User talk:Xiner/Archive 1

This archive contains messages I still refer to from time to time.

Userbox

Hi,

Strangely, someone deleted a userbox of yours as T1, even though it was userfied. I assume this was a simple mistake on the part of the deleter, so I've restored it for you. Best wishes, Xoloz 21:16, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Actually, I was unaware the thing was already at DRV when I undeleted. Technically, one probably should wait to undelete until the DRV is over, so I unintentionally goofed a bit. Still, the deletion was clearly a mistake (in process and content, which is quite mild.) Looking at the RfC and DRV, I don't see that Dmcdevit has defended it at all, so I'll continue to assume he was simply confused.

Although I understand your unhappiness, your RfC is a little bit premature -- one speedy deletion can be a simple mistake (which everybody makes.) A pattern of bad choices, and an unwillingness to reconsider them, would be required to initiate an RfC, really. Dmcdevit is a very nice person - even if he wasn't mistaken in the deletion, and genuinely had a problem with the userbox, he isn't the type to object to taking the debate to MfD (the proper forum), at the very least.

Thanks for the kind words. I've been off-wiki for a bit, but I'll be getting around to my old "beat" soon, which includes DRV normally, so, should you have other problems, I'll be happy to help. Best wishes, Xoloz 21:41, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

On looking at the DRV again, I do notice Dmcdevit there, and he isn't arguing a sound position, although he is being civil. Surprising, I must say. Anyway, I hope he's just having bad day... I've probably been grumpy myself lately, what with the flu, the snow, the relatives, etc. :) Xoloz 21:53, 11 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

last word in

The first question you need to ask yourself is, "do I have a history (perhaps as yet unadmitted) of being overly critical of myself?" If the answer to this might be yes, then you can't always trust your own tendency to self-criticize, because your subconscious motivation is not self-improvement but self-denigration; don't pay that too much heed then. If, however, the answer is no, then if you notice a behavior of yours that bothers you, listen to the notice, and decide cognitively how much it really bothers you or should bother you. Sometimes we only notice what bugs us about ourselves by trying to observe ourselves objectively. You might be doing that, and you might do well to listen, but it's hard for me to weigh this. As for my own opinion, looking at Wikipedia:Categories for deletion/Log/2006 December 11#Abortion, you haven't added anything that was redundant, so I wouldn't say it's an issue. If the discussion gets long and people keep bringing up things that you've already answered, remember that the closing admin is going to read everything and they should notice if you've already answered a repeated objection. Then it's a question of how much faith you have in the admins (I know, I'm treading on very thin ice now). For instance, I made sure to answer everything at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Faith Freedom International because I wanted to be absolutely certain that if the article did get deleted, I couldn't blame myself for not trying everything. I'm likely to do the same thing at Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2006 December 5#Ali Sina if anyone opposes the citations I've dug up. But my motivation here is dedication to freedom of speech and for less critical articles I leave my comments for the admin and let it go. A rule of thumb that you should know is that if an article is up for deletion and 80% of the votes are keep, it will probably be kept (even though it's "not a vote"). If it's less than 80%, then the keepers will have to put forward a pretty solid argument to keep. As you can see at the Faith Freedom AfD, keepers had about 66% and we just barely came through with "no consensus". I suspect that the factors that weighed most heavily for the admin were TruthSpreader's and my arguements, as almost no one else seriously argued the merits of the citations and notability guidelines.

Hope all that helps. — coelacan talk — 18:01, 12 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Why Assume good faith, and assume again

I'd been on alert for vandalism on Baiji and its talk page Talk:Baiji for days, ever since it went on the main page, when I noticed this edit by Dante Alighieri. The link he inserted there gave me a porn site. Another vandal, I thought, and a blatant one at that, a registered user. I checked the site again, just to make sure. Yep, a porn link.

Imagine, you read about a Chinese website that someone claims not to understand, but is full of naked pictures. I started composing a warning on Dante's page. When I was done, I checked Talk:Baiji again. Dante has now modified this edit, and wrote, "I believe Menchi may have gotten the information from baijitun.com, but as I don't read Chinese, I cannot confirm. The website seems currently defunct, but the Wayback Machine has an archive of the page if anyone can make use of it: [1]." This vandal is persistent, I thought, and very inventive. The old, archived site looks legit, but the current site is definitely not defunct. It is...some odd page about fluid dynamics. Huh?

I checked the site a few more times. Finally I got the porn site back. There you go, I thought, still oblivious to what's happening. I reread Dante's post. That bit about not understanding Chinese is funny. So I told him so, with a bigger warning.

Meanwhile, the poor guy's hitting my talk page asking me why I'm treating him so. Typical, I thought. I'd better ignore the bait. I stopped talking to him. To avoid messing up the edit history for Talk:Baiji, I also stopped reverting his edit, but seek help at WP:AIV instead.

An admin (DragonflySixtyseven) messaged me on Dante's behalf at this point. Wow, this guy's got some buddy, I thought. I told DS politely but firmly that this is between me and Dante over a porn link. Then more messages from Dante, with one referring to a discussion he participated in several years ago about the baiji.

It dawned on me. Dante is a Wikipedia:Administrator oblivious to the fact that baijitun.com (search for it at its registrar) is now a website registered by digitaldreamstudios.com, a porn operator. It masquerades as a half-written essay on fluid dynamics most of the time to evade censors. Had Dante assumed that I was a bad editor, he could've warned me, to say the least; I would've been no less infuriated and reacted even badly. DS could also have done the same. They could've retaliated, but they didn't, the good admins that they are.

So the lesson of the day: Assume good faith, and assume again.

Another lesson: process is important. Also, talk pages should be archived, not deleted.

Oh, and the porn site? Not Chinese.

I'd just like to point out that Xiner handled this quite well. He did everything he should, and didn't lash out, or fly off the handle. Here he was, trying to keep the poor Baiji page free of vandalism when some weirdo (me) shows up and links to a porno site (well, or so it seemed). Then I have the "audacity" to keep harassing him over it. Throughout, Xiner kept his cool and didn't escalate things inappropriately. When we finally figured out what was going on, he was very apologetic and very helpful. I appreciate his write-up on this matter, as neither of us was aware that this sort of "crypto-porno" existed. Honestly, most of the time the website is this inane rambling about fluid dynamics (I didn't know what was going on with that, so linked to the archive). Unfortunately (and this is where my and Xiner's confusion is totally understandable) sometimes it shows up as a pornographic website. Needless to say, we had quite a laugh once it was all over. Still, this could have gotten quite ugly quite quickly, but thanks to a cool head by Xiner, everything worked out just fine. Bravo! --Dante Alighieri | Talk 03:12, 20 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

re: I was wondering...

I wasn't sure if you were watching my talk page or not, so here was my response to your question:

It is a modified version of {{Non-admin fwarn}} that I maintain in my user space here. I altered it to automatically include a 4 tilde (~~~~) signature within the warning box and slightly toned down the background. My version must be substituted to work properly, but you are welcome to use either version. AuburnPilot^talk 23:29, 7 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

A new userbox!

Hello, Xiner. I just finished a userbox that I've been working on for a while. It replaces about fifteen similar userboxes that I've created. Try it out!

{{User Cremepuff222/User Friend|Color|Username}}

For the color parameter, do Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, or Purple (yes, it is case-sensitive). Then, the username is simply Xiner or Cremepuff222, or any other valid username.

I know that I should probably contribute to the encyclopedia instead of wasting my time creating a userbox, but it really helped me to learn many template tools such as parameters and conditional statements. Let me know what you think! --Cremepuff222 (talk, review me!) 02:36, 24 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Is that archive special or something? --Cremepuff222 (talk, review me!) 02:47, 24 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I already have. It's been a lifelong dream to have a message in there, and I'm honored and happy that I have one there! ;) See ya around! --Cremepuff222 (talk, review me!) 02:53, 24 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

RfA talk pages

It's basically whoever sees it first. If they see the talk page of an RfA is redlinked, they can go do the editcount at wannabe Kate's, and then copy and paste it to the RfA talk page. Nishkid 64 23:38, 4 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Hey there's even a template that does it all neatly: Template:RfA talk. Use it like {{subst:RfA talk|USERNAME|edit stats}} --Majorly _{(o rly?)} 08:20, 5 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

JuJube's talk page archive

Since you expressed an interest in the history of JuJube's talk page, I ran my archive builder bot on it. It goes through each revision and detects the removal of sections and creates a full report. You can find here: User talk:HighInBC/Temporary page indexes/JuJube, it was a bit tricky because of the way he moves them, it was spread over 8 pages. Between the record of what has been removed, and what is still left on the pages, I think what I have is a complete record. ^High_InBC^{(Need help? Ask me)} 02:15, 31 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Edit Counter

Just in case you didn't see the URLs on mIRC, go here, follow the instructions there, then go here to count a user's contribs. Thanks, ~Step trip 20:13, 3 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

VP

Regarding this problem

Hi - I've replied to a bug you left about VP: [2]. Thanks, Mart inp23 13:13, 8 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]