Wikipedia:Help desk/Archives/2019 January 22

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January 22

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Martin Luther Ling Day Wikipedia page

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Dear wikipedia the martin luther king jr day page has been hacked or something there is a disturrbing image of genatailia on the page. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2601:140:8200:F3E5:DFA:DE0:619A:A1F (talk) 00:22, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Hello IP and welcome to the Help Desk. The offensive image has been removed, and the user blocked. Rubbish computer (Talk: Contribs) 00:27, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Please help with IBSN number in reference number 17. Thankyou in advance. 175.32.165.144 (talk) 00:44, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

You have entered two ISBNs, a 10-digit and a 13-digit one, separated by a comma. It may be that both are valid, but from reading the linked help in the error message I am given to understand that the ISBN field will only accept one ISBN, and will not accept commas. You need to choose which of the two you want to use and eliminate the other one (and also the comma). {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 90.217.251.247 (talk) 00:57, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Pease see above request. help please. I would like to choose the first 10 digit IBSN - but I Cannot do it on current device. Please do it for me. Sorry and thanks 175.32.165.144 (talk) 02:36, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  Done Eagleash (talk) 05:10, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]
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The article on David E. Shaner has been tagged as probable copyvio and blanked since 2 November 2018. It was first tagged for G12 by User:PRehse, and then blanked pending copyvio work by User:Justlettersandnumbers. (I thank both of them for keeping Wikipedia free of copyvio.) How long should an article be tagged in this fashion before it goes back to G12 and then into the bit bucket? Is there something that should have been done, or is there something that editors need to do to continue to deal with copyvio? Robert McClenon (talk) 01:00, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

This copyright problem already listed under 2 November at Wikipedia:Copyright problems#Listings of possible copyright problems, that's the normal assembly point. You'll see that there are a few outstanding issues older than this one: Bhunacat10 (talk), 11:19, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks, Robert McClenon, Bhunacat10; yes, unfortunately the copyright problems board is pretty much chronically back-logged. A month or so ago I did look at the rewrite proposed for this article; I found it acceptable from a copyright point of view, but so unencyclopaedically promotional in tone that I wasn't prepared to move it into mainspace, and so left it for someone else to review. It's since been moved into draft space (passing note to ColinFine and Hamster Sandwich: Talk:David E. Shaner/Temp actually was the right place for a copyvio rewrite). Ptarry seems to have been working on the draft; with his/her agreement, and if no-one else objects, I suggest that I now delete the previous version of the page – which will resolve the copyright problem – and let the draft proceed through the AfC process. Justlettersandnumbers (talk) 11:59, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]
It's a bit difficult sorting the wheat from the chaff on that page, but the article concerned is also listed at Category:Wikipedia pages tagged for copyright problems. --David Biddulph (talk) 11:25, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]
All, thank you for your help. I am glad the copyright issue has been resolved. I would be fine with taking the David E Shaner article off of the mainspace and continue to work on Talk:David E. Shaner/Temp until it is neutrally acceptable in tone. At that point the revised article could be put on the mainspace. For background, I have no financial ties to David Shaner. I know David Shaner through my time as a student at Furman University and continuing study of Aikido. (Ptarry (talk) 14:36, 22 January 2019 (UTC))[reply]
User:Ptarry - The currently blanked article on David E. Shaner has been nominated for deletion. See Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/David E. Shaner. If the copyright issue has indeed been resolved, it would useful if someone could restore the non-copyvio text. As it is, with the entire article overwritten by a huge copyvio banner, I have a hard time imagining that it will survive the AFD. I see three problems with it, of which one may be resolved. The first is the matter of copyvio. The second is that the notability of Shaner is being challenged, and is the primary basis for the AFD. The third is that the draft is still very promotional and non-neutral, and this leads editors at the AFD to wonder further whether there is anything besides puffery, and puffery is not a reason to keep an article. Robert McClenon (talk) 17:50, 23 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]
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Sir I am missbahuddin Ahmad.why do you delete all my wikipedia contributions. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 0786dcba (talkcontribs) 03:41, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Well, for example, the Principal Secretary of Home Department (Bihar) is not notable enough for an article. Your edits have bad grammar and capitalization, and inevitably lack any kind of reliable sourcing. --Orange Mike | Talk 04:46, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

A potential factual issue on multiple pages (possibly subtle hoax?), and unsure where to put this

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(Sorry, I don't really know what the right place for this is, I am not really experienced at all with wikipedia editing or contribution)

Multiple articles relating to the First Jewish-Roman War gave me some suspicion. There are references to a "Judean Free Government" which sounds somewhat anachronistic, and the "Judean Free Government" page itself refers to a "Judean People's Assembly" which sounds even more anachronistic, with there being no google results for such an assembly except wikipedia and a couple mirrors. I am also having a hard time finding any sources from Google (apart from blogs that seemingly copy from the wiki) refer to the Jewish rebels as a "Judean Free Government", and a look at some of the sources cited in the articles doesn't seem to show any such references, or it isn't cited at all. Also, some of the usages on some pages seem grammatically clunky, and edit page histories for a couple of the pages I looked at showed that the "Judean Free Government" was just referred to as Jewish rebels or something like that, until edits made by one user in 2017 and 2018. Part of me is kind of suspicious that this might just be a Monty Python/Life of Brian joke (Judean People's Front/People's Front of Judea/etc).

TL,DR: found some questionable stuff in an article. I am suspicious that something is up here, but while I have some knowledge of history, I am no expert. I also don't really know where to post this or where to get the attention of those more knowledgeable in wiki editing and the subject area. It sounds like talk pages are for that, but there's a bunch of pages with these potential issues (maybe that's where this belongs anyway, I just don't want to spam it or anything if that's not cool or whatever)

HelpPls? (talk) 14:58, 22 January 2019 (UTC)-[reply]

@HelpPls?: Welcome to Wikipedia and thanks for wanting to make it better. You should post on the talk page for the article's in question. Editors who are interested in that article will see it there. Also, some article's are associated with a WikiProject. If you look on the article's talk page, you will see a link to the project page and you can also post questions there. RudolfRed (talk) 19:13, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]
This is first-class BS. It doesn't quite qualify for WP:SPEEDY deletion, so I've nominated it for deletion via WP:AfD here. Clarityfiend (talk) 23:58, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Contact another user?

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I would like to contact another user who has been editing some of the same articles that I've been working on so we can discuss the subject. Is there a way to do this?

(Probably a newbie question but...)

Thanks!

Michigan Gold Diver (talk) 18:47, 22 January 2019 (UTC)Michigan Gold Diver[reply]

Michigan Gold Diver Every user has a user talk page, which is used for communication. If you look at your signature above, there is a link to yours included; most signatures have such a link. If you look at an article's edit history, there is also links to user talk pages there. 331dot (talk) 18:50, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]
I will shortly post to yours, as an example. 331dot (talk) 18:51, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]
(edit conflict) If you look at the article's history it shows the user name for each edit, and there will be a "talk" link alongside each user name. There is advice at WP:Talk page guidelines. --David Biddulph (talk) 18:52, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

How to share the mobile app Saved lists with my desktop web broweser

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I love the app and save many articles there for reading. Can I do the same on-line? and can my saved lists be accessed via a web browser?

thank you — Preceding unsigned comment added by Uselessbay2000 (talkcontribs) 23:38, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Using Who's Who as a reference

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Hello, I'm just wondering if Who's Who is considered to be a reliable source for BLPs. I came across its use in a couple of articles a few minutes ago when it was added by someone. Can someone advise? I'm pretty certain it's come up in discussions in the past but can't recall where. I tried Wikipedia:Who's who but it didn't give me the information Id hoped. Cheers in advance, This is Paul (talk) 23:39, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Hello @This is Paul: There have been several discussions on various Who's Who publications:
  1. 2007 discussion on notability
  2. Marquis, Feb 2008
  3. Marquis, Dec 2008
  4. Canadian Who's Who, 2009
  5. Marquis, 2010
  6. Who's Who UK, 2010
  7. Who's Who UK, 2011
  8. Who's Who UK (notability), 2015
  9. related AfD, 2015
  10. Marquis, 2017
The general consensus seems to be that since the subjects write their own entries (or at least provide the information via a questionnaire), they can be considered self-published sources – good for basic biographical information on the subject, but not for determining notability or self-serving claims. Editors make a distinction between the Marquis Who's Who and Who's Who (UK), which are compiled by different publishers. The UK edition is sometimes said to have more editorial oversight regarding the notability of its subjects and accuracy of information, but the core biography is still dependent on information provided by the subject.
For future reference, there is a dedicated noticeboard for discussing the reliability of sources. – Teratix 00:55, 23 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Correction: Canadian Who's Who is not related to Marquis Who's Who. – Teratix 04:56, 23 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for getting back to me. It was used for background information for some biographies of UK politicians. I'll mention it at the niticeboard anyway. Cheers again. This is Paul (talk) 09:39, 23 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]