Wikiquote:Village pump archive 3

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Archives
2003 2004 2005 01-06/ 07-09 / 09-12 2006 01-05 / 06 / 07-09 / 10-11 '06 12 - '07 01 / 02 / 03 / 04 / 05-06 / 07 / 08-11 / 12 2008 01-01 / 01-08 / 01-08b / 01-08c

Originally posted to Wikiquote:Village pump from January 2005 till June 2005.

1 Village pump archive 3

[edit] Village pump archive 3

[edit] Www.wikiquote.org

Hi, from the new year each Wikimedia project's toppage, www.wikiXX.org is switching to a portal shared with every language instead of a redirect for English project. I created a portal for our project, Wikiquote. Please give a look to m:Www.wikiquote.org portal and make a comment on m:Talk:Www.wikiquote.org portal. If you have a skill to improve it (I am not skillful for such a desiging work), it is also appliciated. Cheers. --Aphaia 12:02, 30 Jan 2005 (UTC)

[edit] en: links

I notice a template page warning of obsolete links of the form en: instead of w:. Has this conversion been systematically addressed? Is there a Special:Old Pages we could troll for these links to change them or better a "TopBanana"-style report listing them? If not, could we ask for one to be generated from the latest data dump? User:Rmhermen

There has been no systematic changing of the obsolete links; thus far there has only been advisories to alter the deficient "en:" links to "w:" links wherever they are encountered. ~ Achilles 20:11, 1 Mar 2005 (UTC)

That is probably the most important formatting issue that exists here, but other formatting advisories include adding {{lynx}} to the bottom of pages to provide convenient links to some major directory pages, and to avoid colons (:) in section headings (and removing them from the ends of headings where they are unnecessary) because it makes directing links to those sections of pages more of a problem. ~ Achilles 22:45, 1 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Moving the category links to the bottom of the page, as you have been doing in your recent edits is also very helpful. It prevents unnecessary white space forming at the top of pages in many browsers. ~ Achilles 23:04, 1 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I was doing that because I was having trouble finding them when adding/fixing sort keys to [[Category:Author|lastname, firstname]] to keep them all properly alphabetized.

I notice Special: Newpages works. I am surprised to not see it appear on the main page or recent changes or something. It might aid checking that new pages contain the lynx and the correct Wikipedia link. Rmhermen 23:21, 1 Mar 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Date format preference

Why doesn't Wikiquote have an Preferences option for selecting Date Format? I imagine there are some practical concerns (e.g., the resulting links would look red unless and until someone created pages for each day of the Gregorian year and each year cited anywhere in Wikiquote articles, and what would those articles contain?), but it would help in standardizing date citations in Sourced sections of quote pages without causing unnecessary arguments. I volunteer to create the articles, work on standardizing dates, and adding links on the created date pages to speeches and such mentioned in Sourced sections, if that feature is enabled. — Jeff Q (talk) 01:50, 12 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Is there a Wiki markup for dates? How would a contributor notate 4-10-1920 so that we would know whether it referred to spring or autumn? --Eustace Tilley 10:41, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Wikipedia uses a date preference system that reformates dates when they are linked day month, year or month day year. This preference setting does not appear to be available on Wikiquote. x-x-xxxx of either meaning is never encouraged. Rmhermen 14:03, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

To elaborate on Rmhermen's statement, on Wikipedia, at least, dates are expected to be written either like April 5, 2005 or 5 April 2005 (and possibly slight variations on those), and they will be automatically displayed for each reader based on their Preferences settings. This avoids the ambiguity Eustace mentions, and allows people to see dates in the format they prefer, regardless of how an article writer added them. That capability does not appear to be enabled here. Are there any Wiki developers monitoring Wikiquote? Can someone describe what would have to be done to turn this feature on? — Jeff Q (talk) 02:55, 7 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I've enabled it now for en.wikiquote.org, en.wikibooks.org, en.wiktionary.org, and commons.wikimedia.org. (It's off by default and supported only for English currently.)

Since we've got so many wikis (over 600 including lots of small or barely-used ones) we can't really monitor them all for requests. If you can catch someone in #wikimedia-tech on irc.freenode.net, or drop a note to the wikitech-l mailing list [1] you'll have a better chance of getting something done. (Also, reports of software bugs and requests for fixes/features should go to our tracker at http://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/ ) --Brion VIBBER 03:42, 7 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Finding Long Quotes

Jeffq, I'm curious, how do you know that those pages that you mentioned are 1st and 7th-longest? And is there also a way to tell which page is the biggest when also taking into account all of the revisions history? I now also added a longish quote to the Martin Luther King, Jr. page about Vietnam, if anyone who is interested in the long quotes issue wants to take a look. But my general impression is that no one wants to formulate a policy on this issue, which is fine with me:) So the (non)-policy should be that as long as a quote is focused on a certain specific point, it's ok to include it regardless of its length, i.e. it would be determined by common sense and not by formal rules, at least for now. Sams 15:19, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Look under Special pages then Long pages. Rmhermen 16:42, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Oops, thanks. Sams 12:10, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Edits

Apparently this project has gotten really popular. My watchlist claims there have been 120,000 edits in the last 3 days. Or maybe it is a bug? Rmhermen 15:12, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I noticed that, too. It's gotta be a bug. I recall reviewing Recent Changes a few times in the past few days and being amused to see large chunks of time when I made 90%+ of all edits during my intense cleanup work. But this was on the order of 50-100 edits in a few hours. Even with your, Kalki, and Aphaia's similar busyness, plus the regular traffic, we could hardly have achieved 120,000 edits! I'd suspected that it had something to do with all this cleanup work, which has been rather uncharacteristic of Wikiquote editing patterns. — Jeff Q (talk) 17:59, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I would count on that being a bug... mine has similar misreads. I usually just keep an eye on recent changes, so I don't know how long this has been happening. ~ Kalki 18:19, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)

It seems a bug: I list 16 pages without talk and there have been 120,000 edits on those (same number!) I noticed this message on other projects where total edit number is provided. --Aphaia 20:46, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)

P.S. This bug was reported to developers as Bugzilla:1778. --Aphaia 21:06, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Subsection links broken?

Is anyone else having problems using subsection links (e.g., Blackadder#Dish and Dishonesty)? I've found that nearly all the subheadings (at least two levels down) I've tried to jump to from other pages go to the article, but fail to jump to the subsection. (I can sometimes get Blackadder#Chains to work, but haven't detected a pattern.) I first saw this when trying to fix a link from War to Politics#Iraq War, which also wasn't working for me. (When I tested it just now with this page, it worked once, then failed a second time. Neither Blackadder link is working correctly at the moment.) It happens whether I use spaces or underscores in the link. Is it just me? — Jeff Q (talk) 03:11, 2 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Three links the above work for me (FireFox 1.0.0). Hmmm strange. Subsection links didn't work for you only on this project or on other s too? Or now they work for you too? (I hope so ...) --Aphaia 05:10, 2 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I was using Opera 7.23. I just tested Firefox 1.0.1, and it worked perfectly. I went back to Opera, and now only "Chains" didn't work. I'm getting closer to switching to Firefox every day… — Jeff Q (talk) 05:50, 2 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] New deletion policy discussion

I'm afraid I've been remiss in bringing an important point to the Wikiquote community. The new sysops (including myself) are working hard to fill in some gaps in Wikiquote policies and documents, now that we have more hands to do the work. One item we're working on is Wikiquote:Deletion policy, which was copied over from Wikipedia's version and edited down toward the more basic version that's been practiced here. In my zeal to get this going, I forgot that all Wikiquotians should have a chance to consider these issues. I invite everyone to drop in there and participate in codifying and possibly modifying our practices. — Jeff Q (talk) 18:13, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

We're also working on Proposed Votes for deletion and Proposed Votes for deletion archive pages, to give a view of some of the possible changes we've been discussing at Wikiquote talk:Deletion policy. Take a look there and feel free to join in the discussions on the Talk pages. Jeff Q 10:45, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Latest news

There are some interesting news

Yahoo! hosting. See Wikimedia:Home.
Wikimania in this summer.
Wikiquote visitors are increasing and now we are at 26,444 th in the Alexa ranking (average in three months). On April 1, we were almost at 10,000 th, and as for today, April 8, at 14,456 @_@

Now I feel our community very activated and have a good atmosphere. Keep it up together.

--Aphaia 07:59, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I notice that that Wikimedia page contains the erroneous claim that Wikiquote is only five months old. Following the Wikiquote link on that page leds to a second page that claims that Wikiquote was started in 2004. Unfortunately you can only edit those pages with Board approval. Who do we have to notify? Rmhermen 23:03, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Hmmm Wikiquote started in 2003. 2004 was the year of langauge subdomain creation. Five months old should be an error. Thank you for your notice. Rmherman, could you give me those links?

Check the Latest News section on http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Home. You will see "As of March 25, Wikiquote has 10,000 articles in total, 5 months after its inception." --Eustace Tilley 03:30, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)

As for who ... how about me? ;-) I'm an editor of WMF. --Aphaia 03:25, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Fixed. Please see Wikimedia:Home. --Aphaia 05:52, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)

You are magical! You changed wikimediafoundation's Home without changing it! Is the Latest News section on that page automatically composed from Latest News sections of the various projects?

Thanks ;-) Latest news is using a separate template, like our Main Page. As for synch to other projects, it should be done manually ;-X. Your feedback about site is always welcome on m:Wikimedia site feedback by all editors! Aphaia

[2] is the one which claims Wikiquote began in 2004. Rmhermen 15:47, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Thank you for your all information; I found I misunderstand the day of inception of our project. It started on an inactive Wikipedia, and then have its own and proper site as a part of Wikipedia on July 13, 2003, and later its own domain, current "wikiquote.org". Perhaps Kaliki remember those old days. So the correct data is "21 months from its inception" ... As for the date "wikiquote.org" started, Kalki or other oldbies. do you have any information? --Aphaia 08:14, 11 Apr 2005 (UTC)

- No rush on this, but at some point, could somebody clue me in as to what "Wikimania" is? --RPickman 02:27, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)
  - Wikimania is an international meetup in this summer, in Frankfurt, Germany. Please visit the site for further information. ;-) --Aphaia 03:25, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Unified user accounts?

Could someone also let us know what is the status of having a unified user account for the various wiki projects? Currently if I would like to contribute to wikiquote in another language, then I'd need to start another user account there that is completely separate? There's a comment about this here above at #Wikipedia_integration, with a link to metawiki, but that comment was made more than half a year ago... Sams 04:39, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)

As for single login policy, go to meta and read relevant pages like m:Single login policy; all project-wide, hence development related topics are on meta. --Aphaia 16:01, 11 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] blocking of Gumba ad verbatim

Sorry for late report, I blocked Gumba ad verbatim last night to hinder his further edit. (his contribs). I appreciate hereby Jni, who reported it first, Walkingshaw and Kim Bruning, who came from English Wikipedia to revert edits of Gumba ad verbatim.

On Gumba a.v. I put 24 hours blocking And I asked him not to do so any more and if he does again, so he will be stopped again. from log:

*17:10, 8 Apr 2005 Aphaia blocked "User:Gumba ad verbatim" 
 with an expiry time of 24 hours (vandalism)

I would like you to discuss here as follow:

if my reaction is acceptable or not,
what kind of blocking and banning policy we should have
- because we seem to lack it currently; If I recall correctly English Wikiqutoe has not its own policy on this matter.

Any comments and suggestions are welcome. --Aphaia 09:53, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I propose Wikiquote community adopts and starts to follow this rule from English Wikipedia's blocking policy (slightly edited by me to combine several facets of en-wp policy into two sentences): Sysops may also block new user accounts that make lots of disruptive edits, for any length of time or permanently, at their discretion. Sockpuppets or public accounts that were created to violate Wikiquote policy should be blocked permanently. This would allow infinite blocks for Gumba ad verbatim and other user accounts that have never contributed even a single good edit. Time-limited blocks for anons are a different matter. If Wikiquote does not have its own blocking policy, then English Wikipedia has one that would make a good starting point. However, I think the en-wp policy is too long and its verbiage is too awkward for a smaller project like Wikiquote. Maybe start from the "Vandalism" and "Disruption" clauses and add other cases as need arises? jni 11:13, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Your action was both just and merciful. Perhaps a vandal who uses a Latinate username may someday become a contributor.--Eustace Tilley 11:52, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)

We do need a policy, simple to start out with, and one that accomodates our still fairly small set of active admins while not unduly hindering potentially useful anonymous editors. However, Gumba ad verbatim, who vandalized 41 pages in as many minutes and taunts the Wikiquote community with his user page, does not fall into this category. Kalki has blocked anon vandals for 30 days for less provocation. I see no reason not to extend a similar block to Gumba. — Jeff Q (talk) 12:09, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I stand corrected on one aspect above — the taunt apparently came from an anonymous user upset with the vandalism. It's great that community members chip in to revert vandalism, but it's not a good idea to respond in kind. However, the volume of vandalism still argues for a longer-term block for Gumba. — Jeff Q (talk) 12:15, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I think Aphaia chose the briefer block in order to distinguish the registered-vandal from the anonymous-vandal. This acknowledges the mischief-maker's making the minor but not negligible acknowledgement of Wikiquote protocols.--Eustace Tilley 14:04, 10 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Why did you revert 131.211.51.113's response to Gumba? "make your time" is from All Your Base and to me at least appears to be of more value than Gumba's copy-paste repetition. It's a first-class example of merciless editing.--Eustace Tilley 14:39, 10 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Eustace, I reverted vandalism to a user's page, not a response (which belongs on their talk page, as you well know). I don't believe that committing violence against someone committing violence serves any purpose in a community project. The Wikiquote community may decide that a user page is not appropriate, but a single user replacing the content of a user page, however inane, put there by the user himself, is vandalism. (As far as the content goes, it was "you'll never win", which is exactly the same kind of taunt I've seem in some many acts of vandalism that I and the other sysops have been working to revert. It's obvious why I mistook it for a comment from Gumba, who, I will repeat, deliberately vandalized 41 pages in less than a single hour. Nevertheless, I will treat user pages as belonging to each user, and article space as community property, until the community decides otherwise or I am relieved of my adminship.) If you feel Gumba ad verbatim's user page is inappropriate for Wikiquote, why don't you nominate it in WQ:VFD? And STOP REARRANGING DISCUSSIONS! You seem to be going out of your way to create the problems you're complaining about, in order to justify your mailing list argument. — Jeff Q (talk) 07:09, 11 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Jeffq, I have two questions. Did you look at the other contributions of the person whose change to Gumba's page you reverted? Did you recognize his comment?

Thank you for your all feedback. I am sorry for that I left this taunt; partly I was merciless then and partly I was simply tired --- it was dawn rather than midnight in my country and it was just after some hours I cared for Yahoo! press release as translation coordnator, but for the involved parties such my situation might be irrevant. So I hereby apologize both Gamba and the community I left this page and took no action.

Now Would we separate our discussions into two, for this particular case and the general discussion on our policies? --Aphaia 07:51, 11 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Gamba

Though I put 24 hours blocking on Gamba, I don't oppose to expand it. He troubled at least three users; and I heard Ed Poor offered help privately to Anthere, fortunately then we hadn't to bother him.

Proposed 1 month block is not merciless from my view. Specially, if Gamba will back and act on a bad faith, so I won't hesitate to block him in two weeks or a month. But I wouldn't like to rely parmanent block too much. Even he is a part of community theoretically, I would like to wait the time we set rules. --Aphaia 07:51, 11 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Blocking policy

I think we can start with very simple policy and adoptation from Wikipedia is also helpful. My principal ideas are:

A sysop can block an user both registered and unregistered, if they act inproperly.
If a sysop blocks an user without community concensus, the length of banning should be within a month except cases particular described
- spammer, particularly commercial spam, from an registered account can be blocked parmanently.
- open account
- sockpuppet, in particular on voting.
IP address, or anonymous users shouldn't be banned parmanently. Blocking on them should be within a year.
As for banning length, the banning with agreement of the community might be less than one year. It doesn't prevent a same user is banned repeatedly.

--Aphaia 07:51, 11 Apr 2005 (UTC)

And scanning Special:Log/block, I found a pattern of IP addresses of spammer(s), which made me doubt if those addresses were used by a same person or group. See below:

07:48, 10 Apr 2005 Kalki blocked "User:221.196.195.162" with an expiry time of 7 days (spam vandal)
07:56, 7 Apr 2005 Jeffq blocked "User:221.196.195.231" with an expiry time of 7 days (Spam vandalism of 10 pages.)
07:24, 19 Mar 2005 Kalki blocked "User:221.196.99.2" with an expiry time of 30 days (spam vandal)
05:13, 15 Mar 2005 Kalki blocked "User:221.196.197.66" with an expiry time of 30 days (spam vandal)

Possible range blocking for them includes:

221.196.195.162-221.196.195.231: 221.196.195.192/27 etc.
221.196.195.162-221.196.197.66: 221.196.196.0/24 etc.
221.196.99.2-221.196.195.213: 221.196.128.0/18 etc.
221.196.99.2-221.196.196.66: 221.196.128.0/18 etc.

Besides if we apply range blocking to those addresses or not, range blocking policy would be better to discuss here.

--Aphaia 20:32, 12 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I wouldn't use range blocks against isolated incidents of spam. Only when the flood of garbage is too high to deal with the rollback and with single-IP blocks and only for duration of 24 hours or less. Otherwise it is too easy to block innocent people. Even in Wikipedia, which gets tens of times more vandalism than we, range blocks are seldomly used. I recall using that feature once or twice in three months and never for a span larger than /24. jni 09:59, 13 Apr 2005 (UTC)

If I miss the basic line of your thoughts, I think your introduced ideas are kind and good. We should be more prudent to place range blocks. Personally I don't hesiate to place range blocking those chinese spammers in the mid term, but I admit there is a possibility to lose potential editors. So if we follow the English Wikipedia way, it is better to state clearly range blocks are placed in case of emergency and only. Because of its emergency, the duration should be not so long. 24 hours in maximum sounds to me appropriate.

I try to summarize those discussions above on Wikiquote:Blocking policy. --Aphaia 20:35, 13 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Interwiki links

Is there a way to make an interwiki link here? I tried q and it didn't work. - Hephaestos 17:07 20 Jul 2003 (UTC)

We use w: or en: to link back to the Wikipedia. What is q? Are you talking about links to Meatball or something? Nanobug 19:03 23 Jul 2003 (UTC)

No Hep is saying is there a way of linking from other wikis to here. But no there is not yet a way. -fonzy

So we have to keep using external links until q is set up in the other wikis.

You can however use wikiquote templates in Wikipedia.

I tried using en:, but it resulted in bold text that was not a link. w: worked. --Eustace Tilley 15:10, 3 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Just to tie up this old thread, let me point out that, at this posting, w: is now used to link to Wikipedia, q: is used to link a Wikipedia article to Wikiquote, and the list of prefixes for interwiki links (at least for en:Wikiquote and en:Wikipedia) can be found via the Special pages link in the Toolbox (on the left side of every page, using the default Monobook skin), under List of Wikimedia wikis. — Jeff Q (talk) 01:42, 4 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Is it better to add those interwiki markup to Wikiquote:How to edit a page or have a separate page including other tricks like {{PAGENAME}}? --Aphaia 07:27, 4 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Perhaps we could add a box or two on "Edit a page" for w: (Wikipedia) and wikt: (Wiktionary), the two most common ones? Perhaps also one example of a link to a non-English wiki? We could also provide a link to the List of Wikimedia wikis for a complete list. As far as {{PAGENAME}} goes, that's not something a starting editor is likely to run into, is it? Should we add that to Wikiquote:Template messages, since it looks like a template? I'm not sure. I think I need to get some sleep to think more clearly. — Jeff Q (talk) 10:30, 4 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Hoping a good sleep ;-) Well agreed {{PAGENAME}} and similar technics is not for newbies so it would be better not to mention "How to Edit". We can put a link to more closer help of MediaWiki. I recommend w: wikt: and Wikisource: as for early introduced interwiki tags. Interlang tag like fr: or de: would be worthy to mention and promote other language projects ;-) --Aphaia 13:18, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

There are still a lot of folks who are adding incorrectly formatted Wikipedia links, like en:TITLE, en:wikipedia:TITLE or wikipedia:en:TITLE to articles, probably as a holdover from older wiki practices. As I suggested above, I've added a very terse example of interwiki links at How to edit a page, but I suspect there are other places in our still-evolving documentation that may have outdated information. If anyone can point me to documentation or help articles that have that old data, I'll be happy to fix them. We also need to have a more concise list of project prefixes than List of Wikimedia wikis, which can be somewhat confusing to decipher, and doesn't provide some common prefixes; e.g., wikt: for en:Wiktionary, m: for Wikimedia Meta-Wiki (aka Meta). Such a list could link to LoWW for details, but provide the prefixes most frequently used on en:Wikiquote. — Jeff Q (talk) 22:40, 25 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I have no idea which those older formats are mentioned - I suspect it is even outsides of the project, so we can't erase it completely. Anyway I agree with you, to Jeff, to add this information to "How to Edit". And I propose to make a section on FAQ - supposingly interwiki question might be one of projectwide FAQs . --Aphaia 23:42, 25 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Blockquotes

There's the HTML element 'blockquote', perfectly suited for Wikiquote, but not used -- why?

Since it is a Wiki we try to keep the use of HTML to a minimum. See here for more explanation, in the section "Why not use HTML" (about half way down). Nanobug 19:03 23 Jul 2003 (UTC)

It's fine to not use blockquote for entering quotes but why is it not used for displaying them?

It is not obvious how to add semantics to information entered with ordinary wiki syntax. The Wiki engine cannot reliably emit <blockquote> </blockquote> in the proper places unless the contributor gives it sufficient hints. A contributor to the Abraham_Lincoln page (for example) needs to figure out only that the quote begins with one asterisk, and the source with two asterisks. Wiki translates that into nested lists because it always does, and the resulting visual presentation is not unacceptable. No special logic is required. If an author happens to have uttered a memorable list himself, the contributor can write

* I have nothing to offer but

** blood

** toil

** tears

** sweat

*** The condensed Winston Churchill

and get

I have nothing to offer but
- blood
- toil
- tears
- sweat
  - The condensed Winston Churchill

--Eustace Tilley 00:55, 4 Apr 2005 (UTC)

The presentation/design of the quotes is just confusing. This site need a graphic designer.

I agree that it would be neat to have more semantic markup. The Abraham_Lincoln page consists of the repeated sequence

<ul>
 <li>The memorable quotation
   <ul>
    <li>Source and circumstances of the memorable quotation</li>
   </ul>
  </li>
</ul>

The CSS technician in me would prefer something like

<div class="q">
 <div class="t">The memorable quotation</div>
 <span class="s">Source and circumstances of the memorable quotation</span>
</div>

but the problem, again, is how the Wiki engine can distinguish quote from source unless the contributor is somehow required to make the markup. Solve that problem, and then graphic designers can provide style sheets to suit. --Eustace Tilley 00:55, 4 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Recently perhaps on wiktionary-l and/or foundation-l, a new wiki tag for verse quote was proposed. In my opinion what we have to do is a proposal of our expecting layout and hope a dev to give a feature to this new layout. --Aphaia 13:13, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Emphasis

Several pages have emphasis added to some quotations, or to some parts of quotations. Examples are W. H. Auden, Sweat of the Damned, Pride and Prejudice, and Ulysses, among others. If this emphasis is part of the original work (e.g. a book) it makes sense to leave it there. But if we have added the emphasis, to make the quotations or part thereof stand out from the rest, I think we should remove the emphasis, as each reader should decide for themselves which quotes are more important or significant than others, and the text should speak for itself. If no-one disagrees with this concept, shall we add something to this effect in Manual of style? And something on pages where the emphasis is part of the original work like "Emphasis is as shown in the original" or words to that effect?) Nanobug 18:57, 27 Aug 2003 (UTC)

I believe emphasis should sometimes be used, especially to point out more famous portions of larger quoatations, as I have done in George Santayana, Chief Joseph and in some of the above mentioned pages. I do not think it should be ruled out as an instrument of presentation. All use of quotation is a process of selection for presentation, of that which is found to be significantly profound, humorous, instructive, or otherwise interesting.

I think a general guideline against emphasis on derogatory remarks might be appropriate, but even that not an absolute rule, any more than exclusion of such quotations if the author is known to have declared them, and they reveal something significant about his or her character.

As this compendium grows it might be helpful to others for those contributing or editing to add emphasis to those quotes or portions of quotes that they feel especially significant. I do agree it could be overdone, and in some extreme cases could be detrimental to an overall appreciation of the author or a literary work, but I do not think this would generally be the case. --Kalki 2003*09*04 00:44 UTC

I, as well as others, have used bolding to emphasize passages or entire quotations that we find to be especially significant or notable. I do seek to continue to encourage the use of this form of presentation, as I think it can be very useful in drawing the eye to major passages and statements, especially on pages with a great deal of material. It may not be perceived as necessary but I (and, I believe, others as well) do find it appropriate, and useful. (I personally rather dislike the blandness of many pages that have no bolding or other use of typography to draw the attention of the eye to at least some of the more significant statements.)

As I noted in my original comment on this issue last year, I am aware that this could be excessively employed, but the only guideline that I have thus far suggested is that passages that are innately derogatory should not be so emphasized. Even this, though I consider it a good practical guideline, I have not and do not seek to make an absolute rule.

I think bolding is generally preferable to italics for such purposes on electronic pages, because it is more noticeable, and italics have often been used in the original documents or statements— bolding is thus more obviously an editorial addition within Wikiquote. On the rarer occasions where bolding or capitalization is used in the original for emphasis these can be retained or omitted as seems appropriate.

Anyone well acquainted with me would perceive that I am a person who recognizes a need for establishing some useful and convenient rules and guidelines for many procedures, but who strongly prefers that in nearly all endeavors there be a minimum of rules improperly imposed as if they were absolutes, and an avoidance of any rules or actions based upon casual presumptions or unwarranted suppositions. I know that others do, and expect that others will disagree with me on many issues, but hope that relatively minor disputes, or even major ones, will not be seen as indications or causes of enmity. ~ Kalki 00:59, 1 Jul 2004 (UTC) [This indented section originally was posted elsewhere, but probably should be here. ~ Kalki 18:40, 5 Jul 2004 (UTC)]

I strongly feel that all statements are subject to various interpretations, understandings, and misunderstandings, but that does not mean that all statements are created equal— they are not, and never will be. Perhaps no two statements that make any sense at all can have totally equal worth. There can, and should be a transcendence of biases, but I choose to not even pretend that there can be a NPOV when it comes to selection and presentation of quotations, and that if someone finds some more noteable than others, they should generally be free to indicate it. I realize there can be disputes over this, but feel a few disputes about what should or should not be emphasized are better than a general blandness. ~ Kalki 19:19, 5 Jul 2004 (UTC)

As an advocate of semantic markup, I would favor a markup for contributor-added emphasis that would be distinct from emphasis in the original. That way those who value such emphasis can enable it in their stylesheets, and those who value the Ur-text will not be distracted by intrusive typography. --Eustace Tilley 19:10, 7 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Quotes by non-famous people

I have several quotations on my Quotes Page that, though extremely apposite (and humorous), are not by famous people. Is there a place for such quotations or are we only going for Great Words by Great People? On one hand I know this isn't a blog, but on the other hand some of these are real gems. - Montrealais

There is definitely a place for quotations from a great range of people, from the very famous, through to slightly famous, and even to witty or insightful comments from your next door neighbor (although in the latter case, unless your next door neighbor was famous in some degree, you would probably add their quotes to Anonymous). Nanobug 13:28, 31 Aug 2003 (UTC)

What about a section of quotes from Wikipedians? :) Angela

I think that inclusion of such quotes on personal User pages is entirely appropriate. If anyone wishes to submit them for other pages, there could be some kind of nomination process developed for inclusion on a specified theme page —in these early stages, a quotation perhaps only needing 7 user votes or so; or even creation of a new Author page —but this perhaps should require at least 4 quotations deemed worthy of attention, and at least 4 votes by Sysops or such, and even more as Wikiquote grows more widely visited and popular. Kalki 07:55, 14 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Forgive my cutting in but wouldn't "(...) 4 votes by Sysops or such" give Sysops the editorial authority they should not have? A sysop's vote should be no more and no less important than any other users vote. Now... About the idea itself - I've been pondering a similar one lately and I've come to the conlusion that the best place for such quotations would be a separate page entitle Quotes by Wikiquotians (or whatever) to which everybody would have access with no votes for inclusion. Primarily becouse such a system seems awfully un-Wiki - it's not free and open to all anymore. Wether this page should be in the main namespace or in Wikiquote: is debatable. I'd go for main (after all... those are quotes, are they not? :)). --TOR 13:08, 23 Nov 2004 (UTC)

It can be useful to distinguish between a quote and an aphorism. Samuel Gompers' "More" and Ronald Reagan's "Tear down this wall!" are both quotes, but they are unlike the work of Pascal or Wilde or Lec or Bierce. Non-famous people can certainly author memorable aphorisms. --Eustace Tilley 12:02, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Search problem

I tried searching for "Elliot" and it gives no matches despite the presence of the page JimElliot. Am I doing something wrong, or is there a problem? --DavidFraser 10:22, 6 Dec 2004 (UTC) Found out on IRC it was a problem that was fixed - working fine now. Davidfraser 14:06, 11 Dec 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Random Quote

I see you have a way to randomly bring up a quote page. Is there a way given a certain page display a random quote. I would like to use this so I can integrate it with a small (some what silly) app I made that displays Futurama quotes on a PC. The current set or quotes I’m using is taken from, the Slashdot website. I was considering making my own database to store a better range of quotes, and also quotes for other things, but now I have found this I would like much more to adapt it to the site for obvious reasons (if this is ok or possible). I was thinking something like Link http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/simpsions/Special:Randomquote reply is Homer: doh

or something like that Thanks for your help (hope I edited this correctly) -- 210.11.193.121 23:13, 6 Dec 2004

I'm not exactly sure what you're asking for, because you talk about random quotes from Wikiquote, Slashdot, and your own app. As far as Wikiquote goes, the Random page link in the Navigation box on every Wikiquote pages is just a URL that brings up a random Wikiquote page. You can bookmark it or invoke from within your app (as an HTTP GET, I suppose) to fetch a random page. If you only want random quotes from a single article (e.g., Futurama or The Simpsons), please realize that Wikiquote — in fact, all Wikis that I'm aware of — are article-focused, not text-fragment focused. The entire Wiki retrieval system is based on the encyclopedia format (presenting a document) rather than a dictionary or fortune cookie program (presenting only a sentence or paragraph). You'd have to collect the data from Wikiquote periodically and assimilate it into your quote app. — Jeff Q (talk) 02:14, 12 Mar 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Wikiquotes - Abortion

I was reading wikiquotes on abortion and I found this under the pro-life section:

"A person's a person, no matter how small." Dr. Seuss (Horton Hears a Who!, 1954) (Note: Abortion was not actually the express topic of this quote)

Even with the "note" at the end - why would that quote be there? As a matter of fact, especially with that note at the end isn't it apparent this quote had nothing to do with abortion. Dr. Seuss wrote children's books, from this quote one cannot tell whether he is pro-choice or pro-life. I know lots of people who love children, and who have children, but are pro-choice. So the fact that Dr. Seuss obviously loved children and therefore would be pro-life makes no sense at all.

That quote would be rather appropriate for the pro-life argument (and perhaps is used by PL proponents), but as it is taken out of context, I've removed it from the Abortion article. I also added a note to the Talk:Abortion page to indicate how it might still be cited in certain circumstances. — Jeff Q (talk) 02:08, 7 Mar 2005 (UTC)

This is worth a FAQ writeup. I can easily imagine someone referencing "It is logical. The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few. - Spock" as a rather appropriate pro-choice argument, and "If it were done, when ‘tis done, then ‘twere well It were done quickly. - Shakespeare" for the morning-after pill. "Quotes-by-category" is not as harmless as it seems. "Quotes-by-author," I think, is always NPOV.--Eustace Tilley 10:50, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Speedy Deletion

I marked several articles for deletion, some via VFD, some via Speedy Deletion. But it seems that the articles stay longer on Speedy than on Votes for Deletion. Is Speedy not being used here? Rmhermen 05:02, 13 Mar 2005 (UTC)

vfd was added earlier here, and I wasn't actively monitoring Speedy until now. I will attempt to address some of the backlog there today and tomorrow. I generally prefer to revise an improperly created page on a valid subject rather than deleting it, but of course, some simply are not appropriate to retain at all, and these can get deleted swiftly. ~ Kalki

On a related note, Special:Shortpages contains a number of pages with zero content, or "hi", etc. These would all be speedy deleted on Wikipedia. Would you prefer them to just be blanked, a procedure currently discouraged on Wikipedia, which does though have more admins doing the deleting tasks? Rmhermen 00:47, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

How does one go about nominating for speedy deletion? Bisexual seems to cry out for it... MosheZadka 16:57, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Put {{delete}] at the article top, if you find such contributions in the next time. Thank you! --Aphaia 17:08, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)

It's often helpful, but not required, to use the {{db|REASON}} tag instead, which allows you to include a reason for nominating the article (e.g., {{db|no quotes, only personal opinion}}). The REASON text will appear in the delete message at the top of the article. More information, including a list of reasons for speedy deletion, can be found at Wikiquote:Speedy deletions. — Jeff Q (talk) 22:46, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Quotation Copyright Rules

I wanted to create a page for Erich Fromm and add some quotes of his. Do I need to ask permission from the publisher even if using quotation marks and a full citation? If so, how should I go about doing this?--Golden Eternity 02:14, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Almost all quotations from modern sources are used under fair use provisions of copyright laws. Short quotations less than a few sentences long of any author's work is usually considered fair use, and can be used without permission. It also is always helpful when a citation of original sources can be provided, as well as links to further information on authors and their works. ~ Kalki 13:10, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Odd pages

Using Special:Old pages as a way to find large numbers of improper en: links to change to w: links, I have found a number of odd pages that probably need more changes. Ludoviko Zamenhof, Giovanni Giolitti and Leon R. Yankwich contain long list of the same quote translated into a number of different languages. Alexander_Gode consists entirely of a single quotation embedded in an image. What should I do with these? Rmhermen 16:34, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

The lists of multilingual translations that exist on some pages were early experiments that have been rejected, and when you encounter these, most of the list can be removed, retaining only the original language and English versions. I have just turned the page with the imaged quote into a standard format page, and moved the link to the image to the talk page. ~ Kalki 20:16, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

[edit] What qualifies as a "quotation"?

Over on Wiktionary we're wondering what to do regarding collecting citations and quotations and some have suggested that Wikiquote is the correct place for such things.

I've just read the main introductory pages of Wikiquote but I can't find any place where it is clarified just what kind of quotations are sought. My intuition would be that Wikiquote is interested in aspects such as famous people's views on various topics or insightful or witty statements on various topics.

A dictionary needs to collect citations of a word as used by many authors in different domains and in different eras in order to determine the various senses of the word and how those senses change over the years. Because of this, many citations will be quite mundane and dry even though they may be from famous authors. Does Wikiquote still have a place for them?

I believe a Wiktionary contributor has added a collection of "tidal wave" citations to Wikiquote but I'm unable to locate them using the "Search" button. In any case, I think it would be beneficial to Wikiquote to define which qualities make a quotation worthy of inclusion here. — Hippietrail 00:48, 20 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Tidal wave does look odd as it is organized by year. But many of the quotes certainly look appropriate to me. Does Wiktionary not intend to collect their own lists of first usages of discrete meanings like the OED does? Rmhermen 17:53, 21 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I hadn't heard of using Wikiquote to collect word or phrase usage for etymological purposes. It's an interesting idea. I can see why the Tidal wave material is organized by year, however — it was moved from Wiktionary, where that purpose and this organization makes sense. — Jeff Q (talk) 19:40, 21 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Hippertral, you seems to guess rightly. Quotes for etymological and usage are necessary to build a dictionary but it is a bit different from what Wikiqutoe aims; your idea sounds to me very similar to Wikidata, proposed by GeraldM (see wiktionary-l and meta), a cross-project data archives for "universal Wiktionary". I hope both Wikiquote and such archives give a good influecne to each other. --Aphaia 19:36, 22 Mar 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Maximal length of a quote?

Should we have a policy with regard to the length of a quote? See for example Noam Chomsky, I've added a few long quotes there. One approach is to simply limit the maximal number of characters that a quote may have to some absolute value. A second approach is to look at it in relative terms, i.e. adding a quote from a speech where the speaker is making a certain point might result in a lengthy quote, but if it's a 3 hour speech, then relative to the entire speech it's still, say, 50 times smaller than the whole thing. A full speech should be on wikisource and not wikiquote. So the policy in this 2nd approach is that if the quote is no more than 1/x (for some x) of the whole thing, then it's ok. A third approach is not to limit individual quotes, but to have a policy that limits the total size of the page, like in wikipedia. A fourth approach, which is de facto what we have so far I guess, is not to limit anything, so that a quote can take as much space as needed in order to make the point. I don't see a big problem with the 4th approach, meaning that there would be no policy about this. The 3rd approach is also ok, but a size limit can be quite large imho. The 2nd approach can also be ok, x=1 means wikisource, and wikisource should also have a policy on whether other small values like x=2 or x=3 are also appropriate there, and wikiquote would be restricted to a higher value of x. This issue can viewed in a general way as what should be the relation between wikiquote and wikisource. Sams 09:26, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Prevention Is Bad, Wait Until Someone Gets Hurt

Your efforts to quantify potential approaches are commendable, but is this really perceived as an issue at this point? I'm in favor of waiting until something becomes a problem before we worry about choosing one or more solutions. (Of course, being the instigator of and a major contributor to the 1st- and 7th-longest Wikiquote pages, I'm perhaps a bit biased toward avoiding proscriptive limits in general. ☺) Seriously, I wouldn't be concerned unless and until people start complaining. — Jeff Q (talk) 10:50, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

[edit] There Is Already Bleeding

how is this for an example of too long - Closing session of the 5th Meeting on Globalization and Development held in Havana, Cuba. And not just the title. Do we have a transwiki procedure? Rmhermen 03:38, 28 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Well Closing session of the 5th Meeting on Globalization and Development held in Havana, Cuba seems to be good to move Wikisource ... I prefer a quote within 10 lines or so, but it is my personal taste. --Aphaia 05:10, 28 Mar 2005 (UTC)

[edit] True, That Looks Bad

Wow, that is absurdly long! Not only does that violate the principle of not including full works, but I have to wonder whether there may be copyright issues that might keep it out of Wikisource, too. Does Castro copyright his speeches? (I guess that would be ironic, but you never know.)

Castro copyright would not be unprecedented--Eustace Tilley 16:04, 10 Apr 2005 (UTC)

As far as excerpted works, I prefer to keep quotes down their pithiest minimum (with some exceptions for cinematic dialog), but I have no problem with a paragraph or two that can't easily be reduced. — Jeff Q (talk) 06:34, 28 Mar 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Moving Issues

So how do we go about moving it? I would also nominate Polybius which just got moved here from Wikipedia. Perhaps they thought they were moving it to Wikisource. Rmhermen 14:45, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)

If there are no copyright issues we should move Castro's speech to Wikisource; it looks like it might have been created before that project existed, or was just getting started. The Polybius "quotes" also seem a bit excessive for here, but I do agree with others there shouldn't be any pre-set cut-off on how long a quote can be. That they do make a cohesive set of assertions should be a general guideline, and the more concisely the better. ~ Kalki 18:19, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Sweat of the Damned

I would consider Sweat of the Damned as too long of a quote but I don't know what the "meat" of it is supposed to be. Rmhermen 23:31, 3 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I agree with you, not necessarily because of the length, but more because it doesn't seem like a 'focused' quote, and in fact the page itself says that it's a "speech". So perhaps it's not so great for wikiquote, but still, since it's an excerpt and not a complete work and therefore it doesn't fit in the other wikimedia projects, and since some work has been put into that page in order to make it nice/informative, I suggest that even in such cases we should be liberal and allow it to be hosted on wikiquote. But perhaps there're better solutions that we haven't considered yet... Sams 12:10, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Suggestions for Limits

There is a qualitative difference between a quote, an excerpt, and a Reader's Digest Condensed Version. One Protagorean approach to quantifying the upper limit of a quote is "the length of the longest utterance commonly committed to memory by native speakers of the utterance's language." The Gettysburg Address would be my candidate for American English, which implies an upper limit for a quote of three hundred words. Another would be "the length of the longest utterance that can be made on a single breath," though that might rule out too much Shakespeare. While on the topic of length, I think the Difference engine would work better if we had an informal maximum length for an unbroken line. Spotting what changed between versions of the Jean Valjean quote is something of an exercise. We are using the Wiki markup for lists in order to get the visual presentation of quote / source. Wikimedia lacks a line-continuation character for list items. A newline always terminate a list item. Hand coding the <ul><li></li><li></li></ul> pairs the Wikimedia engine generates is a (wearisome) workaround. --Eustace Tilley 16:08, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

On the specific issue of the criteria for maximal length, your suggestions here can be very ambiguous I think, while the criteria that I suggested are straightforward but perhaps not useful enough.

Mathematical rules are rigid; rigidity is good in some places and bad in others. Protagorean rules are flexible, and flexibility is likewise good or bad depending on circumstance. I know that your longer Chomsky quotes (on drugs, on intelligence) meet my suggested standards, because Aya Ogawa, the actor who portrays Chomsky in The Loneliness of Noam Chomsky, has proven by example that these utterances are memorable.--Eustace Tilley 20:39, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] The Loneliness of Noam Chomsky

Wow, interesting link... you actually saw the show? Does any of the quotes from the wikiquote page get performed?:) When I first saw what you wrote above about "committed to memory", I wondered if that means with or without practicing, but since you used the work "commonly" I assumed it meant without:) I guess some people could also memorize a 3 hours speech etc... maybe it's not that easy to define "commonly" in this context. Sams 23:21, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I saw the show, and Aya was awesome. Note that she performed the excerpts on multiple occasions to a paying audience during evenings where the memorization itself was in no way emphasized. None of her individual speeches were as long as Lucky's speech in Beckett's Waiting for Godot, or Lena Shchpenovska's speech in Bernard Shaw's Misalliance. Note also that political exhortations such as the State of the Union addresses and Castro's speeches are strictly speaking readings performed exactly once to a crowd largely consisting of a mix of the speaker's fan club and those legally obliged to attend.

Cool... but I'm still curious, what material did she perform?:) Anything similar to what's in the wikiquote page? For the comparison, I checked now for example the recording of the long quote about Somalia, and including the question it's 4.5mins, out of more than 1.5hours of talk+q&a, i.e. the full thing is more than x20 of the quote I transcribed. And that's from 1999, when he's speaking quite slowly, compared e.g. to 1984 when he spoke at a high tempo... Sams 17:28, 10 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Alas, the theater was too dark for me to take notes during the performance. I remember the actors doing the Chomsky / Bennett CNN debate, and I remember the final speech was a rundown on all the Southeast Asians the United States murdered during the second half of the 20th Century. There were a lot of numbers, and I remember one of the producers saying it was a particularly disturbing speech for the actor, and an important reason for why the run would not be extended despite the sellout crowds.--Eustace Tilley 21:22, 10 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Let's Wait 'Til It Is Howlingly Obvious that Something Must Be Done

Anyway, I don't think that for now we want to formulate policy on the issue, because generally it's not a problem it seems. Sams 15:32, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Why do you think that policies formulated under conditions of urgency will be wiser than policies that are formulated when there is time to deliberate? Isn't it the opposite?--Eustace Tilley 20:39, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Well, I started this topic in order to see if there's an interest to formulate a policy, but got a response from Jeffq about this not being a problem yet. I assume that in one sense it's not the opposite like you suggest, because if everything works fine for now, and wikiquote keeps growing, then if in the future this issue would become a problem for some reason, then we would have wikiquote in a more extensive state, so that we could make better judgements then by looking at what's available... My personal opinion anyway is that we shouldn't formulate a policy about this neither now nor in the future, and consider problems individually instead, if they occur... Sams 23:21, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Hey, I'm no oracle; I just haven't seen much concern to date on this issue. I think Village Pump is the logical place to find or poll for such concern, and so far, the number and mood of the participants in this discussion seem to bear me out. I'm sure that will change down the road. Concerning workarounds to the limitations of Wiki list markup, it's much more common (and perhaps preferable, though it's nearly as kludgy) to insert HTML break tags (<br/>) into text that is meant to appear as multi-line, but shouldn't require another bullet. This usually preserves the formatting intent, even though it makes the source text somewhat ugly. — Jeff Q (talk) 23:52, 9 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Hey, what's with the Subheaders With Serious Capitalized Statements? Not only does it look like we're writing a book here ☺, but it also encourages people to violate wiki capitalization practice (i.e., first word and proper nouns only). — Jeff Q (talk) 04:44, 11 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] What is a quote, cont.

What is the feeling about a page like Health and disease in developing countries. I find it odd but is it within the aims of the project? Rmhermen 15:12, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)

It is a bit odd, but it seems to be the title of a text book someone has quoted from and I don't percieve any definite reasons to reject it. ~ Kalki 18:19, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I agree that it seems odd for Wikiquote, which I tend to think of more as a collection of favorite quotes. But it certainly includes quotes communicating interesting points, so perhaps it's not so odd. (I've removed its footnote markers, though, since the footnotes aren't included. I'm pretty sure this is proper print-publishing practice.) I would suggest, though, that its content might be more appropriately included in an existing article like Health, or another article that might logically include quotes about breast-feeding, unless we expect to see more quotes (and on more varied topics) from the source paper. — Jeff Q (talk) 18:23, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)

For me, it is odd too. Like an extract made by a reader for memorandum. As for it's treating I agree with Jeff: if it is not growing than now, so be included into other articles like Health or other appropriate one. --Aphaia 20:39, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Wikiquote Category education and organization

I've been looking for information and discussions on Wikiquote use of Wikimedia Categories (capitalized, as opposed to the more generic sense of "category", which I'll leave lowercase). Nor am I the only one asking. But I haven't really found much. To date, it looks like there have been some ad-hoc efforts to create a few conventions, and many other individual attempts to add categories (some rather limited in scope), but no real documentation of what we have. While I don't think we need to formalize everything to the extent Wikipedia is doing just yet, we could really use a page or two to direct our category education and development efforts.

What we have right now in the way of organized categorization is this:

Category:Categories, which has conflicting information. The introductory text describes two top levels, Category:Main page (article space) and Category:Wikiquote (administrative space), but the category index shows a third, Category:Fundamental, which seems to be the collection point for high-level categories. (This suggests some overlap with Cat:Main, but both serve a purpose.)
A second tier of Categories like Themes, Occupations, Films, Literary works, and Television shows, with many logical subcategories beneath each.
List of categories, which probably still has its uses as a collection point for the older categorization system. However, it would be an ironic place to carry on conversations about the newer system.

As far as where to have these conversations, it's not clear where we best to put them:

Wikiquote:Village pump would get overburdened by what I anticipate will be many threads of Category discussions.
Wikiquote versions of Wikipedia pages either don't exist or have junk in them. None have talk pages. My initial reading of their Wikipedia use is:
- w:Wikipedia:Category provides an introduction to the Category system for basic users. Its talk page recommends bypassing itself and posting at Wikipedia talk:Categorization.
- w:Wikipedia:Category schemes: lists a variety of organization systems with links to each. Its talk page discusses classification systems and general category stuff.
- w:Wikipedia:Categorization: provides guidelines for creating and organizing Wikimedia Category systems. Its talk page discusses numbers, organization, technical problems, and pretty much all Category issues.
- Meta:Help:Category provides technical details on the use and maintenance of Categories for all Wikidom.

I suggest one of two approaches: a quick and easy one, and a basic Wikipedia-like starter structure. I'll describe the more involved one first, to show the rationale for multiple pages:

Create Wikiquote:Category and Wikiquote:Categorization along Wikipedia lines, borrowing their material and adapting it for use here. This should initially involve just changing "Wikipedia" to "Wikiquote" and changing some examples, since the functionality is the same. (The latter page's examples may take some time, as they're more complicated and may involve things not yet relevant to Wikiquote.)
Optionally convert the existing but useless Wikiquote:Category schemes into something akin to Wikipedia's version, listing schemes currently in use on Wikiquote, as well as others in use elsewhere. This will probably take some time to rewrite the local stuff and redirect the nonlocal stuff. (We could also skip the separate schemes page and just add it to one of the two above.)
Make clear in each article, and in an intro paragraph for each of the 2-3 Talk pages, which Talk page to go to with questions or comments; e.g.:

Discussions about using categories are at Talk:Category. Theoretical discussions about how to organize categories are at Talk:Category schemes. Technical problems with creating, modifying, and organizing categories are at Talk:Categorization.

… along with appropriate links.

Alternatively, we could just create one Wikiquote:Category page that has smaller, simpler sections for each of these aspects of categorization, and put all discussions on its Talk page. This may be a better way to start organizing Wiki category efforts on Wikiquote, and can always be broken into components at a later date if desired. It might take a bit more time to create than the above slap-and-tweak, but it would be worth the effort.

Regardless of what we do (if anything), the general "how to" pages should also be updated, so newcomers will see categorization as just an integrated part of creating articles. I offer to do some or all of the porting after we decide how to proceed.

I would also suggest that, before any discussion on this topic gets much longer than my already lengthy posting, we first figure out where we can put this particular discussion and move it there, so we don't bog down the Village Pump. ☺ — Jeff Q (talk) 02:20, 30 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Thank you for your excellent proposals! I agree on that we have two pages instead of "Category schemes" unused and rest of spams. A instruction page and category map are better to be separate because of scalability in future in my opinion.

I propose hereby a new fundamental category for lists like "List of proverbs" or "List by occupations" and so on. Though we could have "List of lists" instead, using a category would be easier than managing a static page. Some of newly created other language versions, starting with category feature, have no list page on main namespace, but use category. --Aphaia 04:15, 30 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I started a possibly useful Wikiquote:Category schemes. I included a Category:Lists from Aphaia's suggestion although it may be better as a subcategory of Fundamental. I made the link for the instructions page Wikiquote:Categorization but that is easily changed or preferably redirected if we prefer Wikiquote:Category. I would suggest we only need two pages for now instead of Wikipedia's three pages, and redirect the extra one for now. I would include links to Meta:Help:Category and maybe w:Wikipedia:Category on our explanation page whichever name it gets.

I also raise some questions on Wikiquote talk:Category schemes Rmhermen 14:13, 30 Mar 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Statistics

Dutch developer, Erik Sachte renewed his statistic pages on English Wikipedia. His improved statistic pages provide us all Wikimedia project statistics - not only Wikipedia but also all Wikiquotes!

Here are links:

The table of all Wikiquotes says there are 70 active Wikiquotes @_@, though it concludes many projects which have only Main Page ...

Enjoy! --Aphaia 05:06, 2 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Creative Commons Licensed Images Hosted on Flickr

Flickr members can specify several versions of the Creative Commons license for their images, but many of them are not Free. I want to use an image with a CC-BY-ND-NC license on one of the quote pages. Assuming I provide the proper credits for the image, would that be in conformity with Wikiquote policy?

I'm no expert on licensing issues, but if Wikiquote is open to the same repackaging and resale that Wikipedia is (and my impression is that the GFDL allows this), then I suspect that license would not be sufficient, as it explicitly proscribes "commercial" use. (See Wikipedia:GFDL: Materials for which commercial redistribution is prohibited.) Hopefully, someone with a better understanding of the licensing issues can expound on this. — Jeff Q (talk) 22:11, 3 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Transwiki issues

Another maintenance activity that is receiving fresh attention is Transwiki, or moving articles between wiki projects. (Most of the work thus far has been importing quote articles from Wikipedia or exporting entire speeches to Wikisource.) I've created Category:Transwiki to collect all this activity, and Wikiquote:Transwiki candidates to allow people to list articles they believe should be moved to another project. I'm planning to bring over documentation as well, but the official transwiki process is discussed in detail at Meta:Transwiki. Anyone who's interested in helping out in this arena (either to move articles or to import, edit, and discuss policy) may want to visit Category talk:Transwiki. — Jeff Q (talk) 18:24, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I've now added a Help:Transwiki page to distill the general Meta:Transwiki information into a step-by-step, Wikiquote-specific process. It still needs some work, but I invite everyone to check it out. Jeff Q 10:40, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Mitch Hedberg problem

I tried to edit the Mitch Hedberg page but for some reason it didn't save and when I tried to edit it again it deleted all of the content. I feel terrible about it and I this was the only way I could find to let anyone know. I could probably fix it if I knew how your site worked, but I just found it today so I'm afraid to touch anything else now. I apologize for the random desruction, but could you fix the page to just ignore my "edits"?

The problems have been corrected: If you do encounter massive problems in your own (or someone else's) recent edits, you can always click on the page's history tab, then click on the version prior to those problems, click on the edit tab to edit it, and then save. This is also one way that any user can deal with the deliberate vandalism of pages as well. ~ Kalki 14:41, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Using the Wikiquote:Sandbox or logging in to create your own Userpage to work on are 2 highly recommended ways to become more familiar with the editing processes here. ~ Kalki 14:49, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I prefer to say "and" to "or". How about registration and get your own user page? And there are other useful features granted to logged on users. ;-) --Aphaia 03:26, 7 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Polish language

I found this page but don't know what it is for or how it might be successfully developed. Is this a useful type of page at all? Rmhermen 22:15, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)

It is certainly interesting, and if the information presented here ever comes up in a Trivia game, I will now be able to astound my teammates; but is it a quote? I think it is. This is my argument.

The page presents noteworthy facts about two (today) sentences in the Polish language.
The Wikimedia projects are repositories of noteworthy facts.
The Wiktionary is for facts about individual words.
The Wikipedia is for facts about entities.
Sentences are arrangements of words; so they are too big for Wiktionary; but sentences do not rise to the level of entities (except in very rare cases such as Maxwell's Equations), so they are too primitive for Wikipedia.

Therefore, this page belongs here. --Eustace Tilley 23:10, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Just because it is a quote does not mean that it warrants inclusion here. Everything that everyone ever says or writes is a quote that doesn't make it notable. Also these are Polish quotes so perhaps they should be in the Polish Wikiquote. Rmhermen 23:47, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Do you think these sentences are not notable? One claims to be the first written Polish sentence, the other to be the most widely known.

I find both of them interesting, but only in context. And the current title seems to me unadequate. "Frequently referred Polish quotes" or sorts might be appropriate, in my opinion. --Aphaia 03:17, 7 Apr 2005 (UTC)

This reminds me of the w:Interesting_number_paradox. Perhaps these are the most dull Polish sentences, since each has only one interesting property. --Eustace Tilley 17:38, 7 Apr 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Classifying films

Do we want films that fall into specific genres (Western, Sci-Fi, whatever) listed only by genre, or in the main list of films by title as well? I'd like to know if there's a consensus on this so I don't create unnecessary clutter and/or editing headaches for other people. --RPickman 03:06, 7 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Subcategories by genre looks fine to me. It is a bit controversial they should be and only be in a category by genre or they should be in both categories (in general and by genre). Sometimes we hear only the name of films and have no information for its genre. --Aphaia 07:59, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Current category policy on Wikipedia, I believe, is to avoid including articles in a category and its parent (or other ancestor), although it's okay to include it in multiple categories that have a common ancestor (say, "Films by genre" and "Films (initial letter)", both rolling up to "Films"). (We're still working on our own category policies.) Aphaia is certainly right in that it's a controversy, probably chiefly because of the desire to see/browse a complete list. A complementary initial-letter categorization might help break up the category lists into something manageable. Meanwhile, we still have List of films for the overall collection, even though it's manual. It might be best to bring this issue up at Wikiquote talk:Category schemes. — Jeff Q (talk) 11:40, 23 Apr 2005 (UTC)