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Question at

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Wikipedia:Files_for_deletion/2012_September_2#File:Into_The_Vietnamese_Kitchen_p10.jpg .Thanks In ictu oculi (talk) 03:26, 3 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

I've replied there. —Bkell (talk) 03:39, 3 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

Is there a tool for that?

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This was very helpful, and I wonder how you figured it out. I've done this by looking at the "prev" diffs that pop up on mouseover in the page history, or use the radio buttons to do diffs for blocks of time to narrow it down, but I can imagine a tool might exist to make this easier - that attempts to determine the diff and editor associated with content on the page. Do you use such a tool? -- Scray (talk) 11:42, 3 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

I wish I knew of such a tool. I just opened the history of the page and manually did a binary search on the previous versions, seeking the edit at which the word "soundiferancic" first appeared. It's like the game where someone thinks of a number and you try to guess it, and after each of your guesses you are told "too high" or "too low." So, for example, I looked at the last edit from 2011, which did not contain the word, so I knew it had been inserted this year; then I looked at the first edit from May; then I looked at an edit from 14 June; and so on.
If you're tracking down vandalism in this way, it helps to realize that you can ignore edits which were immediately reverted, because they don't change anything. Also, a lot of vandalism is done by anonymous editors, so when you get close you can start focusing on the anonymous edits. Even so, it's a bit of a tedious process. —Bkell (talk) 15:44, 3 September 2012 (UTC)Reply
Yes, seems we approach this in just the same (tedious) way - the binary search method is the right term for what I was referring to when I mentioned use of the radio buttons. Years ago I saw editors refer to a (defunct) tool called "who wrote that" or somesuch. Certainly, such a tool could not be perfect, but in many cases it should be tractable. Once I find that person, searching their contributions around the same time sometimes yields strange vandalism sprees. -- Scray (talk) 16:11, 3 September 2012 (UTC)Reply
Just ran across the blamer tool, which seems like it could be quite useful. Cheers! -- Scray (talk) 05:33, 19 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

Johnny Torrio Image

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If the image I uploaded has to be deleted, then so be it. I will not lodge any protests. Thanks for letting me know. And003 (talk) 21:44, 4 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

Harmonic Maths

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I forwarded the permission from the author. Pkeets (talk) 19:27, 30 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

Okay. I've added {{OTRS pending}} to the file description page. —Bkell (talk) 19:38, 30 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

Pegrema photo

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Hi Bkell! You have left me a message at my Talk page stating that the file [File:Karelija Pegrema.jpg] I uploaded a while ago lacks a copyright verification. Unfortunately it looks like since the file was uploaded, the site where I took it from (http://www.nordfoto.ru/) ceased to exist. Therefore, I'm not sure how to verify the license tag. Thank you. Khakhalin (talk) 21:26, 30 September 2012 (UTC)Reply

Right, I saw that too. I checked the Internet Archive at http://www.archive.org/ before I left the message on your talk page. I found an archived copy of their photo gallery of Medvezhyegorsky District, Медвежьегорский район, but unfortunately there is no archived copy of the subgallery for Pegrema (Деревня Пегрема) where I imagine you found the photo you uploaded as File:Karelija Pegrema.jpg. In any case, at the bottom of the galleries that are archived, there is a copyright notice that says "Copyright © 2002, Валерий Гуляев", but I do not see any mention of the GFDL. So I don't see any evidence to support the {{GFDL}} tag that is currently on the File:Karelija Pegrema.jpg file description page. —Bkell (talk) 00:24, 1 October 2012 (UTC)Reply

So God Made a Farmer

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I understand your point on the "speech became famous" comment. I was mostly basing it on the Atlantic comment "Here's the text of his speech, made newly famous during the Super Bowl". Is there a way you think that information can be incorporated? Ryan Vesey 13:45, 4 February 2013 (UTC)Reply

The statement that the speech is now famous is an opinion at this point, not a fact. I suppose you could say something like, "The speech has been described as 'newly famous,'" with a reference to the Atlantic, which is a verifiable fact; but that statement doesn't really convey any meaningful data (and how does the Atlantic know it's now famous, anyway, and not just a flash in the pan?). I think you should leave this claim out of the article. See Wikipedia:Let the dust settle#Notability requires more than 15 minutes of fame. The word "famous" is an example of a class of words commonly called "peacock terms" on Wikipedia; such words "make unprovable proclamations about a subject's importance" and should be avoided. See also WP:ASF. —Bkell (talk) 14:17, 4 February 2013 (UTC)Reply

Good call

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... this :-) -- Cheers - DVdm (talk) 21:06, 11 February 2013 (UTC)Reply

File:Windows Setup.jpg

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Hi.

I hope I am not bothering you, but I thought it is important to drop you a note about your edit in File:Windows Setup.jpg. I think it is good thing that the image isn't PNG. JPEG screenshots are smaller and the lost fidelity (due to artifacts) is actually a plus for WP:NFCC#3b compliance.

Best regards,
Codename Lisa (talk) 22:21, 7 March 2013 (UTC)Reply

Hmm. It is not generally true that JPEG screenshots have a smaller file size; PNG files are usually smaller for images that have large blocks of solid colors, which includes most screenshots of computer programs. However, a JPEG might be smaller in this case because of the gradients around the edges.
I do not interpret WP:NFCC#3b as promoting a loss of fidelity in images via means such as blurring, garbling, or introducing compression artifacts. Instead, I think it refers to using low-resolution images and low-fidelity sound samples. I have always thought that, within the low-resolution requirement for images, we should have the most accurate representation of the image that we can get. —Bkell (talk) 22:32, 7 March 2013 (UTC)Reply
Hello again. I see that I may have been wrong about my interpretation of "fidelity". I now remember that "fidelity" is used as a counterpart of "resolution" in audio, since "resolution" has its own meaning in that domain. (My way of thinking might have been in part influenced by FleetCommand's practice of reducing image color depth and putting distinction between "resolution" and "dimension".) Since you have a valid counterargument, I cede my position. But would you say that in general, I should avoid JPEG screenshots in favor PNG whenever possible? Best regards, Codename Lisa (talk) 00:08, 8 March 2013 (UTC)Reply
Well, it depends on the content of the screenshot. If it's a screenshot of a video game, for example, so that the image is essentially photographic in its nature, then a JPEG might be best; the JPEG format was designed to work well with photographs. On the other hand, if it's a screenshot of a typical window with text, large areas of flat color, and sharp edges, then a PNG is usually a better choice than a JPEG. —Bkell (talk) 00:12, 8 March 2013 (UTC)Reply

Mathematical coincidence & Almost integer

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removed a bunch of random stuff that had neither references nor connections to things in other Wikipedia articles


Well... I'm glad you did. It feels really refreshing and motivating to have someone pissing all over your work...

Anyway... you said that the "random stuff" in question had "no connections to things in other Wikipedia articles": this isn't exactly true: a few of the approximations -or coincidences- that you chose to remove were based on (or related to) other similar or equivalent relations from the related article almost integer. These are:

  •  
  •  
  •   
  •   

Also, the fact -or coincidence- that the value of the Euler-Mascheroni constant   is so close to the value of   is explained by applying the Gaussian quadrature for 2 points to the integral definition of the constant. So perhaps next time it would be better to check your facts first before taking such rash and swift decisions. And here's another outrageous idea: how about actually trying to contribute yourself with links, references, and connections, instead of simply hacking away the information ? P.S.: I've sometimes felt a bit guilty for not contributing (financially) to Wikipedia... thanks for clearing my conscience once and for all. — 79.113.230.39 (talk) 05:46, 9 March 2013 (UTC)Reply

I'm sorry I upset you. What I am trying to avoid is an article that is just a miscellaneous collection of facts that editors happen to discover and find interesting. The mathematical coincidence article was really bad about four years ago—hardly any of the things listed in the article had references to justify their inclusion in the article as notable coincidences that have been observed and covered by reliable sources outside Wikipedia. Since then it has gotten a lot better, but we need to make sure we include references to reliable sources to demonstrate that the facts in the article are not original research.
Frankly, the almost integer article is awful. It's just a huge unreadable mess of random trivia, with no citations to outside references that show that the facts are anything other than interesting discoveries made by Wikipedia editors. That is not what a good Wikipedia article should be. Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information. The mathematical coincidence article looked a lot like that in 2009, but it has improved a lot. How did that improvement come about? Part of the improvement was made by finding references for various claims, and part of the improvement was made by deleting claims for which no meaningful references could be found.
You seem to believe that deletion is not contribution. I respectfully disagree. Wikipedia articles need a certain amount of pruning as they develop.
Now, let's see if we can come to a satisfactory solution about the items I removed from the mathematical coincidence article earlier. Can you find reliable sources that discuss those particular coincidences? If so, I fully support their inclusion in the article, with references to those sources. —Bkell (talk) 06:42, 9 March 2013 (UTC)Reply
The properties of  , Heegner numbers, and Ramanujan's constant are neither random, nor the discoveries of Wikipedia editors. There is a mathematical reason or explanation for them. The property of Gelfond's constant is random, however, it is not the the discovery of Wikipedia editors. And the square root of 10 and cube root of 31 have been historic approximations for  , albeit perhaps less famous than others. Then again, these entries are not the ones you've deleted, so perhaps you already knew all this. And I never said that deleting meaningless junk is not an acceptable way of contributing to Wikipedia... I just thought that these particular entries did not necessarily belong into that category. — 79.113.196.61 (talk) 07:27, 10 March 2013 (UTC)Reply
Okay. Let's suppose, just for the sake of discussion, that I don't believe you when you claim that the properties of these various numbers are not the discoveries of Wikipedia editors. Can you prove to me, by providing references to external sources, that these things have been discussed in a scholarly context outside of Wikipedia? —Bkell (talk) 21:46, 10 March 2013 (UTC)Reply
Theoretically, yes. Practically, no. I personally don't have the (re)sources to do that. Not unless one considers my memory a (re)source. :-) — 79.113.227.82 (talk) 11:24, 12 March 2013 (UTC)Reply

Proportions question on math ref desk

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Thank you so much for a perfect answer to my question about why the pencil measure trick works when setting up proportions. Manytexts (talk) 08:13, 9 March 2013 (UTC)Reply

You're welcome! —Bkell (talk) 08:26, 9 March 2013 (UTC)Reply

Ping....

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Hi Bkell, I left you a response here. All the best -- CassiantoTalk 21:19, 13 March 2013 (UTC)Reply

log n and lg n are not same thing

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I think lg n and log n are not same thing. For the former base is 2 but for the later base is 10. This is in context of Binary Search Tree. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 199.67.140.45 (talk) 12:58, 22 March 2013 (UTC)Reply

True, but O(log n) and O(lg n) are the same thing, because log n and lg n differ by only a constant factor (by the change-of-base formula for logarithms). —Bkell (talk) 15:46, 22 March 2013 (UTC)Reply


Also, 199, beware of assuming that unadorned "log" always means base 10. In mathematical writing, it will ordinarily mean the natural log (base e). Yes, "ln" exists, but not everyone uses it. --Trovatore (talk) 17:10, 22 March 2013 (UTC)Reply

Alternative names/translations in lead

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You may be interested in my proposal over at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Lead section. —Designate (talk) 15:44, 21 April 2013 (UTC)Reply

AFT5 re-enabled

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Hey Bkell :). Just a note that the Article Feedback Tool, Version 5 has now been re-enabled. Let us know on the talkpage if you spot any bugs. Thanks! Okeyes (WMF) (talk) 00:45, 24 April 2013 (UTC)Reply

Request for comment

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Hello there, a proposal regarding pre-adminship review has been raised at Village pump by Anna Frodesiak. Your comments here is very much appreciated. Many thanks. Jim Carter through MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 06:46, 28 May 2014 (UTC)Reply

Category:Space Shuttle landing sites

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Category:Space Shuttle landing sites, which you created, has been nominated for possible deletion, merging, or renaming. If you would like to participate in the discussion, you are invited to add your comments at the category's entry on the Categories for discussion page. Thank you. DexDor (talk) 06:56, 26 September 2014 (UTC)Reply

Hi, can you make a comment about my new project Encyclopine.org

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hi, Hi, can you make a comment about my new project Encyclopine.org?

Invitation

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ArbCom elections are now open!

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Hi,
You appear to be eligible to vote in the current Arbitration Committee election. The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to enact binding solutions for disputes between editors, primarily related to serious behavioural issues that the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the ability to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail. If you wish to participate, you are welcome to review the candidates' statements and submit your choices on the voting page. For the Election committee, MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 22:13, 30 November 2015 (UTC)Reply

Nomination for deletion of Template:Puf2a

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 Template:Puf2a has been nominated for deletion. You are invited to comment on the discussion at the template's entry on the Templates for discussion page. Magog the Ogre (tc) 14:40, 11 April 2016 (UTC)Reply

== Bkell It has been a while since I have uploaded any images into Wiki. Can you refresh my memory on this. All the deleted images are my creations. --Johnaldentalk 18:16, 13 October 2016 (UTC)Reply

Extended confirmed protection

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Hello, Bkell. This message is intended to notify administrators of important changes to the protection policy.

Extended confirmed protection (also known as "30/500 protection") is a new level of page protection that only allows edits from accounts at least 30 days old and with 500 edits. The automatically assigned "extended confirmed" user right was created for this purpose. The protection level was created following this community discussion with the primary intention of enforcing various arbitration remedies that prohibited editors under the "30 days/500 edits" threshold to edit certain topic areas.

In July and August 2016, a request for comment established consensus for community use of the new protection level. Administrators are authorized to apply extended confirmed protection to combat any form of disruption (e.g. vandalism, sock puppetry, edit warring, etc.) on any topic, subject to the following conditions:

  • Extended confirmed protection may only be used in cases where semi-protection has proven ineffective. It should not be used as a first resort.
  • A bot will post a notification at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard of each use. MusikBot currently does this by updating a report, which is transcluded onto the noticeboard.

Please review the protection policy carefully before using this new level of protection on pages. Thank you.
This message was sent to the administrators' mass message list. To opt-out of future messages, please remove yourself from the list. 17:48, 23 September 2016 (UTC)

Wikipedia:WikiProject United States/The 50,000 Challenge

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  You are invited to participate in the 50,000 Challenge, aiming for 50,000 article improvements and creations for articles relating to the United States. This effort began on November 1, 2016 and to reach our goal, we will need editors like you to participate, expand, and create. See more here!

--MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 02:38, 8 November 2016 (UTC)Reply

Two-Factor Authentication now available for admins

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Hello,

Please note that TOTP based two-factor authentication is now available for all administrators. In light of the recent compromised accounts, you are encouraged to add this additional layer of security to your account. It may be enabled on your preferences page in the "User profile" tab under the "Basic information" section. For basic instructions on how to enable two-factor authentication, please see the developing help page for additional information. Important: Be sure to record the two-factor authentication key and the single use keys. If you lose your two factor authentication and do not have the keys, it's possible that your account will not be recoverable. Furthermore, you are encouraged to utilize a unique password and two-factor authentication for the email account associated with your Wikimedia account. This measure will assist in safeguarding your account from malicious password resets. Comments, questions, and concerns may be directed to the thread on the administrators' noticeboard. MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 20:34, 12 November 2016 (UTC)Reply

A new user right for New Page Patrollers

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Hi Bkell.

A new user group, New Page Reviewer, has been created in a move to greatly improve the standard of new page patrolling. The user right can be granted by any admin at PERM. It is highly recommended that admins look beyond the simple numerical threshold and satisfy themselves that the candidates have the required skills of communication and an advanced knowledge of notability and deletion. Admins are automatically included in this user right.

It is anticipated that this user right will significantly reduce the work load of admins who patrol the performance of the patrollers. However,due to the complexity of the rollout, some rights may have been accorded that may later need to be withdrawn, so some help will still be needed to some extent when discovering wrongly applied deletion tags or inappropriate pages that escape the attention of less experienced reviewers, and above all, hasty and bitey tagging for maintenance. User warnings are available here but very often a friendly custom message works best.

If you have any questions about this user right, don't hesitate to join us at WT:NPR. (Sent to all admins).MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 13:47, 15 November 2016 (UTC)Reply

ArbCom Elections 2016: Voting now open!

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Hello, Bkell. Voting in the 2016 Arbitration Committee elections is open from Monday, 00:00, 21 November through Sunday, 23:59, 4 December to all unblocked users who have registered an account before Wednesday, 00:00, 28 October 2016 and have made at least 150 mainspace edits before Sunday, 00:00, 1 November 2016.

The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to impose binding solutions to disputes between editors, primarily for serious conduct disputes the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the authority to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail.

If you wish to participate in the 2016 election, please review the candidates' statements and submit your choices on the voting page. Mdann52 (talk) 22:08, 21 November 2016 (UTC)Reply

ArbCom Elections 2016: Voting now open!

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Hello, Bkell. Voting in the 2016 Arbitration Committee elections is open from Monday, 00:00, 21 November through Sunday, 23:59, 4 December to all unblocked users who have registered an account before Wednesday, 00:00, 28 October 2016 and have made at least 150 mainspace edits before Sunday, 00:00, 1 November 2016.

The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to impose binding solutions to disputes between editors, primarily for serious conduct disputes the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the authority to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail.

If you wish to participate in the 2016 election, please review the candidates' statements and submit your choices on the voting page. MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 22:08, 21 November 2016 (UTC)Reply

Administrators' newsletter - February 2017

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News and updates for administrators from the past month (January 2017). This first issue is being sent out to all administrators, if you wish to keep receiving it please subscribe. Your feedback is welcomed.

  Administrator changes

  NinjaRobotPirateSchwede66K6kaEaldgythFerretCyberpower678Mz7PrimefacDodger67
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  Guideline and policy news

  Technical news

  • When performing some administrative actions the reason field briefly gave suggestions as text was typed. This change has since been reverted so that issues with the implementation can be addressed. (T34950)
  • Following the latest RfC concluding that Pending Changes 2 should not be used on the English Wikipedia, an RfC closed with consensus to remove the options for using it from the page protection interface, a change which has now been made. (T156448)
  • The Foundation has announced a new community health initiative to combat harassment. This should bring numerous improvements to tools for admins and CheckUsers in 2017.

  Arbitration

  Obituaries

  • JohnCD (John Cameron Deas) passed away on 30 December 2016. John began editing Wikipedia seriously during 2007 and became an administrator in November 2009.

13:37, 1 February 2017 (UTC)

I noticed you program in JavaScript...

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The JavaScript WikiProject is now up and running. We organize and develop JavaScript articles, navigation aids, and user scripts.

The WikiProject also organizes every resource it can find about JavaScript out there, such as articles, books, tutorials, etc. See our growing Reference library.

If you would like to join the JavaScript WikiProject, feel free to add your name to the participants list.

Hope to see you there! The Transhumanist 15:01, 12 May 2017 (UTC)Reply

File:Some Girls titlecard.png ‎

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Hi could you restore File:Some Girls titlecard.png please as it clearly was taken off of a webpage...... I had no idea this tag was placed nor was I even notified..... Thanks, –Davey2010Talk 14:17, 10 July 2017 (UTC)Reply

Having looked at the cached version it would appear I used the wrong tag (Template:non-free television screenshot should've been used) however on a technicality the previous tag would've still been correct as it was still taken from a web page however that's all irrelevant, Could you restore it when you're back on and I'll add the correct template, Thanks, –Davey2010Talk 16:42, 10 July 2017 (UTC)Reply
Apologies for the continued posts, As you've not been on all day I obviously wasn't sure when you'd next be on so I've gone to AN[1] and it's since been restored, Your name wasn't mentioned but thought I should mention here anyway, I'll bugger off now! :), Thanks, –Davey2010Talk 23:30, 10 July 2017 (UTC)Reply
Glad you found someone to help. I'd like to reply to this point, though: "on a technicality the previous tag would've still been correct as it was still taken from a web page". No, that isn't correct, because that isn't what the {{Non-free web screenshot}} tag is for. The tag quite clearly states: "This tag is not appropriate for images and media found on websites; it should be used for screenshots of websites only." —Bkell (talk) 23:55, 10 July 2017 (UTC)Reply
The template does state "This image is a screenshot of a copyrighted web page," .... The BBC Iplayer is media but what is it still? ... a web page isn't it?, I'm not trying to be awkward or pedantic but that's exactly went through my mind when uploading this image, Yes it's a screen shot of media however it's still on a webpage nonetheless which is why I believed I was technically correct,
That all said if you knew the correct template then why didn't you just change it ?, Ofcourse I'm not saying you should fix every mess up I make but deleting it over a minor issue (on my part) is rather silly isn't it ?,
Anyway no point arguing over it it's been restored so all's good in the hood as they say :), Happy editing, –Davey2010Talk 22:35, 11 July 2017 (UTC)Reply
"Yes it's a screen shot of media however it's still on a webpage nonetheless which is why I believed I was technically correct" — For the purposes of fair use, the source of the image is mostly irrelevant. What is important is the subject of the image and the way in which the image is being used. The subject of this image is a TV title card, not a website. I've edited Template:Non-free web screenshot to try to make this distinction clearer: "it should only be used when the subject of the image, not the source of the image, is a website."
"if you knew the correct template then why didn't you just change it ?" — You are asking me to make a legal claim, and I am not willing to do that. This isn't just a minor internal issue of categorization or something. A fair-use claim is a legal claim with legal consequences. I am not the one who is arguing for the inclusion of this image on Wikipedia, and so the burden is not on me to justify it with a fair-use claim. If you want to claim that it is legally acceptable to use this image in a Wikipedia article, then you have the duty to justify that with an appropriate fair-use claim.
"deleting it over a minor issue (on my part) is rather silly isn't it ?" — No, it's not silly at all. Copyright is a serious concern, and the Wikipedia non-free content policy is of fundamental importance here. I was following criterion F7 of the criteria for speedy deletion, a Wikipedia policy, when I deleted this non-free image with a clearly invalid fair-use claim. —Bkell (talk) 00:19, 13 July 2017 (UTC)Reply

Website screenshots

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Thanks for working on improperly tagged website screenshots. I'm currently going through Category:Screenshots of web pages and tagging some more. – Train2104 (t • c) 00:07, 18 July 2017 (UTC)Reply

Thanks! —Bkell (talk) 01:34, 18 July 2017 (UTC)Reply
I'll do the category in chunks...I'm also finding plain old F7 replaceable fair use in there. – Train2104 (t • c) 01:35, 18 July 2017 (UTC)Reply

Light Rail in Canberra

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Just wondering if you could explain deleting newspaper scans from the Light Rail in Canberra page? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Health Blogger 2000 (talkcontribs) 12:31, 27 July 2017 (UTC)Reply

As I explained in the file deletion summaries:
Copyright is a serious concern, and the Wikipedia non-free content policy is of fundamental importance here. I was following criterion F7 of the criteria for speedy deletion, a Wikipedia policy, when I deleted these non-free images that violated the non-free content policy. —Bkell (talk) 11:40, 28 July 2017 (UTC)Reply

Invitation to Admin confidence survey

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Hello,

Beginning in September 2017, the Wikimedia Foundation Anti-harassment tool team will be conducting a survey to gauge how well tools, training, and information exists to assist English Wikipedia administrators in recognizing and mitigating things like sockpuppetry, vandalism, and harassment.

The survey should only take 5 minutes, and your individual response will not be made public. This survey will be integral for our team to determine how to better support administrators.

To take the survey sign up here and we will send you a link to the form.

We really appreciate your input!

Please let us know if you wish to opt-out of all massmessage mailings from the Anti-harassment tools team.

For the Anti-harassment tools team, SPoore (WMF), Community Advocate, Community health initiative (talk) 19:52, 13 September 2017 (UTC)Reply

Hi. We're into the last five days of the Women in Red World Contest. There's a new bonus prize of $200 worth of books of your choice to win for creating the most new women biographies between 0:00 on the 26th and 23:59 on 30th November. If you've been contributing to the contest, thank you for your support, we've produced over 2000 articles. If you haven't contributed yet, we would appreciate you taking the time to add entries to our articles achievements list by the end of the month. Thank you, and if participating, good luck with the finale!

Butler

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I re-read my interaction this morning and realised that I probably came across as rather snarky. It was 1am when I posted, and after a long and stressful day - my apologies for being less polite than I should have been. Your change to the cathedral link is, of course, a good one. Cheers - SchroCat (talk) 08:47, 29 November 2017 (UTC)Reply

ArbCom 2017 election voter message

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Hello, Bkell. Voting in the 2017 Arbitration Committee elections is now open until 23.59 on Sunday, 10 December. All users who registered an account before Saturday, 28 October 2017, made at least 150 mainspace edits before Wednesday, 1 November 2017 and are not currently blocked are eligible to vote. Users with alternate accounts may only vote once.

The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to impose binding solutions to disputes between editors, primarily for serious conduct disputes the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the authority to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail.

If you wish to participate in the 2017 election, please review the candidates and submit your choices on the voting page. MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 18:42, 3 December 2017 (UTC)Reply

Category:Wikipedians who like NationStates

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Hey! Based on your edits to NationStates, I thought maybe you would be interested that I started a series of userboxes for the game. Feel free to add any or add your own!-🐦Do☭torWho42 () 05:37, 16 December 2017 (UTC)Reply

Better source request for File:Triangle VA.png

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Thanks for your upload to Wikipedia:

You provided a source, but it is difficult for other users to examine the copyright status of the image because the source is incomplete. Please consider clarifying the exact source so that the copyright status may be checked more easily. It is best to specify the exact Web page where you found the image, rather than only giving the source domain, search engine, pinboard, aggregator, or the URL of the image file itself. Please update the image description with a URL that will be more helpful to other users in determining the copyright status.

If you have uploaded other files, consider checking that you have specified their source in a complete manner. You can find a list of files you have uploaded by following this link. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page or me at my talk page. Thank you. ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 08:38, 28 October 2018 (UTC)Reply

File:L.A. Noire motion capture.jpg

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Hi Bkell, could you please reinstate the image File:L.A. Noire motion capture.jpg? The image clearly had an invalid fair use tag, but I will be sure to correct the tag as soon as the image is reinstated, as I believe it is suitable for inclusion on Wikipedia. Thanks – Rhain 02:01, 12 November 2018 (UTC)Reply

OK, I've restored the image. I replaced the clearly invalid fair-use tag with a notice that the image is missing information on its copyright and licensing status. Please fix this by adding an appropriate copyright tag and explaining why the use of this image satisfies all points of the Wikipedia non-free content policy. —Bkell (talk) 04:51, 12 November 2018 (UTC)Reply

ArbCom 2018 election voter message

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Hello, Bkell. Voting in the 2018 Arbitration Committee elections is now open until 23.59 on Sunday, 3 December. All users who registered an account before Sunday, 28 October 2018, made at least 150 mainspace edits before Thursday, 1 November 2018 and are not currently blocked are eligible to vote. Users with alternate accounts may only vote once.

The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to impose binding solutions to disputes between editors, primarily for serious conduct disputes the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the authority to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail.

If you wish to participate in the 2018 election, please review the candidates and submit your choices on the voting page. MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 18:42, 19 November 2018 (UTC)Reply

Chinchilla

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Thank you per Talk:Chinchilla#Un_Italicize_the_title. 2601:647:CB02:5034:4DDB:C6AD:B8A4:B2D4 (talk) 04:10, 28 April 2019 (UTC)Reply

ArbCom 2019 special circular

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Administrators must secure their accounts

The Arbitration Committee may require a new RfA if your account is compromised.

View additional information

This message was sent to all administrators following a recent motion. Thank you for your attention. For the Arbitration Committee, Cameron11598 02:58, 4 May 2019 (UTC)Reply

Administrator account security (Correction to Arbcom 2019 special circular)

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ArbCom would like to apologise and correct our previous mass message in light of the response from the community.

Since November 2018, six administrator accounts have been compromised and temporarily desysopped. In an effort to help improve account security, our intention was to remind administrators of existing policies on account security — that they are required to "have strong passwords and follow appropriate personal security practices." We have updated our procedures to ensure that we enforce these policies more strictly in the future. The policies themselves have not changed. In particular, two-factor authentication remains an optional means of adding extra security to your account. The choice not to enable 2FA will not be considered when deciding to restore sysop privileges to administrator accounts that were compromised.

We are sorry for the wording of our previous message, which did not accurately convey this, and deeply regret the tone in which it was delivered.

For the Arbitration Committee, -Cameron11598 21:03, 4 May 2019 (UTC)Reply

ArbCom 2019 election voter message

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 Hello! Voting in the 2019 Arbitration Committee elections is now open until 23:59 on Monday, 2 December 2019. All eligible users are allowed to vote. Users with alternate accounts may only vote once.

The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to impose binding solutions to disputes between editors, primarily for serious conduct disputes the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the authority to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail.

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ArbCom 2020 Elections voter message

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 Hello! Voting in the 2020 Arbitration Committee elections is now open until 23:59 (UTC) on Monday, 7 December 2020. All eligible users are allowed to vote. Users with alternate accounts may only vote once.

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ArbCom 2021 Elections voter message

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 Hello! Voting in the 2021 Arbitration Committee elections is now open until 23:59 (UTC) on Monday, 6 December 2021. All eligible users are allowed to vote. Users with alternate accounts may only vote once.

The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to impose binding solutions to disputes between editors, primarily for serious conduct disputes the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the authority to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail.

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Administrators will no longer be autopatrolled

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A recently closed Request for Comment (RFC) reached consensus to remove Autopatrolled from the administrator user group. You may, similarly as with Edit Filter Manager, choose to self-assign this permission to yourself. This will be implemented the week of December 13th, but if you wish to self-assign you may do so now. To find out when the change has gone live or if you have any questions please visit the Administrator's Noticeboard. 20:05, 7 December 2021 (UTC)

Merchandise giveaway nomination

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A token of thanks

Hi Bkell! I've nominated you (along with all other active admins) to receive a solstice season gift from the WMF. Talk page stalkers are invited to comment at the nomination. Enjoy! Cheers, {{u|Sdkb}}talk ~~~~~
 

MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 23:50, 31 December 2021 (UTC)Reply

How we will see unregistered users

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Hi!

You get this message because you are an admin on a Wikimedia wiki.

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.

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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.

Thank you. /Johan (WMF)

18:12, 4 January 2022 (UTC)

New administrator activity requirement

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The administrator policy has been updated with new activity requirements following a successful Request for Comment.

Beginning January 1, 2023, administrators who meet one or both of the following criteria may be desysopped for inactivity if they have:

  1. Made neither edits nor administrative actions for at least a 12-month period OR
  2. Made fewer than 100 edits over a 60-month period

Administrators at risk for being desysopped under these criteria will continue to be notified ahead of time. Thank you for your continued work.

22:52, 15 April 2022 (UTC)

Adolf Kunerth's modular square root algorithm

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Hi Bkell,

I read your biop on your page and noticed you are a Google software engineer with a PHD in algorithms.

Just thought I'd mention Adolf Kunerth's modular square root algorithm Kunerth's algorithm. I noticed an oblique reference to it in Dickson's Theory of Numbers (vol ii, p382-384) and got the original german paper from 1878. It actually does composite modula without the need to factor the modulus. I'd say it is the best algorithm on composite modula known. I've worked out that certain formulas of modulus can easily take the roots of certain residues, regardless of the size of the modulus. See the talk page on my wiki article on Kunerth to see how the root of 5 mod RSA260^2+18*RSA260^2+1 can be taken on a Raspberry PI 4 in a second or so.

I'm trying to get people to investigate kunerth's method to see if it can be turned into a regular square root algorithm that substantially solves the math problem. I'm wondering if you people at Google are interested.

Endo999 (talk) 22:09, 17 July 2022 (UTC)Reply

If you are still in Munich you might also look into the biop of Adolf Kunerth. He seems to have been a uni prof of either math or engineering, and he seems to have been Austrian, but I can't find out any other information on him. He might even be an alias since his math is powerful but there are only 4 articles in the Austrian Academy of Sciences pub. Endo999 (talk) 22:21, 17 July 2022 (UTC)Reply

Hi Endo999, interesting find! I haven't had time to look at it in detail yet, but thank you for investigating it. One word of caution: Make sure you aren't going so far as to include original research. A description of the algorithm as published is fine, but results about what can be done with a Raspberry Pi, for example, are certainly original research and cannot be included in Wikipedia.
I wonder if you can also find any reliable sources to help bolster the claim of notability. As the article is written now, this algorithm seems pretty obscure, with nothing to show it has been of interest since it was described 144 years ago. Can you find any references in published papers to anyone else ever using it or citing it for anything? Google Scholar might be helpful. —Bkell (talk) 00:19, 18 July 2022 (UTC)Reply
The citation in Dickson's Theory of Numbers vol ii p382-384 is notable enough, since Dickson's work is a very important number theory book. I have included some Mathematica uses of the algorithm on the Talk page (they aren't on the article page), and it is a notable finding that the modular square root of 5 mod RSA260^4+18*RSA260^2+1 can be found on a Raspberry PI in seconds. Noone has ever found a modular square root before of a 3500 composite modulus. No one that I know of has ever found the modular square root of 67*y mod RSA260 before. This is an RSA number that hasn't been factored yet. The main power of the algorithm is that it can find modular square roots without factoring the composite modulus. No other known modular square root algorithm can do this. Endo999 (talk) 01:12, 18 July 2022 (UTC)Reply
The Mathematica examples on the Talk page are acceptable because they are effectively examples of the Algorithm at work, and these show the algorithm to be the most powerful known for composite modula. It is actually a good question why this algorithm is so little known, but I am not in a position to say why that is the case at this moment. So the examples in Mathematica establish notability. Endo999 (talk) 01:49, 18 July 2022 (UTC)Reply
Notability is not the same as usefulness. An argument that this algorithm allows one to find square roots with large composite moduli is an argument for usefulness, but not an argument for notability. To establish notability, we need to show that the algorithm "has received significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject" (see WP:GNG). The fact that this algorithm is "so little known" suggests that it is actually not notable yet, even though it may be very useful. See Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not: Wikipedia is not a publisher of original thought, it is not a means of promotion, it is not a blog, and it is not a crystal ball. Wikipedia is not the place to promote this algorithm and tout its usefulness in order to make it become notable; we require notability to have already been established previously. And that requires significant coverage in reliable sources, not just demonstrations of usefulness. —Bkell (talk) 09:55, 18 July 2022 (UTC)Reply

DYK nomination of Cloud laboratory

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  Hello! Your submission of Cloud laboratory at the Did You Know nominations page has been reviewed, and some issues with it may need to be clarified. Please review the comment(s) at your nomination's entry and respond there at your earliest convenience. Thank you for contributing to Did You Know! Complex/Rational 21:38, 16 August 2022 (UTC)Reply

ArbCom 2022 Elections voter message

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Hello! Voting in the 2022 Arbitration Committee elections is now open until 23:59 (UTC) on Monday, 12 December 2022. All eligible users are allowed to vote. Users with alternate accounts may only vote once.

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November Articles for creation backlog drive

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Hello Bkell:

WikiProject Articles for creation is holding a month long Backlog Drive!
The goal of this drive is to reduce the backlog of unreviewed drafts to less than 2 months outstanding reviews from the current 4+ months. Bonus points will be given for reviewing drafts that have been waiting more than 30 days. The drive is running from 1 November 2023 through 30 November 2023.

You may find Category:AfC pending submissions by age or other categories and sorting helpful.

Barnstars will be given out as awards at the end of the drive.

There is a backlog of over 1000 pages, so start reviewing drafts. We're looking forward to your help! MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 13:23, 31 October 2023 (UTC)Reply

Image about mechanisms of self-harm - now in Polish :D

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Hi ;-)

Just letting you know, I had translated into Polish your illustration (diagram?) about mechanisms that lead to self--harm and what is happening afterwards. As I am slowly translating the article itself into Polish, the Polish version of that file will be really useful.

Thank you ;-)

-- Kaworu1992 (talk) 22:44, 4 November 2023 (UTC)Reply

PS. Link to the Polish version is here - https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Mechanizmy_samookaleczania_(PL).png Kaworu1992 (talk) 22:51, 4 November 2023 (UTC)Reply
I guess it came from File:Self-injury.svg? I'm glad the diagram will be useful! But I really only made some minor technical changes and am not the original source of the diagram. It was created by User:jleedev, who attributed the textual content and structure to LifeSIGNS. If you want to give an attribution for the original image, I think it would be better to attribute jleedev, not me. —Bkell (talk) 22:55, 4 November 2023 (UTC)Reply
I don't remember this, but the computer says I only converted a PDF to SVG, perhaps at MediaWiki's urging. No comment otherwise. jleedev (talk) 17:54, 5 November 2023 (UTC)Reply
Oh yes, OK, the original image was File:Self-injury.pdf, which was created by User:Cedars. So that's probably the best attribution. —Bkell (talk) 18:25, 5 November 2023 (UTC)Reply
Ah, okay, so I should also credit Cedars and jleedey? ;-) No prob ;-) I just need to understand how to change version of files? ;-)
Best wishes --Kaworu1992 (talk) 22:58, 6 November 2023 (UTC)Reply

ArbCom 2023 Elections voter message

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Hello! Voting in the 2023 Arbitration Committee elections is now open until 23:59 (UTC) on Monday, 11 December 2023. All eligible users are allowed to vote. Users with alternate accounts may only vote once.

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If you wish to participate in the 2023 election, please review the candidates and submit your choices on the voting page. If you no longer wish to receive these messages, you may add {{NoACEMM}} to your user talk page. MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 00:20, 28 November 2023 (UTC)Reply

Invitation to participate in a research

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Hello,

The Wikimedia Foundation is conducting a survey of Wikipedians to better understand what draws administrators to contribute to Wikipedia, and what affects administrator retention. We will use this research to improve experiences for Wikipedians, and address common problems and needs. We have identified you as a good candidate for this research, and would greatly appreciate your participation in this anonymous survey.

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BGerdemann (WMF) (talk) 19:21, 23 October 2024 (UTC) Reply

Reminder to participate in Wikipedia research

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Hello,

I recently invited you to take a survey about administration on Wikipedia. If you haven’t yet had a chance, there is still time to participate– we’d truly appreciate your feedback. The survey is anonymous and should take about 10-15 minutes to complete. You may read more about the study on its Meta page and view its privacy statement.

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BGerdemann (WMF) (talk) 00:17, 13 November 2024 (UTC) Reply