That's the standard welcome; you might also want to check out Project:Welcome, Wikipedians (if you haven't already), which highlights Wikivoyage's idiosyncrasies. Thanks much for the comments (and especially the map!) at Talk:New York (state)#Regions again—sorry I missed your comment earlier, I've now responded. --(WT-en) PeterTalk 20:04, 26 May 2008 (EDT)
Thanks again for all the help with that! It's nice to see a new talented contributor pop up—I hope you stick around. --(WT-en) PeterTalk 04:51, 4 June 2008 (EDT)
With regards to removing Penn Yan, I thought you might be interested in this discussion, where the consensus was to allow longer lists if the article hasn't actually been subdivided yet. Not that you were in error—like you said, that didn't even have an article yet. --(WT-en) PeterTalk 04:40, 6 June 2008 (EDT)
And to allow longer lists if the region article shouldn't be sub-divided :) – (WT-en) cacahuatetalk 21:11, 10 June 2008 (EDT)
In view of our policy, I'm wondering why you added the links to the guides in this article. -- (WT-en) OldPine 12:01, 15 June 2008 (EDT)
I guess it works for that subsection, but I don't like the listing of other guides (my objection was not based on their being secondary or worse) as they are specifically listed under things not to link to. I agree that this article might be a special case, but I fear it might start the slippery slope. If Fodor's guide to say, Napa Valley (or any number of other complex destinations where it's probably true), is better than ours, should we link to that, too? (WT-en) OldPine 13:11, 15 June 2008 (EDT)
Hey, I nominated you for sysop status, please leave a comment indicating whether you are willing to accept! There are no requirements whatsoever, save logging in something like every 3 months. Feel free to mull it over too—we'll leave the nomination up at least 14 days anyway. --(WT-en) PeterTalk 17:53, 16 August 2008 (EDT)
I cut and pasted information from this page into the Walt Disney World resort page. That page can be deleted now. —The preceding comment was added by 70.232.35.201 (talk • contribs) .
I just changed your status on Wikivoyage from nothing to "sysop" per the nomination. Congrats and thanks for taking on the extra responsibility. If you have any questions, as always, feel free to ask. -- (WT-en) Sapphire • (Talk) • 09:28, 1 September 2008 (EDT)
I few of us really like your Florida map with the cities and points of interest, and would like to use it on the main Florida page. One comment though was that some think the Southwest Florida area is a little empty, can you consider adding Fort Myers to that map, then it would be perfect for the main page. Thank you in advance.(WT-en) Jtesla16 10:13, 6 September 2008 (EDT)
I noticed (WT-en) Gamweb has complained about you deleting things in the past, and him and I are getting into much the same argument. My opinion is that he is dumping information from wikipedia and the yellowpages here. Some of our argument points are Lakeland#Eat, Ormond_Beach#Cope, and Florida#Learn. I think this information is not useful to a traveler and does not belong here, and therefore have been removing it. Am I out of line here?(WT-en) Jtesla16 11:35, 7 September 2008 (EDT)
Another user has already cleaned up the Lakeland eat and removed the Florida learn sections. Hopefully that builds consensus for my case.(WT-en) Jtesla16 12:04, 7 September 2008 (EDT)
Hi there! As you've probably already seen, we've all made nice progress on the Walt Disney World article, and I even nominated it for Star status. Unfortunately, the discussion has been rather negative, and I've reached a point where I can no longer comprehend what is expected of a Star article. I also noticed that the discussion is dominated by no more than three other users. Since you are a docent can you add your thoughts? I'm sure it would help a lot. Thanks!
Hi there! Just added a new infobox to Walt Disney World#Go next. But I'm not sure if my writing is precisely clear, so please add more to it if you can. :) (WT-en) Jonathan 784 15:51, 12 October 2008 (EDT)
An anonymous user just made 4 alterations to the article - please check them for accuracy. Also, did you know that I added more to the Star discussion? (WT-en) Jonathan 784 11:44, 22 October 2008 (EDT)
Thanks for your work in Edmonton/West End. I hope you are learning lots about Edmonton Metro! Have a great day:>!!!!! Keep smiling, (WT-en) Edmontonenthusiast 15:09, 28 October 2008 (EDT)
to bring this from TALK:EDMONTON i wanted to make sure i edited my pictures. i put taken on _______ by edmontonenthusiast. check my image. thanks! keep smiling, (WT-en) eetalk 21:18, 7 November 2008 (EST).
Why'd you unblock that user? He(she) vandalised multiple articles with inapporpriate words. I don't get it. He deserves a ban! Keep smiling, (WT-en) eetalk 21:00, 12 November 2008 (EST).
Just an FYI, the blocking policy has been relaxed somewhat over time - if a user is moving pages, abusing others, or being a persistent nuisance then a short block seems to be OK. As an example, there's a guy who logs on from Canada on a weekly basis and changes pages for a few hours unless someone puts a block on the IP, so blocking isn't ENTIRELY bad. But it's generally only used to stop someone who is being a persistent problem, so if the user goes away there's no need to use a block unless they come back. I'm sure there are talk pages where this has been worked out, but that seems to be the current consensus. -- (WT-en) Ryan • (talk) • 22:18, 12 November 2008 (EST)
Thanks for your fabulous imput on my talk page about the situation. You are a real help and I am glad you were calm. (WT-en) edmontonenthusiast [ee].T.A.L.K. 10:09, 27 November 2008 (EST).
Hey LT, I was wondering if youd be interested in checking out the Edmonton page as I uploaded a new skyline photo. I don't know if it is any good, I used some effects on it and I would love your input. (WT-en) edmontonenthusiast [ee].T.A.L.K. 18:14, 28 November 2008 (EST).
Hi.
Just wanting to see advice on what's going on over the vfd on this article...
It has been nominated for understandable reasons. However, the page creator has rebutted this and is removing the vfd tag from the page concerned. I've tried explaining that there is policy governing deletion nominations.
Just want to make sure am not being too heavy handed. I'm going to step back from it now as I don't want to get into a major argument, and I feel it may be best for an admin(s) to make some sort of decision, give advice, etc.
Thanks, (WT-en) Nrms 10:30, 16 December 2008 (EST)
Hi Lt! I just wanted to give you a Merry Christmas and I hope your day is good. I really do want to thank you for the support, opinions, and helping me find the rules on the site. All the best to you in the New Year. Happy holidays, (WT-en) edmontonenthusiast [ee].T.A.L.K. 12:41, 25 December 2008 (EST).
Hi there! Merry Christmas and stuff! Glad to see you are plunging forward with the routeboxes! When you upload a new icon, please do us the favor of adding it to the list page at Project:Route icons so that others can locate it easily. I went ahead and added the two images you just uploaded to it, so don't worry about that. Also I just noticed on your Shared gallery page what great mapwork you are doing. Super spiffy! Keep it up! (WT-en) Texugo 13:52, 25 December 2008 (EST)
Hi, I know that you ment well, but the page I created on Ripley, was about a small town in Bruce County, Ontario, Canada. In other words, not England. I'm new, but I'll try and figure out how to change it back, or change it to "Ripley (Canada)". If it isn't changed when you see it next, change it for me please? Thanks.
(WT-en) Ripley 23:09, 31 December 2008 (EST)
Hi! Just adjusted the article because some of the URL's were broken and redirected to the main page of the official WDW website. You might be interested in my addition to the Buy section. :) (WT-en) Jonathan 784 23:56, 5 January 2009 (EST)
Lt, can you please tell Peter to not revert my user talk page. It is my page and I can do with it what I please. Or is there a reason? Could you help? Maybe investigate please. Thankyou. (WT-en) edmontonenthusiast [ee].T.A.L.K. 19:04, 6 January 2009 (EST).
I also dont get why him and Cacahuate always delete my comments on their pages. It is rude and I dont do it to them. i just dont get it anymore. (WT-en) edmontonenthusiast [ee].T.A.L.K. 16:26, 8 January 2009 (EST).
To be very clear, I won't remove your comment from my talk page or anywhere else, provided they do not request information that has already been given to you (many times), are not disruptive to an ongoing conversation, and are not abusive. You can comment however you like on your talk page—that is a consensus we achieved at Project:How to handle unwanted edits. I consider much of your talk page involvement to simply be attention seeking and/or abuse, and will revert accordingly. --(WT-en) PeterTalk 16:44, 8 January 2009 (EST)
I believe by "abusive", Peter meant rude and incivil. Which, unfortunately, you have been on occasion. You will do best by working on your areas of expertise while observing the way the community operates without your participation, and learning from that observation. (WT-en) LtPowers 18:48, 8 January 2009 (EST)
Well I am not being incivil but honestly I may be rude, but he is even more rude. He is the one that aggravates me to rudeness. If he means that by abusive, then he should try different words because that is a bad interpreation as it is not at all what I am doing. One that can drive me nuts surely can come up with a better word.
You and only you are responsible for your actions. Displaying magnanimity when faced with adversity is a virtue you would do well to cultivate. (WT-en) LtPowers 22:02, 8 January 2009 (EST)
Wrong Peter is responsible for my actions. Why is it that he doesn't get talking to when he reverts edits on his talk page when they aren't abusive but when I do it's a case? Why is it that when he aggravates me and pushes me off the cliff, no one tells him to tone down? Why why why why why? I haven't got a clue. Probably because you all want him here because he did a lot on the site - and that's sad. In any rate, like I have said from the start, I mean absolutely no harm, and if it comes this sites way due to me I appologise as it was probably a my bad, but this Peter crap NEEDS to be resolved and people needa realise that it isn't just me. Also take into account how unwelcoming this site has been to someone who is new, and stuff. Literally, all this crap has made me loose motivation to even contribute to this site. There is no motivation because there is no reason to me right now. It's not worth it really. That's why all the stuff you see from me really is discussions and not articles, and even at that it is very little. (WT-en) edmontonenthusiast [ee].T.A.L.K. 22:09, 8 January 2009 (EST).
Right, this stops now. Peter is not responsible for your actions. I don't care how much he provokes you, it is your responsibility, and yours only, to react in a calm and civil manner. Period. If you can't do that, then you don't have much of a future on this site, because right now you are irreparably damaging your reputation. I can't emphasize enough that you are on extremely thin ice. You don't take constructive criticism well, and you don't demonstrate an understanding of the consequences of your actions. You promised to stay out of contentious conversations and just focus on editing travel guides, but you haven't done that. Dealing with you has occupied an inordinate amount of time for me and several other people on this site.
Do you want to know why Peter reverts your edits so often? It's because it's quicker than explaining something to you over and over and over again. I personally would not do that, and have not, but these longtime editors don't want to deal with interpersonal problems on Wikivoyage; they just want to write travel guides. Your behavior obstructs that goal, by requiring a lot of attention, and that's why people are upset with you.
I will reiterate what I said above: You will do best by working on your areas of expertise while observing the way the community operates without your participation, and learning from that observation. You must ignore any conversation that doesn't directly deal with editing travel guides. You must ignore Peter no matter what he does. You must not participate in policy discussions. I am not imposing these restrictions on you; I am merely outlining what steps I think you are going to have to take to have any chance of avoiding being banned.
I will copy this post to you talk page to make sure you see it. -- (WT-en) LtPowers 09:01, 9 January 2009 (EST)
If I may also interject, EE, occasionally I have to just ignore things on Wikivoyage. It's called a wikibreak and sometimes they're needed -- just stop working on things and get your bearing about you and start contributing when you want to again. It doesn't have to be an all out vacation or break, but, if you feel like you're getting to your wits' ends, simply do not focus on perpetuating the issues that you and Peter have been having. Simply take a few steps back, focus on contributing to guides and that's it. Do, however, realize that you shouldn't disregard advice from the community -- we're all here to see a free, open source travel guide that's useful take root and better the world for travelers and the community provides you with advice, because we all want to be successful in the project. I recommend that you listen to LT and focus on your areas of expertise and letting the conflict simmer down so that everyone around can take a step back and analyze the situation from a not-so-heated perspective. -- (WT-en) Sapphire • (Talk) • 11:27, 9 January 2009 (EST)
Because this involves me, I do want to add my side to this. Quite frankly, Cacahuate, Nrms is right, but he leaves you out. You and Peter are truly the only culprates to not helping this and I agree with him in that you two step aside to people who will deal with me in a proper way. If you feel I should be banned, discuss it with another admin,okay? (WT-en) edmontonenthusiast [ee].T.A.L.K. 18:48, 10 January 2009 (EST).
Why would Peter delete that, see the last thing on Peter's talk page to see. I just don't get it and it is getting quite arrogant. It seems he doesn't even read it, just deletes. (WT-en) edmontonenthusiast [ee].T.A.L.K. 20:53, 10 January 2009 (EST).
Peter deleted it because he doesn't want to deal with you anymore, and he doesn't want your comments on his talk page. I suggest respecting his wishes. (WT-en) LtPowers 22:43, 10 January 2009 (EST)
What a jerk! He should be being more open minded about stuff. I do not care if what I said was rude, I'm sorry, we do not live in a sugar coated word and what Peter is doing is just plain rude. I have been more than nice to him in the past and whatnot. I have been mean to him aswell, but only in comment to what he has done. Whatever I am done with this stupid website I think. There is too much drama that it's not even worth writing stupid travel guides anymore. Nobody on here can even see where I am coming from, and use that same old harsh tone with me and whatnot (a few exceptions) but immideatly jumps to Peter on it. I am sick of being the 1 dude army against millions. I also can't believe how when matters are discussing me, for some damn stupid reason I am not allowed to join in? Well then don't talk to me. When it is talking about me - at least allow me to participate. I am done with this website I think, and I would like all discussion on me put to a halt, or discussed in my talk page. (WT-en) edmontonenthusiast [ee].T.A.L.K. 11:26, 11 January 2009 (EST).
I don't even know where to begin. Read your third sentence again and see if you can figure out the problem. (WT-en) LtPowers 15:35, 11 January 2009 (EST)
Thanks for the "help" and I read that sentance.
You say you don't care if you were rude, then complain that Peter was rude. That's called a double-standard. You might want to take a look at the role your behavior has played in this debacle. (WT-en) LtPowers 19:41, 11 January 2009 (EST)
I don't even know where to begin with you. I guess I have to spell it out...*clear throat*...I t-h-i-n-k t-h-i-s h-a-s g-o-n-e t-o f-a-r t-h-a-t I d-o-n-'-t e-v-e-n c-a-r-e i-f I w-a-s r-u-d-e. Do you not ever have that in real life, where whatever it was has amounted to something so big you don't even care anymore or forgot the original idea? (WT-en) edmontonenthusiast [ee].T.A.L.K. 19:52, 11 January 2009 (EST).
What I am suggesting is that you may be too quick to reach that point. And even when you do reach that point, the better course of action is to take a step back and take a break from the site, rather than get angry and lash out. Because getting angry and lashing out results in further animosity, which feeds further anger on your part, and it all spirals down into the current debacle. Someone has to break that cycle. (WT-en) LtPowers 08:19, 12 January 2009 (EST)
Write down your child's name and your name, resort and cell phone number on a 3 x 5 inch index card, and place the card in your child's pocket. (If your child is a member of MedicAlert or an equivalent organization, that information should also be included on the card as well, or s/he should always be sure to wear his/her ID tag.) Instruct your child to show the card to a Cast Member (a Disney employee) in the event that you get separated. If you lose your child, notify a Cast Member immediately. Cast Members in either situation are instructed to stay with the child or parent(s) in the area where the seperation was reported was made for 10-15 minutes. After that time, both parties are brought to the Baby Care centre in that park. If the party is not reunited at that time, Cast Members will send out a message via radio for all Cast Members to be on the lookout for the child. If your child goes on a ride on his/her own, make sure you know where the ride's exit is. Arrange a place to meet with all members of your party if you become separated. Note: Try not to make your meeting place something that is too obvious, such as in front of Cinderella Castle. Crowding is likely to occur at these places.
This paragraph is bulky. How should we "fix" it? (WT-en) Jonathan 784 23:50, 27 January 2009 (EST)
Why am I even bothering talking to you, you probably don't want to "deal" with me? Probably cause you are the only person on this horrible website I can think of. Maybe I can explain it to you? I have been, lets face it, cyber bullied on this website so much that the people on here don't even care how I feel about it. I would never hurt anyone on here to the amount that they have done to me. They are jerks. I don't care, I am pointing out these jerks, Ryan, Peter, and worst is 2old. My my do I hate 2old. He has only ever commented on me in a mean way, yet he never gets a "stern" talking to, just me. You know, when I "left" this website, I said to myself, I'd come back to do 1 thing, and that was to get rid of the EEarchive. Towards the later part of the month, I thought I'd give the site one last chance, which has proven bad thinking on my part. Bottom line, I just think people don't like me here at all, and just try to bug the crap out of me, and do it in ways so that the community will side with them. Now, I contributed a bit, but I still want my EEarchive deleted. I made a very very generous compromise that it be kept, just the names be taken out, as the names aren't necessary. You guys obviously don't get it. You guys run with no emotion, and could care less (maybe not you specifically, but the site overall)about any persons feelings. You guys don't see how humiliating it would be to point someone new to the site who is questioning the rules to my "archive", I'd feel like an idiot. I'd feel like the laughing stock. I could care less if it is good reference, when people feelings are involved, that shouldn't matter. Peter should not victimize me like this, but yet he gets away with nothing, what, cause he's the top of this website? What a pile of crap. Now I just want my archive deleted, or my compromise made, and I just want to leave this site forever. But, in a sense, I still want to stay cause it can be fun making travel guides, but it hasn't been fun in months. I took the break, I am a lot calmer about everything, but it seems nobody else took the break as a time to think, and rethink. I am here now strictly to finish off the EEarchive, and nothing more now. Unless there is a real big, sudden change in the attitude of this website, once the EEarchive thing is resolved, in some way, and I know I don't need to worry about it anymore, I'll be gone. No need to deal with me or anything. Although I will pop back from time to time to make sure whatever is resolved through the EEarchive is kept going. I would also let you know I'd never ever make someone on this website cry or get shaky when they log into this site, like people such as Peter Fitzgerald have. I think I have been more than fair in everything especially considering everything that's happened. I admit I haven't been so rosy great in the past on this website, I know, Look at that stupid EEarchive. But, you will notice I appologize each time, and if I haven't then I'm sorry, cause I am sorry for all the wrong I've done here, but none of you can do the same in return? I've had people, like Shaund, who I thought were so nice and would stick up for me, actually go against me, PerryPlanet is another perfect example, as is Sertmann. I've been called a troll, which is most insulting, and I hate people thinking I'm something I'm not like that. I hate being labelled those things, I'd never label Peter or you a troll, so why me? What because I talk? So what, communication is key. I could care less if Sertmann says for me to shut up, I like to talk, whupee. So I have feelings. What, I don't disregard peoples feelings? No, I think feelings come first, otherwise you keep everything bottled up and really hurt people sometimes. What am I doing ranting this all to you? Well, Lt, I just wanted some advice on what to do, I hope that's okay. As I'd say, Keep smiling, (WT-en) edmontonenthusiast [ee].T.A.L.K. 14:54, 28 February 2009 (EST).
If you have some time to work on a Boracay map before next DoTM month change, please check my comments here. --(WT-en) Stefan (sertmann)Talk 16:57, 16 March 2009 (EDT)
I reset the lower price range to $0 on two of those price range boxes because I noticed that the previous one, "$82", didn't fit with some of the listings that listed "$80" as the base price. That's when it struck me that those boxes usually use "zero-to-___" or "less than ___" for the budget listings. See any of the San Francisco districts for examples. Admittedly, "under $148" is probably a better way of putting it than "$0-$148", but I was in a hurry and just slapped in "$0".
As for why I removed the Magic Kingdom one, it was because it really didn't fit what the listings said. I think the mid-range said something like "$150-$225", even though the actual mid-range listings had prices of $250 or more. I could have changed the numbers, but I thought it would be best not to dictate a system I don't understand, so I figured removing the box would be the best option until someone who had a better grasp of the situation could put down some useful numbers to classify what's really mid-range and what's splurge at Magic Kingdom. (WT-en) PerryPlanetTalk 16:17, 14 April 2009 (EDT)
I'm pretty sure that was Gamweb, since I know there were some unpleasantness that basically led him to stop contributing here. (And I assume nli = not logged in.) But since it was an anon ip, we cannot be sure that it was him, so I'm going to revert and leave him a message. --(WT-en) PeterTalk 13:46, 25 April 2009 (EDT)
Hi - For every attempt at humor there is always someone out there that doesn't get it - hey? I've just had a go at clarifying the what you can see from which side section of the article. I certainly don't wish to discourage light-heartedness in articles. Hate to be the Wikivoyage scrooge. If you think its just me that doesn't get it, feel free to revert, or if you want to have another shot, my humor-meter is always available to you. --(WT-en) Inas 21:13, 11 May 2009 (EDT)
The new text is definately clear, and I think (hope!) it still read in a lively way.
On a more general theme, I've been giving some thought to lively writing within a wiki framework, with this discussion, and the discussion in DC, and I might continue this dicsssion and the DC discussion at Project:Tone --(WT-en) inas 18:32, 26 May 2009 (EDT)
Hi Lt, I thought I'd let you know I'm back. But don't worry, I'm only popping in from time to time, and am not getting involved in site politics. Mostly article stuff, although I have done one nomination over on the DotM and what not but otherwise yeah. Thanks for sticking up for me in the past and trying to sort through the previous drama(s). (WT-en) edmontonenthusiast [ee].T.A.L.K. 22:09, 15 May 2009 (EDT).
Hi! What I'll do is post this here and on your talk page. I'll also look through it while I write this so I don't miss any of my thoughts and whatnot on the topic.
I'm actually doing the same for Portland (Or), as over the past while I have gotten an increased interest in the city, and will be going to it soon so that's good. I nominated it for DOTM cause I cleaned it up a bit and it seemed worthy. By the time it'd get DOTM I'd be able to upload pics so there will be more pics, and make a map perhaps.
Oh and of course I'm doing it with Edmonton & Alberta.
Anyhow, Walt Disney World. Before I get started I mind as well just say flat out the place doesn't attract me. It seems like more a place for little kids and families instead, and to me just looks tacky and overhype. I don't know, that's just how I feel - but then again I don't go and watch Disney princess on tele.
One thing I do like though is the information really. I love how you give tributes to Walt Disney and fun facts. The Understand section is amazing.
I didn't know there was a parade! Interesting. And one thing you might want to do is a climate graph like in Edmonton. They seem very strict on alcohol. In the food section I wouldn't be so quick to single out mcdonalds. maybe say there are some regular fast food chains but save the actual lists for high quality restaurants / vendors.
For me? You ask? What kind of travelling do I like to do? I like going to cities. Particularily North American ones, although I would not mind Europe. I am a urban planning geek so that would explain that. WDW looks very very suburbanized and concentrated around the highway, which I hate. I am very antisuburbs, so thats another thing that bothers me about it. Maybe if they have transit going to it, that would be a good thing to highlight. I don't really like warm cities either. Miami, Los Angeles, Honolulu, Las Vegas, Abuquerque, Phoenix, and Tampa barely interest me. San Diego is an exception, as is Texas. I like northern cities, with 4 seasons, and seem to feel more "older" I guess, although the southern cities are also old just in a different way. Rustbelt, New England, East Coast, North midwestern, Pacific Northwest, and NoCal areas of the US I like. In Canada, almost anywhere interests me, as long as it's cities. Montréal, Fredricton, Thunder Bay, Toronto, etc. I like sort of former communist countries in Europe like Germany, Poland, and Russia just cause it would be interesting to see socialism instead of capitalism, although I'd never live in those places even though they are democratic now. I like the places that either had a big influence by English or the place influenced English. So Belgium, Germany, Holland, Denmark, and Sweden interest me. Scadinavia as a whole seems pretty cool. I'd rather go to New York than Yellowstone, or Sydney than Everest, or Tokyo over the Coral Reef, or Houston over WDW basically. I don't like suburban cities at all. Maybe if WDW has a more "urban sector", although I doubt it does that would be cool to highlight. Orlando as a whole seems very suburbanized. Nearby Tampa too. And Jacksonville. Nearest would be Miami I guess or Atlanta.
Does that help? If not please let me know, or if you need more information or just a general comment please don't hesitate to reply. I'd actually like a reply, but ya don't haveto. Thankyou. (WT-en) edmontonenthusiast [ee].T.A.L.K. 22:15, 16 May 2009 (EDT).
Spare me the lecture. I reverted that edit because he deleted useful text, and explained why in the edit summary. He didn't provide a valid reason for the deletion, so I reverted it again. He stated that he was going to take care of it, and I left it alone. There's nothing wrong with that sequence of actions. (WT-en) Gorilla Jones 17:16, 23 May 2009 (EDT)
Hi Lt, sorry if I dragged you into the thing with Gorilla, now you and Peter are at argueing. Sorry. I want you to know though that I appreciate you jumping in the discussion, dispite what Peter says. I'd like you to continue, unless you don't want to as it is greatly appreciated for someone whose more neutral it seems on the topic. No offense to Peter or Gorilla, but they seem to be very biased on the topic, and still haven't let the previous annoyances go. Anyhow have a very good day, you're a great moderator. And please don't take that as kissing butt :P. (WT-en) edmontonenthusiast [ee].T.A.L.K. 22:13, 23 May 2009 (EDT).
I saw you signed up for the MA regions map. I did a bunch of work on it previously, including the state outline, counties, roads, and cities, but lost interest in finishing it because the region borders were confusing. I've uploaded it here, so you can work off of it. If you've already done the bulk of the work on your own map, I can merge relevant details later. --(WT-en) PeterTalk 12:24, 3 June 2009 (EDT)
Hi, I just noticed a minor error on your latest version of the Walt Disney World map: the locations of Fort Wilderness Campground and the Wilderness Lodge Villas are transposed. Shouldn't be that hard to fix. (WT-en) Jonathan 784 12:17, 11 June 2009 (EDT)
The Travellers Pub for more details on the New Skype Style question I asked. I have replied back. It's so odd... +1 877 627-2525 ,--71.254.108.245 13:15, 26 June 2009 (EDT)
I'm 24.126.73.17. I revised the language because it was speculative and boastful. I changed it to a neutral tone, taking out "America's most livable city", and "Baltimore is far less lovely" and converting it to a neutral tone. I have spoken to Peter about this. (WT-en) RickS 12:05, 28 June 2009 (EDT)
Hi there! I would like to create new maps or edit existing ones, but I'm pretty much still a new kid on the block and I don't fully understand the map-making process here. Could you please give me a "heads-up"? Thanks!
Tokyo Disney Resort's map is flawed. This version [1] is way better, but it's missing the locations of the Tokyo Disneyland Hotel and the Cirque du Soleil Theater.
Oh no, not essential. Perhaps with the exception of adding more info to the Narnia exhibit description, I was just trying to tighten the prose (which is always something about which people can disagree)—largely to keep me busy while reading through the article. I assume points of contention were towards the beginning? I got rid of the isIn chain in the intro, since it should be obvious from the main article which state it's in, and I think it's safe to assume that WDW/X is in WDW (and the breadcrumbs are already displayed). I was also hoping to get rid of some "experience the" expressions, since I think that fits into the category of brochure-like tone that others were describing. But by all means, edit my edits! --(WT-en) PeterTalk 23:22, 12 July 2009 (EDT)
Nope, there are still a ton of redirects to NY(c)—I got less than half. They're sloppy and break all rdf templates when you navigate through them, so they are undesirable. The more important work, though, was to make sure the whole hierarchy stayed intact. --(WT-en) PeterTalk 13:13, 14 July 2009 (EDT)
I was wondering why the listing for Pacific Coastal Properties was removed. The company does offer vacation rentals in the Del Mar area, as well as many other areas in San Diego county. Please refer to one of our property pages for an example: http://www.pacificcoastalproperties.net/rental/house.html?ID=2. I have the same question for the removal of the posts from Cardiff-by-the-Sea, La Jolla, and Carlsbad. Thanks!
I think most people in Britain and Commonwealth countries understand American spelling perfectly. I'm the furthest thing possible from a spelling pedant, and personally I don't care what spelling people use, and I certainly wouldn't go out of my way to change American spelling to Commonwealth spelling anywhere. However our policy is to use British spelling in British articles, so to change the spelling of gaol to the American jail along with a comment saying they were fixing a strange misspelling is just a mistake in terms of our policy, because the existing version was perfectly correct. All the jails in Britain have a sign on the front saying gaol. --(WT-en) inas 20:55, 1 August 2009 (EDT)
The 7 things in memory is like a the 80/20 rule, and similar rules. More based on anecdotes and sounding right than any basis in psychology. --(WT-en) inas 19:29, 24 August 2009 (EDT)
Yes, I did. =) I'm trying my best, but it's a tad bit harder than I expected. However, I already did one image. (WT-en) Jonathan 784 10:14, 27 August 2009 (EDT)
Back in July you left this edit message at Nusa_Penida: "LtPowers (Talk | contribs) (398 bytes) (I can't find any useful content here) (undo)". Please have a look now :). I am realy pleased with this article. It is a relatively little visited and poorly known destination. I think the WT article is now better than anything in any travel guide I know for the destination. Cheers. --(WT-en) Burmesedays 11:26, 6 September 2009 (EDT)
I removed it because it doesn't have a regional map, the list of regions however is still listed but not on the regional template. Tamil Nadu needs re-organizing :( . Have a nice day.(WT-en) SnappyHip 20:23, 24 February 2010 (GST)
Any chance you're still around? If so, would you mind casting an eye over what is going on with the Kerala page. We have tried educating this user as to why his edits are being reverted, but he is insistant on keeping them there; now trying to get us to allow them to stay while he takes time to work on the content (to which the cynic in me says he's hoping we forget!) I'm not really sure what else we can do, short of a temporary ban on the user, which is really not a road I wish to travel down. Cheers (WT-en) Nrms 12:18, 8 March 2010 (EST)
Best to not encourage trolling—it can be extremely counterproductive. I'm aware of the couple useful bits there thrown in (to try and rope people in), and will continue revising the article, but not before our silly provocateur tires and wanders off. --(WT-en) PeterTalk 22:53, 9 March 2010 (EST)
The idea that I have some sort of radical view on trolling is absurd. Don't feed the trolls is the mantra of the online world [2]. Rising to this sort of bait [3] makes you look ridiculous, and encourages trolls to continue wasting everyone's time. This hurts the site, is unfair to anyone on the receiving end—or really anyone who would rather our site be devoted to productive ends—and is simply inappropriate for an admin to knowingly do. I can assure you that a if a user trolling decides to start contributing positively, they will do so from a new account, and it will not be because you guided them into the light—by continually rising to the bait (and far worse, contradicting other admins trying to deal with this responsibly), you increase the rewards trolling relative to those of positive contribution. --(WT-en) PeterTalk 10:09, 10 March 2010 (EST)
Given your question "elsewhere", you might want to catch up with the long discussion about that email here. --(WT-en) Burmesedays 03:50, 23 April 2010 (EDT)
Just finished reading the whole IB/spam discussion at Wikipedia. Thanks for representing this site there — you're doing a good job of it. (WT-en) Gorilla Jones 21:08, 6 May 2010 (EDT)
I would really appreciate your view on this. I have just about finished putting together the Bougainville article (a very OtbP island). I would love to draw a map but there are no sources, except... this. What is your take on using that as a trace source? Believe it or not, that website is the official tourism site of the Autonomous Region of Bougainville. There is no copyright statement anywhere. Thanks. --(WT-en) Burmesedays 11:34, 7 May 2010 (EDT)
There is a UN map! Many thanks for pointing that out. It will be a perfect source. --(WT-en) Burmesedays 18:53, 7 May 2010 (EDT)
I'm not sure how to contact you...can you contact me please? <<email redacted>>
I'd like to discuss the TAXI section with you.
I only removed that other taxi company because it was misplaced in the Niagara Falls, ONTARIO section. It is an American company and should be listed in the Niagara Falls, NY section. My intent wasn't to remove competition, they are not our competition, they are in a different company.
Replied on your talk page. (WT-en) LtPowers 19:49, 13 May 2010 (EDT)
Vanessa has changed her listing to fir the policy
Hey Hi, I think you made a mistake deleting Vanessa's Random La Paz City Tour. I will tell you why: Her tour goes to places that no tourist could ever find on their own and are custom designed by each small group. There are no museums, govt. building, churches or tourist attractions per se. She uses public transportation which no traveler knows how to use and teaches people about Paceño life and culture. It is analgous to a helicopter flight over the Sahara as the stops are completely off the tourist circuit, not even Paceños know about most of them, and often random. Its a learning experience more than a tour. I think you should undelete it. She read the policy and decided to have the tours meet on the side step of Artesenia Sorata on the corner of Linares & Sagarnaga. That is her office, and her phone is 752-72212, Marko Lewis.
Very glad to have your help with the Salema article (http://en.wikivoyage.org/wiki/Salema). I noticed you marked the article as 'Usable', which has me tickled pink since it's one of the first pages I've created from scratch. I'm a little new here, and would appreciate your feedback: What do you think it would take to bump the article up to the next level? I'm looking at the Wikivoyage:Usable articles page and trying to figure out what, specifically, I could add to make it a more helpful page. More restaurants / hotels / bars, more detailed description of the town, a map...?
A new user has copied partly some material and put in the source. I'm not sure if this is fine but it's not all copy paste, some is (bad) written by himself. Delete all or partly? (WT-en) jan 07:52, 9 June 2010 (EDT)
I dont know if I am placing this in the right area. The reason for adding the ==Understand== section to Rincon, Puerto Rico is due to the fact the site I am adding is the only one available for the town with an interactive map listing multiple categories. In addition, the site lists the latest news regarding the town. If more is needed, please let me know.
Wow! If the docent for Disney World says that people don't contact docents, it must be a real problem to find or understand the link.
In the old pre-web days of 1992, I posted a guide "Planning a trip to Disney World" on the old rec.arts.disney newsgroup, and at the peak was getting up to 40 or 50 emails and posts a week asking questions, advice, and such. I was still getting occasional emails ten years later. Based on my last trip down there in April, the crowds are still there, so I'm sure the need for docents remains high.
Of course, it doesn't help that the Docents link won't show up at all when someone gets there with a redirect, such as going to "disneyworld". But as they click around to Epcot, MK, and such, they will start seeing the Docent box if they just noticed it. To attract attention, perhaps it should appear in the main body of the text, up on the right near the top. Or I guess you really don't want people to START with a docent before they even read the article, so maybe the box should be at the bottom, but still in the main article space. (WT-en) Bill in STL 18:07, 6 August 2010 (EDT)
Yeah, we've talked about it a bit on Project:Docents, but never came to a consensus. You can drop an opinion over there if you want. (WT-en) LtPowers 21:52, 6 August 2010 (EDT)
I just uploaded my first image. I would appreciate it if you could tell me if I filled in the forms correctly. It is from wikimedia commons, and is Image:Catsup watertower.jpg. I then added it to the Collinsville (Illinois) page. I know nothing about the image except what appears in wikimedia commons. I tried to imterpret what I should put in source, license, etc, and think I got it right, but just feel shaky. (I'm not sure it is the best picture, but at least it's a start). Thanks for your help. (WT-en) Bill in STL 20:23, 18 August 2010 (EDT)
Thanks for taking a look. This first time I guess I was so wrapped up in how to do it that I sort of skipped over selecting a good picture. I did find that I brought over a thumbnail at first, and replaced with the full picture, but it still fails to show well in small size. Next time, I'll spend more time on selection and not sweat the process. (WT-en) Bill in STL 19:19, 20 August 2010 (EDT)
Hello LtPowers,
You've reverted the listing for La Paz Walking Tours at the La_Paz_(Bolivia) guide saying "per tour policy". However, the listing constitutes a value-added activity and no traveller could not fulfill the substance of the tour on their own, as the tour policy states. Another similar activity called Ramdom Tour is already listed and falls in the same category. Could you give some feedback and allow the listing? Thank you for your time. --(WT-en) Skykid123 ve 16:15, 25 August 2010 (EDT)
Thanks for pointing me at the category list. I had been looking at the list of pages linked to the template to come up with my list, but the category page alphabetizes them. I added some help text to the top of the category page.
Thanks for your comments and sharing your opinion on listing consulates. I think I'll keep sticking with it, although I would agree with you there might be more useful things I could do with my time. One thing it seems to do is make the articles more official-looking, which I think is a positive. You can read my comments on (WT-en) Peter 's page. Got any big tasks you might like some help on? (WT-en) Zepppep 14:46, 16 September 2010 (EDT)
Ok, where is a central place to talk about this? Travellers' Pub...? (WT-en) Zepppep 12:31, 17 September 2010 (EDT)
As good as any. =) (WT-en) LtPowers 10:35, 18 September 2010 (EDT)
Ok, my bad re: embassies. I thought you were saying it's good to have embassies on the country page but putting them on the city page may not. Did I misunderstand your type? If this is the central place for a discussion, I'm fine with that. I don't see any issue with putting consulate info. on the city pages and haven't run into any major obstacles, I guess. Consulates are helpful and typically there are only a few in each country. Some large countries might have more due to their size or influence and I'm fine with having that particular city list which consulates are in town. —The preceding comment was added by (WT-en) Zepppep (talk • contribs)
First of all, I meant to endorse your suggestion of the Travellers' Pub as a place for discussion, not here. You've now spread discussion across three or four different talk pages; that is not conducive to establishing a useful consensus.
I only responded to the comments you made on other users' pages because you had responded to them on that specific page, so please don't blast me for using a user's page to comment directly to that WT'er. I then came to your page to say "Travelers' Pub is cool with me if it's cool with you." I'm not worried so much about formality when posting to a user's page--and doing a little consensus building or "hey, we're heading over to the TP if you're interested in voicing your comments" is nothing but aiming to inform/update a user who's expressed interest or gratitude in something I've done. I was also offering my help to you (16 Sept post). (WT-en) Zepppep 16:45, 6 October 2010 (EDT)
Sorry if I sounded a bit short. It wasn't intentional. (WT-en) LtPowers 14:13, 9 October 2010 (EDT)
I was under the impression that the underscores were necessary; I've been noticing A LOT of problems with the breadcrumb navigation recently (and purging the cache doesn't always seem to take care of the problems) and thought that might be the reason. Sorry (WT-en) Eco84 10:13, 17 November 2010 (EST)
I was doing a pass through the VFD page to see what nominations could be completed, and on a couple of nominations - Beachtraveller and Lake James (disambiguation) in particular - you've made comments that I assumed were "Keep" votes, but on second look may just be comments without any vote. If these are indeed meant as "Keep" votes could you update the comment? If not, for an article such as Lake James (disambiguation) in which the consensus seems to be "delete", are you OK with completing the nomination? Thanks! -- (WT-en) Ryan • (talk) • 16:08, 27 November 2010 (EST)
That's not true according to my information. Do you have a more recent source than this one? (WT-en) LtPowers 10:11, 15 January 2011 (EST)
Actually in Massachusetts, most highway signs on I-90 in Massachusetts include Springfield or Worcester (not always Albany), and according to Project:Routebox_navigation#Assigning_major_destinations, "If the route goes for 2 hours' travel time or more without a major city, the next biggest city in the region should be used to break it up." So although Springfield and Worcester aren't officially control cities to the AASHTO, I think they should still be included. (WT-en) Sumone10154 12:14, 15 January 2011 (EST)
Well that's different, then, and something that could be discussed. Boston is only three hours from Albany, so I'd say it's close to okay for them to remain the "major" cities on the templates. With toll roads (which I-90 is in New York and Massachusetts), which have relatively few exits, we risk nearly every city becoming a control city if we include all of the major ones. If we include Worcester and Springfield, for instance, we'd also want to add Rochester and Syracuse. (WT-en) LtPowers 15:43, 15 January 2011 (EST)
The collaboration of the month was updated to Niagara Falls. I just thought I'd let you know, since you gave support and know the area. (WT-en) ChubbyWimbus 17:24, 18 January 2011 (EST)
I-80 does not go through State College, but it's close - the town that I-80 passes through doesn't have a page, and I-99 (which does pass through the town) hasn't been routed yet. As I continue to complete these routes, I'll address this issue. I'm just having I-80 in place until I get around to routing I-99 (in other words, it's a temporary situation). :) (WT-en) PerryPlanetTalk 22:09, 21 February 2011 (EST)
Sorry it took me so long to get back to you on the I-86/I-390 deal. Anyway, I'll start with your second question first - I omitted the junction from the other cities along I-86 just because it seemed needlessly complicated to have that much info in those other cities (I wasn't aware that the junction was a major landmark), but I don't feel really strongly about it either way - if you think it works better the way it was before, you can change it back. I don't mind.
On the other point though (why did I take I-390 out of the Corning routebox), that I did because I-390 goes nowhere near Corning (the junction with I-86 is a good 20-30 miles out of town). I'm approaching this from the perspective of someone who is looking at the Corning page and asking the question "Say, which roads pass through Corning? Oh look, I-390 does!" (pulls out map) "Well, wait...I don't see an I-390 anywhere near Corning!" I did note the junction with I-390 in the I-86 row however, so I feel that anyone who follows I-390 south from Rochester and jumps ahead to Corning can still follow it back north if they wish. (WT-en) PerryPlanetTalk 17:02, 28 February 2011 (EST)
Hello LtPowers. Recently, I tried to rename a page without properly using the "move" tab. (It wasn't showing up at the time.) The page was Rocky Mountains (Washington), and I was renaming it, because according to Wikipedia, the Rocky Mountain range doesn't extend into Washington State. (see Rocky Mountains)
Here's what I think needs to be done, but don't have the administrator rights to do it:
I made a few additions to the Northeast Washington page, but I have an offline copy and will add them back after the move-page problem is fixed. Thanks (WT-en) MMKK 17:27, 17 March 2011 (EDT)
I took care of this. -- (WT-en) Ryan • (talk) • 17:31, 17 March 2011 (EDT)
Hi! I would also like to point out that according to some (but not all) sources [4], I-787 does end in Troy. But anyways, the problem is that if later there are articles for every single town along this section of I-87 (the case in many highways in Massachusetts), Troy would not fit anywhere along the route. And additionally, coming from the north, you would take route 7 to get to Troy, not I-787. So I would prefer keeping it the way it is right now with the I-787 routeboxes. (WT-en) –sumone10154 12:12, 1 April 2011 (EDT)
Hi LtPowers, on the Project:Votes for deletion page, some users were proposing to delete town articles or village articles in New York. Since you live in New York, could you give your opinion there? (WT-en) –sumone10154 10:21, 10 April 2011 (EDT)
Re your recent edit..Understand > History. "The region known as The South comprises..." Hopefully that takes care of it. I have watchlisted it. Cheers-- (WT-en) felix 04:22, 26 April 2011 (EDT)
I noticed you made a couple of quick comments. Do you think you could expound on your opinions on this? I wish Peter were around to comment too. (WT-en) texugo 02:49, 21 May 2011 (EDT)
Honestly, I'm ambivalent. I just knew there was strong opposition in the past, though I never knew exactly why. (WT-en) LtPowers 11:35, 21 May 2011 (EDT)
If Japanese is considered a world language but is the national language of only one country, why isn't Swahili a world language when it's a National language of several countries, and official in the African union? (WT-en) Ituwari 12:17, 19 June 2011 (EDT)
I've restarted a discussion about the designation—it may be simpler to rename the section altogether. Lets take the discussion there. --(WT-en) PeterTalk 16:17, 19 June 2011 (EDT)
Hi there (with apologies for a cut and paste message). I am trying to muster up some interest again in the now almost moribund Destination of the Month feature. This used to be one of our more dynamic initiatives with lots of debate. Sadly, that is no longer the case. I have made some new nominations to try to get it going again. If you have a moment please pop over there. And some nominations would be good if you can think of any! Thanks. --(WT-en) Burmesedays 10:22, 9 July 2011 (EDT)
There is an obvious mandate for change on the Chicago site. Please stop shamelessly promoting the shameless self promotions of that page.132.160.43.101 19:25, 4 August 2011 (EDT)
Look, if you want to salvage any of your remaining credibility on this issue, you need to do several things:
Stop reverting Chicago to your preferred version. Whatever claims you make about consensus, the bare fact is that we have a "status quo bias" -- in a dispute, we keep articles the way they were unless the specific change can be shown to have wide support. No matter how many people have supposedly chimed in with comments criticizing the current lead, your version has no one but you asking for it to be instituted.
Register for an account. We welcome unregistered users, but it makes it much easier to work with you long-term if you have a consistent identity. It will give you more credibility, because you will be seen as more than just a random person stopping by to complain, but instead as a fellow Wikivoyageer looking to improve the guide. And it also will reduce questions about just which IP addresses belong to you and which ones don't.
Restart the discussion on your proposed changes on the talk page. You may have noticed that it had been discussed and improvements were being made... but that discussion ended once you started trying to impose it upon the article. That should tell you something about which is the more successful route.
If you show no interest in doing any of these three steps -- let alone all of them -- then it will be clear to all that you are not actually here for any productive purpose, but rather just to tweak, troll, and annoy. The choice is yours.
You are talking very reasonably, but your actions haven't been. You and the other Mayor Daleys have been bullying anyone with a differing opinion, calling their changes boring and colorless.
The status quo bias only comes into play if there is a previous consensus. There isn't. Changes need to be made and NOT reverted so that editors can judge them. Every editor's opinions are equal. I don't need an account.
But I'll make a concession for you, because we're both from the Roch-cha-cha. I won't make mass reverts of the whole lead, but rather smaller ones. I think we can do some honest analysis on the talk pages and make a great article together.
There is and was a consensus for the previous version, as the article was promoted to star status with near universal acclaim. It doesn't lose that approval because a one or more persons who haven't done any other significant work on the site come in and say they don't like it.
If you want to make changes, you'll have to gain consensus for them first, then make the change -- not the other way around. (WT-en) LtPowers 16:31, 10 August 2011 (EDT)
So you admit that there is no consensus to keep the lead. The article was a star, so everything in it gets the green light? I don't buy that.
You are probably too partisan to have seen the consensus for change in the discussion section.
Ryan said the lead is "too flowery"
Peter said that the old lead can use improvement at least somewhat. He also had a few kind words for revisions.
Even you said you are "starting to see what I mean."
There are more, but I digress,
My individual edits should be viewed on their own merit. Why did you get rid of my first sentence edit?
When did I say "there is no consensus to keep the lead"? I reverted you because you didn't do any one of the three things I asked earlier -- you didn't register for an account, you didn't start a discussion on the talk page, and you didn't stop trying to impose your changes by fiat instead of garnering consensus first. Those are the basic steps in gaining the trust of the other users of this site; until you can understand their importance, you won't understand how to best be a productive contributor to this site. (WT-en) LtPowers 09:58, 12 August 2011 (EDT)
132.160.43.101, I have been casually watching the recent editing on the Chicago article, your own commentary and that of others. Regardless of any content issues your undoubted enthusiasm and considered input into the article is noted. Accordingly I wish to pass no judgement upon either your motives or the quality of content in your edits. I am a regular editor on Wikivoyage but the Chicago article is not one with which I am familiar, nor an I familiar with the destination. However I am quite familiar with the principals, policies and intent of the editors with which you are in apparent disagreement. This article has an established style and content that has been arrived at through both consensus style editing and rigorous scrutiny by both long established and also casual editors such as yourself. Although a quick reading does reveal some good content input from you the certainly bombastic manner with which you are delivering it to the article is in no way constructive. If it were an article of a lesser state of evolution I speculate you would probably not be experiencing such resistance however to be blunt the main problem appears to be with your attitude. Frankly it sucks and I suggest that if you wish to contribute that you do it in a manner that is far less fractious. One of the things that really annoys regular editors and contributors here is an individual who comes along swinging their trouser snake around like a gushing garden hose. Put it back in your pants. The way to deal with the contentious nature of change in the article is to discuss it. It is not a complex process and would consume far less energy for all concerned if you would do so in a more restrained, balanced and mature manner. The appropriate venue to establish change is the articles discussion page. That applies most especially for an article that has evolved and developed to a Star rated level. Put your ideas forward on the discussion page in a concise manner and other editors will look over them in a measured, balanced and hopefully still objective manner despite your still prevailing bombastic behaviour. If your ideas and content suggestions are considered to be of overall merit and benefit the article you may be surprised to find you have some support for some change. The direction you are heading is presenting a total distraction from the proposed content and moving the attention instead to you and your inappropriate behaviour. Unless you make some effort to behave like a grown up person then it is hard to disagree with any of the comments made about you. Register an account, what is the problem with doing that, at least then we know it is you, not someone else that you share the IP with. If you wish to make a constructive contribution and improvement to the current article then please just take your proposed content, thematic changes and other considerations to the discussion page and deal with them there in a sensible and constructive manner. Maybe try reading the MoS and then practicing your editing and content contribution skills on a more needy article, maybe even consider creating or improving an appropriate article for a destination that is lacking an article or content, this website is full of needy areas to cover. Then consider coming back to the Chicago article when you have some idea of how to behave in a collaborative environment. Otherwise, please just go away. -- (WT-en) felix 15:12, 12 August 2011 (EDT)
More posturing. Listen guy, I'm not the one revert warring and refusing to discuss the issues. The people want change, and a few bullies are standing in the way. Don't encourage them.
I'm gonna keep on making positive edits.
Chicago is not the truth of blues.
132.160.72.197 04:43, 17 August 2011 (EDT)
Who are all these people who want change and where is the discussion which proves that? All I have seen are a few anonymous comments (probably from one user only using different anonymous IPs), and certainly no consensus building going on. If you want something changed, discuss it reasonably on the Chicago talk page first. It's really very simple.--(WT-en) Burmesedays 04:59, 17 August 2011 (EDT)
Hi. I'm in the process of moving my material from the CouchSurfing travel guides to Wikivoyage, as CS has just converted to a for-profit company.
I'm confused as to how Wiki talk works. Is there any pre-formatted process for responding to or starting a new topic, or do I just edit the appropriate talk page in some seemingly appropriate manner? Is it OK to pick up on a pertinent but long-dormant discussion, or should I start a new one on the same topic?
Is there a shortcut for IDing and timestamping a talk comment?
I communicated on the Ulster County split as you suggested, but per above, I don't know if it's in the right context.
Hi, John. Talk pages here work just like on Wikipedia, by and large. Try giving Project:Using talk pages a read and then let me know if you have any further questions. (WT-en) LtPowers 16:48, 24 August 2011 (EDT)
Hi. I'm sorry I offended you. I remain astonished by the idea of New York as a Mid-Atlantic state, but I didn't realize there was actually a precedent behind that and it wasn't just something done out of organizational convenience here or something. I don't really come here out of a motivation to discuss it, though; I really just came here to apologize. (WT-en) Ikan Kekek 21:51, 16 October 2011 (EDT)
No problem; I may have overreacted, but I was stunned by your strident assertion. No harm, no foul. (WT-en) LtPowers 07:27, 17 October 2011 (EDT)
Hi, I saw your edit removing the "Danforth Dragon" description from the Toronto Pearson International Airport details. I puzzled over it for a while wondering how on earth that arrived there as an outcome of one of my edits, and indeed that was the obvious source. I scoured the article for mentions of Danforth Dragons and in the edit history I found a badly formatted restaurant listing that I had edited. I assume this abberation was an inadvertent paste that dropped into a cursor point without my noticing. The wretched page purging issue then ensured that I did not see it when I did a quick scan over the final edited version of the page. Your edit note (dare I ask where this even came from?) is still making me smile. Certainly it was a most odd thing to append to an airport. Good thig you spotted it. Cheers-- (WT-en) felix 01:29, 6 November 2011 (EST)
Just wanted to thank you for the welcome :) I'll take a look at the links you provided and get acquainted! (WT-en) travelguy101 18:43, 5 January 2012 (EST)
I'd like to ask you to change back information about tour guide company in Warsaw. Capital of Poland was destroyed in 90%, which means that it is absolutely impossible to see the most beauty and important architectonical details on apartments, monuments and other sights, if you dont have licensed and very experienced tour guide. That is why tours offered by warsaw4u have "a value-added activity". —The preceding comment was added by 85.222.21.83 (talk • contribs)
Hi ... I added a listing for a Spanish teacher to the La Paz article yesterday, which you subsequently reverted ... I don't have much experience with Wikivoyage, but I have to admit I'm at a loss to understand the reason for the revert.
Can you tell me what was wrong with it? The only thing I can think of is that I didn't create an account before making the edit - is that it?
I may have been too hasty. The listing struck me as somewhat problematic as it's a bit of a slippery slope to start listing all private Spanish teachers in the city. I'm not sure if we have concrete guidelines on such things. Perhaps drop a note at the Project:Travellers' pub and see what other editors think. (WT-en) LtPowers 21:28, 25 January 2012 (EST)
Thanks for adding the Districts Discussion box to the Buffalo page; I probably should have thought to do that myself. I had been planning on beginning to write the articles in the next few days - but given that the box is on the page now, I guess I should wait a bit longer for new contributors who might want to add their two cents. How long do discussions like this normally take? (WT-en) AndreCarrotflower 19:13, 17 February 2012 (EST)
Considering how little attention the article had gotten before you came along, I honestly wouldn't worry about it. (WT-en) LtPowers 10:16, 18 February 2012 (EST)
Thank you. I guess I'll start in the next few days. (WT-en) AndreCarrotflower 13:06, 18 February 2012 (EST)
I think this person [5] was, ah, er, venting about the current heat wave (June was positively cool). It hit 106° yesterday at DCA. --(WT-en) PeterTalk 18:28, 8 July 2012 (EDT)
No doubt, but the sentence left behind was still self-contradictory. =) (WT-en) LtPowers 21:35, 8 July 2012 (EDT)
No one else agrees that they're inappropriate. Many people in the Wikivoyage editing community are likely to be interested in a travel guide project started by the Wikimedia Foundation; a pointer to that discussion does not seem excessive. (WT-en) LtPowers 15:46, 12 July 2012 (EDT)
Actually, both Peter and Ryan have voiced their disapproval as well.--(WT-en) IBobitalkemail 17:23, 12 July 2012 (EDT)
Just to be clear, my position is that using Wikivoyage for discussion of a fork is, for lack of a better word, impolite to the current site owners, but not something that should be censored. -- (WT-en) Ryan • (talk) • 17:43, 12 July 2012 (EDT)
It is useful information to specify in a bracket sentence what The Holy See is since the article mentions its official language. The part about Latin could be omitted. But then, many readers might be confused since it is a common misunderstanding that Latin is the official language.
And I do not know who started that rumor that one could get by in the Vatican by speaking Latin. That is definately something for Myth Busters.
"Thanks" for your comment on my site. Maybe you should discuss the issue on the Vatican's discussion page instead of just violating with simple nonsense.
In return for being the first to support you for bureaucrat, I demand that you return to me my admin bit. — Ravikiran r (talk) 20:45, 13 September 2012 (CEST)
I see it's been done, though I'm finding it hard to tell if your tone was serious or joking. =) LtPowers (talk) 05:12, 14 September 2012 (CEST)
Yes Peter took care of it. And yes, I was joking :) — Ravikiran r (talk) 09:10, 14 September 2012 (CEST)
I should probably address this on your talk page rather than Eco's, as at this point the discussion no longer has anything to do with him. :)
At some point after I began to contribute more and more actively to the Buffalo article, I knew that I would eventually begin work on articles for other destinations in WNY, and I found myself grappling with the same question. The rule of thumb that I came up with involved drawing a distinction between communities that are more or less faceless tracts of suburbia (i.e. Cheektowaga and West Seneca in the case of Buffalo, and perhaps Greece and Brighton in the case of Rochester, though you'd know better than me of course) and communities that "feel" more like small towns (i.e. Clarence, my newest pet project, and East Aurora, which likely will be my third one). Suburbia, following my logic, should be treated as an extension of the city proper, but the "small-town" places can and should have their own articles. The way I see it, readers will invariably be more interested in quaint villages, main streets, mom-and-pop stores, and places with charm than in wading through a list of malls, plazas and chain restaurants. In my articles I try hard to limit the size of the "Eat", "Drink" and "Sleep" sections relative to the other sections; I feel that to merit its own article, any destination generally ought to have at least one, and preferably two or three, actual tourist attractions.
Of course, when I eventually do get around to districting the Buffalo article (one of the reasons I'm glad its DotM month has been put off so many times; it's going to be a daunting task) it may very well be that Cheektowaga, West Seneca etc. will end up with their own articles. When the listings of restaurants, hotels and attractions are migrated to the district articles rather than the main one, I'll likely have to choose between creating articles for boring suburbs, deleting worthwhile attractions that happen to be located in such places, or leaving them on the main Buffalo page where they won't really fit. I suppose I'll cross that bridge when I come to it. Thankfully, I've not heard anything about districting Rochester, so it's likely that wouldn't be an issue for you in any event.
Obviously every metro area is different, but I think Buffalo and Rochester are similar enough in size and in other ways for this template for Buffalo to be applicable to Rochester, if you like, as well. Hope this helps.
That's the basic conclusions I came to about Rochester as well, and as a rule of thumb I set "anything with a Rochester ZIP Code" as the boundaries. That's essentially the towns of Irondequoit and Brighton, plus the busiest parts of Gates, Chili, Henrietta, and Greece. (The main snag with doing so? The fact that Irondequoit has that small-town feel you mentioned; it really could be its own destination, despite being essentially surrounded by Rochester.) I thought it was working fairly well until Routeboxes came into it.
For Buffalo, I think you're on the right track; there's no reason you can't treat the inner-ring suburbs like Cheektowaga as districts of Buffalo, even if you have to group them together a bit.
Today I let run about 1,5 million update jobs. Replacing texts should be now faster. I will check every day the number of jobs and will start a maintenance tool. --Unger (talk) 20:10, 14 October 2012 (CEST)
As you probably know, building an article more or less from scratch is a whole different animal than fleshing one out from an already-existing template, as I did with Buffalo. So, I'd appreciate your honest opinion on what I've been doing at the Clarence article. Specifically:
Too many Eat/Buy/Drink/etc. listings?
Listings too wordy?
Too many photos?
Does it seem like I'm leaving anything out (other than the sections I obviously haven't gotten around to yet, i.e. "Do", "Drink")?
Is referring readers back to the Buffalo article a bad idea (i.e. "Get In", "Climate", "Go Next")?
Thanks a bunch for your feedback regarding the Clarence article. My reason for asking was that I intend to nominate Clarence as OtBP at some future time, and having taken an active role in the DotM/OtBP nomination process lately has enlightened me to the pitfalls that can make or break a nomination. Also, I would love for Buffalo or Clarence (or another article I may write in the future, or some combination of the above) to reach Star status someday.
Regarding linkbacks to the Buffalo article, you said "providing a summary in the Clarence article and linking to Buffalo for expanded information makes sense". The rule of thumb I followed was something similar: if I have nothing to say in any given section that is specific to Clarence, the section should simply be omitted rather than have it consist entirely of a linkback to the other article. E.g., the "Climate" section contained not only a linkback but also more specific information about Clarence's relative lack of lake-effect snow, and the "Radio and television" section contained not only a linkback but also the factoid about WBBZ; however, sections such as "Talk" don't exist at all in the Clarence article, being that there isn't any major thing that sets Clarence apart from the larger Buffalo area in that regard. That being the case, I do see the value in smoothing out the prose to avoid the appearance of touting the Buffalo article; I'll get to work on that when possible.
Also, you said: "[r]eferring to state routes as, e.g., 'NY 5' implies that that's how they're known to locals. 'Route 5' would better represent the local parlance". In this case I wasn't referring to local parlance at all; if I had been, it would simply have been "Main Street". Including the numbers was intended to aid visitors from outside the area who may be navigating via road signs, maps, or GPS systems. Your point regarding county routes is well taken, though. Including technical information regardless of how useful it is to the traveller on the ground, who will never see a County Route sign, strikes me as more of a Wikipedia approach than a Wikivoyage approach.
Do you find that these guidelines that I've set for myself clash with the Wikivoyage standard in any huge way? Again, my goal is Star status.
No, I think you're hitting the right notes. I do not think we have any suburban Star articles, so in some respects you're setting the standards. But of course, there's only one way to find out for sure! LtPowers (talk) 02:39, 25 October 2012 (CEST)
How the heck does one email on wikitravel? I don't see an email this user button and nothing that looks obvious. Meanwhile, I've added links that should connect RegentsPark on Wikipedia and Wikivoyage to Wandering on Wikitravel and Wikivoyage and (WT-en) Wandering on Wikivoyage. --RegentsPark (talk) 21:46, 26 October 2012 (CEST)
Looks like IB has disabled that function. *sigh* You're all set and have your admin bit. LtPowers (talk) 22:08, 26 October 2012 (CEST)
I'm pretty unsure of what is OK to move to Commons and what won't be accepted. When a city's main attractions are art, architecture, and unique local businesses, it seems that Commons might nix nearly all of our images... Could you do a quick audit of the following images and note here whether they would be accepted? That will help me figure out which to tag with what:
Nos 1, 3, 4, 7, 8, and 11 are absolutely fine to upload to Commons. 5, 6, and 12 are absolutely not okay. 2 and 10 are questionable and could be argued either way (see commons:Commons:De minimis). Number 9 (Oak Woods Cemetery) is fine if the statue on the monument is Confederate-era; if it's modern, then it's questionable like 2 and 10 are. LtPowers (talk) 23:52, 29 October 2012 (CET)
I would think #2 would not be acceptable under WMC:De minimis, since the whole of the image is of copyrighted material (the sign)? Of course, the tavern would be plenty happy for people to re-use it as free advertising... #10 definitely is borderline per that policy—would you recommend I use the "move" tag or the "KeepLocal" tag? I sort of figure "KeepLocal" would make more sense, since making the argument would be time-consuming, and we have a ton of moving work to do. --PeterTalk 00:24, 30 October 2012 (CET)
Also, I'm still a little confused as to why #s 1 and 4 are OK, since they represent architectural works, and why 3 and 7 are OK, when they are focused on signage for businesses. --PeterTalk 00:27, 30 October 2012 (CET)
When in doubt, I suppose go with KeepLocal. You can always ask for opinions from the Commons experts later. The only part of #2 that is a concern are the illustrations on the left and right sides of the sign; the text itself is too short to be copyrightable. #3 and #7 are okay for the same reason: the text is too brief and too basic to be copyrightable, while any imagery in #7 is small enough that it's de minimis. #1 and #4 are okay because the United States has freedom of panorama for architectural works; they are copyrighted (if they were completed after 1990), but you can take as many pictures of them as you want without copyright concern, as long as you do so from a public place (i.e., a place accessible to the public, not necessarily public property). See commons:Commons:FOP#United States. LtPowers (talk) 01:42, 30 October 2012 (CET)
Here's another I'm not sure of. It's architectural, but indoors, so FoP doesn't come into play? --PeterTalk 23:55, 1 November 2012 (CET)
That is a tricky one. First off, buildings in the U.S. are only copyrighted if they were completed after December 1, 1990. (See commons:Commons:Freedom of panorama#United States.) The National Portrait Gallery was erected in 1968, so the building itself is in the public domain (only its plans are copyrighted). However, this picture is of a courtyard that was added to the building in 2006, so it could be that this part of the building is copyrighted. All that said, though, I believe freedom of panorama still applies to indoor photos, as long as the indoor space is accessible to the public. For reference, this is another picture of the same area already on Commons. (Keep in mind, though, that that image may not have been vetted by the community yet.) LtPowers (talk) 00:04, 2 November 2012 (CET)
In this specific case, of course, there's also the issue that the courtyard was likely created as a work-for-hire for the federal government (e.g., the Smithsonian Institution). If that's the case, it's in the Public Domain, as with anything created by the federal government. LtPowers (talk) 01:24, 2 November 2012 (CET)
"This includes such interior public spaces as lobbies, auditoriums, etc" ← This seems like a clear enough go-ahead. I'll give it a move tag. --PeterTalk 01:47, 2 November 2012 (CET)
I'm surprised this has gone unnoticed for so long, but I think Quickbar/working has been semi broken for some time, inserting this text into articles that use it:
<rdf>
<http://en.wikivoyage.org/wiki/Somaliland> dcterms:spatial <urn:x-wikivoyage:en:Somaliland> . <urn:x-wikivoyage:en:Somaliland>
a wts:Country . </rdf>
I'd just remove the rdf code, but I don't know what it's initial purpose was. --PeterTalk 03:07, 30 October 2012 (CET)
I think the only reason was to categorize the article as a country. --Unger (talk) 07:02, 30 October 2012 (CET)
Whatever it was, I think I just copied it from Template:Quickbar. Since we've given up on RDF for the time being, I'll remove it. LtPowers (talk) 12:33, 30 October 2012 (CET)
Latest comment: 12 years ago4 comments2 people in discussion
Hello LtPowers :) As one of the local 'crats here, could you consider appointing people like Thehelpfulone and Stefan2 as temporary admins for the sole purposes of assisting with the migration process? SnowolfHow can I help?21:56, 11 November 2012 (UTC)Reply
Yes indeed, and I'm willing to fasttrack the nominations rather than waiting the normal fortnight. But I would expect the community would want to see some strong evidence of helpful wikignoming on other projects in order to approve these. LtPowers (talk) 22:57, 11 November 2012 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 12 years ago2 comments2 people in discussion
Hi, this is weird, Pigsonthewing's userpage history is displaying some strange form fields towards the top of it and is full of strangely linked text. See:
http://en.wikivoyage.org/w/index.php?title=User:Pigsonthewing&action=history
Any idea what caused that? That whole history page looks weird. I don't know Pigsonthewing but I happened to look and saw. Hope this helps. Thanks for all the work you are doing around here. I'd help if I knew how. I just don't know the details of what is going on with the merge. So I'll just speak up when I see weird stuff. --Rogerhc (talk) 19:53, 14 November 2012 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 12 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion
Hey LtPowers,
I caught your comment in the deletion discussion for {{ref}} and I was wondering if there was a manner for handling references on the talk page. Should I just use links for websites, or any particular formatting for books and publications? - Theornamentalist (talk) 18:42, 17 November 2012 (UTC)Reply
It looks pretty good, but I have some serious concerns about allowing such articles to proliferate. It seems like they would quickly overwhelm the travel guides, and maintaining potentially hundreds of thousands of them could be very difficult. LtPowers (talk) 00:29, 20 November 2012 (UTC)Reply
I think something of the form could prove useful and could be maintained, but WV seems to be a fairly tight knit community that probably has enough on its plate. If you'd like, we can revisit this whenever, if ever, you feel the community could manage pages of this sort. - Theornamentalist (talk) 03:12, 20 November 2012 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 12 years ago2 comments2 people in discussion
Hi LtPowers, *thank you* for adding those very helpful instructions at Wikivoyage:Cleanup. I probably cannot help much this week but if by next week I have acquired enough understanding of what is going on to help, I may have some time to do some image tagging. Your recently added instructions help. However, I don't quite understand what "keep local" means (what server is "local" there) nor why "keep local" would be a valid option if hosting the image on Commons would not. Could you clarify this point over at Wikivoyage:Cleanup (you will see my Question: there towards the bottom of the page, unless someone else answers and removes it, under "Tag the image. You have five choices:"). I also raised this same question at http://wts.wikivoyage-old.org/wiki/Wikivoyage:Pub_%28temporary_refuge%29#What_to_do.3F. I want to understand what these tags mean before I start labeling images with them, of course. No need to answer here if you can clarify on those two pages instead. Thanks, --Rogerhc (talk) 05:57, 20 November 2012 (UTC)Reply
Please don't do that. If you have a question, use the talk page. That's what they're for.
Latest comment: 11 years ago3 comments1 person in discussion
Hi LtPowers -
As you can see, I've begun the first Buffalo district article. I'm struggling, though, with the question of what material to migrate over to the district articles and what to keep in the main article, particularly as concerns the "Do" section.
For example, I'm leaning toward keeping "Sports" and "Tours" in the main article, because a) it seems like it'd be better not to wait until a reader gets into the nitty-gritty of the individual district articles before telling him about the Bills and the Sabres, and b) most of the tours encompass multiple districts.
I have less of an idea what to do about "Festivals", because some of those (i.e. the Italian Festival) are definitely linked to one neighborhood in particular, while others are not; and "Theater", where my first instinct is to tell the potential visitor to Buffalo about all of the different theater options at once, rather than breaking up the list unnecessarily.
In all cases, I'd rather not proceed until I am sure what Wikivoyage's protocol is on the matter. Your advice is appreciated.
Firstly, thank you as always, because you did clarify the vast majority of the questions I had. The one remaining one, however, is how to deal with the "Tours". As I said earlier, many of the organized tours that exist now on the main Buffalo page encompass many districts. For example, the Open-Air Autobus of Buffalo's "Whirlwind Tour" passes through Buffalo/Downtown, Buffalo/Allentown and the Delaware District, and Buffalo/Elmwood Village and spends an approximately equal amount of time in each.
The one possible solution I've come up with is to simply cut-and-paste the information into all applicable articles, and emphasize to the reader that the tour encompasses districts other than the one he is currently reading about. Mind you, if you can help me brainstorm an alternative solution, that would be great, because the one I described above strikes me as far from ideal.
Your continued assistance, as always, is hugely appreciated. My goal is for my work on Buffalo to some day be mentioned in the same breath as our material on Chicago.
I've finished the first Buffalo district article: Buffalo/Downtown. I'd appreciate a friendly critique to make sure I'm on the right track with the whole thing.
Specific concerns I have:
Is the "History" section too long? I'm a bit of a local history buff, so my first instinct is to drone on and on about it. I'm aware that such detail may be boring or not strictly necessary from a traveler's perspective, so I would like to know if I've "reeled it in" enough.
Is there too much focus on public transportation?
Anything else that might have gone completely over my head?
I'm a big fan of "plunging forward", as you know, but I much prefer to do so knowing that I am also staying true to Wikivoyage convention, which is why I'm cluttering up your talk page like this. I actually asked the same question of Peter a while back, but from what I've come to understand since then, he is dealing with tech issues on the site that are likely keeping him quite busy, so I figure it's best not to bother him now with an issue like this.
Latest comment: 11 years ago6 comments2 people in discussion
I'm trying to nail down the necessary info for my uploads still remaining on wts-old. I'm stymied a little bit because I cannot view deleted files on wt/en and wt/shared. Would you mind going through and checking and then adding a license-review template to the following:
For Sheki_khansarai.jpg, I went to the trouble of first uploading the original from en.wikivoyage-old, and then uploaded your modifications from wts.wikivoyage-old, and supplying the upload logs for both. That should preserve attribution and such. But since I uploaded it some other admin on Commons will need to verify the license.
For Niamey_GrandeMosque.jpg, I don't see that anything needs to be done, as the file was originally uploaded to Shared, so wts.wikivoyage-old has the full imported upload log.
For Split_Point_lighthouse.jpg, I didn't touch it. I'm still not sure about it, as I found a higher-res version online -- albeit on a web site with a domain name matching the uploader's username.
I can't; for some reason IBobi has decided I'm inactive and removed my admin access. And protected my user page for some reason. This despite the fact that I edited yesterday. LtPowers (talk) 13:22, 4 December 2012 (UTC)Reply
Some of your license review templates didn't transfer with the files, strangely. Could you add reviewed templates to the following (which you already reviewed on wts-old):
It looks like that mobile phone 166.137.208.*, 166.137.209.* IP range which was being used to troll a few weeks ago is back. Might be worth keeping an eye on these? K7L (talk) 00:09, 20 December 2012 (UTC)Reply
It's difficult to keep an eye on IP ranges. That particular edit seems fine to me, but I appreciate your attention to possible trouble. I'll try to drop by Recent Changes more often. LtPowers (talk) 00:11, 20 December 2012 (UTC)Reply
A few things I wanted to respond to in particular:
I had gone over "History" already to remove the overlap with Buffalo#History, and thought I caught everything. Inasmuch as there is information from Buffalo#History repeated in Downtown#History, it's usually there as a sort of introduction to set up examples that are specific to the district (i.e. the beginning of the third paragraph, which boils down to "Buffalo began to shrink and deindustrialize after WW2... for downtown, this meant Main Street department stores became less busy"). If you have any specific examples of how this could read better, I'd love to hear them.
Not sure what you mean by "the Dunkirk station" that's referenced in "By train". (Did you mean Buffalo#By train?)
Regarding 710 Main Theatre/Studio Arena as "Western New York's only professional regional theatre": that information was taken directly from a Wayback Machine-archived version of the theatre's own website [14], which one might consider the prototypical "reliable source". Again with the ambiguity of "Western New York"...
In the "Eat" section, the Anchor Bar is listed under "Frank & Teressa's Anchor Bar", the full name that's used consistently on their website, signage, menu, etc.
Regarding coffeeshops: that actually solves a problem with the Allentown/Delaware District article, where I'd been struggling to find a place to stick Café 59. How do you suggest I set this up—separate "Bars" and "Coffeehouses" subsections under "Drink"?
For lodgings, I prefer to reserve the "Budget" section for hotels and motels rather than hostels. A youth hostel is a distinctly different experience than an Econo Lodge, Motel 6 or the like, and geared toward a distinctly different type of traveler. The only thing the two have in common, IMO, is low price. Same rule will apply to B&B's, which figure in to some future district articles.
I will likely fold "Stay healthy" into "Cope", rather than "Stay safe". That exchange I had with User:AHeneen was stuck in my head for a long time after it concluded. I had never seen it done that way before—hospitals under "Cope"—but it made more and more sense the more I thought it over.
Your assumption regarding St. Paul's Episcopal is correct; I will correct the text accordingly.
My aspiration is for everything I write here to be among the best articles Wikivoyage has to offer. So it's good to hear such high praise from someone who's done work as stellar as yours—the docent of a Star article and Wikivoyage's only two-time DotM, no less. If you're in the mood for some more reading material (or another opportunity to critique my work, or more inspiration to cross inside the Interstate loop), I'm speeding toward the finish line on the second district article—Allentown and the Delaware District. IMO this will be at least as interesting an article as Downtown, if not more so.
I meant Depew, not Dunkirk. Always get those D-suburbs mixed up (and yes, I know how far out Dunkirk is). I'm a bit surprised the Anchor Bar is so expensive; I expected to find it under "Budget" -- and yes, I also expected to find it under "A", not "F". Official usage by include the names, but popular usage doesn't; I'm not sure it's worth the risk to the unsavvy traveler. For coffeeshops, my personal preference is a single coffee subheading, leaving the bars in the top-level section. There's been some disagreement over the best place for coffee listings, though; some people think that Drink should be just for nightlife. If I get a chance, I'll take a closer look at the History section. LtPowers (talk) 14:41, 2 January 2013 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 11 years ago13 comments3 people in discussion
I'm not sure moving the legalese about drinking age and DUI to the top of the drink section is a good idea. This stuff is borderline captain obvious, and it's certianly not a gripping read. The locations of wine regions and the difference between malt and rye are fairly interesting and, I think, deserve greater prominence. Travelpleb (talk) 17:01, 3 January 2013 (UTC)Reply
The rule is usually "general before specific", so I wanted to get the legal stuff out of the way first. I'm not sure what exactly is obvious about stating the legal drinking age, either. I'm not wedded to the exact wording in the "public drinking" paragraph, of course; I just moved it as-is, and it could probably be pared down a bit. LtPowers (talk) 18:04, 3 January 2013 (UTC)Reply
How shall we define "general" and "specific"?
Half of all alcohol consumed in the U.S. is beer. Therefore, beer consumption is pretty general.
Drink driving, I hope, involves far less than half the national alcohol consumption. It especially loses relevance given that most people using a travel guide won't have a car (at least when they're using said travel guide.)
Drinking in public is also pretty specific. People generally drink in bars.
America's globally pervasive media and culture makes its drinking age fairly common knowledge across the world. Most drinkers are also generally over 21 by the sheer fact that most people are over 21. But I'll grant that it could stay at top.Travelpleb (talk) 18:22, 3 January 2013 (UTC)Reply
The bulk of the Drink section discusses various types of alcohol; the section should lead with information that applies to all types of alcohol, rather than burying it at the bottom after discussion of spirits. That's basic good writing, and semantic gymnastics don't change that. LtPowers (talk) 18:43, 3 January 2013 (UTC)Reply
I am sorry you should think I am employing Socratic trickery. I will try to be more plain. The article should be constructed with the most relevant information first. DUI and public drinking are peripheral to drinking generally. What one drinks, unless one is addicted, is usually the main concern. Travelpleb (talk) 19:50, 3 January 2013 (UTC)Reply
I was not accusing you of trickery, just pointing out that you were using creative applications of the words "general" and "specific" to support your preferred ordering. Since we disagree, this discussion should be continued at the article's talk page where others can weigh in. LtPowers (talk) 19:58, 3 January 2013 (UTC)Reply
I was being matter of fact, there's nothing creative in it. The most relevant information is not whether you can drink in parks. Can you honestly think that it is? The legal stuff is also dull. Leading with it is a real turn off. Can we compromise with legal age at the top and DUI and the like at the bottom?Travelpleb (talk) 20:07, 3 January 2013 (UTC)Reply
I don't think this is a case where compromise is useful; I don't see this as a negotiation. How (not) to drink is just as important as what to drink, and moving it to the bottom again violates the principle of "general before specific". Again, I would ask that this discussion be adjourned to a more appropriate location, like the article's talk page, where we can get additional input. LtPowers (talk) 20:14, 3 January 2013 (UTC)Reply
Peter, thanks for trying to help. I'm going to be bold and try to press you for an actual opinion, rather than a compromise. How do you think the article should be ordered?Travelpleb (talk) 11:29, 4 January 2013 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 11 years ago2 comments2 people in discussion
I would like work on Wikivoyage, just as I work on Commons, Wikiversity, Wikibooks, and other Wikimedia projects. Because of an out-of-process "global lock" that was placed on my Thekohser account by Mike.lifeguard (who later quit, after it was discovered that he had no authority to apply such a lock on a user account that was posing no cross-wiki problems), Wikivoyage seems to be rejecting my single user log-in. The way that Commons, Wikiversity, and Wikibooks got around this was to have one of their bureaucrats "rename" Thekohser to another account name, then switch it back again to Thekohser. I am wondering if you, as a bureaucrat, would be kind enough to do me this favor on Wikivoyage? Any questions, simply e-mail me at thekohser (at) Gmail (dot) com. - Thekohser (temporary) (talk) 17:53, 11 January 2013 (UTC)Reply
It is not my decision to unblock you or not. As a bureaucrat, I am naught but a soulless functionary, empowered to execute the will of the Wikivoyage community, and nothing else.
Considering the global lock was placed at the behest of Jimbo Wales himself, your characterization of the placement strikes me as incomplete at best.
Considering you remain blocked on major wikis like English Wikipedia and English Wiktionary, I am disinclined to consider your request non-controversial.
If you truly want to contribute constructively -- and please note that we have considerably less patience for battlefield mentalities than most WMF wikis do -- then I suggest doing so with an alternative account name, one that doesn't carry the baggage of "Thekohser". Alternatively, you can make your case to the community, but I suggest being more forthright regarding the reasons for your global lock than you were here.
Then I think you need to carefully read the advice at HTML again.
How exactly is something like "–" or, even worse, "–" easier to edit and less likely to intimidate casual editors than other HTML like "<bold>revert</bold>" or "<strong>rv</strong>" ?!?
Will you restore my text or should I, please? -- Alice✉ 00:07, 15 January 2013 (UTC)
Even if your interpretation is correct, it's out of place on a page otherwise devoted to time and date formatting. There is absolutely no need to explicitly prohibit '–' on that page. LtPowers (talk) 00:25, 15 January 2013 (UTC)Reply
At the moment (and it's my fond hope this situation continues) that's the only article page (as opposed to article discussion page) that mentions pesky en dashes. How (where?) exactly are we going to give advice that we don't want these HTML entities popping up all over the place? If you really think that the policy at HTML is wrong then, personally I have no problem, but it does seem weird to have this recommendation to use a character that most users will never have heard of and will be unable to find on their keyboard/touch screen and then not tell them how to use it or the alternatives. -- Alice✉ 01:51, 15 January 2013 (UTC)
In that case, I'm afraid we're back to my original query.
Why delete
Use an en dash for time ranges in preference to a hyphen: 2–5PM, not 2-5PM; 09:00–13:00, not 09:00-13:00. (However, if you can not easily type an en dash, use a hyphen instead since we discourage the insertion of HTML entities like "–" or "–" for the same reasons we discourage the use of other raw HTML.)
but let
Use an en dash for time ranges in preference to a hyphen: 2–5PM, not 2-5PM; 09:00–13:00, not 09:00-13:00.
stand?
What about if I modify my text to:
Use an en dash for time ranges in preference to a hyphen: 2–5PM, not 2-5PM; 09:00–13:00, not 09:00-13:00. However, if you can not easily type an en dash, use a hyphen instead (since we discourage the insertion of the alternative HTML markup like "–" or "–").
Because not only do I disagree with the advice, I also think it's ridiculous to get into that level of minutia on an otherwise unrelated page. LtPowers (talk) 02:59, 15 January 2013 (UTC)Reply
It is sometimes really frustrating not being able to talk eyeball to eyeball. I'm sure if we could we'd sort this out in the blink of an eye.
Tell me what part of this I've got wrong or misunderstood:
1) Nowhere else in the entire corpus of non User talk pages and non discussion pages do we give any mention to the en dash.
3) You don't revert this new policy commandment (that you say above that you disagree with)
4) Since it's rarely my style (and there seem to be lots of others ostensibly opposed to this breathtakingly tedious new policy who are also watching) I do not revert this controversial new policy commandment, but instead try to modify the tedious effect of it on all those non-Mac users that don't know where to find an en dash from an em dash on their non-Mac keyboards (and also the chaotic effect of all those smarty-pants HTML aficionados who, instead, will think they have to clog up thousands of articles with exactly the HTML that it has been long-standing policy to deprecate and avoid), by making an edit that is almost exactly in line with what I earlier said on very same the policy article's discussion page: "There is also the trivial point that, if the en dash is enshrined in our MoS, we should still discourage the insertion of constructions like "–" and "–" for the same reasons we discourage the use of raw HTML (where alternatives exist).". If you (or anyone else) disagreed with that sentiment, then I must have missed it.
5) You revert me (twice) but leave the new command (inserted without consensus) intact "Use an en dash for time ranges in preference to a hyphen"
6) Since there is currently no other policy page that mandates this en dash, where exactly on Wikivoyage would it be appropriate to point out that, if one can't find it on one's keyboard, one should not use "–" and "–" ?
7) I assume you will be rattling over to change our Star article criteria very shortly? -- Alice✉ 04:00, 15 January 2013 (UTC)
I didn't revert Tony because we were already in a dispute and I chose to discuss it on the talk page instead, and because his change might be acceptable to the community. I can understand how that might seem inconsistent to you, and I apologize. LtPowers (talk) 12:54, 15 January 2013 (UTC)Reply
Thanks for the explanation.
If I'm wicked then, I suppose the lesson to draw from all this is that I should enter into the dispute first with you and then make (what I would regard as an otherwise uncontroversial) edit (cheeky grin)? Seriously, I'm still baffled as to why we should not advise editors on the only page (I notice you've not contradicted my factual statements above) that mentions these pesky en dashes that, if they can't type them in natively, they should not resort to HTML! Since I can't type en dashes natively, and the advice is policy if it is on that page, I have decided to consistently try and use the "–" HTML entity on the basis that is the least incomprehensible of the two alternatives to newbies, is easily spotted by humans and can then be removed by bots if our policy does change (as I hope it does) in future. -- Alice✉ 20:53, 15 January 2013 (UTC)
Remember, policy pages describe our current practice, not proscribe it. Please, continue using either Unicode — dashes — or simple hyphens if you don't like the look of — and –. And certainly don't edit a page just to change one to another. LtPowers (talk) 22:21, 15 January 2013 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 11 years ago2 comments1 person in discussion
Hi Lt Powers. I see what you mean - the computer I drew them on wasn't very bright so the white showed up. Now that I'm on a different screen, the roads are hard to see. I'll fix it up tonight. Cheers -Shaundd (talk) 15:05, 15 January 2013 (UTC)Reply
I uploaded new maps, although I'm not sure how long it will be before the thumbnails draw properly. Not sure if I'm doing something wrong or if this is normal for Commons when a new version of an existing image is uploaded. -Shaundd (talk) 06:46, 16 January 2013 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 11 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion
How would you recommend adding supermarkets/grocery stores to the listings? Should they go in Eat, Buy, or just be left out entirely?
It strikes me that travelers on a budget might prefer that option to constantly eating out, and for the next Buffalo district article that I'll be beginning work on, it's a relevant question.
Latest comment: 11 years ago5 comments2 people in discussion
Hi, noticed you enabled the disallow. The problem and why I hadn't enabled it before is that it should also warn the user beside disallowing the edit, so the user knows that is going on. For this purpose enwiki has a specific message, but it relies on a template and I still haven't figured out if I can import them or not. It would help us a lot as all of the edit filters messages on enwiki use it :) SnowolfHow can I help?02:56, 17 January 2013 (UTC)Reply
Also I was leaving a few disabled with the thought of leaving them up for monitoring and seeing if we get any false positive, but that one is indeed a sure enable :) SnowolfHow can I help?02:57, 17 January 2013 (UTC)Reply
A fair point. What happens if it's just Disallow, without Warn? I noticed that the Page Creation Spammer filter is set to just Disallow, so I thought it'd be okay. LtPowers (talk) 03:05, 17 January 2013 (UTC)Reply
Hmm I don't think the current warning is very informative either, but see w:MediaWiki:Abusefilter-warning-blanking. Like there's valid reasons a user might try to blank a page and we should try to educate him on what to do, while to add poop, not so much, it's run of the mill vandalism :) As for what it does without the warn, I am not really sure, edit filters are not where I work usually... I assume they get a less tidy message saying the edit is denied by filter #whatever or something. SnowolfHow can I help?03:15, 17 January 2013 (UTC)Reply
Catskills/HV boundary, and another possible solution
Latest comment: 11 years ago3 comments2 people in discussion
I did a little more poking around, and I see that those regions are based on the state's divisions, which frankly, we all admit, aren't the best but serve if you're insisting that every county belong to one region and one region alone.
I stated that the Catskill portions of Ulster and Greene counties are the western and southwestern portions (basically, west of Rondout Creek and the Blue Line in Ulster and the western portion of Greene County). The famous problem of the Catskills is that, apart from the one hard boundary (the Catskill Escarpment on the northeast, where the mountains rise to almost 4,000 feet from the valley floor without any foothills), there's no easy way to define the region's boundaries (aside from "when there are no longer two rocks for every dirt" in the soil :-)). I'd be comfortable including all of Sullivan, Delaware and Schoharie counties as well.
Actually, what we could perhaps more easily do is just rename the regions: Eastern Hudson Valley and Western Hudson Valley/Catskills. Something like that. I'm still figuring this out. Daniel Case (talk) 00:11, 21 January 2013 (UTC)Reply
The regions actually don't resemble the state's in any significant fashion; any semblance is more coincidence than anything else. I would prefer something more traveler-oriented than simply renaming the existing regions; if New Paltz and Kingston (New York) fit better in a Hudson Valley region with Poughkeepsie, then that's where they should be. I encourage you to weigh in at Talk:New York (state)#Regions again, again as I only know Western NY and Peter only knows Northern NY. If you know the Valley at all, you're one up on us. LtPowers (talk) 00:34, 21 January 2013 (UTC)Reply
I'm thinking that it would be better if we created "Capital District" with Albany, Schenectady, Rensselaer and (possibly) Saratoga and Washington counties (the latter is currently included in the Hudson Valley, which is absurd). That's actually the grouping we use at WikiProject Capital District.
And we should put Orange County in the Hudson Valley, not the Catskills ... save for oddities like the current boundaries of the 101st Assembly district (mine), no one sees any way by which Orange County is in the Catskills.
I think Ulster and Greene should stay where they are, but we can include more valley-relevant info related to them in that article as well.
Latest comment: 11 years ago7 comments3 people in discussion
Powers! Anon Ip with a dynamic IP of 212.219.207.39-42 is continiously vandalising Europe. I have never done a range block. How can i do it? Tried to write 212.219.207.39-42 but this seems not the correct way. jan (talk) 15:36, 23 January 2013 (UTC)Reply
For the record, the block you would want to cover those 4-5 ips is 212.219.207.32/28. In that case, it looks like reverts may have been more effective though. The risk with a short-term range block is that the vandal just comes back at the expiry. The risk with a long-term one is that it might snare non-vandals that are trying to edit from the same range by coincidence. As long as the vandalism isn't too crazy, reverts are usually better than a range block IMO. --PeterTalk01:36, 24 January 2013 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 11 years ago4 comments2 people in discussion
Thanks very much for the nomination. I would have originally declined, thinking it was too soon (I'm used to waiting 2 years or so!). But there appears to be quite a bit of support, and it would definitely come in handy. So I do accept. Thanks again! JamesA>talk00:34, 31 January 2013 (UTC)Reply
If you look up at the top of this page, you'll see I joined in May 2008 and was nominated for administrator by August, so you're behind the curve! ;) LtPowers (talk) 01:26, 31 January 2013 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 11 years ago2 comments2 people in discussion
Sorry about that - I had looked for a discussion on those icons but couldn't find one, so I decided to plunge forward with a few other articles and see if there were any complaints before continuing. It didn't occur to me to check the talk page of the template itself! PerryPlanet (talk) 19:50, 2 February 2013 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 11 years ago4 comments2 people in discussion
Hi, Lt. It can be but and maybe usually is, but it doesn't have to be. See [16]. And I'd prefer it not to be capitalized, but I guess we may have to debate that, like everything else. :-)
Latest comment: 11 years ago2 comments2 people in discussion
Hi there Lieutenant with Powers. I very so shocked when you swiftly and unconstructively ridded Wikioyage of my helpful links from the Pakistan article to two Wikipedia pages explaining obscure terms that many readers are unlikely to know.
I've read a few pages / discussions on the topic and most of them seems to be from before Wikivoyag joined Wikimedia.
I wonder if you would like to discuss what seems like a bad arbitrary rule to a couple of us in the #wikivoyage channel on IRC at irc.freenode.net where I must admit I've been ranting about this. — Hippietrail (talk) 01:46, 25 February 2013 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 11 years ago8 comments2 people in discussion
My edit summary to this edit was unusually explanatory: "enlarged image in lead paragraph to display at a factor of 1.5 times users default set in preferences or default set by IP user's screen resolution, change ToC positioning to avoid squeezed worm" and should have given you a clue that you need to educate yourself before jumping in. Please take the time to read all of the relevant Wikipedia article that is referenced here (the reference was helpfully removed from our own image articles by User:Peterfitzgerald). See the English Wikipedia documentation for details of why this parameter is not just for portrait style images. -- Alice✉ 06:50, 25 February 2013 (UTC)
I don't thinks it's ever inappropriate to put the needs of the traveller first. Except for ignorance, why ever would you want to flout the technical means provided by the wikimedia software developers, our WMF hosts and our users themselves (when they either change or accept a default thumbnail width in their preferences). Thanks for listening. -- Alice✉ 20:48, 25 February 2013 (UTC)
I know this is going to sound like a smart-Alec riposte, but are you conceding that it is only a blind and ignorant tradition that means many editors still specify a thumbnail image width? Or are there actually good, rational reasons not to allow the reader their own choice of thumbnail image display size when they are logged on (or an image display size appropriate to the resolution of their devices when they're not)? -- Alice✉ 01:58, 26 February 2013 (UTC)
Sure, we're always conscious of how our pages will look in print, and it's very hard to make sure maps are readable when printed without specifying a particular width. And once you've selected a width for the map, it's nice to be able to set the size of the photographs to harmonize appropriately. I hope that's good and rational enough for you. LtPowers (talk) 02:00, 26 February 2013 (UTC)Reply
In the past that was an excellent reason. I'll have to do some more research on how the current Books option works before I can reply. I hope that will be within a couple of months. -- Alice✉ 02:05, 26 February 2013 (UTC)
Fair enough. I'm not set against a change to prefer relative sizes, but there is a method to our madness, and it should be considered carefully. LtPowers (talk) 02:07, 26 February 2013 (UTC)Reply
is that I prefer the image_widths_not_fixed version - if only because that uses less of those expensive colour inks. However, I do now think that we need to think very seriously about introducing another "print only" parameter so that editors can specify appropriate image print widths that will not flout the preferences of those reading on-line.
Far more important than all of this, in my view though, is the fact that the Mobile view option right at the bottom of the page seems to be completely buggered! -- Alice✉ 02:41, 26 February 2013 (UTC)
This: Screenshot taken 2013-02-27 08:14:26hrs of Mobile version of Wikivoyage article La Macarena showing that ONLY the lead image, paragraph and section headers are displaying! Do you get to see the rest of the article? --Singapore.Alice (talk) 19:17, 26 February 2013 (UTC) That's not a sock of mine contributing. (I created a new account on Wikimedia Commons in order to upload some images; unfortunately my usual user name was unavailable and, as the next best alternative, I chose instead to create an account with the same name I had on Wikitravel. It seems like it automatically created this parallel account here!) -- Alice✉ 19:23, 26 February 2013 (UTC)Reply
You have to click the section headers to view each one, as indicated by the expansion-arrows on the right. This reduces the bandwidth needed to initially load a page. LtPowers (talk) 19:53, 26 February 2013 (UTC)Reply
It would be a more intuitive UI if the arrows were changed to a plus sign in a box and moved immediately adjacent to the section heading. I'm not the only silly airhead that may miss this!
The whole page actually does load immediately (so no roaming charges are reduced); it's just that it doesn't display without active user intervention - that means that folks pay the data charges but may never get to see what they have paid for... -- Alice✉ 20:05, 26 February 2013 (UTC)
Well I'm not sure there's much we can do about either of those; they're built in to the MediaWiki mobile site generator. I think the intuitiveness is a little more obvious on a mobile device, however, where the arrows will appear much closer to the headings than they do on a desktop. LtPowers (talk) 20:09, 26 February 2013 (UTC)Reply
Yes, that's right. Thanks for listening and sorry for the (mostly) false alarm with Mobile display. I'll keep thinking about the trade off between the on-line and print versions - I'm pretty sure there's a technical solution to this! -- Alice✉ 20:13, 26 February 2013 (UTC)
Latest comment: 11 years ago2 comments2 people in discussion
Hi. First of all, where is the policy discussion on this? Secondly, why not? The point of the rule of 9 is psychological: that people have trouble absorbing more than 9 items at a time. Otherwise, there's nothing whatsoever sacrosanct about it. So if there's room for a few cities or towns in "Other destinations," why not? Or, alternatively, if that's not OK, how about 9 cities and 9 towns or villages, then 9 "Other destinations," where that's considered a better solution for the reader/traveler? Ikan Kekek (talk) 06:23, 22 April 2013 (UTC)Reply
I don't know what to tell you, Ikan, except that we've always done it that way. Discussion of it has been scattered throughout the site, but I thought everyone was on the same page on this. Maybe you should bring it up on the Pub if you think it should change. LtPowers (talk) 15:18, 22 April 2013 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 11 years ago4 comments2 people in discussion
Hi LtPowers,
I noticed that you deleted my recent attempt at a revision at Pacific Northwest and I'm hoping you can elaborate? The current list is a joke? Is it maybe an April Fools thing? Right now Opal Creek is listed as a top level destination?!? Have you ever been to Opal Creek? I was specifically looking at California when I started to develop this section better which has a similar division of Other Destination, is there a reason why you would delete this in the PNW on not in California? The PNW is all about outdoor activities and National and State Parks and the current layout is embarrassing to put it mildly. Maybe we could discuss this further on the discussion page in interest of transparency? Lumpytrout (talk) 18:11, 25 April 2013 (UTC)Reply
Well, I only noticed it on the PNW article because it was just done. I don't know about California. We don't usually allow more than nine other destinations, because the lists are not supposed to be exhaustive. LtPowers (talk) 18:57, 25 April 2013 (UTC)Reply
It was not a deletion but a reversion back to the last version that followed our guidelines. We're pretty strict with those lists because people like to add to them until they bloat up into uselessness; we tend to just revert and invite changes to be discussed on the talk page. LtPowers (talk) 20:27, 25 April 2013 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 11 years ago3 comments2 people in discussion
I like the idea of using shades of red/pink, I'll try for that. I didn't realize there was an overall color scheme going on here, I just tried to pick colors from the NY map, but slightly altered so the roads could still stand out. As for the text sizes, that was just the map going wonky on me. Let me see about fixing those two things... PerryPlanet (talk) 20:05, 30 April 2013 (UTC)Reply
The map looks OK, though I'd find a slightly darker shade easier on the eyes. But the color-coding for regions in the list is too similar, in my opinion. I can easily make out the different shades, but I think some people with weaker eyesight might have trouble. Ikan Kekek (talk) 02:40, 1 May 2013 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 11 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion
So, I guess I've been over using the Other Destinations section and you have been moving some of my entries into other sections. I get that now and will try to limit to 7-9 entries, but I was wondering if you could give me some examples of regions that you think are divided up well? I'm having a bit of a hard time filling the void. Lumpytrout (talk) 13:07, 2 May 2013 (UTC)Reply
Thanks; I noticed Sven's changes later. It would have been nice to have some sort of notification so we don't just see unexplained changes happening in our watchlists. =) LtPowers (talk) 02:03, 13 May 2013 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 11 years ago3 comments2 people in discussion
Hi. I saw this entry: "moved page Chautauqua County (New York) to Chautauqua County (Pointless disambiguation)". It's certainly arguable that the disambiguation is not needed right now (though I'd disagree - see below), but it isn't pointless. There's a Chautauqua County in Southeast Kansas, too. I think it's probably best to keep a disambig and point the one in Kansas to Southeastern Kansas. Ikan Kekek (talk) 20:29, 14 May 2013 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 11 years ago3 comments3 people in discussion
I made the edit, because "Iceland is a a mountainous island nation in the north Atlantic Ocean" sounds really weird to me. Iceland can be a nation, but I don't think it is a mountainous nation, since most of the population lives in coastal cities and towns. If you think the sentence is ok like that, I give up, not being a native speaker ;-) Danapit (talk) 13:00, 15 May 2013 (UTC)Reply
While "nation" (referring to the people) and "country" (referring to the geographic area) technically have different meanings, in practice, English speakers tend to use them interchangeably. If you think it would parse better as "mountainous island country", I wouldn't object. =) Thanks for your attention to detail! LtPowers (talk) 13:11, 15 May 2013 (UTC)Reply
(edit conflict) If we want to get really technical, a nation refers to a culturally linguistically homogeneous people with a shared history. So if Iceland is a nation, all or most of its citizens would be of the same ethnicity. Either way, I think the "island nation" wording as it stands is fine and makes complete sense. Edit: beat me to it, LtPowers! JamesA>talk13:13, 15 May 2013 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 11 years ago3 comments2 people in discussion
Hi! It feels like I've been disagreeing a lot with you lately and I'm sorry if it's come across like that. It's been a bit of a stressful week here, and its very easy to transfer one's passions over to Wikivoyage and to misidentify lithographs... :D Either way, I'm sorry for digging my heels in occasionally; you do a great job on here and it's much appreciated. :) --Nick (talk) 14:15, 16 May 2013 (UTC)Reply
I'm not clear on what you want here. The latter filename already exists, with several uploads in the file history, while the former file predates the last two revisions of the latter. If you want to replace "Mapping L.A. neighborhood boundaries" with the file at "LA City raw", then just upload it over top and tag the other one with a speedy template. LtPowers (talk) 13:30, 17 May 2013 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 11 years ago4 comments3 people in discussion
LtPowers, you do a great job here! I think it's perfectly OK for us to strongly disagree on some things; wouldn't it be terribly boring if everyone always agreed on everything? And none of the stuff we talk about here is that important, in the scheme of things. I spend a lot of time here when I probably should be doing something else, because it's fun. I'm sorry if I have been making things less than fun for you, and especially if you've felt insulted by anything I posted.
All my best to you, and congratulations on those banners you've been posting!
I've also ended up taking opposing positions from you in a number of discussions lately, and as Ikan noted if any disagreement seems personal that is not my intention. In the interest of full disclosure, however, I have been frustrated at times when it seems that you (or anyone else for that matter) are simply saying "no" rather than trying to find ways to address the concerns raised - to me that often feels like the concerns of those with opposing viewpoints are not being considered, or are being minimized as unimportant. I'm sure I do the same thing much, much more often than I realize, but it's tough to tell how others perceive me through the muddled medium of internet discussion - any suggestions for self-improvement would be appreciated. Last of all, hopefully you understand that this comment is by no means meant to diminish my admiration for the great editorial work you do around here, and for the useful opinions you bring to discussions - it's hugely helpful to have a diversity of feedback expressed in discussions. -- Ryan • (talk) • 00:47, 24 May 2013 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 11 years ago3 comments2 people in discussion
LtPowers, you make really pretty banners! You uploaded the satellite pic of the Finger Lakes in the Commons, so I was wondering if you could tell me, where you find them? Danapit (talk) 18:48, 24 May 2013 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 11 years ago4 comments2 people in discussion
Hi, LtPowers. That was a policy I didn't know about, but I think I should know more about it. Do you have any idea where I could see a clarification? I'm guessing it would also apply to Westchester County?
It's an inevitable result of the requirement stated at Wikivoyage:Geographical hierarchy#Linking articles: "Every city or other destination article should be listed in at least one region article, as it should be possible to navigate through the hierarchy to each and every destination article on the site. Cities, Other divisions, and Other destinations should be mentioned under those section headings in at least the surrounding Region article. This should normally be the same article mentioned in the IsIn or IsPartOf template." Wikivoyage:Geographical hierarchy#Dividing geographical units is explicit about this: "This doesn't need to be applied stringently to the lowest level of the hierarchy; if a region has more than nine cities in it, and there's no helpful way to divide it into subregions then don't split it." LtPowers (talk) 15:22, 28 May 2013 (UTC)Reply
I could definitely see "Northern Westchester" and "Southern Westchester" articles. More than that would be a bit complicated (and even that would require decisions about marginal towns), but there could be a further division of Long Island Sound towns, if need be.
Latest comment: 11 years ago15 comments3 people in discussion
Hi there!
I understand you're not the greatest fan of the current logo, so I wondered if you'd mind taking a look at this idea that I've been working on. I've also created a mock-up of our portal with the proposed logo, which you can see here. Would you let me know what you think and whether it's worth going any further with it?
It's very good, and definitely worth developing further. Most of the other WMF content projects use blue logos, so it fits in well that way, though this is a bit brighter and sunnier than the others. It does look a bit like a logo I'd expect to see on a commercial airplane tailfin, but that might not be a bad thing. The font is a big improvement over Lenka, but it strikes me as a bit weak yet. Maybe tightening up the kerning would help; it doesn't appear to have been adjusted from whatever defaults the font has built-in. LtPowers (talk) 20:49, 30 May 2013 (UTC)Reply
Thanks very much! I'll have a play with the wordmark and see if I can tighten it up a bit and maybe tweak the logo itself a little more. I'll let you know what happens! Do you think now is a good time to do this? --Nicktalk20:58, 30 May 2013 (UTC)Reply
As good a time as any, I suppose. I'd been thinking about reopening discussion on Meta, now that we're settled in and there's no rush to get a logo in time for launch. LtPowers (talk) 21:21, 30 May 2013 (UTC)Reply
I would dearly love to have that luxury, but I've (literally in the last ten minutes) just been made aware of an issue that may impose a deadline regardless of what we'd like to do. I'm not sure how much I'm at liberty to say, but for now I strongly suggest Nick get to work refining his idea. ASAP. LtPowers (talk) 21:28, 30 May 2013 (UTC)Reply
(Edit conflict) Thanks very much Peter! I was just about to put a message on your page as well! Is it worth mentioning this in the pub? --Nicktalk21:34, 30 May 2013 (UTC)Reply
Right - I will do! Shall we introduce this to the Pub then? If we've not gone long we probably need to get the ball rolling; I'll keep refining it. --Nicktalk21:34, 30 May 2013 (UTC)Reply
This change will affect all language versions of Wikivoyage, so the discussion should be held on Meta. WMF is going to be starting that shortly, so no need to start a discussion yourself just yet. LtPowers (talk) 22:19, 30 May 2013 (UTC)Reply
I've tightened the kerning quite considerably now and changed it across all versions. I think it looks much better as a result. --Nicktalk21:57, 30 May 2013 (UTC)Reply
I think both the font and icon are looking pretty great, and a big improvement. I might suggest color in the text, but yes, let's take this to the pub. --PeterTalk22:19, 30 May 2013 (UTC)Reply
Hi! Do you think I should withdraw/call to a halt to the topics that were created yesterday? At present all they're doing is generating a list of people saying 'We've got a logo'. Do we have any idea of when the contest might be set up? --Nicktalk13:17, 31 May 2013 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 11 years ago2 comments2 people in discussion
First off, THANK YOU for adding the map to the Clarence article. Not only do I think this brings it a long way closer to true Star status, it's something that I'm sorry to say I've been putting off learning how to do with the Buffalo articles.
Secondly, I wanted to let you know that your work on Rochester inspired me to make the trip down the Thruway a few days back to try a garbage plate at Nick Tahou's. I've often used the Rochester article as a template for how I should treat various issues in my own work on Wikivoyage (which, of course, is not to say that I've always followed it religiously), and in so doing I've absorbed a lot of information through osmosis that's piqued my interest. I hope to give Rochester a proper thorough examination soon; even in my brief stop there I saw a handful of things that I'll want to come back to.
Good to hear! The Clarence map was unusually difficult, due to the high concentration of icons along Main and Transit. I continue to think there's got to be a better way to organize Erie County that avoids putting these large tracts of farmland in the same article with dense suburban strips; at the very least, it would help ease mapmaking! =) LtPowers (talk) 02:10, 8 June 2013 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 11 years ago2 comments2 people in discussion
The Wikivoyage Barncompass
Thank you for all the time and effort that you put into this project and so many of its articles! Your work on Walt Disney World and its subsidiaries is always incredibly thorough (having been, I realise how a baffling a place it is!) and it's obvious that you really do care about this site. You also manage to put up with new bods like me, who come in with big ideas and small brains; your advice has been really valuable! :)
PS Sorry if my response to the matter on Peter's talk page seemed like first class toadying - I just wanted it to be clear that Tony's claims about both of you were spurious and infantile. --Nicktalk23:52, 22 June 2013 (UTC)Reply
You are far too modest. New blood such as yourself is both long overdue and ridiculously useful. I appreciate your defense. LtPowers (talk) 00:10, 23 June 2013 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 11 years ago2 comments1 person in discussion
You are right on saying that the underscore removal do not affect anything. I just remove them when I see it because the "wiki-correct" way to link a page is without the underscore (blank space is the correct version). In it:voy I've added a rule to my bot that is applied when I have major changes to do on a certain page. Regarding the right article, I just haven't checked it in advance taking (erroneusly) for granted that the one in the page was the right one. --Andyrom75 (talk) 06:20, 23 June 2013 (UTC)Reply
Don't worry, I always respond to anyone :-) However I agree with you, I don't recall why I did just that changes... maybe after saving the Italian updated versione I've pressed save instead of exit... the important thing is that I haven't made any damage :-) --Andyrom75 (talk) 06:00, 24 June 2013 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 11 years ago6 comments4 people in discussion
Hi Powers. I noticed you had quite a bit of input in that discussion in regard to changing our external link format. A few weeks have passed, and everyone who has commented there is in support. I just wanted to confirm you do not hold any more reservations and are happy to see the new format implemented. All the best, James A ▪ talk14:02, 25 June 2013 (UTC)Reply
Happy? No. I prefer the footnote-style links, as they work best in print. I haven't commented because I've recognized that consensus is against me. LtPowers (talk) 01:56, 26 June 2013 (UTC)Reply
Are you sure that they do? Torty made this helpful image showing the differences in how the formats look in print, and I think the frontlinked usage looks better in the pdf/books version (as it makes the footnote actually look like a footnote), and especially better in the printable web version, which is what we used in WTP. --PeterTalk04:15, 26 June 2013 (UTC)Reply
I believe there has been a change in the software in how external links are shown when printed. Previously, I believe that they would work oddly when frontlinked, but with newer software, everything seems to work fine. James A ▪ talk13:55, 26 June 2013 (UTC)Reply
Fair enough, I hadn't realized that. But the formatting still rubs me the wrong way. I'm worried it's not obvious enough that it's a link, and the "becomes obvious it's a link only when hovered over" is usually considered bad web design. LtPowers (talk) 14:21, 26 June 2013 (UTC)Reply
That's a very legitimate concern. It's best if the default CSS sticks to the standard blue colour for a link - whether external or internal.
Latest comment: 11 years ago2 comments2 people in discussion
Oh, my goodness.
I'm in Pittsburgh visiting my girlfriend, and I only have access to Wikivoyage through my iPhone. I have Niagara Falls (New York) on my watchlist and saw that PerryPlanet (I think that's who it was?) had removed the disambiguator from the pagebanner and you had to restore it. The text on (the desktop version of) Wikivoyage shows up very small on my phone, which is old, slow and clunky to begin with. I must have undone your comment without realizing it. I've made mistakes like that before when editing WV on my phone, so I guess it was only a matter of time. I'll try to stick to using my laptop in future.
Latest comment: 11 years ago3 comments2 people in discussion
Hi LtPowers, as and admin, can you please check this? User:Asdefyn has been uploading lots of banners recently of a very varying quality. I got a little suspicious, and now I have found one of the pictures had a watermark, and looks he just google-finds the images and uses as own work. Danapit (talk) 15:34, 15 July 2013 (UTC)Reply
Our usual practice is to block them for a short period of time to get their attention. I have left one last message; we will see if the user responds. LtPowers (talk) 15:38, 15 July 2013 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 11 years ago4 comments2 people in discussion
More than 4 days ago I asked you: "Do you have a preference for spaced or unspaced?"
I know that you have a strong preference to prefix any currency code, and it would be really helpful if you could find the time to express your opinion about spacing on that page too, Sir.
I've also now had a chance to read both the English and French versions (each equally authoritative) of British Standard ISO 4217:2008 (as amended, and the current version at £196 a pop) and, as I previously suspected, it is completely and totally silent on the topics of either prefixing or suffixing or spacing. That means we're on our own with regard to our proposed house style. --W. Franke-mailtalk22:19, 18 July 2013 (UTC)Reply
FWIW, I also don't think the content should be merged to New York. It's overkill/unnecessary to describe a region at length that we don't use in our regions division. --PeterTalk17:47, 20 July 2013 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 11 years ago3 comments2 people in discussion
Hi Powers. What's the deal with these new banners? If I want to take an image and use it as a banner how do I go about it? I tried "{{pagebanner|Pyin U Lwin Myanmar.jpg}}" but that got messed up and was wondering if you know anything about how to go about making these work. --RegentsPark (talk) 01:32, 22 July 2013 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 11 years ago10 comments3 people in discussion
Hi! I just wanted to say thanks for all your support for my logo proposal - I really appreciated it! It's a shame that it didn't make it through, but hopefully we'll still get something that we can be proud of. --Nicktalk21:04, 11 August 2013 (UTC)Reply
I know... my 'proud of' comment was more wishful thinking if I'm honest. I think unfortunately we may end up with 'the best of a bad job' on this occasion, though what that'll be I don't know. I certainly don't want to come across as 'sour grapes', but I am quite disappointed with the selection that has been chosen: excluding my own there were other, better examples that have been dropped. --Nicktalk21:15, 11 August 2013 (UTC)Reply
Yes. There still seems to have been a strong preference, particularly on the part of some of our non-English Wikivoyagers, for a red-green-blue logo with globe. I am puzzled by that as well as by the low support for yours. LtPowers (talk) 21:18, 11 August 2013 (UTC)Reply
You're right - the predilection for a globe in WMF colours baffles me somewhat. Personally, I think the WMF colours are quite unpleasant and a globe seems quite unimaginative, but unfortunately some people obviously like them. I'm just glad that the globe was knocked out at the legal stage, but it's worrying that it was only dropped at that point. --Nicktalk21:23, 11 August 2013 (UTC)Reply
The three we're left with are at least different, so that's good. As long as the legal issue with the tricorn logo can be worked out, its colors can be adjusted in the next round. LtPowers (talk) 21:24, 11 August 2013 (UTC)Reply
I was glad to see that you weighed in in the pub and provided a voice of reason in the discussion over the new logo. Whilst I wouldn't have chosen the new one myself and I, like you, remain baffled by the apparent love for the WMF colours that seems to exist, we need to make sure that it doesn't distract us from the business of making a travel guide. If we end up choosing another in 6 months time, so be it, but we can't spend the intervening period going to war over it. I was going to post in the pub myself, but I'm sure I wouldn't have phrased my thoughts as eloquently as you did. Thanks for stopping a potentially internecine discussion! :) --Nicktalk18:05, 1 September 2013 (UTC)Reply
I hope you'll note that I have honoured your polite and sensible request to end the sad logo discussion in the Pub. However, many of us don't use "Meta-Wiki" much or at all. Please would you add, in the Pub (hopefully that will be the last word on the the subject), the relevant URL to this topic at "Meta-Wiki". (You just wrote in the Pub: "... brought the issue up on Meta-Wiki; let's keep the discussion all in one place. And that's not here.") --W. Franke-mailtalk00:48, 2 September 2013 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 11 years ago4 comments2 people in discussion
It has long been our policy that (except in the special cases of correcting minor formatting such as indentation, missing signatures, legal threats/jeopardy, extreme obscenity, "outing" personal details, etc) we don't "correct" or otherwise edit contributions other than our own on discussion pages, never mind remove them (except in the limited case of our own user talk page - where it's still frowned on by many).
Thanks for the prompt response, but I don't think that's apposite in the case of edits to the Pub (which is technically in WV namespace but in reality acts as a sort of glorified common user talk page).
The implication at Wikivoyage:How to handle unwanted edits is that it is referring to edits in article and template namespace rather than contributions in the Pub or on specific user talk pages. This is evidenced by some of the wording at the beginning: "... unwanted contributions clutter the guides, making it harder for travellers to find the information they're looking for. In addition, they make it harder for contributors to find where to share their knowledge, or may give them the wrong idea about our project and what kind of knowledge we want."
I don't usually invoke the slippery slope argument but, mindful of what happened at Wikitravel when the IBadmins got heavy handed and then everybody left, I'm not convinced that the (probably IB) IP was so disruptive his words needed to be censored. Has s/he been blocked? --W. Franke-mailtalk15:46, 2 September 2013 (UTC)Reply
Blocked? No, you should know by now that soft security is our first course of action. We have no responsibility to allow others to troll us with vague accusations of impropriety; the best course of action is to simply remove and ignore, a task being made harder by your questioning of it. You will note, I hope, that the removal had precisely the intended effect. If you have further concerns about the way this was handled, please ask for a second opinion from another admin, though I would be wary of encouraging our interlocutor further. LtPowers (talk) 01:15, 3 September 2013 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 11 years ago2 comments2 people in discussion
A question regarding [18] (+1-888-857-7223 vs. +1 888-85-SPACE): I'm proceeding using the same assumptions (SMS/800 numbers require all eleven digits 1+10D as they have no local area, we list telephones as all-numbers instead of as phonewords, the {{listing}} fields (phone, fax, tollfree) contain just one number each to permit conversion to tel: links, clickable on mobile devices) currently reflected at Wikivoyage:Phone numbers and Wikivoyage:Phone numbers#USA. If I'm wrong about +1-888-85-SPACE that poses the risk that a few edits I've made to Wikivoyage:Phone numbers (a policy page) are also wrong. Could you please check that I haven't placed wrong info into Wikivoyage:Phone numbers, either in the intro or the individual NANP (+1..., North America) members? K7L (talk) 16:32, 22 October 2013 (UTC)Reply
Er, sorry; I didn't notice the hyphen removal. I usually put a hyphen between the +1 and the 888 (or 800 or whatever) because I believe it is required. LtPowers (talk) 17:09, 22 October 2013 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 11 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion
By way of explanation: I had thought that changing the pgname= parameter from "Syracuse" back to the default "Syracuse (New York)" might get Wikidata to recognize Syracuse, New York as not being synonymous with Syracuse, Italy. (I must confess only vague familiarity with how Wikidata works.) After I realized that didn't fix the problem, I brought the issue up on the pub, but I must have forgotten to revert my edit. Sorry about that. -- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 21:49, 30 October 2013 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 10 years ago3 comments2 people in discussion
Hi, I noticed a comment you made on my changes in United Kingdom which stated "ignoring the religious division borders on re-writing history". I am happy with the subsequent rewrite by you and others, however suggesting another editor is 're-writing history' is a rather strong statement (which I disagree with), and also one that could easily offend.
I would also contend that anyway the entire history of the Irish independence struggle cannot be adequately expressed in a paragraph. Andrewssi2 (talk) 01:22, 6 December 2013 (UTC)Reply
Of course not, but we can do better than simply ignoring the fact that much of the struggle has been centered around religious differences. I did say that it "borders on" re-writing history, not that it is re-writing history, and I stand by that statement; leaving out the Protestant-Catholic division goes well beyond the mere omission of a detail. I did not meant to imply an intentional deception on your part, though, so if that's what it sounded like, I apologize. LtPowers (talk) 02:31, 6 December 2013 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 10 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion
Hello, Emily, and welcome to Wikivoyage. I looked at the edit you linked, and it looks all right to me. Do you have any specific concerns?
No, I do not have any specific concerns. I was just checking with you on whether the edit should be approved or not, and the editor already explained. Thank you, too, for the welcome. Emily951 (talk) 02:24, 8 December 2013 (UTC)Reply
This has been done, but as a result your contributions here have been disconnected from your global King jakob c 2 account. You will need to re-unify once all of your accounts have been migrated. I wouldn't suggest renaming yourself again, so I hope you're happy with Jakec. =) Powers(talk)03:09, 17 January 2014 (UTC)Reply
Yeah, I'll go and merge my account once I'm renamed on all the wikis where I have significant edits. And my new name is better than "King jakob c 2". Thanks. Jakec (talk) 12:55, 17 January 2014 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 10 years ago5 comments2 people in discussion
I have created a listing for the Battle of Richmond within the Richmond(Kentucky) page and would like to link it specifically to the larger and historically connected Battle of Perryville which is listed as a Kentucky state park within the state page. Would you mind looking at my Battle of Richmond entry and give me pointers how to do this? I have looked around and seem to be digging a dry well. Schwaltz (talk) 02:46, 24 January 2014 (UTC)Reply
We do have Template:Anchor, which you can use to name a particular point in a page to which you'd like to link. However, we don't usually use it; normally we just link to the section in which that listing is contained -- in this case, Kentucky#State Parks. However, that whole section on the Kentucky page is rather non-standard; we'd prefer those listings to be in city-level articles. In that case, you'd simply link Perryville (Kentucky) without really needing to link to a specific listing. Powers(talk)13:23, 24 January 2014 (UTC)Reply
Thanks for the info. I ultimately decided it would be easier to provide a link to the nearest city of any size (Danville). Can you provide some guidance on how state parks should be handled? I do think they should referenced to on the state page in some way since they are state run entities. Having read more on what should be considered an article, I realize that some of the state park pages I created earlier do need to be redirected to the nearest city. Schwaltz (talk) 14:29, 26 January 2014 (UTC)Reply
Yeah, if they're a small park that people visit as part of a trip to another community, then they're considered an attraction and don't need their own articles. But if they have significant camping or lodging facilities, meaning they're a potentially multi-day destination, and they're not within any other community of note, they might merit their own articles. It's a judgment call, but you can always feel free to ask (such as at the pub) and we'll help you out. Significant state parks should definitely be listed on the state page in either See or Do' depending on whether they're more scenic or more activity-oriented. State parks with their own articles may also be listed under Other destinations, but we only allow nine items in that section. Powers(talk)18:58, 26 January 2014 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 10 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion
Thanks for your poke to merge my WikiTravel account! I didn't want to bother the WV admins with a merge request, but if it's no trouble... =) RickScott (talk) 03:24, 31 January 2014 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 10 years ago5 comments2 people in discussion
Regarding this edit, I believe the listing you reverted does pass muster per our tour policy. I took a look at the website and it seems to be a value-added activity - there's two tours, one which offers access to portions of the Pearl Street Brewery that are otherwise off-limits to the public, and one that appears to take visitors to parts of the Hotel Lafayette normally accessible only to hotel guests. The blurb should probably be expanded to be more specific about what's offered, but in general, I don't agree that it should be reverted. -- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 01:48, 6 February 2014 (UTC)Reply
It still seems borderline to me. The hotel in particular; the traveler can fulfill the substance of the tour on her own, so long as she stays at the hotel. And those are each just one stop among many on the tour. I'll defer to your judgement, but if it stays, it should make very clear what the value-added activity is. Powers(talk)18:01, 6 February 2014 (UTC)Reply
Thank you for letting me know, but I'm afraid the listings for this company still don't explain what makes them value-added. Nowhere is it mentioned that the tour has access not available to the general public. Powers(talk)21:30, 9 February 2014 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 10 years ago17 comments3 people in discussion
I don't much appreciate being reverted on this issue when my edit is something that has always been encouraged in the past. What you appear to be are saying is screw tradition, screw the fact that we reached 99.9% success in intentionally right-aligning all of our articles, I say it "looks better" therefore I get my way. You are intentionally subverting something we have intentionally done over the years; allowing an exception anytime someone subjectively says it 'looks better' is tantamount to throwing out all the work that has been done over all these years to keep images off the left border. I will continue to insist that your approach is disrespectfully contrary to this wiki's accepted means of bringing about change. Texugo (talk) 16:16, 11 February 2014 (UTC)Reply
I'm sorry. That really came off ruder than I intended. It just riles me up to see such a strongly established status quo be completed disregarded and thrashed by a simple "it looks better". I didn't want to edit war with you, but I would appreciate if you would at the very least use the talk page to explain why you think this case is special enough that such a rare exception is warranted.Texugo (talk) 16:40, 11 February 2014 (UTC)Reply
In an article where an established editor has made a conscious decision to left-align one or two images, it's downright rude to move them just because "that's the way we've always done it", particularly without discussion. I still think this particular right-always paradigm is unique to a few contributors; I do not believe there was ever a consensus to go beyond recommending right-alignment to requiring it. Powers(talk)19:14, 11 February 2014 (UTC)Reply
We most certainly didn't get over 99.9% by accident or the actions of a mere few. You don't get to disregard this overwhelming status quo just because you happen to disagree with it. To require the person who is merely enforcing the status quo to dig through the history of an article and make a judgment about who did it and whether they are an "established editor" is 100%, totally, exactly backwards. The onus falls on the person who wants to make an exception, not the person on the status quo side. Texugo (talk) 19:32, 11 February 2014 (UTC)Reply
I cannot accept your continued assertion that the "status quo" involves no exceptions, ever, especially not when you are so militant about never letting anyone change that status quo. How is standard practice supposed to evolve if you come in and change left-alignment to right-alignment without fail? Powers(talk)23:45, 11 February 2014 (UTC)Reply
It seems like what I am hearing reduces down to this logical fallacy: "change must be allowed, therefore my desired change should be allowed". If 99.9% consistency across our articles is not enough for you to accept that a consensus for change is needed before we start just allowing this change anytime someone says "it looks better that way", what in the world would convince you? And what is the difference between
a) your assertion that you don't need a consensus to start ignoring the unwritten but well established practice of not left-aligning; and
b) W. Frank et al's assertion that he doesn't need a consensus to start ignoring the unwritten but well established practice of not using relative sizing?
I see no difference in the slightest. And it's not bias on my part: I actually approve of W. Frank's proposal but I disapprove of that strategy of by-passing the need for change-by-consensus in his case every bit as strongly as I disapprove of it in yours. Texugo (talk) 00:14, 12 February 2014 (UTC)Reply
I'm not sure how many ways I can clearly state that I do not recognize the existence of a long-standing consensus to exclusively right-align images. Preferentially, yes, but not exclusively. Powers(talk)13:06, 12 February 2014 (UTC)Reply
Just as W. Frank could have said in his own defense, but refusing to "recognize" it doesn't change the fact that in practice and substance, the evidence is overwhelmingly against you. And even if we call it a preference, how could a "preference" possibly have any meaning if no one is allowed to enforce it? Anytime an exception to the stated preference crops up, one of the following must be true: either a) the person left-aligning has the burden of explaining why an exception is warranted, or b) the person right-aligning has the burden of explaining each time why he is just following our stated preference. By the very meaning of the word "preference", only the first of those options makes any sense at all. And even if you can accept a), it doesn't mean that a personal preference like "it looks better" should be enough to make an exception. If personal preference were all it took to trump a collective preference, it would just mean everyone could do it as they liked, which, again, would nullify the point of having a stated collective preference in the first place. Texugo (talk) 13:15, 12 February 2014 (UTC)Reply
That's a ridiculously black-and-white way to view the situation. There's no reason we can't ask editors to keep alternative alignments to a minimum while simultaneously giving them the benefit of the doubt if they selectively use left-alignment. Obviously we'd reject an attempt to left-align a majority of images in an article, or something like that, but in a case such as Catskills, where the left-aligned images were in a section of the article with several images in a row, and the left-alignment did not interfere with either section headings or bulleted lists (the two main objections to the practice), insisting upon rigid conformity is churlish and inexplicable.
Furthermore, how exactly is an editor supposed to "explain why an exception is warranted" prior to being challenged on it? And how would an editor know that he or she had to do that? Powers(talk)13:08, 13 February 2014 (UTC)Reply
Very tired of arguing about this. These facts are really inarguable though:
We intentionally and collaboratively reached an extraordinarily high degree of consistency in not left-aligning
Your assertion, contrary to advice in the past, seeks to reverse that trend by no longer allowing certain kinds of left-alignment to be corrected
It's a net change that affects the whole site, and how are we supposed to bring about that kind of change? Hint: It's not dismissing the practice just because it wasn't enshrined on a policy page, as you eloquently pointed out to 118 today. Texugo (talk) 21:14, 13 February 2014 (UTC)Reply
The only evidence you've provided that this decision was collaborative was its prevalence -- assisted, no doubt by the diligence of a few editors. You have yet to point me to any discussion in which this decision was collaboratively made or agreed upon, which means that the practice evolved organically. In the absence of that clear verbal consensus, there's no reason why practice cannot and should not be allowed to continue to evolve organically. But as long as you're inflexibly enforcing your idea of what the current consensus is, that evolution remains impossible. And I ask again: how exactly should an editor "explain why an exception is warranted" to your satisfaction? Powers(talk)18:21, 14 February 2014 (UTC)Reply
Powers, that is the only evidence that is needed. For anything controversial, as left-alignment inarguably has been for years, in the absence of policy, we look at practice, we look at past preferences, we look at the current state of our site, and we determine from that what the status quo is. If there is an overwhelming "way things are/have been done", as there undoubtedly is in this case, we require discussion and consensus to reverse it. It is the same with relative image sizing, it is the same with novel punctuation preferences, it is the same with using colored text in another font, it is the same with any number of things that happen to have no written proof of a consensus against. Every single argument you have thrown at me could easily be turned around and used verbatim to insist on things you yourself have been fighting against. It just seems like you are blinded by your bias on this issue. I am willing to see discussion and a new attempt to reach a new consensus, our perennial mechanism for change. What I am absolutely not willing to do, though, is to allow the long-standing tradition to be overturned without consensus, supported by arguments which would set a dangerous precedent with regards to all manner of things which we may not have enshrined in policy yet. Texugo (talk) 11:40, 15 February 2014 (UTC)Reply
So consensus to exclusively right-align can be shown by practice, but consensus to not exclusively right-align has to be discussed first? Is that what you're saying? Powers(talk)21:45, 15 February 2014 (UTC)Reply
Don't wax semantic now. Take the exact same question and replace "right-align" with "use pixel image sizes" or one of W. Frank/Alice/118's other pet preferences, and answer it yourself. Texugo (talk) 00:42, 16 February 2014 (UTC)Reply
Sorry to jump in, but this idea that "trusted users" should be able to introduce non-standard style changes even if concerns are raised is troubling - site policy is to discuss changes when there is disagreement and defer to the status quo in case of dispute. We don't want to be draconian, but if someone argues for a change we should never rebut that argument solely with "Evan made that change"; I might assume that since Evan made the edit that there was probably a reason for it and that we can try to discern that reason, but that is all - editor reputation alone is not a sufficient rebuttal to an argument questioning something on this site. -- Ryan • (talk) • 15:31, 16 February 2014 (UTC)Reply
Well that's rather my point. Texugo doesn't argue for exclusive right-alignment, or raise concerns; he just imposes it by fiat, claiming a questionably universal consensus for it. If I were to describe current practice, it's that alternative alignments are rarely but occasionally used when aesthetics or practicality dictate, while it seems Texugo would say they're only used when someone sneaks it by the guardians of right-alignment.
In addition, it is and always has been true that we grant established, trusted contributors considerable latitude when it comes to article formatting issues. Why this image alignment issue is inviolable in that regard I cannot fathom. Powers(talk)20:05, 16 February 2014 (UTC)Reply
Sorry, sleepy here, haha. I just mean the slight convenience in keeping them linked is not sufficient to outweigh the big disadvantage of losing Special page funcionality. My full response at your new discussion thread there. Texugo (talk) 15:27, 19 February 2014 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 10 years ago6 comments4 people in discussion
Hi Powers. I recollect from the wikitravel era (not sure if correctly) that reviews of hotels are generally frowned upon and that hotel listings should be just listings. Is that correct? (Context: This from the Petra page: Update from August 18th 2012 : Friendly & welcoming but definitely not a clean place. Rooms are disgusting, no air conditioning, no TV, english is approximative, breakfast just acceptable and you've to ask for towels, toilet paper, sheets etc. Manager sleeps in the entrance hall on a mat. Careful when you come down for breakfast. Restaurant was not open and it's not really a restaurant. It's cheap but that's probably it's main attraction. 11 JD per person. )--RegentsPark (talk) 19:16, 13 May 2014 (UTC)Reply
I'm not aware of any such restriction in our policies. By all means, we should be giving people the straight dope on the quality and amenities of their lodgings. Powers(talk)17:29, 14 May 2014 (UTC)Reply
A facility described as friendly, welcoming, and cheap doesn't sound like a negative review. Just because a place has negatives doesn't mean we shouldn't list it; AVN is intended to preclude "Don't go here" descriptions. Powers(talk)01:02, 15 May 2014 (UTC)Reply
It should be pointed out, though, that we want a review/description of the hotel itself, and not a story of a specific visit to the hotel. We want "restaurant may not be open", not "restaurant was not open". Texugo (talk) 11:52, 15 May 2014 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 10 years ago2 comments2 people in discussion
Hi LtP, you might have noticed that i'm back and started to do some finishing of Travemünde for the crosswiki presentation. Saqib was so kind to draft a static map that should follow in pretty much detail WV policies. I read that the star nom for Travemünde was slushed due to the style of the static vs. the dynamic map. I don't want to argue about that but rather inquire if in your view the new static map would change your opinion? As you have been the one with the opposing vote, i will not start anything starnomish if you don't agree. Regards, jan (talk) 18:04, 14 May 2014 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 10 years ago5 comments2 people in discussion
Thanks, for adding that to your edit summary. I found that to be kind of confusing as such. But know that I think about it "it" does make sense. Should it have been usable instead of the guide? --Clarkcj12 (talk) 21:06, 15 May 2014 (UTC)Reply
Oh, Europe. I admit I didn't even notice it was at Outline status; I assumed you'd upgraded it from Usable. Usable requires that the most important linked destinations (continental sections, cities, and other destinations, and possibly countries) be Usable or better. There are a lot to check and I don't have the time right now. Powers(talk)21:11, 15 May 2014 (UTC)Reply
As I said, there are a lot of article status to check before we know if it's okay to upgrade to Usable. I suggest you open a discussion on the talk page. Powers(talk)21:27, 15 May 2014 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 10 years ago9 comments2 people in discussion
Hi there. I noticed that some of the Disney articles were marked as parks, some as cities, and some (sub-park articles) as districts. I started to change them a bit, but thought I'd get your opinion. I did change the ones marked as "cities" at least, so right now, all the top-level ones are parks, and the individual parks in the WDW complex are marked as districts. Do you think it'd be better to mark them all as parks? Or would it be nice to have theme parks in their own category since they don't fit any other template? It'd be awfully simple to set up and maintain, and if we did that, then we could easily find all theme park articles too, instead of them being lost among the park and city articles. Texugo (talk) 15:45, 21 August 2014 (UTC)Reply
I don't believe the Disney resort complexes are "parks" in anything more than the most literal sense. The individual theme parks might be, but our park article template and status guidelines are calibrated for wilderness parks, not theme parks. The only thing useful from the park template is the "Fees/Permits" section (which is unique to that template), and even then I changed it to "Tickets". I followed the City template much more closely, so it would be a little odd to tag them as parks. Powers(talk)17:41, 21 August 2014 (UTC)Reply
While we're on the subject, I'm not sure tagging Kauai as a region was necessarily correct. Only one community on the island has its own article, and we've even discussed upmerging it. It's possible Kauai would work best as a bottom-level article. Powers(talk)17:41, 21 August 2014 (UTC)Reply
If we upmerge it, sure, I think it should go back to the city template. We seem to have a loose consensus that that's how it should be for small islands with consolidated coverage. That works fine for things at the bottom of the hierarchy, but I'm very leery of using the city tag for islands with only partially consolidated coverage, where there is still one or more hierarchical subdestinations, you know? I'm not sure where that's been discussed, but I think it better to either leave it as a region or to go ahead and tag it for merging.
As for theme parks, I don't even know how many theme parks we have; I don't know how to find them because they're lumped in city or park categories. Would you support giving theme parks their own class of article so they don't have to get lumped in with cities or nature parks? Then we could take your template tweaks and give theme parks a proper template more fitting for them and be able to easily track them. Texugo (talk) 18:09, 21 August 2014 (UTC)Reply
I just randomly happened across Busch Gardens Williamsburg too, so yeah, who knows how many more there are...
Anyway, I know it'd have to have wider discussion and all, I just thought I'd sound you out first since you're probably the regular user who has worked most on this type of article. The advantages would be that
the status tags could be customized so that they no longer refer strangely to the article as a city or district or mention campsites and all
they'd get their own tracking categories so they could be found easily
adapting a template might help make them more consistent and would suggest things that may be missing from some articles
The only disadvantage I can think of would be that it'd take a little bit of work to set up, but I could take care of most of that, and then it'd be all set. It's an already existing article type which doesn't fit into the other categories. I can't imagine what it would hurt to acknowledge it. Texugo (talk) 22:46, 21 August 2014 (UTC)Reply
The other disadvantage is that it might encourage overcreation of such articles. By policy, they are exceptions, and it's a little weird semantically to put infrastructure in place to support acknowledged exceptions. I don't disagree with your advantages, though. Powers(talk)00:41, 22 August 2014 (UTC)Reply
Well, that's one way to look at it. I'm certainly not wanting to encourage more of that type of article. It just bothers me that we have an unacknowledged article type using tags with inaccurate descriptors and no way to keep track of them. The only other thing I can think of, although it doesn't address the inaccurate status descriptor issue, would be to make them a kind of subclass, as we do with huge cities. Huge cities are classed just like normal cities, but they are additionally categorized as huge cities when they are tagged with the {{PrintDistricts}} template, and that's the only way we distinguish them for tracking. But there isn't any existing template that's unique to theme park articles. What if we made some kind of hatnote template for them and used that to categorize them? Or can you think of another way we could track them? Texugo (talk) 01:37, 22 August 2014 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 10 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion
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I am cross-posting this message to many places to make sure everyone who is a Wikimedia Foundation project bureaucrat receives a copy. If you are a bureaucrat on more than one wiki, you will receive this message on each wiki where you are a bureaucrat.
As you may have seen, work to perform the Wikimedia cluster-wide single-user login finalisation (SUL finalisation) is taking place. This may potentially effect your work as a local bureaucrat, so please read this message carefully.
Why is this happening? As currently stated at the global rename policy, a global account is a name linked to a single user across all Wikimedia wikis, with local accounts unified into a global collection. Previously, the only way to rename a unified user was to individually rename every local account. This was an extremely difficult and time-consuming task, both for stewards and for the users who had to initiate discussions with local bureaucrats (who perform local renames to date) on every wiki with available bureaucrats. The process took a very long time, since it's difficult to coordinate crosswiki renames among the projects and bureaucrats involved in individual projects.
The SUL finalisation will be taking place in stages, and one of the first stages will be to turn off Special:RenameUser locally. This needs to be done as soon as possible, on advice and input from Stewards and engineers for the project, so that no more accounts that are unified globally are broken by a local rename to usurp the global account name. Once this is done, the process of global name unification can begin. The date that has been chosen to turn off local renaming and shift over to entirely global renaming is 15 September 2014, or three weeks time from now. In place of local renames is a new tool, hosted on Meta, that allows for global renames on all wikis where the name is not registered will be deployed.
Your help is greatly needed during this process and going forward in the future if, as a bureaucrat, renaming users is something that you do or have an interest in participating in. The Wikimedia Stewards have set up, and are in charge of, a new community usergroup on Meta in order to share knowledge and work together on renaming accounts globally, called Global renamers. Stewards are in the process of creating documentation to help global renamers to get used to and learn more about global accounts and tools and Meta in general as well as the application format. As transparency is a valuable thing in our movement, the Stewards would like to have at least a brief public application period. If you are an experienced renamer as a local bureaucrat, the process of becoming a part of this group could take as little as 24 hours to complete. You, as a bureaucrat, should be able to apply for the global renamer right on Meta by the requests for global permissions page on 1 September, a week from now.
In the meantime please update your local page where users request renames to reflect this move to global renaming, and if there is a rename request and the user has edited more than one wiki with the name, please send them to the request page for a global rename.
Stewards greatly appreciate the trust local communities have in you and want to make this transition as easy as possible so that the two groups can start working together to ensure everyone has a unique login identity across Wikimedia projects. Completing this project will allow for long-desired universal tools like a global watchlist, global notifications and many, many more features to make work easier.
If you have any questions, comments or concerns about the SUL finalisation, read over the Help:Unified login page on Meta and leave a note on the talk page there, or on the talk page for global renamers. You can also contact me on my talk page on meta if you would like. I'm working as a bridge between Wikimedia Foundation Engineering and Product Development, Wikimedia Stewards, and you to assure that SUL finalisation goes as smoothly as possible; this is a community-driven process and I encourage you to work with the Stewards for our communities.
Latest comment: 10 years ago2 comments2 people in discussion
I notice on Atlantic City in your edit to the history section on 2014's casino closures, you assert (→History: It's unfair to single out Pennsylvania). I'm just relying on what the newspapers are reporting as hard news, presumably off the AP wire: Pennsylvania opened its first casino in 2006, from 2006 to 2013 Atlantic City gambling revenue dropped by half and in 2014 four of the twelve Atlantic City casinos closed. The link to PA is in the original source. K7L (talk) 02:26, 4 September 2014 (UTC)Reply
This discussion would be better on Talk:Atlantic City. I'm not sure what original source you mean, but unless there's been a definitive link established exclusively to the Pennsylvania casinos, it's not reasonable to single them out when destination-gambling as a whole market segment has been declining in the last decade. Powers(talk)18:04, 4 September 2014 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 10 years ago4 comments2 people in discussion
Apologies in advance for what will undoubtedly seem like a harsh comment, but re: [19], respectfully I would like to see far more usage of "Support", "Oppose", etc in discussions, and will do my best to use that format where appropriate. As has been discussed elsewhere, this discussion format is not voting, but does represent a very easy way to get a sense of each participant's opinion in the discussion, subject to change later based on the arguments presented. Telling people to "quit it" when using this discussion format strikes me as both unfair and, to a lesser extent, an inappropriate statement from a long-time contributor, since as far as I'm aware there is no consensus against using that discussion format. If you have a reason for opposing the use of "Support" and "Oppose" notations, aside from your opinion that it looks like voting, then we should discuss, but until those opinions are made clearer and agreed upon by others I don't think it is appropriate to call for the abolition of such comments. -- Ryan • (talk) • 19:15, 17 October 2014 (UTC)Reply
I thought we had a longstanding aversion to such things because they unnecessarily turn discussions into purely two-sided affairs and prompt participants to side with a team rather than make cogent and novel arguments. Powers(talk)19:23, 17 October 2014 (UTC)Reply
To the best of my knowledge we have a longstanding aversion to voting, i.e. a "support" or "oppose" with no justification. Using "support", "oppose", or another bolded phrase as a way of summarizing the opinion that follows, however, strikes me as hugely useful and something that we should encourage to the greatest extent possible. If I've missed a relevant discussion to the contrary please let me know. -- Ryan • (talk) • 19:55, 17 October 2014 (UTC)Reply
I'm afraid I don't keep an index, so I can't say if there was such a discussion or not; it's just my impression of the zeitgeist. But I still think the use of "support" and "oppose" separates us into tribes of warring factions and subverts the consensus process. Powers(talk)20:13, 17 October 2014 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 10 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion
Hi, Powers. I addressed your point on my user talk page and the talk page for the article, but while your objection is well taken, you might consider being a little less quick to take things so personally. My remark may have been careless, but it wasn't directed at you and wasn't meant as any criticism of an action by you, as I had no idea you had any part in it.
Latest comment: 9 years ago3 comments2 people in discussion
Hello, and Happy Thanksgiving!
I think you are not right to revert my effort to improve this language:
"there are compelling advantages to do so" just reads all wrong to me, and I think it's actually bad grammar though I can't point to the specific rule. Do you speak that way?
"there are compelling advantages to doing so" reads correctly to me.
Unless you actually think that the previous version is better, you shouldn't revert.
It feels to me like you'd give the dynamic IP user who loves to edit all the character out of articles about Southeast Asian places more latitude in copy editing than you want to give me. Ikan Kekek (talk) 20:33, 27 November 2014 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 9 years ago3 comments2 people in discussion
First, thank you for approving the bot flag on the archive bot. However, regarding your comment that "I never opposed the approval of this bot; I merely declined to be the second admin to take responsibility for approving it", you're aware that bots cannot be approved while there are outstanding objections, so when you write that you "still have concerns" [20] it has the same effect as if you had explicitly opposed approval. While legitimate concerns should definitely be addressed, our consensus-building process cannot work unless people are willing to allow ideas to move forward even when they are not enthusiastic about the proposal, or if they have minor differences of opinion. In this particular case efforts were made to respond to the points you raised, but even after three weeks your objections continued, and like so many other discussions on this site the process became a stalemate, with the outcome thus a failed bot nomination.
If you're merely playing devil's advocate in these sorts of discussions, or if you just want to raise concerns (so that they can be considered) without halting a nomination (as I assume is the case since you have since approved the bot?), then please make that explicit in the future so that consensus-building can move forward. Note that in the bot discussion, even if several other admins had voiced their support, based on current policy requirements your comments (as written) were sufficient to cause the nomination to fail. While an occasional filibuster is something that everyone here is guilty of, they are happening too frequently on this site.
I'm sorry about my "conniption", but I feel strongly that people are exercising veto powers far too often in discussions, which then causes our consensus-building mechanisms to fail completely. To deal with the frustration this causes I've found myself avoiding participating in many project discussions, and, while I intend to stick around, I've nevertheless been considering whether it makes sense to follow Peter's lead and walk away from Wikivoyage rather than continuing to engage in a project that has huge (but unrealized) potential, but is stagnating, partly due to the endless and ultimately fruitless debates over even the most trivial of matters. -- Ryan • (talk) • 22:48, 2 December 2014 (UTC)Reply
To the best of my recollection, I have never consciously exercised any sort of veto power on Wikivoyage. I wasn't aware that outstanding concerns, even in the face of overwhelming support, stood in the way of a bot approval. None of our processes should work like that. I recall frustration some months ago on the part of Andre about certain processes requiring unanimity, and I said then, and still believe now, that pure we-speak-as-one unanimity has never been a requirement for any of our consensus processes. Powers(talk)00:07, 3 December 2014 (UTC)Reply
The criteria for script approval requires no outstanding objections for approval: "If 2 administrators voice their support for the script and there are no unresolved objections". With regards to unanimity in other cases, we updated WV:Consensus#What consensus is not some time ago based on the misunderstanding that unanimity was required, but in practice a consensus is almost never declared when there is someone who raises concerns that cannot be addressed (such as with differences of opinion) unless it is massively and overwhelmingly clear that there is broad support. Whether an intentional filibuster or not, the end result is an inordinate number of discussions that go nowhere. These discussions would be made much easier if more people followed the advice at WV:Consensus#Contributing to a consensus building discussion: "As consensus does not require unanimity, it is considered classy to state that you will respect the consensus being built and stand aside if you find yourself alone in your position, even when you feel sure that your position is correct.". -- Ryan • (talk) • 00:37, 3 December 2014 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 9 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion
It is a long time since I had create this page in the erstwhile wikitravel website. I do remember migrating my userid to the wikivoyage but I did not
have the time to contribute much in the wikioyage space. There were a lot of deliberations in wikitravel on the 2 pages - I do remember that we discussed a lot and then decided on this course of action. I am not sure how to retrace all the archived discussions in wikitravel now
Pls let me know your opinion ~~kbala1055
Hi, kbala. The discussion is all there at Talk:Dindigul.
In time it would also be nice if we could do the same for EN but at the moment neither User:Magog the Ogre, User:Stefan2 or I (I edit under MGA73bot there because I could not create an account there under MGA73 (The user name "MGA73" has been banned from creation. It matches the following blacklist entry: .*[0-9][0-9]$) so unless I can create a MGA73x that you can rename then I'll continue to work as MGA73bot) are sysops there so we can't delete files or wiew deleted files to check file history. Do you think that we could be promoted to sysops there?
I do not know how many bureaucrats that is still active on WTS and EN but if the number is getting to low perhaps it would be a good idea to promote some more? --MGA73 (talk) 16:59, 9 April 2015 (UTC)Reply
Magog and I have been checking and deleting a lot of files at WTS. Now WTS (and EN) seems to be down. Do you know if it is closed permanently? --MGA73 (talk) 19:57, 6 August 2015 (UTC)Reply
Misleading? No, I don't think so. I understand "largest" is sometimes used to mean "most populous", but I would be surprised if that was the default interpretation. If you really think clarification is needed, maybe we can come up with a more euphonious phrasing. Powers(talk)23:41, 27 April 2015 (UTC)Reply
I think it is in the phrase "largest cities"; I'm not sure what the results would be if we took a poll on the meaning of "largest countries". How about "two widest countries" or "two most spacious countries", or if you really want to wax poetic "two most capacious nations"? Or we could just take Ryan'sto-the-point language. Ikan Kekek (talk) 23:47, 27 April 2015 (UTC)Reply
How 'bout largest countries by area? Or (in the context) ... the two countries with the biggest share of North American landmass / continent... I get that we don't want to be too correct, but if we end up being just wrong or misleading or on the other hand boring, who benefits? Hobbitschuster (talk) 00:03, 28 April 2015 (UTC)Reply
I prefer Ryan's language here. Regardless of the fact that Central America and the Caribbean are under the North America umbrella here, many people tend to think of North America as only Canada, the US, and Mexico, and with that in mind, it just sounds kind of odd to be talking about how two of those are the "largest" (out of a whole three). Do we really need to insist on having this caption reference their relative sizes? Texugo (talk) 00:18, 28 April 2015 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 9 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion
Thanks. I must have been sleeping when reviewing the criteria; the status of region articles is of no matter when determining usability. My bad. I'll be upgrading a few countries to usable soon then... JuliasTravels (talk) 18:59, 2 July 2015 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 9 years ago2 comments2 people in discussion
I made a pagebanner for Letchworth State Park. That article being mostly your work, I figured I'd solicit your opinion of it before putting it on the page. What do you think?
It looks good, though it's hard to tell for sure before putting it on the article. Please feel free to do so without my approval! Powers(talk)00:15, 27 August 2015 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 9 years ago8 comments3 people in discussion
Good morning, Powers. I just want to say you caught on more quickly than I did, but I now see you're right about who we're dealing with. As usual, I'm willing to cut this user some slack, perhaps more than you, but we both know who this is and will doubtless be observing closely. Ikan Kekek (talk) 13:54, 12 September 2015 (UTC)Reply
I'm always willing to cut individuals plenty of slack, which is why I haven't pursued my suspicions further. But the patterns of behavior are unacceptable, regardless of whom they're coming from. Powers(talk)14:47, 12 September 2015 (UTC)Reply
Nothing unacceptable to me yet, so I will wait and watch but others might not, but he was pretty rude to you in the Talk:Philippines thread. I hope you haven't taken too much offense at my entertaining his line of argument about capitalization and so forth. I'm perfectly satisfied with the situation as clarified for me in that thread. Ikan Kekek (talk) 14:52, 12 September 2015 (UTC)Reply
118 sockpuppets need to be permabanned as soon as any reasonable chance of mistaken identity is ruled out. None of this watching and waiting nonsense. The block evasion itself is the "crime". We gave the user plenty of chances to reform himself into a productive member of the community, and he blew it. -- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 15:00, 12 September 2015 (UTC)Reply
We have to watch and wait. The ban-evasion you refer to only applies to one individual, so we have to be certain it's that individual before blocking for ban evasion. Alternatively, we can also block for engaging in those specific unacceptable behavior patterns (the ones that comport with Frank and Alice's patterns of disruption), but it takes time for it to be established as an actual pattern. Powers(talk)15:06, 12 September 2015 (UTC)Reply
[Edit conflict] Well, I'm certainly convinced. There was one particular edit within the last couple of hours or so that clinched it for me. If necessary, I can link to it. Ikan Kekek (talk) 15:07, 12 September 2015 (UTC)Reply
Powers - As I said, "as soon as any reasonable chance of mistaken identity is ruled out". I had suspected this user was a 118 sockpuppet as soon as he came on the scene - frankly, I'm suspicious of any new users who start editing in projectspace too early or who have any familiarity with policy, and that's leaving aside the telltale turns of phrase - but I held off on blocking him until we had a smoking gun. If I'd come across the edit linked in the original post before you did, though, the edit would have been reverted and the user would have been banned without further comment. -- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 15:16, 12 September 2015 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 9 years ago2 comments2 people in discussion
Re: the comment that "we discourage edits like these" on User talk:MargNely, wouldn't it be more accurate to say that we don't encourage those sorts of edits? I think we can all agree that trivial edits offer little value to the site, but if we're weighing the cost of potentially chasing away a contributor vs. unnecessary churn in the article history, I think in the past we've erred on the side of allowing the trivial edits to continue without intervention. -- Ryan • (talk) • 15:56, 19 September 2015 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 8 years ago2 comments2 people in discussion
I notice you reverted template talk:geohere to remove {{unsigned}} and a date stamp from this comment: "This template is RDF code for inserting the geographical location of a place into the RDF metadata."
I'm hesitant to leave that statement at the top of the talk page with no date and no attribution for one reason: it's no longer true. The RDF project was basically abandoned a few years ago. According to Wikivoyage:RDF, "This page is currently inactive and is retained for historical reference." RDF looks to be a possibly-valid historical footnote (at best) within WT, but en:voy never did use it. If the statements about RDF apply to WT in 2005, we should say so. K7L (talk) 19:45, 20 January 2016 (UTC)Reply
Fair enough, but moving the line underneath a completely unrelated section heading was puzzling. I consider that line to be documentation, not a comment that needs to be preserved. If it no longer applies, we should replace it with something more accurate, or remove it entirely. Powers(talk)21:58, 20 January 2016 (UTC)Reply
Need your help creating a better regions map for Alps
Latest comment: 8 years ago2 comments2 people in discussion
Hi LtPowers. Andrewssi2 recommended that I'll ask for your help with this one. Would you be able to create a better regions map for the Alps article than the once currently used in that article? (I want to create the standard SVG type map common here on WV). ויקיג'אנקי (talk) 03:53, 2 March 2016 (UTC)Reply
It's possible, but I would need to have something to work from. Something that shows or describes where the regions' boundaries should be. Powers(talk)20:01, 4 March 2016 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 8 years ago2 comments2 people in discussion
About this edit (removal of busbud): I think it would be reasonable to offer consumers all available relevant information that helps them in their journeys instead of deleting relevant services claiming it is unfair to list useful services. Don't be a deletionist, be an inclusionist and add the sites that I missed when I scanned the Internets for the original list compilation in 2014. --Jukeboksi (talk) 17:23, 28 April 2016 (UTC)Reply
As long as we're offering free advice, don't pigeonhole people into "deletionist" and "inclusionist" camps. Argue everything on its own merits rather than falling back on Wikipedia tropes. Powers(talk)18:57, 28 April 2016 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 8 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion
Hi LtPowers, I noticed you're a member of the regions map expedition. I'm trying to districtify Skopje and need someone to make a district map. It will consist of only three districts so it shouldn't be too complex. Please let me know if you're able to do this, thanks! Local hero (talk) 15:19, 1 September 2016 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 7 years ago2 comments2 people in discussion
Thanks for your support re Disney Springs. We need badly an updated map for Disney Springs. I don't know how to do that. If you or someone else you know know how to get an updated map for Disney Springs, please put it in. CA2MI (talk) 05:54, 16 January 2017 (UTC) ̴̴Reply
Hi, User:CA2MI. A new Disney Springs map is on my list of updates (as were many of the changes you've already made to the article -- thanks for that), but I've got a lot of other WDW updates to make first. The main obstacle is finding a recent public domain source image for the map. Most of the free satellite photos out there are years old and don't show the new layout. Powers(talk)21:54, 16 January 2017 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 7 years ago4 comments2 people in discussion
American Express and VISA both call them "Travelers cheques" -- a curious amalgam of UK and US English. Neither uses an apostrophe before or after the "s". (Thomas Cook seems to have abandoned that market altogether, and offers "Travel Money" instead, a card that carries up to 10 currencies.) That's why I removed the apostrophe from the Toronto article. Does anyone sell "Traveler's cheques"? Ground Zero (talk) 04:51, 4 February 2017 (UTC)Reply
I am not that bothered about it, it was just that as they are the only twonproviders left, as far as I can tell, using their format seems to make sense.
Latest comment: 7 years ago4 comments2 people in discussion
Sorry for getting it wrong in the summary. My purpose in writing the summary is to try to see if we can works towards a consensus. Reading your comments again, I'm not clear how I misinterpreted what you wrote. Ground Zero (talk) 15:41, 26 February 2017 (UTC)Reply
I specifically pointed out that there was no good solution, and followed it up with questions that I would like to see answered before taking a specific position. Powers(talk)22:15, 27 February 2017 (UTC)Reply
I thought that your first question, "how do we signal that to novices?", was the general theme of the discussion. I addressed your comments immediately below, and interpreted your other question, "why bother restricting the creating of these redirects?", as being an indication that you do not agree with restricting redirects. As you know, this issue has been a matter of contention on the Votes for Deletion page. I am trying to resolve it through a policy discussion, and as we can see, getting a consensus is proving to be difficult, but I don't want this to become another discussion that goes around in circles until everyone gives up and leaves the problem unsolved. Summarizing a discussion is risky, but helps move the discussion forward. I apologize again for misinterpreting your comments. Ground Zero (talk) 01:29, 28 February 2017 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 7 years ago3 comments2 people in discussion
They're both roughly the same size and are about equally as important touristically, but Salamanca is the site of an important highway junction (I-86/US 219). --AndreCarrotflower (talk) 04:08, 27 June 2017 (UTC)Reply
According to the latest census, there are about 6,300 people in the city plus town of Salamanca (I can't imagine Wikivoyage would ever cover those two municipalities in separate articles), and about 8,700 in Bradford. So the latter is bigger, but IMO not by enough of a margin to supersede the highway-junction factor. (As tourist attractions they're in a dead heat, too: Bradford has the Zippo/Case Museum, but Salamanca has the Seneca Allegany Casino.) -- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 00:19, 28 June 2017 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 7 years ago15 comments2 people in discussion
Hi. This is hardly a Federal case, but a series of criteria are enumerated in "Star articles: Last minute checklist". "Any 'guide' quality article you think is ready to be declared a 'star'" is a noun (or if you prefer, the subject of a sentence). It is not a criterion. If you want to make your point clearly, so that readers like me can understand it, substitute "star quality" for "the criterion above" in this phrase:
"Please do not nominate an article if you know that it falls short of the criterion above" -> "falls short of star quality"
And I really hope you don't say that simply because you clearly understood what the text means, it shouldn't be clarified for other readers. Ikan Kekek (talk) 23:42, 5 September 2017 (UTC)Reply
What do you mean by "it is not a criterion"?
I thought you might mean the list in the infobox, but a) they are not criteria for nomination but a last-minute checklist before featuring, and b) they are not "above" the text that references a criterion but to its right.
I'm fine with re-wording it for clarity if you feel it was unclear, but I don't think "criteria" is at all correct.
A criterion, to my mind, has to be a quality or property: "I chose the car for its horsepower"; "I chose the bike for its maneuverability"; "I adopted the cat because she was so beautiful and friendly"; "I graded that paper down because of its poor syntax". "...article you think is ready to be declared a 'star'" is to my mind a thing, not a quality, and therefore not a criterion. For a criterion to be established, a reference would need to be made to "star quality" or some specific aspect of an article that would make it a star. At any rate, I found the wording confusing enough to think it had to be a reference to the checklist, even though, as you mention, that list is not literally above the text. Ikan Kekek (talk) 23:55, 5 September 2017 (UTC)Reply
It is not, but it is the most obvious and well defined, so I assumed that's why it was called out as a "definitely don't do this". Powers(talk)00:15, 6 September 2017 (UTC)Reply
I still think it would be clearer, then, to use the phrasing: "Please do not nominate an article if you know that it falls short of guide status", but I really think that's an insufficient exhortation and would prefer to use the phrase "star quality". Ikan Kekek (talk) 00:26, 6 September 2017 (UTC)Reply
I'm not clear on why anyone would even think of nominating an article for star status if they knew it fell short of star quality. Powers(talk)00:31, 6 September 2017 (UTC)Reply
In that case, maybe we should delete that section except for the first sentence (You can nominate any "guide" quality article you think is ready to be declared a "star") and the checklist. Ikan Kekek (talk) 00:42, 6 September 2017 (UTC)Reply
You said "that section", which I took to mean the section headed "Nominate". You said we should keep just the first sentence and the infobox, but that would remove all of the information about how to create the nomination. Powers(talk)01:47, 6 September 2017 (UTC)Reply
[unindent] Sorry for the confusion. I wasn't looking at the whole article, so I missed the part of the section you're talking about.
Here's a paragraph as currently written:
You can nominate any "guide" quality article you think is ready to be declared a "star". Please do not nominate an article if you know that it falls short of the criterion above — refer to the info box for a last minute checklist. If there are other nominations on this page, add yours to the bottom of the list. The basic format of a nomination is as follows:
I'd change it to this:
You can nominate any "guide" quality article you think is ready to be declared a "star". Before doing so, please refer to the info box for a last minute checklist. If there are other nominations on this page, add yours to the bottom of the list. The basic format of a nomination is as follows:
Hmm. I admit I've always interpreted that infobox checklist as a last-minute check before promoting, not before nominating. I could be wrong, though. Powers(talk)13:27, 6 September 2017 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 6 years ago2 comments2 people in discussion
You reverted my change to Niagara Falls (Ontario) with the note "rv. unexplained price removal". The prices were not removed, they were moved from the freeform text section of the templates to the Price field of the templates. Did you not see that the information was still there, but now in the correct location? I've reverted your reversion. --Robkelk (talk) 22:00, 2 December 2017 (UTC)Reply
Sorry, you're correct I did not notice. I apologize. For future reference, edit summaries help head off these sorts of misunderstandings. Powers(talk)01:12, 3 December 2017 (UTC)Reply
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Latest comment: 6 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion
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Latest comment: 6 years ago2 comments2 people in discussion
This edit does not seem to match the edit summary very well. You only removed the dates, but left the event itself in, while asserting in the edit summary that they don't happen there at all. Perhaps a further edit is in order? WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:19, 13 May 2018 (UTC)Reply
The Candlelight Processional is not "included" in the array of events at the resorts, because it does not happen at the resorts. So using the word "including" is misleading, and removing the "more" bit excludes everything else besides "events at the resorts" and "the Candlelight Processional". Powers(talk)00:49, 13 May 2018 (UTC)Reply
Latest comment: 3 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion
For pointing that out, my apologies - only just getting back to a very slow restart after a very long absence - thanks, will indeed take care - if I dont get the chance to say later at some point - have a good christmas new year and may it be a good one for you (I cannot believe how close it all is) JarrahTree (talk) 05:38, 28 November 2020 (UTC)Reply
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When someone edits a Wikimedia wiki without being logged in today, we show their IP address. As you may already know, we will not be able to do this in the future. This is a decision by the Wikimedia Foundation Legal department, because norms and regulations for privacy online have changed.
Instead of the IP we will show a masked identity. You as an admin will still be able to access the IP. There will also be a new user right for those who need to see the full IPs of unregistered users to fight vandalism, harassment and spam without being admins. Patrollers will also see part of the IP even without this user right. We are also working on better tools to help.
We have two suggested ways this identity could work. We would appreciate your feedback on which way you think would work best for you and your wiki, now and in the future. You can let us know on the talk page. You can write in your language. The suggestions were posted in October and we will decide after 17 January.
Latest comment: 2 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion
You are receiving this message because you are a bureaucrat on this wiki.
Following a successful change in the inactivity policy, the bureaucrat policy has now been updated. Bureaucrats may now have their privileges removed if they have not:
Made one edit
Made one admin or bureaucrat action
over a 12-month period.
Bureaucrats who do not meet these requirements will be notified well in advance on their talk pages. Thank you.
Latest comment: 2 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion
Thanks for your service as a Wikivoyage bureaucrat. As you may be aware, our bureaucrats policy indicates that bureaucrats who have not edited the English Wikivoyage or made at least one admin or bureaucrat action in over 12 months should have their bureaucrat flags removed. This is for account security purposes, not a reflection of a loss of trust or any disappointment.
Latest comment: 2 months ago5 comments2 people in discussion
Hello!
My name is Chuck, and I'm working on fixing the catagory Category:Bureaucrats, Can you add {{Template:User Wikivoyage/Bureaucrat}} to your userpage? It will transclude the catagory to your userpage.
Latest comment: 1 month ago1 comment1 person in discussion
Thanks for your service as a Wikivoyage bureaucrat. As you may be aware, our Wikivoyage:Bureaucrats policy indicates that 'crats who have not edited on the English Wikivoyage in over 12 months and performed at least one admin and/or bureaucrat action should have their bureaucrat flag removed. This is for account security purposes, not a reflection of a loss of trust or any disappointment.
Your last edit was on 2024-09-03, but you did not make any admin and/or bureaucrat actions within the last 12 months.
As such, your bureaucrat perms will removed on 2024-10-19 unless you make an admin/bureaucrat action in the interim.
Done -- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 16:48, 9 February 2014 (UTC)
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