to later forms" is as follows:

Archaic forms are alphabetic/epigraphic/phonetic forms, and Sampi/Qoppa articles are articles primarily about phonetic letters, and secondarily about numeric symbols.

OR

Reason to follow policy "Later forms are always preferred to archaic forms" is as follows:

Later forms are numeric forms, and Sampi/Qoppa articles are articles primarily about numeric symbols, and secondarily about alphabetic/epigraphic/phonetic letters.

Which solution you prefer? 93.190.218.146 (talk) 17:55, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

To repeat, I prefer neither, but instead the commonsense policy that the emphasis of each article should be determined by which form occurs predominantly. It seems that expert editors such as Future Perfect at Sunrise and Akhilleus agree with me. I think you should enlist a larger consensus--at least a couple of other editors who share your point of view--before continuing to make changes that only you support. Wareh (talk) 18:06, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

Magister Equitums

I very much appreciate your contribution in correcting this bit of Latinate illiteracy. I've been working on this for two weeks and can't get it changed. Don't know where I went wrong, but I feel my further participation would only provoke obstruction, so I'm bowing out. If you're able to help, it might save you time and frustration to read this archived discussion. Cynwolfe (talk) 01:06, 10 November 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the pointer. There may be more strange passion on this than I can muster the will to confront. I think I'll just stick to my naively offered two cents--Latin is better than pseudo-Latin in the encyclopedia, whether temporarily or permanently--and hope that this small bit of common sense sticks. Of course, if you have more specific advice or concerns about this or anything else, I'm always glad to hear a suggestion or a point of view. Wareh (talk) 15:25, 10 November 2009 (UTC)

Strange passion indeed. I tend to argue my points vigorously, but hope the argument speaks for itself. I don't always succeed, and exasperation tells. I liked Septentrionalis's idea of simply correcting the error for now, but when he didn't specify what the rename should be, I probably roiled the waters by stepping in too quickly.

I go back and forth on capitalization; at one time, I thought it was an antiquated convention of the 19th century to capitalize 'the Senate' to refer to the Roman senate, or "Praetorian Prefect of Gaul," or "Magister Equitum", and so on, but I've seen 21st century mainstream scholars do it, and now my capitalization has become utterly haphazard. When I created the category "Prosopography of Ancient Rome" (the only category I've ever created), why did I capitalize the "A"? I don't know. But evidently changing a category name is a more hazardous undertaking than I thought, so I'll leave it.Cynwolfe (talk) 17:07, 10 November 2009 (UTC)

Munros

Hi, I noticed you have done alot of work on articles about people named Munro. I have written the current Clan Munro article and its all well sourced. I have also written most of the articles on the chiefs the Munros of Foulis and contributed to the others, as well as many other members of the Clan Munro. One thing I should point out thhough is that once out of the 18th century there shouldn't really be a need for the Category: Clan Munro within the article as the clans ceased to exist halfway through that century. Keep up the good work. QuintusPetillius (talk) 17:31, 20 November 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for your interest. My goal was just to provide a new article covering the career and collection of H.A.J. Munro of Novar, and it's true that I acquired precious little knowledge of Scottish clans in doing so. The list of "authenticated chiefs" at Clan Munro, together with my source emphasizing my Munro's ownership of Novar House and status as "head of the Munros of Novar," caused me to believe that the category would be relevant, but please feel free to remove or replace it if you are confident that it's not appropriate. Wareh (talk) 17:44, 20 November 2009 (UTC)

Thanks, again

Wareh, once again I must thank you, this time for reverting the vandalism on my User page. This IP address has vandalized my page several times, and the first time, went un-noticed (to me), as the links are unapparent. Thank you for your help and your kindness. --15lsoucy (talk) 22:34, 2 December 2009 (UTC)

Coldwell

I'm sure that's far and away the best use I've ever seen of Doug Coldwell's time and energy on Wikipedia. :) RandomCritic (talk) 14:45, 8 December 2009 (UTC)

Red links on dab pages

Re this edit and your edit summary "no proof offered that redlinks don't point to needed & notable articles" -- you are correct, no proof was offered. But no proof was needed either: disambiguation pages disambiguate Wikipedia articles, not needed & notable non-existent articles. Please see MOS:DABRL for the guidelines on including red links on disambiguation pages. (It is also not necessary to undo other style fixes when trying to maintain incorrect red links.) -- JHunterJ (talk) 02:04, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

But MOS:DABRL says, "Do not create red links to articles that are unlikely ever to be written, or are likely to be removed as insufficiently notable topics." This implies that redlinks to articles likely to be written, or on sufficiently notable topics, should be retained. Even if MOSDABRL didn't say this, it would still be true, given the overriding purpose of serving the encyclopedia's users well. Wareh (talk) 03:32, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

No, it doesn't imply that, but even if it did, it first says "should only be included on a disambiguation page when an article (not just disambiguation pages) also includes that red link" (which these don't) and goes on to say (not imply) "link also to an existing article, so that a reader (as opposed to a contributing editor) will have somewhere to navigate to for additional information". The red links removed do not link to existing articles that give additional information on the red linked "Calbuco". The encyclopedia users are not well served by disambiguation page entries that do not disambiguate Wikipedia articles. -- JHunterJ (talk) 04:02, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

I'm happy to take you as authoritative on what MOSDAB says (it's a poorly constructed guideline: if it works as you say, its point is to restrict the usefulness of disambiguation pages), but I have to take issue with your final sentence. People use Wikipedia to seek encyclopedic treatment of things in their world - geographical features are just one instance. Redlinks are even more valuable to many users in disambiguation pages than in articles, when they indicate that the encyclopedia lacks coverage of the topic sought. Otherwise, users end up confused about, say, whether the Calbuco they're reading about may be correctly identified with some unrelated Calbuco. Don't confuse a partial opinion about what serves the encyclopedia's users well with certainty on the subject. Wareh (talk) 04:11, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

Disambiguation pages are navigational aids, not exploration lists or suggestions for new articles. WP:LISTS and WP:AFC are intentionally separate from WP:D. Whichever Wikipedia article will clear up the reader's confusion in your example should be (blue) linked from the disambiguation page; if no Wikipedia article clarifies it, then there's nothing to disambiguate. -- JHunterJ (talk) 04:23, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

That would make sense to me if and only if a redlink, indicating the existence of a topic, did not by itself have the power to clear up the reader's confusion. In this case, the aggrieved editor has created stubs, which is always a good thing, but the fact is that the stubs are so short that the disambiguation page had 90% of its current utility for ordinary users while the links were still red. Wareh (talk) 15:29, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

Red links

Hi, Wareh! For what it's worth, I wanted to add my voice of support to what you said here. Amazingly, your arguments almost word-to-word match the arguments I made a year or so ago about this very problem (and posted, I think, on that very page). It's eery! My suggestion then was to at least allow references for the red links on dab pages (which would make it easy for mosdabbers to distinguish cruft from things which are truly notable), or to require (referenced) explanations of the red links' notability of the dab's talk page (which would have the same effect with an additional benefit of keeping the dabs clean). That, of course, got shot just as efficiently as your thread has been. I sometimes wonder if the dab project got overrun by evil cyborgs or something :) Their approach is truly mechanical and often mindless indeed. Just three or four years ago that place was a lot more reasonable than it is now (I pretty much gave up).

The project I am involved with shifted to using set indices instead; perhaps that's something you could consider if your complaints move nowhere. In many ways these sets could be a lot more flexible than dabs ever were (example), and they can be made project-specific, too.

I'll continue to watch your thread with interest. Please let me know if I can be of assistance.—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); 21:43, December 17, 2009 (UTC)

OTOH, those of us who have put thought into the current guidelines find the repetition of the same suggestions, without addressing the problems that were described with them the last time they came up, pretty mindless as well. Just remember that if there is ambiguity, a disambiguation page is needed, even if a set index article also exists. -- JHunterJ (talk) 22:00, 17 December 2009 (UTC)

J, thanks for your comment. First off, I should point out that if I wanted to start another fruitless discussion with you, I'd most certainly address you directly. My comment above was simply voicing support for Wareh's position; nothing more, nothing less. That said, however, I can't resist pointing out that repeated ignoring of the same concerns, brought over an extended period time by unrelated editors, is a much better indication of mindless approach than me supporting a fellow editor and getting dissed by a passer-by like you. Of all the mosdabbers I had a chance to communicate with, not a single one was able to coherently explain why it is a problem to require sourcing red links (be it via regular references, in-line html comments, or a talk page) in order to enable keeping them on dab pages. The only arguments I keep hearing over and over again are "dabs are for navigation only" and "MOSDAB does not allow for that". Well, sorry, but that's not an argument at all, that's dogma, pure and simple (has someone mentioned "mindless" yet?). When something does not work well in practice, it does not matter how well it is codified and implemented or how much effort went into that codification and enforcement; it needs to be fixed eventually. One of these days years, someone will hopefully see the light and start working on improving the MOSDAB in such a way that it accommodates the needs of both the housekeepers and the content-creators, not just the needs of a few human bots currently running the place and smashing dissent with an iron fist because of an existing consensus (sorry, I know it doesn't sound very nice, but I am just being honest about my lack of respect to the quality of the "thoughts" that've been put into MOSDAB so far; nothing personal).

On your last point (that a dab is needed even if a set does exist), I just want to remind you that I am acquainted with the MOSDAB rules just as well as you are (the set I used as an example is in fact accompanied by dab). The irony is that when a dab is reduced to a list of links to several sets, it pretty much renders the dabs completely useless. Oh well, the important thing is that they remain MOSDAB-compliant... right?

To Wareh: I apologize for cluttering your talk page with this. Best,—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); 14:45, December 18, 2009 (UTC)

Wareh had indicated an interest in learning about the dab area, which is why I replied here. -- JHunterJ (talk) 14:55, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

Thanks, Ëzhiki, for your supportive comment. I appreciate it. I have encountered many other editors with the same sentiments, in part by watching the talk page of one of the MOSDAB enforcers (I won't mention the name here, because I really don't want to make this more personal than it already threatens to be). Unfortunately, most have suffered just an atom of frustration and go away. You and I are, I'm sure, not the last to propose the same solution (notable redlinks are ok simply because they are to notable topics), and, after all the argument (which you're right, I don't want to continue indefinitely here!), it still seems right to me, and I think the MOSDAB enforcers could learn some rough criteria to discriminate between cruft and important signposts to real (missing) knowledge. Wareh (talk) 15:15, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

We have. I think the MOSDAB unenforcers could learn the rough criteria we use to discriminate between cruft and ambiguous Wikipedia articles: the existence of an ambiguous Wikipedia article. Supposedly important missing knowledge should be added in a stub, a section of an existing article, or a list article (any of which can be vetted through WP:V, WP:RS, WP:N, etc., if another editor feels that the knowledge isn't important). If it's just red linked on a dab page, the fix is simply to delete the entry, since it's just missing, not clearly important, and not ambiguous. -- JHunterJ (talk) 15:44, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

That's not a good policy for the frequent situation in which it's "not clearly important" but actually very important. But, really, the discussion is happening in the appropriate and more public forum at Wikipedia talk:Disambiguation, and that would be the better place for it to play out. Wareh (talk) 16:03, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

...and also unless it is missing, as I and now Wareh have told you more than once, because there is no easy available place for a backlink. In which case mosdabbers remove the red link, and someone else has to suffer because creating an article appropriate for a backlink would first require jumping through a dozen hoops. Case in point—for any given Russian village there is often no good place to backlink from—we first need to have an article about the district to which the village belongs and then we need to make sure that the district article includes a list of all villages (because if you just add places at random due to disambig concerns you are inviting a maintenance nightmare to a severely undermanned WikiProject). Now, some districts have hundreds of villages, most of which are not a priority, and in the end such approach screws up the workflow pretty bad.

Well, never mind that—we've learned to make do with sets (which I personally think are a stupid idea, because properly designed dabs would do just fine for this purpose), but I can imagine there are many similar situations out there for which the sets approach would not work. What the artificial dab constraints do is essentially hinder the workflow and stifle development. Why a thing this obvious needs to be explained over and over is, frankly, beyond me. It's easy for you to say "oh just create an article to backlink from, for crying out loud"; in reality it is not always that simple, yet having a red link is still beneficial (and not just to us editors, but to readers as well).

But we've traveled this particular circle more than once already... You are not thrilled about the added workload of having to sort through the red links were they to be allowed, which I understand quite well. The bottom line, however, is that the needs of the content-creators should always trump the needs of maintenance folks. This ain't happening with MOSDAB, that's for sure...—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); 16:11, December 18, 2009 (UTC)

The needs of the readers should always trump the needs of the content-creators. The workload is secondary (and indeed, I'm volunteering for the dab project, so clearly I'm not shirking workload). -- JHunterJ (talk) 16:48, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

No need for nitpicking; I'm sure you understood what I meant. The needs of the readers always trump the needs of content-creators, but the needs of the content-creators trump the needs of folks doing the maintenance (like cleaning up dabs and such). Not to mention that both Wareh and me already demonstrated that quite often the readers' needs aren't served well when existing dab guidelines are fervently enforced. You are trying to pass the removal of red links as "serving the readers' needs", and while in some cases it is indeed so, in many other cases it is not. I provided several examples during my last round on dab project talk, and Wareh provided one in the section just above this one.—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); 17:05, December 18, 2009 (UTC)

eggnog and disambiguation

Thanks for your note and links. I've glanced over it, and despite my current eggnog and bourbon haze, I have to say that I agree with you completely. Wikipedia is best when the needs of the reader/user are put first; the rules have developed in order to serve that purpose, but increasingly are wielded by some editors in a manner I find ... perplexing. As if imposing rules is an end in itself. I've gone through dozen of pages pertaining to prosopography of ancient Rome in order to split the content between a disambiguation page that obeys the rules, and a page that might actually help a person looking up similarly named figures find what she needs. These latter pages all have the potential of developing useful content that disambiguation zealots would squelch. I'll be interested to see how this discussion progresses. Cynwolfe (talk) 00:53, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

Of course, we're not imposing rules as an end in itself, and the rules are there for the reader/user (but all readers/users, not just the ones that are looking for your lists). These latter pages that you mention would be better cast as list articles (or possibly set index articles), not disambiguation pages -- and if there's ambiguity, they would exist side-by-side. Users needed navigational assistance to reach an ambiguous article would use the uncluttered disambiguation page to do so most efficiently. Readers looking for lists of information would use that page most efficiently. Recognizing that is not squelching anything. And please avoid calling other editors "zealots". -- JHunterJ (talk) 01:20, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

I was under the impression that I was leaving a message for Wareh — in public, of course, but deliberately not on a page where my comments might be construed as directed at any individual. My comments were directed at a type of activity. Evidently you didn't read my comment very carefully, because I did exactly what you prescribe: I removed content that didn't fit the rules of disambiguation pages, and created pages under the category "Prosopography of Ancient Rome" (and other categories depending on the topic) that are in the process of developing as articles. These are not labeled as disambiguation pages. They are not disambiguation pages. There's an energetic new editor who's directing a lot of effort at those pages, and adding proper references, and doing all sorts of good work toward those goals. I think people whose strength lies in providing content in particular areas feel that their contributions often aren't treated as valuable. I've become aware of increasing frustration among specialist editors who produce excellent content but aren't interested in Wikipedia game-playing. I think this frustration needs to be addressed if Wikipedia is to survive and improve in quality.

I've worked as a professional editor and writer; if you've worked on a copy desk at any daily newspaper, you know about applying rules of style. But you also know that the Associated Press stylebook doesn't cover everything, particularly not in your local community. Local editors grasp AP principles, and establish practices tailored to covering their specific communities. The local stylebook that develops always has exceptions that adapt to particular coverage needs. I think Wikipedia editors who specialize in certain content areas are like those local editors: they are aware of problems of presentation specific to their subjects. Informed editors who spend time carefully developing useful content within a limited range of topics are as important to the value of Wikipedia as those who keep the larger machine operating — not more, but taken as a whole not less. 'Real' editors know how to take raw material and develop it; they don't take pleasure in removing or blocking the dissemination of content, but rather shape it to fit their medium.

Now, JHunterJ, I am not talking about you, because I don't have a clue who you are — this is the first time I've encountered you. I described what I regard as a corrosive phenomenon on Wikipedia, which I do indeed see as a form of zealotry. And I don't like zealotry, particularly when it's directed in any way at obstructing the free flow of information. To me it's a false decorum if you can't speak up to despotism, even in its pettiest forms. But I have not called you or any other individual a zealot or despot. I labeled a certain kind of behavior as characteristic of zealots; what perplexes me is when someone says 'hey, I'm one of those zealots, and I don't appreciate being called one.' I can't be responsible for how people self-identify. You seem like a diligent, committed person. But what I see because of my professional experience is that Wikipedia is naturally evolving into a 'publication' with those who are primarily interested in editing and those who are primarily writers. There is always an adversarial element in the editor-writer relationship. In established publications, the tensions of this relationship are mostly productive, because the editor sees her job ultimately as transferring the writer's content, shaped to the medium, to the reader. On Wikipedia, however, there are a worrying number of editors who seem to view their role not as shaping and developing content, but obstructing it. They don't think about the content, they don't offer suggestions or alternatives, they just say 'no.' This is not productive, and it isn't editing; it's gamesmanship, concerned with 'rules' and winning a narrow argument. I've seen a number of online and published articles now on the potential stagnation of Wikipedia, and an atmosphere in which writers committed to providing quality content feel squelched rather than supported is surely a contributing factor. Cynwolfe (talk) 19:06, 18 December 2009 (UTC)