User talk:HouseBlaster

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"However, with all due respect, you are not answering my questions: do you have a conflict of interest? Are you a paid editor? HouseBlaster (he/him) 00:48, 30 May 2024 (UTC)"[reply]

To answer your questions:

Do I have conflict of interest?

No, I believe I do not have any conflict of interest as I have no close affiliation with the company. I am not related, employed or invested in that company.

Am I a paid editor?

Yes, I work for a company which they hired to create a wiki article about them. Despite this, I told them specifically that wikipedia articles (based on my readings) are not something they can control as anyone may edit it.

As for changing the username I do not see any options offered to accomplish. Please see below a snip of my Preferences Page.

ACP Writer (talk) 12:08, 19 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

(talk page stalker) Hi @ACP Writer: weirdly enough, you can't change your username through your preferences. See Wikipedia:Changing username for instructions. Cremastra (talk) 17:18, 20 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@ACP Writer: Thank you Cremastra explaining how to rename your account; their advice is correct. I will let you follow those directions before proceeding further, though I will note that being paid to edit is inherently a conflict of interest. HouseBlaster (he/they) 02:05, 21 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Purpose of Wikipedia:

"Wikipedia's purpose is to benefit readers by presenting information on all branches of knowledge. Hosted by the Wikimedia Foundation, it consists of freely editable content, whose articles also have numerous links to guide readers towards more information."

If the purpose can be achieved with an article that was written, why should it matter if the person was paid or not to write it? Having such an article deleted even if it did conform with Wikipedia's purpose seems... wrong. So with you or anyone's help, I am hoping it is still possible to get it up there.

Anyway, I submitted the request for name change. ACP Writer (talk) 07:18, 27 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@ACP Writer: paid editors have a really hard time maintaining a neutral point of view. For instance, the draft article you created contained lines like Using the same booking platform, travelers receive the convenience of booking rail and bus tickets in conjunction with flights, making it easy for travelers to connect from one mode of transportation to another. This is too promotional: we don't describe things as convenient or easy.

Anyhow, while we are waiting for a rename, we need to make sure AccessRail qualifies for an article on Wikipedia. We call this "notability", which is a bit of a misnomer: it has absolutely nothing to do with "fame" or "importance", and everything to do with coverage it has received in reliable sources. You can read the guideline at Wikipedia:Notability (organizations and companies), and you should read the entirety of the "primary criteria" section. Once you have done so, please provide a list of three or four sources which demonstrate notability. HouseBlaster (he/they) 00:12, 28 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Hi HouseBlaster. I've modified the article taking out the adjectives you mentioned and eliminated the last paragraph mentioning benefits to other companies. What remains is what you see below, would you please see if it is better and may be acceptable for Wikipedia. Thanks.

AccesRail, a division of ACP Rail International, markets and distributes international travel through flights, trains and buses through major airline global distribution systems (GDS(), travel agents, airlines and online platforms.

This company created a platform that provides the travelers the option of booking rail, bus and flight tickets together in one place. [1]

AccesRail Historical events:

2014-01-21: AccesRail signs agreement with Trenitalia to makes its train tickets available on the sales platforms to major airlines of the world. [1]

2020-08-18: Railway tickets becomes available through Etihad Airways [9], [10]

... (more historical events) LFTSOS (talk) 15:51, 11 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@LFTSOS that is better, but you need to respond to the second paragraph of what I wrote before I can assist you further. HouseBlaster (he/they) 16:29, 11 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I have read the guideline regarding Notability (organizations and companies). It states that "A company, corporation, organization, group, product, or service is presumed notable if it has been the subject of significant coverage in multiple reliable secondary sources that are independent of the subject."

The sources I provided can be considered newspaper articles and no direct affiliation with AccesRail, so I qualify them as independent. According to the guide newspaper articles can be considered as both primary and secondary source. It seems that in order for an article to be considered as a secondary source they need to comment or provide some kind of analysis about the company. So, being neutral is out of the question. Some of them comments on AccesRail as a good thing for both clients and human transportation companies, That seems to be a comment or voiced opinion qualifying the article as a secondary source. LFTSOS (talk) 23:06, 16 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@LFTSOS: "Secondary source" is a non-Wikipedia term. Read our page about secondary sources for more information. Please summarize the difference between a primary source and a secondary source (you can learn either by reading Wikipedia's articles about the terms or by doing your own research) so I know you understand it. HouseBlaster (he/they) 23:16, 16 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I do not understand why you say that "Secondary source" is non-Wikipedia term, it is used so often in Wikipedia's guidelines. Please explain.

"Primary source" is when an information is originally introduced by a someone knowledgeable about the subject. Secondary source gives information about the Primary source which involves providing generalization, analysis, interpretation or evaluation of the original information.

The article needs to show "Notability" (based on Wikipedias's definition) to provide multiple reliable Secondary sources that are independent. Below, three sources which demonstrate notability.

1) Ethiopian enters partnership with AccessRail | Times Aerospace

Likely primary source: News release by Ethiopian Airlines or AccesRail

The article provides generalization and evaluation about Ethiopian Airlines strategy by partnering with AccesRail.

2) Press Release: TAP celebrates air-rail partnership in Europe -Runway Girl (runwaygirlnetwork.com)

Likely primary source: News release by TAP Air or AccesRail

The article interprets or generalize about how profitable this cooperation would be.

3) Aeroporti di Roma promote integrated train-air intramodality (internationalairportreview.com)

Likely primary source: News release by Aeroporti de Roma or AccesRail

Contains evaluation and generalization how the Intermodal product enriches Fiumicino airport by adding rail connections to italian cities. LFTSOS (talk) 07:19, 18 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@LFTSOS: I said it was a non-Wikipedia term because it was not defined by Wikipedia, even though we use the term in our policies.

Your definitions are correct, nicely done!

None of those sources contribute to notability. You are correct that they are secondary, but they do not contain significant coverage independent of AccesRail. "Significant" means two or three paragraphs of information about AccesRail. Source 1 has two paragraphs which mention AccesRail, but one of those sources is only quoting someone from AccesRail, does not meet the criteria because it is not significant coverage independent of the subject. Source 2 has one sentence about AccesRail as a company, and source 3 only has one sentence about AccesRail. If there are no such sources, in this case the answer is no and there is nothing you can do to resolve this. No amount of writing, editing, carefully arranging sources, etc. can overcome a lack of notability. HouseBlaster (he/they) 02:49, 19 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

The praise is appreciated Sifu :)

Just writing some more for clarification. Source 1 has 4 paragraphs and AccesRail is actually mentioned in all of them. I understand that the 4th paragraph can be disqualified as independent of the subject because it is mostly a quote from VP of AccesRail. The 2nd paragraph is also a quote, but from the CEO of Ethiopian Airlines. Do you consider what the CEO is saying as a primary source? Why doesn't the 1st paragraph count? Does the paragraph only count if it talking only about AccesRail?

The definition of "Significant coverage", based on Wikipedia's Notability Guideline: "addresses the topic directly and in detail, so that no original research is needed to extract the content. Significant coverage is more than a trivial mention, but it does not need to be the main topic of the source material." It does not mention anything about having a minimum number of paragraphs. LFTSOS (talk) 04:30, 19 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@LFTSOS: I'll start with the easy part: by two or three paragraphs, I mean two or three paragraphs worth of information about AccesRail. That amount of coverage is considered "significant". There are a bunch of asterisks, though. If there are no paragraph breaks in a source, that is fine as long as there is still significant coverage. If a source puts paragraph breaks after every sentence, we need more than two or three of those paragraphs. If there are five paragraphs but they are just rephrasing the same information, that is still not significant coverage. But most sources have paragraph breaks, and it takes two or three standard-length paragraphs to be considered significant coverage. The paragraph count is more of a lie to children which makes grasping the concept of significant coverage easier. (In this case, all three sources you presented had paragraph breaks so I opted to omit that detail.)

Thank you for pointing out that I misread source 1. Paragraph two is not independent because Ethiopian Airlines was working with AccesRail, and is thus not a third party. Paragraph 3 is not really about AccesRail, but about the benefits of the partnership provided to Ethiopian Airlines, and while it is implied that those benefits come from AccesRail's technology, the source does not make it clear what comes from AccesRail's technology and what comes from Ethiopian Airlines's technology. While we can make an educated guess, we are not allowed to use educated guesses on Wikipedia due to our strict policy against original research (that policy encompasses many things, not only going to a science lab and doing experiments yourself but also drawing conclusions from sources). Put differently: it contains coverage about the partnership, but not about AccesRail itself. Paragraph four is not independent, which leaves the single sentence in paragraph 1. Therefore, source 1 does not qualify as a source for notability purposes. And even if it did, we would need multiple sources to establish notability. Best, HouseBlaster (he/they) 04:56, 19 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

How to write romanized text in wikipedia? please help --Lahsim Niasoh (talk) 15:17, 9 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Lahsim Niasoh I am not sure what you mean. Would you be able to give me an example? HouseBlaster (he/they) 20:54, 9 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I understand it now (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Sheikh_Hasina&diff=prev&oldid=1233569908), Thanks for your reply. Lahsim Niasoh (talk) 21:02, 9 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I was looking at the merge discussion for {{Cat}} and saw your note about about {{Category link/core}} saving expensive processing. Is this due to width-first evaluation of the top template resulting in fewer/no calls to the expensive function in the sub-template? Or did I misunderstand? — GhostInTheMachine ^{talk to me} 16:57, 11 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@GhostInTheMachine it is even more simple than that. Certain parser functions are considered WP:EXPENSIVE (i.e., computationally intensive) and therefore there is a limit of 500 "expensive" calls on any given page. {{PAGESINCAT:FOO}} is one such expensive parser function, and calling it multiple times counts as multiple expensive function calls. We can't declare a variable on a page, so to get around this we call a new "helper template" (think of calling a helper function/method in coding) with the desired "variable" as an input. It helps for the same reason you use variable to avoid calling the same function on the same inputs more than once. Cheers, HouseBlaster (he/they) 22:21, 11 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

OK, so other way around. Evaluate the expensive function once in the parent template and pass it to the child as a template parameter so that the child can use the value multiple times — GhostInTheMachine ^{talk to me} 22:29, 11 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@GhostInTheMachine: Exactly. You put it much more eloquently than I did :) HouseBlaster (he/they) 22:30, 11 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Hi HouseBlaster,

I would like to request restoration of the three professional wrestler categories that were deleted at this discussion. I didn't notice that they were lumped in there too, but pro wrestlers aren't actually sportspeople, they're actors. This has caused a problem at Category:Professional wrestlers, where there are 19th and 21st century categories but no 20th century. This has also caused Category:Male professional wrestlers and Category:Female professional wrestlers to only have a 21st century category, meaning that all of the 20th-century pro wrestlers are no longer listed as male or female due to the bot removing the deleted gender-specific century categories. Thanks, ~WikiOriginal-9~ (talk) 08:07, 13 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Reasonable objection; I will restore the category. HouseBlaster (he/they) 15:55, 13 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you. I appreciate it. ~WikiOriginal-9~ (talk) 18:21, 13 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@WikiOriginal-9, technically, there is an element of sport to it. Someone from another sport can train to be a wrestler, but not all of them will be good at it. To say their not actual sportspeople is short sided and ignorant. A lot of wrestlers have transitioned from American/Canadian football (that being most of where wrestlers can from during the territory days and into the 1990s), MMA, gymnastics, etc.. Mr. C.C.^{Hey yo!}_{I didn't do it!} 01:33, 14 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

MediaWiki message delivery 01:28, 16 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Hey, nice to meet you! I read a lot of literature how to write article for Wikipedia right, and what I need for it. So will do it asap, and will keep fingers crossed :) --Pitomadome (talk) 16:15, 17 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Pitomadome: Awesome. Let me know if you need any help! HouseBlaster (he/they) 22:07, 17 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you! just finished working on the article and published it. So now my fingers is really crossed hh :) Pitomadome (talk) 00:51, 18 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Hello, how do I create a citation --AMB Abdulhakim Ishaku Adam (talk) 19:48, 17 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@AMB Abdulhakim Ishaku Adam: excellent question. Are you using the source editor or the visual editor? HouseBlaster (he/they) 22:11, 17 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

The clarification request that you initiated regarding desysopping has been closed and archived. Among the participating Arbitrators, there was a rough consensus that the requirement to "submit a new request for adminship" covers the elections process in addition to conventional RfAs, with no motion being proposed. However, some members were open to having an amendment to procedures following the elections trial's conclusion. For the Arbitration Committee, SilverLocust 💬 05:32, 12 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Per Wikipedia:Categories_for_discussion/Log/2024_July_5#Sportspeople_and_century_categories, I would think that Category:20th-century professional wrestlers, Category:20th-century female professional wrestlers, and Category:20th-century male professional wrestlers would be deleted, but it seems like you disagreed. What am I missing? ―Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 07:50, 18 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

And Category:21st-century male professional wrestlers, Category:21st-century professional wrestlers, and Category:21st-century female professional wrestlers. ―Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 23:35, 18 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Koavf: Apologies, I thought I pinged you earlier. There was an objection on my talk page above (see § Question), noting that wrestlers are actors rather than sportspeople and that it caused a problem in Category:Professional wrestlers. I restored the categories because the discussion was already a bit of a WP:TRAINWRECK and the concerns were valid enough to merit a full discussion. Best, HouseBlaster (he/they) 02:56, 19 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. ―Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 08:12, 19 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

The Wikipedia Library: Books & Bytes
Issue 63, May – June 2024

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• Spotlight: References check

Read the full newsletter

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery on behalf of The Wikipedia Library team --12:16, 18 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

How do I include pictures on the right side of the article? Also, is the article on my sandbox unbiased, clear, and informative? --Luizancoelho (talk) 20:56, 18 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Luizancoelho: Before I can answer that question, I need to ask if you have a conflict of interest (COI) regarding the subject. Do you have an external relationship with the company, or were you paid to create the article? HouseBlaster (he/they) 02:53, 19 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Hi @HouseBlaster,

Yes, I do work for the company, but I am not receiving any additional pay for creating this article. My intention is to provide accurate and factual information about the company.

I strive to write the article impartially and without bias, focusing solely on verifiable information. Additionally, I am an intern and will be leaving the company in a month, which reduces any potential long-term conflict of interest. Luizancoelho (talk) 19:23, 19 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Alright, please make a disclosure on your user page by following these instructions (I highly recommend option 3, disclosing the COI on your user page). Once you have completed those steps, I will be happy to help you determine if the company qualifies for a Wikipedia article under our notability guidelines. If the company qualifies for an article, then I will be glad to help you make sure it is well-written. But because no amount of writing can fix the fact that something is not notable by Wikipedia's standards, we would both be wasting our time polishing the draft before we determine its notability. HouseBlaster (he/they) 19:36, 19 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Hi @HouseBlaster,

Thank you for all the help so far. I am going to most likely need to edit most of the article, as I need to find better souces. Do you have any advice on searching for reliable sources for information about small companies? I had an idea from taking information from review websites, but even those seem to be written by the company themselves (except for the actual reviews) Luizancoelho (talk) 19:44, 19 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Luizancoelho: Thank you for disclosing the COI! Unfortunately, most small companies do not meet our notability guidelines, which require secondary, reliable, third-party sources which contain significant coverage of the company. When and where was the company founded? I can see it there are newspaper records via The Wikipedia Library, but that is the extent to which I can help. You are right that review websites are written by the companies themselves, and the reviews left by others are not reliable sources because anyone can write anything in a review. HouseBlaster (he/they) 19:59, 19 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

HouseBlaster, I apologize for the previous edit. I came to your talk page to ask your thoughts on modifying my proposed policy. Instead of limiting only the nominator, what if we make the central focus the rate of article creation/nominations? This approach could help prevent issues caused by mass article creations that overload our backlog for page reviewers. It would spare editors from unnecessary headaches when they have to sift through extensive material from a single contributor. I believe editors who create thousands of articles rapidly overlook the workload they create for reviewers. Therefore, I think there should be restrictions in place.

Additionally, I'm interested to hear your opinion on the idea of allowing up to five concurrent nominations per contributor. This adjustment might be more practical and beneficial on a broader scale. I look forward to hearing your thoughts. Cheers! 🂡🂡9t5 21:05, 21 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@9t5: The premise of WP:SCOPING is that people are misus[ing] Wikipedia's guideline on assuming good faith (WP:GOODFAITH) to justify the covert harassment of another editor, but that is simply not the case. If one cannot "prove" that they are being harassed by targeted nominations, AGF says we should assume that the nominations are not targeted. That is the very premise of AGF: you need to find evidence that someone is being malicious (in this case, that they are specifically targeting you). If you can't find such evidence, AGF is not being misused as justification – it is doing exactly what it is intended to do, cautioning against assuming malicious intent. Any cap on nominations also means that editors would be forced to check who created a page, which necessarily brings the focus onto contributors rather than content.

Lugnuts (the person who created 93,000 articles) was autopatrolled for most of the time he was creating articles, so his creations did not wind up in the queue. The autopatrolled permission is the way we deal with contributors who create massive amounts of good-quality articles. If people create lots of problematic articles, we can ban them from further creation. (In Lugnuts's case, before they were site banned, they were prohibited from creating articles below a certain size to force them to spend time on each creation.) We don't need to create "asshole John rules" to respond to problematic actions by editors; we need to block/ban editors who are problematic. Best, HouseBlaster (he/they) 00:22, 22 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Hi, first time editing a Wiki page and I've hit a bump. I added an image to the page i edited, but it got deleted. How do I get it back?

I worked on Maiken Mikkelsen wiki page. --SupportBee (talk) 16:09, 22 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@SupportBee: It was deleted because it was a copyright violation. To be eligible to use a photo on Wikipedia, it must be released under a license allowing for adaptation and further distribution, including for non-Wikipedia or commercial uses. I also have to ask: are you being paid to edit the biography? Do you have some other form of a conflict of interest? Best, HouseBlaster (he/they) 16:30, 22 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I work for Duke University where Dr. Maiken Mikkelsen is a professor and I used a photo that is already used by Duke on their website for Dr.Mikkelsen. I am not being paid to edit the biography, my intention was to provide more recent information pulled from Duke directory and Mikkelsen Lab website. SupportBee (talk) 17:26, 22 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Because you have a conflict of interest, you should follow these instructions. I highly recommend option 3 (disclosing on your user page. For a photo to be eligible for use on Wikipedia, it needs to be licensed appropriately by the copyright holder. Because you are not the copyright holder, the image was deleted as a copyright violation. HouseBlaster (he/they) 17:33, 22 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for the explanation. I've added the COI on my user page. And I will edit the article so it shows only facts, probably it's best to review other physicists wiki articles and follow those as examples. SupportBee (talk) 12:24, 23 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@SupportBee: awesome. Because you have a COI, you are highly encouraged to use the edit request process so others can double-check your work. Best, HouseBlaster (he/they) 12:38, 23 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

MediaWiki message delivery 00:02, 23 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

How to create a citation? --Eliseo B. Contillo (talk) 01:33, 23 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Eliseo B. Contillo excellent question. Are you using the source editor or the VisualEditor? HouseBlaster (he/they) 01:37, 23 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

source editor sir Eliseo B. Contillo (talk) 02:01, 23 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Eliseo B. Contillo: you don't need to call me "sir"; we are all equals here :)

For information on how to create references with the source editor, you can see this instruction manual. Best, HouseBlaster (he/they) 02:03, 23 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

You stated my content was "paraphrasing" for a Award Criteria. Award criteria's on Wikipedia always remain verbatim as they are specific criteria's. Furthermore you stated it was copyrighted. The source was The State of Texas and The Governors Office of Texas. Both of those cannot copyright the material such as Award Info and Criteria as it's free-use. Please learn the law and understand it before making changes. TheNathanMuir (talk) 13:51, 23 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@TheNathanMuir: first, if you are copying verbatim, it needs to be in quotation marks or else it is plagiarism. Next, on Wikipedia, we require that text borrowed from other sources be more than "free-use". We require that it be eligible for commercial redistribution. The Texas website says it prohibits commercial redistribution, so we cannot use it on Wikipedia. The Texas website is copyrighted: the opposite of copyrighted is in the public domain, not "free use". Best, HouseBlaster (he/they) 14:10, 23 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

It was not verbatim. It was re-written hence you putting it was "paraphrased". The award which is public law is not copyrightable. Hence why every other government award on Wikipedia is written verbatim. TheNathanMuir (talk) 14:13, 23 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@TheNathanMuir: You need to supply proof that it is not eligible copyright. HouseBlaster (he/they) 15:17, 23 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Works by the federal government are legally public domain, but per https://copyright.lib.harvard.edu/states/texas/ it's not clear whether works of Texas state government are. This is the case for, e.g. works of the State of California -- but not for every state. @TheNathanMuir: The burden is on you to supply evidence that positively states that the State of Texas releases its works into the public domain (or is statutorily required to do so). This means that, for example, https://gov.texas.gov/site-policies does not count -- it simply lacks any statement on copyright for textual content -- this is not enough. jp×g🗯️ 16:11, 23 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]