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Barnstar

The Working Man's Barnstar
For going through the stub types today and fixing almost three thousand links (and counting), I award you the Working Man's Barnstar. Great job.   jj137 ♠ 01:41, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

I just received one of your bot notices regarding

this. thumb|88px|left The copyright owners sent me the picture, in fact a bunch of pictures, and gave me free reign to do as I willed with them. I chose to share them on wikipedia. However I no longer get into protracted back-and-fourths about this sort of thing, so if you really don't like the way it's written up, 1) live with it, 2) remove the image, 3) write it up properly or 4) do something else. I've run into your work a lot, I trust you and have no problems with whatever route you choose. Carptrash (talk) 04:53, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Please add a Non-free ratioanle βcommand 04:56, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

And now it is this one

Image:BirthOfPsycheEJ.jpg. I am Einar Kvaran and Carptrash (talk) 05:02, 2 January 2008 (UTC) and I took the picture, etc. It was placed on wikipedia before the current set of templates were available, or at least known to me. You will find several 100 (give or take) other pictures by me - mostly in sculpture articles. I did the best that I could then, you do your best now.

happy Mango season

'TIS MANGO SEASON....
Have a shlice of mango cheek...well, I am up to my armpits in the things. Yuletide means lots and lots of mangos, as well as turkey and ham and ice-cream and pressies. Were on special so I bought 3 crates for AU$20 and now I have both crispers in the refrigerator full and even with everyone eating two of the ##$@& things every mealtime... I am a bit mangoed out so I thought I'd spread the goodwill around....cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 05:38, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Repeat messages

Stop sending me dupcliate messages after I "fixed" them. I have absolutely know clue what else is necessary to please you, but you're just adding clutter to me User talk page. Jesus, I wish you would get a life some times! TMC1982 8:51 p.m., 1 January 2008 —Preceding comment was added at 04:50, 2 January 2008 (UTC)


Image:DDuchene.jpg

It's gone. Do as you like with any image I have uploaded but please don't send me any more notices.--Sandahl 05:53, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Bot notifications to talk pages

Hey Betacommand; would it be possible for the bot to batch submit notifications to talk pages? For example, instead of the bot doing this, could it temporarily store lists of users to be notified along with the images to be notified of, and if more than one create an alternate message that notifies, and lists all the images the notifcation applies to? I realize this might be difficult to code, but is it possible? --Hammersoft (talk) 23:50, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

I believe this has been requested before. Carcharoth (talk) 00:25, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

Blocked

Please run your bot slower, it's impossible for anyone to keep up with the pace, since you insist people take the time to write specific rationales for every image. No real person is going to be able to do the 5000 repetitive rationale writing edits a day, and unless your goal is just to get everything deleted, please respect that. - Bobet 15:03, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Let me add to that: please refrain from running on this task for the next couple of weeks. People should have a legitimate chance to fix things, but a lot of people are on vacation and not visiting Wikipedia regularly. Mangojuicetalk 18:03, 2 January 2008 (UTC)
There is a deadline folks. There is no consensus that the bot should stop during the holidays or slow down. There are X number of images that need to be done by August. The community allowed a huge backlog of invalid fair use images to back up, so now we need to fix them fast. I think that considering how there is a history of admins going and blocking this bot and then it getting reversed after discussion that it may be best to get consensus for a block before doing it. 1 != 2 18:07, 2 January 2008 (UTC)
August? I thought it was March? Carcharoth (talk) 00:27, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

Image:Mayre.jpg

Hi Betacommand, not sure why this image was tagged. Could you explain? Thanks! Addhoc (talk) 19:01, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Well there is a problem, both Soy Mi Destino (song) and Soy Mi Destino exist and both are on the same subject. you linked to Soy Mi Destino in your rationale, but the image is used on Soy Mi Destino (song). βcommand 19:05, 2 January 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for explaining - I'll obviously fix this. At the moment, there is a script that fills in the article title if the field is left blank. I guess this could be upgraded to fix situations like this. Addhoc (talk) 19:24, 2 January 2008 (UTC)
  • And if the bot finds a fuzzy match, what then? The rationales need to explicitly state each use, per 10c. If the rationale states "Parade (musical)" but the image actually appears on "Parade" it's still wrong, even if it's "fuzzy right". The best it could do would be to inform the person who wrote the rationale that they might have gotten the title wrong. Regardless, the rationale would still need to be fixed. It's not something that can be left unfixed. --Hammersoft (talk) 19:26, 2 January 2008 (UTC)
    • It's not an OMG DELETE THIS IMAGE NOW issue, though. The requirement that fair use rationales have to be made so blatantly obvious that even BetacommandBot understands them or the image gets deleted is entirely self-imposed on Wikipedia by a few editors, and has nothing to do with law or the Foundation. rspeer / ɹəədsɹ 19:34, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Cleanup

Having once again received multiple posts from this bot, I am once again requesting that you add a cleanup function to your bot.

I am also requesting that where an image is clearly used on a single page and is found to be in contravention to 10C, that a feature be added to the bot to automatically correct 10C using said single page as the template.

perfectblue (talk) 20:11, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

See, for example. here. Much more use than flagging these images for deletion. "Each use is unique and must be described"; rubbish. Many uses are not unique. --John (talk) 20:33, 2 January 2008 (UTC)
  • Perhaps I need to be clearer. The policies state that the rationale must have a rationale relevant to each use. You can't template that. You can use a template to assist in making the rationale, but you can't have a template indicate exactly why a given image is fair use, because each usage can be radically different. In fact, the same image might have multiple rationales for multiple uses, and those rationales could be significantly different. For example, an album cover might be historically significant to one article for its artistic impression or depicting a race riot, but be significant to an album article for depiction of the cover and nothing more. There's a broad gap of difference there, and no template or bot can do that. So what I said is accurate; the policies require relevant rationales, and saying a template can't do this is a rubbish statement is in effect stating the policy is rubbish. Sorry if I wasn't clearer before. --Hammersoft (talk) 21:41, 2 January 2008 (UTC)
  • You still don't understand. A bot has already added valid rationales to images. Also, templates have been used to create valid rationales. John was in no way suggesting the current policy was rubbish, which should be obvious. Addhoc (talk) 21:45, 2 January 2008 (UTC)
  • Multiple uses do complicate the issue, yes, but the original request by perfectblue was about the large number of cases of images that are used on exactly one article. These images have a fair use template on them (otherwise they would be deleted by now), and the template generally gives the correct reason why it is used on that single article, it's just that nobody has connected the dots for the bot's benefit and said that that one rationale applies to that one article. This is an easily automatable task. rspeer / ɹəədsɹ 23:00, 2 January 2008 (UTC)
  • Well, allow me to be silly again, but a bot can not determine if a given rationale applies to a given use. Of course, I'm absolutely wrong as Addhoc made so clear above. --Hammersoft (talk) 23:09, 2 January 2008 (UTC)
  • What would be easy to do for such single-uses that have a rationale template is have a bot add the article name and then put the image in a category of images to be checked over the next two months. Humans can then check that the bot-addition and the rationale is valid, and sign off on it. Surely that would work? It's been suggested in the past, but there seems to be, ahem, resistance to doing something like this. Not quite sure why. <starts timer to see how long before a sensible answer arrives>. Carcharoth (talk) 00:34, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

  • I said a sensible answer. Not a strawman involving red tape. Get the Bot to check if a non-free use rationale template is in use on the image, and put these images in a separate category. The way the bot works (it looks for names), this will mean that the only work needed to make these images compliant with 10c is for a human to add a link and check the rationale makes sense. No red tape here. Just obstruction as far as I can see. I've requested this feature on several different occasions. I expect the answer now will be "do it yourself", which will be most helpful. Carcharoth (talk) 02:03, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

I don't understand why...

Having read the notice above, I don't understand why this bot is adding deletion tags to image pages which already have explicit acceptable non-free fair use rationales posted to them. If you would like to respond, please do so on my talk page, thanks. Gwen Gale (talk) 00:06, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

{{Di-missing article links}}. BetacommandBot isn't using it, though. --Carnildo (talk) 02:30, 3 January 2008 (UTC)
It is less than 2 months old, but yes, Betacommand, please use that template, and Carnildo, why not make the category it places the images in a more specific one? Not essential though, as any admin deleting after "reading" that message will get trout-slapped. Carcharoth (talk) 02:57, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

Bot messages

I asked on the bot's page not to be notified about any more images. Please do not put any more notices on my page, though I don't think you will have to after this, they are all gone now .--Sandahl 00:36, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

Another false source/license guitar image

Image:Danelectro.JPG... typical white background shot taken from musiciansfriend.com. 156.34.221.33 (talk) 01:21, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

and now this one

[Image:NaziArchBreker2.jpg] I believe that the rational that I provided is sufficient to use the image here. The book was published by a publisher in Nazi Germany who no longer exists. As probably the picture will not after you have done your magic. Einar aka Carptrash (talk) 02:35, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

The rationale needs to state the article it is being used in, which in this case is Nazi architecture. --MASEM 02:49, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

Authorization list for VP

Hello Betacommand. I have been away for a long while but have returned to Wikipedia to resume editing. I would like to get access to Vandalproof. I was a VP user before my break. Due to my long absence, do I have to wait until I have 250 new edits before I can re-submit my name for permission? Or can I simply be added back to the authorization list? Thanks, cheers and take care! Anger22 (Talk 2 22) 03:18, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

College football tagging

Hi. What rule is your bot following for adding the College football project tag? I would think that adding Hec Crighton Trophy should be outside the rule, as it is exclusively CIS and WP:CFB#Scope says that is outside the scope of project. Not that I mind more editors working on CIS articles; just checking. Thanks, DoubleBlue (Talk) 07:11, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

  • Hmm, I think I figured it out, the article has Category:College football awards. I doubt the cat's appropriate but I'll think about it. I'm sure the project tag is incorrect though and I'll remove it. Cheers! DoubleBlue (Talk) 07:34, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

Excuse me if my ignorance strikes again, but...

What caused this? Your bot or me? Timeshift (talk) 08:17, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

Replied

I have replied to your message on my talk page.-gadfium 00:53, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

Album covers are no longer fair use??

This bot has tagged many album coves that I uploaded (with a fair-enough description and source of the image) as not fair use. My talk page from here onwards is all disputed album covers. Why are album covers not fair use any more?? --Xxplosive (talk) 03:40, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

The reason they're getting tagged as such is because you did not provide an appropriate fair-use rationale. Read WP:FURG for more info as to what to put for an appropriate fair-use rationale. --GVOLTT How's my editing?\My contribs 09:02, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

Gods own country.jpg

This bot has tagged "Image:Gods own country.jpg" for deletion. I think the image should not be deleted as this is widely established image and has been using by many tourist related organizations in Kerala including the official website of KTDC. We should not make our policy so harsh, which may spoil the enhancement of articles. Thanks. --Avinesh Jose (talk) 04:38, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

The image needed 2 non-free use rationales, 1 for each article the image was used in. I've added the rationales, so the images won't be deleted. Regards, Bláthnaid 11:18, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

Geomancer.jpg

The bot has tagged "Image:Geomancer.jpg" for deletion. It's a book cover, and I thought that how I did it would be fine. Apparently not, hehe! I'm afraid copyright goes way over my head, and I don't know how to fix this. Just letting you know, as I am unsure whether or not the image should be deleted. Sid (talk) 10:18, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

I've fixed the problem. The image just needed a Non-free use rationale guideline. You can use similar rationales for your other uploads, and the images won't be tagged for deletion. Regards, Bláthnaid 11:08, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

Curious

I understand that you are a very adamant supporter of WP:NFCC#10c (use rationale). I'm just curious: why? Use rationales aren't a fair use requirement in any country, and are typically copied-and-pasted without thought as to whether or not the image really meets the policy. So, I just don't get it. Why do you support this policy? —Remember the dot (talk) 20:49, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

I dont support the idea of copy-paste rationales, and as soon as phase 2, of the NFC enforcement is done Im going to start manualy going through all of our non-free images and tagging the improper rationales. βcommand 21:56, 2 January 2008 (UTC)
How does tagging improper rationales help avoid copyright violations any more than just tagging invalid fair use images, rationale or not? —Remember the dot (talk) 23:56, 2 January 2008 (UTC)
Oh wait, I see. If we delete non-free images from Wikipedia regardless of whether or not they are actually valid, then that will make the number of invalid images decrease. What a great idea. Why on earth do you support this? —Remember the dot (talk) 00:02, 3 January 2008 (UTC)
Yes. To try to understand Betacommand's reasoning behind not only supporting this policy, but enforcing it to the letter. I'd like a statement, presented in clear, plain language, of why he thinks this is improving Wikipedia. —Remember the dot (talk) 00:13, 3 January 2008 (UTC)
Just as enforcing unjust laws does not benefit the world, enforcing unjust policy does not benefit Wikipedia. But I'm not here to demand that Betacommand cease enforcing the policy. I just want to know why he supports this policy. —Remember the dot (talk) 00:25, 3 January 2008 (UTC)
Remember the dot, in your own words please explain the purpose of wikipedia. βcommand 04:52, 3 January 2008 (UTC)
To provide free knowledge for the world in the form of an encyclopedia. —Remember the dot (talk) 18:49, 3 January 2008 (UTC)
To provide free knowledge for the world in the form of an encyclopedia. I agree too. the issue is people over use non-free content, which goes against the spirit of wikipedia. every use of NFC is another page that is not free. I agree that there are legitimate reasons for using non-free content. But when I remove 345 non-free images from a page, that is not proper use of NFC. The purpose of writing a rationale is to clearly state what, when, where, how, and why you are using a given image.
  • What is the image?
  • When was it published? (could it be Public domain)
  • Where you got it from
  • How are you using that image in wikipedia (what page you are using it on, and a simple reason Historic photo, cover art etc.)
  • Why must we include that image? (what does that image convey that text alone cannot)
A proper rationale covers all of this. and makes a good defense of why we should use the given image on what ever page its being used on. I have a three phase plan on how to help reduce the NFC abuse, phase one ended in august, (tagging images that had zero rationale) phase two, (tagging all images that dont say how) which will end in April. and phase three manual review of those images that pass the robot test. βcommand 19:04, 3 January 2008 (UTC)
Dangit, I just got caught in an edit conflict trying to clarify what I meant. We provide free knowledge, not merely free content. We try to give the maximum amount of knowledge to the maximum number of people. Your point about removing 345 non-free images from a page is a valid one. But when you assume that an image is invalid without manually reviewing it, you damage Wikipedia by reducing the amount of knowledge we provide.
Take this scenario, which has happened thousands of times: A user in good faith uploads a corporation's logo to Wikipedia. A couple years later, BetacommandBot comes along to delete the image because it assumes that the logo is not valid fair use. How does this help Wikipedia? —Remember the dot (talk) 19:12, 3 January 2008 (UTC)
Yes we are allowed to use non-free content under the American term "Fair use". But wikipedia has a stricter stance on non-free content, the American law is very broad in ways that you can use images. BUT the foundation wants to create a free encyclopedia, that is both readability and content. Their position is we dont want it, but because we want a good encyclopedia lets allow as little as possible, without harming the content. Remember the dot as for your position about coming back years later, As I have said I dont want to see images deleted, that improve the encyclopedia. (sorry I have to cut this sort as I have to get to work. Ill post more later) βcommand 19:29, 3 January 2008 (UTC)
I know that Wikipedia has a strong stance on free content. Yet you are saying that even if an image is uploaded in good faith, complies with the requirements, its description page links to the article it is for, and it is tagged with {{Non-free logo}}, it is not worth keeping because it does not explicitly say that it is worth keeping. Can't you see the damage of mindlessly applying this reasoning millions of times? —Remember the dot (talk) 19:49, 3 January 2008 (UTC)
It helps Wikipedia because a misused copyrighted picture lacking a rational is a something Wikipedia does not want. The fact is that fair use images are not free, and unless there is a clear fair use rational we have no right to use them. If the logo is really needed in the article a fair use rational can be written for one. 1 != 2 19:17, 3 January 2008 (UTC)
You are mistaken. We have the right of fair use. A logo, used once in a corporation's article, is perfectly valid and used properly. We are not under any legal obligation to write fair use rationales. —Remember the dot (talk) 19:20, 3 January 2008 (UTC)
There may be no legal obligations, but the Foundation (the ones that provide the service of Wikipedia) has set a higher standard than required by law by requiring fair use rationale. --MASEM 19:26, 3 January 2008 (UTC)
My point is that a fair use rationale has no impact on whether or not the image is actually worth keeping. You can't say "Oh, it doesn't have a fair use rationale, it must not be worth keeping." —Remember the dot (talk) 19:49, 3 January 2008 (UTC)
I don't mean to speak for BC, but I'm pretty sure that his meaning (and certainly my POV) is that we want to save every non-free image that has been uploaded and is currently within use. The problem is that we have a deadline required by our service provider to meet, and an impossible number of images to check and tag appropriately; any image that hasn't been confirmed to have some aspects of an appropriate FUR by that point will be deleted so that Wikipedia can remain compliant with the Foundation's requirements. By tagging these images, BCB is doing the best possible job it can to spread notice around that an image may be deleted if action isn't taken - the uploader(s)'s talk page, the image page, and the talk page of the page(s) that the image is used in. This first pass hopefully gets one of those editors involved, but then you're left with images that have not been touched in 7 days and thus up to the deletion admins to process. Providing a complete fair use rationale is not a trivial task if you are not the uploader or if you are not aware how it is used, and the number of such images that come up per day is too overwhelming that if it's not glaringly obvious whats wrong (say, a simple 10c fix), the image is off to the bit bucket.
This BCB process is meant to prevent any image from getting to that step of deletion by notifying as many interested parties as possible. It is not perfect - editors retire, pages go unwatched, deleting editors may simply hit the mass deletion button. In a more perfect situation, we would have plenty of time to fine tune the process - maybe a task force, maybe a better reporting page to notify a project or the like - but we have less than 3 months and 100,000s of images still left to be checked. The process is also not irreversible - deleted images can be restored if requested, or people can upload new versions. If BC simply wanted to get rid of these images, he could have easily had the bot stop at tagging the image itself, with no other notification, and in 7 days the image would likely be gone because no one would know it was gone.
We don't have a choice in the issue of "if it doens't have a fair use rationale, it must be worth keeping". We'd love to keep everything but we have been told we cannot, and thus must proceed by means to keep as much as possible in the limited time that we've been given. --MASEM 20:35, 3 January 2008 (UTC)
We are under no mandate from the foundation to require explicitly written use rationales. The foundation is perfectly happy with the boilerplate license tags, see [1]. —Remember the dot (talk) 21:44, 3 January 2008 (UTC)
Masem is correct, I dont want to see images deleted, that should be kept. that saying there are still a lot of images that need to be deleted that pass the standard test that BCBot uses. (Example images of living people). I am attempting to get all of our images to follow our policy. BCBot is just one step in a long path. βcommand 21:22, 3 January 2008 (UTC)
BCBot's standard test is an extremely poor indicator of the validity of a fair use image. To get an idea of how bad the problem is, I just checked the last 20 images BCBot has edited. Of those 20 that BCBot tagged for deletion, 10 were valid and 10 were invalid. In other words, for every invalid image that BCBot tags for deletion, BCBot also tags one valid image for deletion.
—Remember the dot (talk) 22:22, 3 January 2008 (UTC)
Incorrect. I checked all the images you claim as valid, and none of them cite the exact article they are being used in. A few are "close" (the B70-16556 one is slightly off in the article name for example), but some don't even include an article name. These fail WP:NFCC#10c, which is required as part of the machine-readable aspect of the Foundation's requirements. Ideally it would be great if closing admins can fix those but the responsibility of a correct rationale is on the shoulders of the uploader. --MASEM 22:44, 3 January 2008 (UTC)
Any user can look at the "File links" section to determine the article the image corresponds to. Ideally it would also be stated in the description, but that's a poor reason to just delete the image, especially since a bot could just add the link automatically and assume good faith that the link refers to the correct article.
Where did the foundation say that the image description page must link to each article where fair use is claimed? Foundation:Resolution:Licensing policy states:
Non-free content used under an EDP must be identified in a machine-readable format so that it can be easily identified by users of the site as well as re-users.
Non-free images are tagged with non-free image tags and categorized into the non-free image category, identifying them in machine-readable format. Nowhere does it say that the description pages must include links to the articles they are for, and it certainly does not say that the images must be deleted because of this. —Remember the dot (talk) 22:58, 3 January 2008 (UTC)
The Foundation's resolution included (at the time of March 23, 2007) WP's current fair-use rationale policy as an example of an acceptable EDP. The requirement to include the name of the article existed in that version (same #10c clause) as it has today. This has "blessed" the policy approach to meet the Foundation's goals. Images that fail to meet the EDP policy must be deleted per the resolution.
Additionally, BCB or another bot cannot use a singular file link without potential false positives. Example: I upload an image, provide a complete rationale for page A that it is used in. Sometime later, a different user included it on page B but doesn't provide a separate rationale. Further later, I decide that the image on A isn't needed anymore, and forget to remove/delete the image or rationale. If BCB came by at that point and said "oh, it's used in one page, I'll just add that page name to the rationale" it would be wrong and this is an unallowable situation by the Foundation. Additionally, people will provide rationales that will lack the article name as well as fail to meet other requirements of the rationale policy. Just added the name does not fix these rationales. These cases shows that while BCB can tag, the resolution of how to deal with such images has to be handled by humans at some point. --MASEM 23:06, 3 January 2008 (UTC)
Right. Our policy meets all the foundation requirements, in fact it is more strict than what the foundation requires. The small number of false positives would not be a big deal, since overall many, many valid images would be saved, and like you said, the images should be human-reviewed for valididty anyway. —Remember the dot (talk) 23:47, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

Phase 3

Is this process (phase 1, 2, 3) documented somewhere? Also, a hypothetical question, you come across a company logo, used in 2 articles, the company and a subsidiary, it has all the parts filled out, but the rationales are generic ones. How should it be handled? MBisanz talk 19:21, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

I set out my three phase plan on AN/ANI about 4-5 months ago. As for logo rationales, there are a few things that have to be taken care of: 1. the rationale(s) includes the name of the article(s). 2. the image is used only on the article about the company. If you want to use the logo somewhere else you need to write a seperate rationale for each use. Phase three will mainly be focused the mis-use of non-free content. βcommand 22:21, 3 January 2008 (UTC)
  • I urge you to reconsider your deletionism. It has been demonstrated above (see the link to Kat's discussion of the policy) that the FUR does not have to list the name of every single article it's used on. You're just wrong here, and it's hurting the project, as good editors are having to take time better spent elsewhere to protect perfectly vailid images from deletion. Bellwether BC 23:08, 3 January 2008 (UTC)
  • Er, #10c states "The name of each article (a link to the articles is recommended as well) in which fair use is claimed for the item, and a separate fair-use rationale for each use of the item, as explained at Wikipedia:Non-free use rationale guideline. The rationale is presented in clear, plain language, and is relevant to each use." My emphasis. Each use is required. --MASEM 23:15, 3 January 2008 (UTC)
  • Er, the policy supposedly (per comments at this talkpage) reflects the wishes of the foundation. It clearly doesn't. Bad policy needs changed, not enforced in a draconian manner. Bellwether BC 23:27, 3 January 2008 (UTC)
  • I was informed that, at least in the case of book covers used only once, unless the FUR included the specific name of the ONE ARTICLE it was used on, it would be deleted. That would lead me to believe that -- following the same logic -- the logos would be deleted as well. I'm sure someone will correct me if this is a misapprehension of what was told to me earlier. Bellwether BC 21:34, 3 January 2008 (UTC)
Ok thats a somewhat reasonable position. I had an instance with several Bell telephone logos where an individual had used them a second time in an entirely inappropriate factory description. Basically, in Phase 3, would you pull the image from the second article or tag it for deletion if it had a poorly formed (generic) rationale? MBisanz talk 00:30, 4 January 2008 (UTC)
Logos, one of a few classes of images where a simi-generic rationale is valid (if and only if the rationale is for the article about the subject of the logo). If the image has one valid rationale and the image is used properly, I would just remove it from pages where there is no rationle. if the image does not have a rationale that can be easily fixed, the image would be tagged for deletion. βcommand 00:40, 4 January 2008 (UTC)
Ok, thats a reasonable position then, I had this fear of an image being used ina good and bad article and then being tagged for deletion, when a simple removal from the bad article would have save it. MBisanz talk 05:35, 4 January 2008 (UTC)
Please see [[#7] above. βcommand 05:38, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

List of Metalocalypse characters

You've officially hit your three reverts for the day. You could report me for "vandalism", or you could do what I've been asking you to for the past few days and discuss the matter. Your call. -- Y|yukichigai (ramble argue check) 07:33, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

see my note on the talkpage. WP:NFC does not allow non-free content in lists. βcommand 07:35, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

Courtesy inform of a thread about you at WP:AN

You are mentioned in the linked thread at Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard#St47_and_Betacommand. DuncanHill (talk) 12:25, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

Rationale

{{Non-free use rationale|Article= |Description= |Source= |Portion= |Low_resolution= |Purpose= |Replaceability= |other_information=Use in accordance with [[WP:LOGO|logo guideline]]. }}

Thanks,

Minnesota1 (talk) 02:42, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

Your edits to List of fictional species in South Park

Resolved
 – I moved the "list" to an "article", and tagged it for references, dated January 2007.

Do not remove images of television characters, as you did to List of fictional species in South Park. Such edits are considered vandalism, and have been reverted. If you do not stop in this act, you will be reported to an administrator, and blocked from editing. See that you take the heed. Wilhelmina Will (talk) 00:28, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

I don't care what I am violating. Those images serve a purpose: to identify the fictional species mentioned. If they are removed, readers will be left to search all over the internet to learn what they look like. Do you understand what I am saying? Wilhelmina Will (talk) 00:32, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

Our policy overrides your opinion. βcommand 00:33, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

'T'ain't opinion; 'tis fact. And now I've added fair use rationales for those images to be used there. What do you have to say about that? Wilhelmina Will (talk) 00:48, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

policy says images in list are not allowed. βcommand 00:52, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

I know it is strange to ask a bot this question, but if you controlled the policy rules, would you let that policy stay? Wilhelmina Will (talk) 00:53, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

I am not a bot, and yes I fully support that policy. βcommand 00:55, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

You aren't? But I thought that there was a robot called "Betacommand Bot". Anyway, why do you think that policy is so good? Wilhelmina Will (talk) 01:35, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

yes I do run a robot called User:BetacommandBot. The policy enforces our m:Mission as set out by the wikimedia foundation. βcommand 01:37, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

Oh. Well, who am I to speak out against that? (To herself) At this stage. (Out loud again) Well would it still be allowed in the wikia dedicated to South Park? Wilhelmina Will (talk) 01:42, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

it might be accepted at the south park wikia, but I am not familiar with their policies. βcommand 01:45, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

Well I think they'll be allowed there. The image policies there are much freeer than they are here. Anyway, I guess this is the end of the discussion, as I have already downloaded the images to my hardrive, explained to their parents what has happened to them, and what is likely to happen to them, and offered them my sympathy. I hope you will do the same. Cheers! Wilhelmina Will (talk) 01:55, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

I find the top post by Wilhelmina Will hilarious. Timeshift (talk) 01:50, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

possible improper tagging

Your change here did not use the correct tag. How can you dispute a rationale that is not even there? I fixed it, but I just wanted to bring this to your attention.--Rockfang (talk) 00:36, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

List of Touhou Project characters

Since all the images on that page were somehow deleted all in an instant, I will ask my questions here instead of in my edit summaries bundled with reverts: How much more official can you get than a lengthy FAQ about copyrights on his very own website? It is understandable if you can't read the Japanese on the pages provided, but to question its authority is just beyond reason. I'm getting the impression that you are just out to delete things and use templated responses to defend your actions. _dk (talk) 02:06, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

Like I have said we need e-mail proof from the copyright holder saying that he has released the copyright, and that needs to me mailed to m:OTRS βcommand 02:12, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
So am I getting this right, that proofs of release on any website are invalid? _dk (talk) 02:17, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
releases on geocities websites are not reliable sources, and there is no proof that the owner of that website is in fact the copyright holder of the images in question. βcommand 02:36, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
This is the main website of the game maker, or copyright holder if you will. If you click on "Support BBS" you'll find a link "■弊サークルの創作物の二次創作・使用関連について" (On derivative works and the use of this circle's creations) that goes here, which is the page given on most of the images. So, as you can tell, this geocities site is sanctioned by the game maker. A portion of the images link here instead, which is clearly a subpage of the official website. Please consider, thank you. _dk (talk) 03:07, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
Since it's linked from the official site, statements on that page should be from or sanctioned by the copyright holders, no? Gimmetrow 03:14, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
Yes. _dk (talk) 03:25, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
The page you linked to [2] does not have a "Support BBS" and does not include the text "弊サークルの創作物の二次創作・使用関連について" and it does not link to geocities. βcommand 03:27, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
The link is there, Beta. Fourth link under contents. Gimmetrow 03:32, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

Well? If I may be bold, can I reupload the images or request undeletion? _dk (talk) 04:45, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

I am getting mixed translations of that site. Please have then e-mail m:OTRS βcommand 04:46, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
Or you can ask a Wikipedian fluent in Japanese to translate the pages for you. If I were to email m:OTRS, what are the procedures? _dk (talk) 05:01, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

I really don't see the need for this. The images were tagged with CopyrightedFreeUse, they were not tagged as fair use. There was a reasonable explanation on the talk page of each image why they were tagged with CopyrightedFreeUse, and the presumption ought to be that these images fall into Category:Conditional use images. If there was a concern, the appropriate procedure was to list them at WP:PUI, no? And DK, any admin can undelete the images, so no need to re-upload them. Also, the only thing that would happen from you emailing OTRS on your own would be someone else reviewing the website/translation; essentially the same can be accomplished with a post at administrators' noticeboard. Beta seems to want ZUN to email OTRS. (And sorry for all the alphabet soup. WP:OMGWTFBBQ.) Gimmetrow 05:21, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard#List_of_Touhou_Project_characters. Gimmetrow 06:50, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

Category:Disputed non-free images as of 2 January 2008

A user pointed out that Category:Disputed non-free images as of 2 January 2008 has over 11,000 images in it. Since we're only talking about 70,000 potential images over the next 80 days and a tops of 1,500 per day, could you re-run that list to spread it out over say days 7-14 or 14-21 from now? I don't even see how 500 active admins could process that day for deletion at this point without ignoring all other activities. MBisanz talk 04:26, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

admins will sort that out, it just might take a few extra days. βcommand 04:28, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

About the issue with Duane

I didn't make any judgments about the issue. I just referred him to the Village Pump. I feel that it is best if you two resolve the issue by making a new section at the pump. WhisperToMe (talk) 05:06, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

Page top

Do you think it might be a good idea to add the notice box at the top of BCB's talk page that says "PLEASE DIRECT ALL QUESTIONS ABOUT IMAGES TO THE IMAGE COPYRIGHT HELP DESK" to his user page and your talk page? Your talk page might say PLEASE DIRECT ALL QUESTIONS ABOUT IMAGES TO THE IMAGE COPYRIGHT HELP DESK FOR FAST ASSISTANCE. Just a suggestion. MBisanz talk 12:25, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

Annoying and Assuming

This bot sent me a love note about the image Image:Bell.png, which I simply ran through some PNG tools to compress further. I was not the original uploader, and I didn't even modify the appearance of the image. The bot is awfully assuming, blaming me for a bad rationale and telling me I should go read the policies. I did not upload the original image, and my modification was made two years ago. I would appreciate it if the bot's message was a little more general and diplomatic ("you uploaded", "your image", "do this", etc.)—either that, or send it only to the original uploader. I apologize if this concern has been voiced before, but I don't feel like wading through a 21-page archive first.—Kbolino (talk) 00:18, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

Wrongly tagged image

Why did Talk:Tatra T97 get notified? Nothing seems to be wrong with Image:Tatra-t97-small.JPG, except that it uses the deprecated {{PD}} tag. But it's certainly not fair use. (Feel free to reply here rather than on my talk page.) -- Ddxc (talk) 03:48, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

There was a sperate image there that was previously deleted. see http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Log&page=Image:Tatra-t97-small.JPG βcommand 03:51, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

BetaCommand is broken,.

BetaCommand appears to be broken. There are a number of complaints about things not being listed. See Wikipedia_talk:Requests_for_comments. My own listing for Chocolate Thai appears to be tagged just as it should be, but several hours later, it hasn't been listed. Also, allowing your bot to be able to be shut down by "anyone" seems like a bad idea. Only let administrators shut it down. Zenwhat (talk) 04:08, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

RFC bot is down, I brought up my copy so all is well. βcommand 04:15, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
Would it be it be possible to have "manual" instructions in Wikipedia:RFC#Instructions that people can follow in the case of bot failure? What I mean is: Would it interfere with your bots' operation in any way? Or do you already have some kind of system that notifies people on Wikipedia:RFC#Instructions about the status of the bots that take care of RFC? I'm no programmer, so perhaps what I'm saying sounds silly, but basically I think it would be great if you could have some kind of failsafe procedure trigged by events OnCrash() or OnShutDown(). Zenwhat (talk) 04:31, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
all you have to do is leave me a note and Ill get it back up. βcommand 04:32, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
Users that read the instructions on RFC might not be aware of that, however. Zenwhat (talk) 01:16, 6 January 2008 (UTC)
you should always tell the operator of a bot, when it crashes. we may not notice it. βcommand 01:18, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

"WP:NFC not allowed in list"

I noticed you deleted images on List of Doctor Who monsters and aliens‎ . Your edit summary said that these were not allowed on list pages. In fact, it staes "The use of non-free media in lists, galleries, discographies, and navigational and user-interface elements is generally unacceptable because it usually fails the test for significance (criterion #8)". Some of these images have fair use criteria for these to be used to aid the discription of the race - so therefore DOES mmet the criteria. I know this doesn't apply to all - but deleting those individually is a better idea than deleting all. StuartDD contributions 16:44, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

The above applies to any enumeration or summary of a group of items related to the article subject (such as a list of people, companies, anime characters, literary or musical works, and so on), regardless of whether the list is in prose, a table, bullet points, contains subsections, or is in any other format. It may be acceptable to include a single image that portrays multiple enumerated elements from the list, or at most two or three separate non-free images portraying items from the list, provided that all other non-free considerations are met.

also see User:Durin/Fair use overuse explanation βcommand 16:47, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
I am going to have to agree with BC here that a list pages should not be using non-free images, but rather should link to the main article which may qualify for fair use. 1 != 2 16:53, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
Well I'll try that, but one of the main reasons for having this list is to prevent lots of small stubs covering one-off species - so most of the monsters are only covered on this page. StuartDD contributions 16:56, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
Well if a subject does not require its own article, then it probably does not need a picture. 1 != 2 17:01, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
I myself have this same problem, for I edit the "List of characters in the Ice Age films" page regularly (having written it myself) and face the threat of pictures being removed from the page. The pictures all depict characters from the series of films and as such, they're all individual pictures with (at most) two characters per picture. Each character should have a picture to illustrate it, it seems.--KnowledgeLord (talk) 01:48, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

WP:NFCC enforcement and your rationale

FYI, you might run into less complaints if you used the rationale "removing decorative or non-vital fair use images per WP:NFCC", (which is really what you're doing) instead of the completely wrong "WP:NFC not allowed in list". (Which, even if it were accurate, would merely be an extension of the former rationale)

I'm not trying to be snarky or counterproductive here; I agree there are a lot of images that need to be cleared out. The problem is that you're spreading FUD with an inaccurate oversimplification of policy. (as it stands, anyway) It's the kind of thing that really pisses people off, hence the revert wars/etc. Seriously, try changing what you put in your edit summaries and see what happens. What have you got to lose? -- Y|yukichigai (ramble argue check) 03:03, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

List of characters in Digimon Adventure

I'll be happy to rename it to Characters of Digimon Adventure if that makes you feel better. You're removing images that have large sections of text talking about the character, which is no where close to what people normally mean when they talk about a list article. I was there for those discussions, I should know. -- Ned Scott 06:10, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

Now I'm going to report you for violating the 3RR. -- Ned Scott 06:12, 6 January 2008 (UTC)
whether or not "list" is in the title makes no difference its still a list. also enforcing NFC is exempt from 3RR. βcommand 06:15, 6 January 2008 (UTC)
Bullshit, it's never been exempt from the 3RR. A single article covering more than one topic does not violate NFCC, and it never has. -- Ned Scott 06:18, 6 January 2008 (UTC)
you might want to re-read 3RR βcommand 06:21, 6 January 2008 (UTC)
If you want to enforce policy, that's one thing, but you're taking an extreme and disputed position on the guideline portion of NFC that was never meant to apply to these kinds of situations. Looking at this again, you've made four edits, not four reverts, but if you revert someone else and don't think you'll be blocked, you're in for a rude surprise. -- Ned Scott 06:30, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

I'm sorry, I'm letting the situation get to me. I understand that you believe you are doing the right thing, but you're going into a grey area with this article, and I'm not the same as most editors you probably deal with. I've even spent a good amount of time on your bot's talk page explaining to people why their image was rightfully tagged, for whatever reason it was at the time. So please, don't just assume here, and listen to what people have to say. -- Ned Scott 06:34, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

I would then suggest separating them into separate articles. βcommand 06:36, 6 January 2008 (UTC)
That has nothing to do with NFC guideline or policy. -- Ned Scott 06:48, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

I'm with you there, Ned. The images should stay. How are readers supposed to recognize the characters without pictures of the characters? —Remember the dot (talk) 06:59, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

Image had rationale, yet got tagged

I'm confused as to what the bot wants. Image:Khan February 2004 confession.jpg had a detailed rationale given even though it was not in template form (there were no such templates at the time it was uploaded, I'm not familiar with them now). The bot does not seem to understand this and gives a misleading message. If this is, as I suspect, a problem with the bot simply not finding the rationale where it expects it to be, perhaps its message could specify that. --Fastfission (talk) 03:07, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

WP:RFCU

Dear Betacommand, you have been listed on a Checkuser case as a party to be checked for sockpuppetry. The case may be found here. Regards, Keilanatalk(recall) 15:07, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

A bot suggestion

Just a random suggestion out of blue in one of these rare lucid moments of mine: Wouldn't it be neat if there were a way to tell BetacommandBot (and other similar bots), "I know how to fix the non-free image rationales / deal with orphan images / whatever - just tell me what images are problematic and how, I already know what to do about them." Not everyone needs the giant boilerplate warning, just the filename and list of policies violated =) It'd be even more useful if bot exclusion/control directives were standardised somehow. All the best... --wwwwolf (barks/growls) 15:43, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

BABS

Hi Betacommand: We're noticing that not all of the articles flagged as being maintained by the WP:BIRD project are showing up on our new Bird Article by Size report, which is run by your bot; any suggestions as to what we can do to make sure the bot recognizes the appropriate articles? MeegsC | Talk 18:29, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

can you give me a few examples of what is being skipped? that would help. βcommand 22:06, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

Dwarf Jay, South American Bittern, List of birds of The Gambia, Least Bittern... Let me know if you need more! MeegsC | Talk 09:41, 7 January 2008 (UTC)
By the way, there are close to 10,000 articles just on bird species, plus articles on various genera and more general articles on bird-related topics. So the total number of articles should be well in excess of 10,000. (Just so you have a rough figure to use when checking the list result...) MeegsC | Talk 09:44, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

HOW?

Ok, this is a curiosity thing more than anything else, but how do you make 30 edits in a minute? I barely do that in 3 hours. Tech43 (talk) 06:00, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

See above thread #Technical question.--Phoenix-wiki 18:56, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Retired user: Gassyguy

I noticed a couple of images your bot listed for deletion were uploaded by a now retired user (Gassyguy). They are album covers, which do fall under the fair use policy, but apparently require an individual justification for each instance (each is only used in the article about the album). I'm having trouble doing this properly, (i'm new to this) and would really appreciate some assistance. I'm not doing this for myself, but for this now retired user. 64.230.43.189 (talk) 01:50, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

RE: VandalProof

I have a question about the program. Do I add my Wiki password onto the login for VandalProof? Zenlax T C S 20:18, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Your not logging into vandalproof. all your doing is logging into Internet Explorer. (VP can do this for you via the startup menu but if you use the remember me option in IE VP will just use that) βcommand 01:06, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

Overdue image investigations

This user's uploads are all overdue for the Hoover. 156.34.210.254 (talk) 00:27, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

World Series of Rock Concerts

Hello Betacommand,

Here is your answer regarding the World Series Concert at Cleveland Stadium

The concerts were every summer from 1974 through 1979. I attended all the concerts in 77 & 78. I was an early teen then and kept a scrapbook with ticket stubs, newspaper articles, my personal notes, etc. My only regret is that I didn't take a camera with me. Too bad we didn't have cell phones back then. The The concerts were always general admission leaving the field open to concert goers. This resulted in the turf having to be repaired before the next Indians' game. These concerts were called "Games" to keep in the tradition of the sporting events held at the Cleveland Stadium. The bands below are listed in order of performance. I only have some show times (if it is still present on the ticket stub). (Tickets were torn in half at redemption and occasional removed some information)

1977 Game 1- June 5 Southside Johnny and the Asbury Jukes(Southside replaced Aerosmith who cancelled several days before), Nazereth, Ted Nugent, Todd Rundgren $9.00 Game 2- June 25 8:30pm - Pink Floyd (Attendence 81,000- A record) $9.50 Game 3-August 6 12noon - Rick Derringer, J Geils, Bob Seger, Peter Frampton $9.50

1978 Game 1- July 1- Kansas, Rolling Stones (New record-83,000) $12.50 Game 2- July 15 4:00pm - Trickster, Journey, Foreignor, Electric Light Orchestra $13.00 Day of Show Game 3- August 26- Eddie Money, Todd Rundgren, Cars, Bob Welch, Fleetwood Mac $12.00

Below is a list of WSoR Concerts that I did not attend so my knowledge is limited, but I can direct you. I know that there are concert dates missing. I am not sure the order of performances, price etc...

1974 First WSoR -June 24 Joe Walsh, (unsure of other acts), September - Crosby, Stills Nash and Young (from The Plain Dealer August 29, 1995 article by Jane Scott)

1975 Unsure of date-Uriah Heep, Blue Oyster Cult, Mahogany Rush, The Faces (featured Rod Stewart and Ronnie Wood)

1979 Game 1- July 28 2:30pm- AC/DC, Aerosmith, Thin Lizzy , Ted Nugent, Journey, (Did not attend but have the promotional poster) (this concert allegedly beat the prior attendence record but cannot verify.) Sources: http://buzzardbook.wordpress.com/ (This is a site maintained by John Gorman who was WMMS program director back then, WMMS and Belkin Production were not only concert promoters but active participants on the day of the show.) Gorman would be a wealth of info on all Cleveland Concerts from that era. He wrote a book entitled "The Buzzard" on that subject. I have not read it yet due to its recent release. I researched it a little and there is a chapter on the World Series Concerts

This another book that may have info, although I haven't read it. Wolff, Carlo, Cleveland Rock and Roll Memories: True and Tall Tales of the Glory Days, Told By Musicians, DJs, Promoters & Fans Who Made the Scene in the '60s, '70s, and '80s, Gray & Company, Publishers (2006), ISBN-13: 978-1-886228-99-3.

I hope this is helpful.

MM DENE (talk) 07:50, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

NFC/FU images in lists

Why do you keep saying that FU images are always not permissible in lists and cite a guideline that doesn't say that? "Usually" and "always" don't mean the same thing. On some lists, unreplacable unfree images can and actually do pass NFCC #8. Will (talk) 20:47, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

Ex-editor

I logged in there for the first time in nine months, after not editing for nine months before that because I'm reading through some articles and remembered I had popups or whatever it's called set up. And got the orange bar & found a torrent of bot messages on my talk page.

I'm an ex-editor. You might as well save the bot's run time and not bother "notifying" me. I won't see it. - SoM (talk) 02:52, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

Technical question

This is not to make a criticism of your pace of unlinking and relinking, but as a matter of curiosity, how do you achieve such high rates of editing (at times, 30 articles per minute)? Are you doing it by a bot? Also, how is it that you seem to be able to get such fast responses out of the Wikimedia servers? Even during times of low lag, I cannot usually even load articles that fast, let alone edit and save them. Thanks, - Neparis (talk) 00:55, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

I write my own programs that can interact with the website that feature page preloading, and pre processing. It shows me something, I make a choice and while the program is posting to the website it shows me something else. βcommand 00:59, 6 January 2008 (UTC)
Fascinating. All other factors being equal, does doing it your way create a lighter or heavier load on the Wikimedia servers for each page loaded, compared to loading the same page in a plain browser at the same rate? Can anybody else do it? Thanks, - Neparis (talk) 01:34, 6 January 2008 (UTC)
on the server side there is no difference, but on the user end there is less time, due to the fact that the browser does not have to render the HTML. βcommand 01:36, 6 January 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for the interesting answers. Is the source code open? - Neparis (talk) 01:47, 6 January 2008 (UTC)
I use AWB and have wanted pre-loading or queing in it for sometime. Would you ever release some version of your tools (even under closed source) in the AWB/NPW model? MBisanz talk 04:20, 6 January 2008 (UTC)Q
I dont write fancy GUI stuff, but if you want a specific tool I might be able to write it for you. βcommand 04:22, 6 January 2008 (UTC)
What about the pre-processing and page preloading non-GUI stuff that you have already written? Would you consider releasing those tools, even if you might consider them to be unpolished, as food for thought? I would be very interested in those two. - Neparis (talk) 13:23, 6 January 2008 (UTC)
Any chance of seeing your code for those two? - Neparis (talk) 01:13, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
Those are basiclly stock parts of m:Pywikipedia which is the framework that I build my tools from. βcommand 01:17, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for the link. I'll look into it. - Neparis (talk) 01:32, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
Please note I enjoy coding and I do write scripts/bots for others see User:RFC bot for an example. βcommand 04:10, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
Thanks, at this stage I don't want to make a bot, but I would like to do some experiments with the specific code you have already written for pre-processing and page pre-loading based on m:Pywikipedia. Would you let me have a look at those or even your BetaCommandBot's code? Thanks, Neparis (talk) 01:29, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
Not all my tools are bots. I do write stuff that is similar to WP:AWB. As for the code of BCbot is about 40 scripts that each do different things. and they are cross dependant on each other. If you want you can down load and look at the source code of Pywikipedia at the link provided. βcommand 01:55, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

Your input requested

I tagged Image:Spj logo.jpg with {{di-disputed fair use rationale}}, due to its lack of an adequate fair use rationale, as well as its inappropriate use/display on a portal page, Portal:Journalism/Selected quote/66. Please correct me if I'm wrong here, but I thought that fair-use images were only really appropriate specifically in article mainspace, and not on other types of Wikipedia space throughout the project, like portals, templates, etc. That's why on portals I only use free-use images. Your input would be most appreciated, both at Image:Spj logo.jpg, and at Portal talk:Journalism/Selected quote/66. Thanks. Cirt (talk) 08:47, 8 January 2008 (UTC).

  • Your input would also be appreciated as to the general fair-use of the image itself, both in the article mainspace, and the portal mainspace. I still don't think enough of a fair-use rationale is given, even though the uploader removed it from the portal space. And even though the uploader had removed it from that portal page, your input at Portal talk:Journalism/Selected quote/66 would also still be helpful, for the edification of the other editor in the discussion on that talk page. Thanks, Cirt (talk) 08:51, 8 January 2008 (UTC).
Here's the deal: the image I uploaded is for fair use on SPJ. Someone added it as an image on a journalism portal, which I agree with Cirt that it is a misuse of fair use. I believe the issue is fixed now. Cirt is contesting the fair use for that journalism portal (image now removed from it) and he is not contesting the use on SPJ. Input on the FUR I wrote would be appreciated, but I will fight to keep it at SPJ. Guroadrunner (talk) 08:52, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
No, I am contesting the fair-use on both the portal page and the mainspace page. I will not re-add the {{di-disputed fair use rationale}} tag another time, I'll leave that up to Betacommand. Cirt (talk) 08:54, 8 January 2008 (UTC).
Image contested is: Image:Spj logo.jpg -- this
Image Cirt maybe wants to use (and put into Commons somehow?) is: Image:SPJ_logo_2_for_cirt.jpg -- the original image I took
09:13, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
  1. Image:SPJ logo 2 for cirt.jpg - The name for this image with "for cirt" at the end is inappropriate. I have requested that the image be tagged by its author with {{db-author}}, and re-uploaded with the name "SPJ logo 2".
  2. That larger second image should be used instead of the first image of just the logo.
  3. Or perhaps instead, use an image like [3], or [4], where its authenticity and location can be verified by a hyperlink.
  4. I'd still appreciate it if Betacommand (talk · contribs) would check the fair-use rationale on both images. Cirt (talk) 09:17, 8 January 2008 (UTC).
    • I agree with Cirt's solution here and I will let him or her upload one of the images he mentioned and put up a FUR. I've DB-AUTHOR ed the other images I uploaded as a replacement should be coming within minutes. Guroadrunner (talk) 09:32, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
Betacommand, sorry for all of the back and forth above, looks like we were able to come to a resolution on this. I'd still appreciate it if you weighed in on the appropriateness or lack thereof, of fair-use images on Portal-space pages on Wikipedia, at Portal talk:Journalism/Selected quote/66. Thanks, Cirt (talk) 10:05, 8 January 2008 (UTC).

Archiving ANI

Your archiving process should be archiving entire level 2 (==) sections; it archives a level 3 section, and also a level 2 section while omitting subsections (leaving them on the main page. Please do not run this process again until the issue is fixed. —Random832 16:44, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

It also seems to have broken on the line ">>>== Message: ==", which was not a header. —Random832 17:23, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

Struggle.jpg

You recently had this image I had uploaded deleted. What am I supposed to say... It's a picture of the album cover of a band of whom I am friends with, and they gave me permission to use that image anywhere on Wikipedia, including that article... That has to qualify for fair use... What am I supposed to do? Andrew Nutter (talk) 21:03, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

WP:MTC

I had the idea recently of a bot for moving images tagged with {{move to commons}}. I noted in the archives of bot requests that you both mentioned that you had a bot that did this, and that the developers are working on an improvement in the software to facilitate this. could you elaborate on this? I really think that the entire process should be automated or semi-automated (obviously user input would be neccessary for images with names that already exist as images on the commons). Also, do you have any text, links, or updates relating to the dev's feature? Any input into this would be helpful, I was not aware that there was a bot for this (as the category currently has a backlog).Thanks!--Vox Rationis (Talk | contribs) 19:39, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

see WP:MTC βcommand 19:41, 7 January 2008 (UTC)
Might I receive your endorsement for using this template? I have moved a few assisted with CommonsHelper, and (after later going back and adding categories) I believe that I understand the process now. I would currently plan to only clear out the backlog on Category:Copy to Wikimedia Commons. From there, I might move on to any other backlogs on the images. However, with the others, I realize that care must be taken, in investigating source (so that invalid licenses) are not used.Your endorsement would be much appreciated, so that I may assist with this project.--Vox Rationis (Talk | contribs) 22:47, 9 January 2008 (UTC)
If you can find someone on the approved list who you know that can endorse you that would be great. βcommand 22:59, 9 January 2008 (UTC)
Done.--Vox Rationis (Talk | contribs) 20:53, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

Question about maxlag

I was interested by your comments earlier on the Bot owners' noticeboard about the use of maxlag in lieu of a timer-based throttle on bot edits. I am familiar with the maxlag parameter, but I had a couple of questions. (1) Is maxlag supposed to be used only on edits, or also when a bot reads information from the wiki? (2) If the bot uses a maxlag setting, does this eliminate the need for other throttling of the read/write rates? Your thoughts on these points would be useful in designing bot software. --Russ (talk) 16:46, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

maxlag should work with r/w. two there is still some throttling that you should take into account. If you are intrested in bot development, the best framework that is currently out is m:Pywikipedia which is what I use. it has built in throtting. along with one of the best support for mediawiki. βcommand 17:01, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
That's what I use, too.  ;) I'm currently working on rewriting parts of the framework to use the api.php interface. I could use any additional guidance you might have on how throttling and maxlag ought to interact. For example, the current timed throttle would seem to be inconsistent with using persistent HTTP connections. The question is, if we use maxlag religiously on all reads and writes, what other constraints are desirable? --Russ (talk) 17:08, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

Not an orphaned picture, do not delete.

Greetings. Your bot wrote to me saying that this image was orphaned and was to be deleted. It's clearly not orphaned, so do not delete it. -- Henriok (talk) 18:31, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

That was 6 months ago!! And it was orphaned at that time. wow. Woody (talk) 18:34, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
Actually, it doesn't appear that it's ever been orphaned since it was uploaded...but it's still probably safe from deletion since the tag was removed the day after it was placed. --Onorem♠Dil 18:42, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
If I remember correctly someone edited a template that remvoed the image parameter that ended up orphaning a lot of images for s short period. (I think this is the cause of the template.) βcommand 18:49, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
Yep. I was just about to post this diff where you comment about the infobox and orphans. --Onorem♠Dil 18:50, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

RFC template

Hey Beta, this RfC request isn't appearing in the problem list or on the RfC pages...not sure if it's formatted right. If you would be so kind as to check..or let me know if I should just wait a bit longer...;) Thanks! Dreadstar † 18:56, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

Im not sure whats up Ill take a look in a few hours when I have access to the toolserv. βcommand 19:13, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
Thanks man. I remember another location where errors were recorded besided the error template page, is that still around? I couldn't seem to find it. Dreadstar † 20:08, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

Image:Poison.png

This bot is not operating correctly. It has placed the disputed fair use template on the above image page twice in the same month. This image page does have a valid fair use rationale listed and did on both of the dates this bot added the template to the page. Eleven Special (talk) 21:13, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

that rationale does not state for what page that the rationale is for and is thus not valid. βcommand 22:26, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
It does now. Eleven Special (talk) 23:40, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

botwiki:Python:Deliever.py

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "C:/pywiki/deliever.py", line 22, in <module>
    main()
  File "C:/pywiki/deliever.py", line 8, in main
    for page in gen:
  File "C:\pywiki\pagegenerators.py", line 266, in LinkedPageGenerator
    for page in linkingPage.linkedPages():
AttributeError: 'str' object has no attribute 'linkedPages'

I must be stupid. Is the problem with the script, or with pagegen? Mønobi 03:29, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Whoops!

Careful...you took a bit much in that archivin'. Cheers, — Scientizzle 07:19, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

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notifcation delivery

So it seems taht there will be a new poll/vote/discussion about Rollback (ugh!). I've scanned the various pages its ever been discussed on and compiled a list of 1119 users who've ever commented on rollback. Once the poll is up and running, I can do a semi-automated delivery using AWB to notify the 1119, but I know BCB is much, much faster than my pointer finger. Can he help out here? MBisanz talk 20:51, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

I just need a list of what/where and Ill be happy to do it. βcommand 23:19, 11 January 2008 (UTC)
Well I'm gonna be out of the country for part of next week and won't have much access to the internet. It looks like this whole issue is still in flux, but should we decide to take a poll, User:Mbisanz/RollbackNotify has the message and user list inbetween the nowiki tags. MBisanz talk 01:29, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

Category:Disputed non-free images as of 2 January 2008 1 and the like

Can you script your bot to add the text "__NOGALLERY__" [5] to non-free categories like these the next time you create them. Per WP:NFCC, this should be done when categories of non-free content exist. Thank you. — Save_Us † 11:14, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

How many images left?

Hi. Do you have some estimate of how many images with missing or invalid fair use rationales there are? I'm just curious about how much work it would be to fix them. --Apoc2400 (talk) 16:57, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

At last count there were 68,000 identified images that have/had problems of those ~12,000 have been tagged. that is about the best guess I can give as for current numbers. βcommand 17:51, 12 January 2008 (UTC)
Of the ~12,000 tagged on Jan 2, by Jan 12, 6,000 had been fixed or deleted with review. Assuming 1,500 new images are added and scanned per day, it seems like the community can bear a rate of 2,100 image tags per day. Is there a way to fit this model into BCB scan schedule and the deadline schedule? MBisanz talk 18:13, 12 January 2008 (UTC)
that is not really a good option. Ive been throttling the tags for the last 6 months. Id like to get done early with these so that the backlog has time to clear itself. βcommand 19:31, 12 January 2008 (UTC)
Actually, I re-did my math over dinner and realized at 2,100 a day, we wouldn't meet the deadline. Is there someway we could have a calendar of days when "big" runs will be done? MBisanz talk 02:25, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Suggestion: Categorize by type

It would be great if your bot could put disputed fair use images into categories by type, such as logo, album cover, screenshot, etc. Since these are marked with templates it should be possible. --Apoc2400 (talk) 17:02, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

if you can create a list of template/new category pairs Ill try and add them into the bot. βcommand 17:52, 12 January 2008 (UTC)
Sure, here is a suggestion:
Tags Category
{{logo}} Category:Disputed non-free logo images
{{albumcover}}, {{book cover}}, {{DVDcover}}, {{Non-free game cover}}, {{Non-free magazine cover}}, {{comiccover}}, {{product-cover}} Category:Disputed non-free cover images
{{game-screenshot}}, {{film-screenshot}}, {{tv-screenshot}}, {{Web-screenshot}}, {{non-free music video screenshot}}, {{non-free software screenshot}} Category:Disputed non-free screenshots
{{promophoto}}, {{promotional}} Category:Disputed non-free promotional images
{{art}} Category:Disputed non-free art images
I noticed I can get a similar effect by using CatScan, but it takes a long time and only returns 1000 results. --Apoc2400 (talk) 00:04, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

commons-ok bot

Is this still running? I tagged quite a few images a while ago (and marked them with categories) but I still see many (maybe all) that haven't been moved. Calliopejen1 (talk) 20:55, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

Joeydeacon2.gif

"This image is a screenshot of a copyrighted television program or station ID. As such, the copyright for it is most likely owned by the company or corporation that produced it. It is believed that the use of a limited number of web-resolution screenshots". It's very low resolution and I believe the above rationale applies. DavidFarmbrough (talk) 16:35, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

Please see WP:FURG as that is not a proper rationale. βcommand 18:00, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

Update on List of fictional South Park species‎

As I said I would do, I have re-listified the above article, and commented out the images. No one attempted to reference the page when it was titled as an article, so it's apparent to me that this is, in fact, a list, and most likely the images should be removed per NFC8. Bellwether BC 02:22, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Just to let you know

If I made an edit to the information about a CSD'd image to help get it out of that situation, please don't reply by sending me the same template. Sometimes, the template doesn't make clear what is wrong with a certain image, only that something is causing it to continue to be a candidate for speedy deletion and being sent the same exact information does not help. Thank you --wL<speak·check> 14:07, 13 January 2008 (UTC)


Request for BCB work

Could you cross-tab images Category:Brands of the World with Category:All non-free media, Category:All non-free Logos, Category:Non-free Logos. Then any that appear in the first and one of the last three, be scanned with BCB for compliance, and dropped into a subcat Category:Brands of the World disputed? These all have reliable sources, and just need human overuse screening, backlinking, rationaling. MBisanz talk 02:13, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

VandalProof Application

I'm just wondering, besides the criteria listed on the application page, what else do applicants need to satisfy before they are approved?Transcendence (talk) 06:46, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

This is something I would also be interested in too. Compwhiz II(Talk)(Contribs) 18:52, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

A quick double check shows that you both Look like your still learning about vandal fighting and both of you have minor issues that I know time will fix. But since VP is a very powerful tool, Id prefer to see some more time under your belts before approving. Please re-apply in 3-4 weeks. βcommand 20:47, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

Okay, thank you for your response Compwhiz II(Talk)(Contribs) 02:11, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Fair use rationale when article has been moved

See for example Image:BlackFuries.gif. The image had a fair use rationale for use in Garou Nation. That article was moved to Garou Tribes (Werewolf: The Apocalypse). You bot still tagged it for deletion. Would it be possible to detect when an article has moved and update the fur automatically? --Apoc2400 (talk) 19:28, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

Same for Image:CDT logo.png in Democratic Confederation of Labour moved to Democratic Confederation of Labour (Morocco). --Apoc2400 (talk) 20:33, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
as for your second example, the old page is a disambig. and that is why it was tagged. βcommand 20:40, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
I agree with tagging, but with a cleanup tag instead of a deletion tag. --Apoc2400 (talk) 21:04, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

What the?

Are you at least going to provide a reason as to why I can't use VP? Two One Six Five Five discuss my greatness 20:31, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

you dont meet the basic requirement of 250 mainspace edits. βcommand 20:41, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
Yes, don't leave it on my talk page and leave me wondering whether you read it or not.
So I have, like, forty-something less edits than I should...whatever! I bet I can bring that up in seven days flat! Two One Six Five Five discuss my greatness 20:55, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
the proper procedure is leave a discussion in one place. if you start it on my talkpage, I reply there. If I start it on yours, you reply there, if its on a article talkpage, we discuss there. βcommand 20:57, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
By the way Betacommand, you left an odd message on this user's page, perhaps you should check it out... The Rambling Man (talk) 21:00, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
un-noticed typo. :) βcommand 21:01, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
Unnoticed by you! Anyway, hence the request for clarification here. Just thought you ought to cut him some slack...! The Rambling Man (talk) 21:03, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

Please approve

Could you please approve me for Vandalproof? I have put my name on the list. Many others have also. Thanks! Ohmpandya (Talk to Me...) 21:23, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

VP approval granted, but nothing happened

Hi there, I see that back on 24 November you approved me for VandalProof. However I didn't receive a notification of this, and when I try to connect or verify authorization, it tells me "No privileges found". Was my application successfully completed? Regards, — BillC talk 02:14, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

the "No privileges found" is just stating that you are not an admin. you should be able to log in and use VP. βcommand 03:32, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

User:BJBot

Hey, ß. BJBot has been given me some orphaned fair-use notices. How come it wasn't you giving me those notifications? Have you quit orphaned fair-use so you can focus on fair-use rationales? What's the deal? Your friend. Jecowa (talk) 05:26, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

I was just covering for BJBot . βcommand 05:28, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

RSPB image

I can't see why a bird charity should object to its Avocet logo being displayed on the Pied Avocet page, but I'm fed up with defending good-faith uploads, so delete to your heart's content. Jimfbleak (talk) 07:46, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Image question

How does the image Image:DreamTheater.JPG... which is an obvious copyvio and already tagged as a PUI end up being uploaded over at Commons? It was loaded over by a user named Drozd??.. a relative newbie... Is there not more scrutiny over there. That image screams copyvio. It shows up on every Google image search page always coming from different websites. Can that gu be put in check for that? It's awfully careless. Oh well... rant over. Back to happy editing :D . 156.34.225.75 (talk) 01:43, 16 January 2008 (UTC) 

You have requested that the images of the members of Dethklok be deleted however Brendon Small has looked at the page and said that those images are okay to use. So stop deleting things that don't need to be deleted or you will be deleted douchbag bot!  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Metalocalypse (talk • contribs) 15:15, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

References tags

Please be careful with adding references tags - at least one of the articles you added the <references /> tag to already had the {{refs}} template on it, thus your edit made the references show up twice in the article. Also please note that the convention is to use the {{refs}} or {{reflist}} templates, not the <references /> tag directly, so that the references appear in a smaller font size and are easily put into a multicolumn format if required. Thanks, Waggers (talk) 08:29, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Please stop adding duplicate reference lists to pages, as you did to Ainderby Steeple. Further edits like this may result in a block. Waggers (talk) 08:50, 17 January 2008 (UTC)


Unblock?

Hi, I'm slightly surprised you haven't requested an unblock (although I was also slightly surprised that you ignored the warnings I left!) - I'm more than happy to unblock you provided you stop adding duplicate reference lists to articles. In particular, look out for the following templates (although I can't guarantee this is an exhaustive list):

If I do unblock you on this basis, it should be noted that continuing to add duplicate references will almost certainly result in a further block (in fact, that's true even if I don't unblock you now and you wait out the existing block). Any thoughts? Waggers (talk) 14:09, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

I missed the warnings. I was using a simi-auto script written in python. (it does not show the "You have new messages" bar. I normaly use a IRC program for that. that is why at times I can have almost instant responce time for certin discussions. The IRC tool decided to stop. it times out processing the RC feed about once a week if I dont reset it). due to over caution in error trapping I did not even notice the block message until I went to check my watchlist right before going to work. βcommand 16:22, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
Must have been a bit of a shock! Now that you've definitely seen the messages, I'll unblock you as I hate to see a normally constructive and active user blocked. Presumably you can alter the script to check for templates that include the list of references? Waggers (talk) 16:37, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
Yeah, its on my todo list, when I get time. βcommand 16:55, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
I'm sorry, that's not acceptable. You must not use the script unless and until you make those alterations; it took me ages to go through your edits and clear up your mess, I'm not prepared to continue clearing up after you. You're still adding duplicate references - see Amish furniture for example. Please will you stop? If not, I'll have little choice but to impose another block as your script is very disruptive. Waggers (talk) 09:16, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
I see you're still using the script - given yesterday's communication problems, please can you confirm that you've seen the above message and amended the script accordingly? Waggers (talk) 10:09, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
Hi. On occasion your script is also relocating {{fact}} tags into the references section, for example here. Just letting you know so the code can be tweaked. Euryalus (talk) 11:24, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

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Blocked

You have been temporarily blocked because a script you are running is malfunctioning. Once you have stopped the script, please contact me or use {{unblock}} here. I encourage anyone to unblock you once this is done, and will happily do so myself. Seraphimblade Talk to me 11:43, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Wait, where is it malfunctioning? Diffs? Majorly (talk) 12:01, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
Give me a moment, I'll find the previous ones. Lot of edits to sift, and they got buried since I saw them. Seraphimblade Talk to me 12:08, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
[6], [7], [8], for some. I love the script idea, I've run across that problem myself (refs listed but no ref section), but there are evidently some bugs to work out still. Seraphimblade Talk to me 12:13, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
Looks like it's FootnotesSmall that got you this time. Here's a couple diffs from today's batch. It looks like a few pages had the references written out without using a template, so some of those wound up with two sets of refs also. --Onorem♠Dil 12:50, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
(edit conflict)Please note that this was fixed yesterday and I have addressed this issue with my tool, Please see above. Looking into the last post βcommand 12:55, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Unblocked. BC has told me he has fixed the script. Hopefully no more damage will be done. Majorly (talk) 13:23, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Suggestion

</reference> has become out dated can your bot add {{reflist}}

It's not outdated; they do not do the same things. <references /> is far more efficient to render as it doesn't involve templates, and doesn't make the font small for no good reason – Gurch 15:08, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
FYI, AWB replaces <references/> with {{reflist}}. TableMannersC·U·T 15:42, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
and there where a lot of complaints about that, and the AWB devs have disabled that in the next release. βcommand 16:16, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
Funny, in my last script I just did the opposite with AWB. If the font is supposed to be different, why not use the mediawiki-namespace to enforce that? --Dirk Beetstra T C 16:01, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
Because most people are happy with the current font; unfortunately a small number of people with a lot of time and automated editing tools at their disposal feel the need to go around changing everything – Gurch 16:19, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Category bot

Hi.. thanks for your reply on village pump, but I don't understand what you mean, could you be more spesific? thanks. borgx (talk) 23:00, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

you just need to file a Bot request and a bot operator may do that. βcommand 23:04, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

VandalProof

Hi, am I on the list of users that are authorized to use VandalProof? It's been killing me, 'cause for the last few days, nothing happens when I click "Verify Authorization". — Cuyler91093 - Contributions 04:54, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

you should have access. βcommand 15:59, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

Seven devils

It's my screen shot, see above and delete away, Jimfbleak (talk) 08:26, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Spelling error in bot edit summaries

Every time I see this pop up in my watchlist it bugs me (mildly, of course): The edit summary used by BetaCommandBot says notifing user of invalid Fair Use claim WP:NONFREE; could somebody change the incorrect 'notifing' to 'notifying'?

Thanks, JavaTenor (talk) 08:49, 15 January 2008 (UTC)


Image:Whitecastle.gif

The bot has constantly harassed me about this image that I already fixed about 5 or 6 times, saying the fair-use rationale is invalid, which isn't right considering the other White Castle logo has almost the same rationale. Please stop. --jonrev (talk) 02:14, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Image:Sosai3.jpg

Hi Betacommandbot! I noticed you tagged this jpg. Not knowing much about fair use, I'd just like to let you know that the subject of the picture is deceased so presumably won't have any objections.Ticklemygrits (talk) 17:32, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Question about parsing MediaWiki API-derived XML using Python

Hi Betacommand,

So long story short, I'm working on a script for a bot using pywikipedia, and I was wondering if you could help me with a problem I'm having. I'm trying to access the XML data in the MediaWiki API so I can parse image-related metadata using xml.dom.minidom, but I can't figure out how to preserve the XML data that I grab from the API. If I use urllib to grab the information using the URL, it just returns the HTML used to display the XML in a browser, which is no good to me for obvious reasons.

I have some programming background but am new to Python, and so it's entirely possible that I'm missing something incredibly obvious. I noticed in one of your comments at WP:RFBA that you know how to use the API with pywikipedia, so I was wondering if you would be so kind as to point me in the right direction?

Thanks in advance! --jonny-mt 08:38, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

If I may interject... It has been quite recently pointed out to me that parsing the XML is a dumb approach (at least, I felt dumb when I realized), like shooting a fly with a cannon. A much better one is to request the result in the JSON format (&format=json) and parse it with something like simplejson (which has a friendly license, too). The JSON format is much more Python-friendly. Миша13 17:35, 20 January 2008 (UTC)
Well that might just do it. I'll give it a shot; thanks for the help! --jonny-mt 04:15, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Flagged image

The bot recently flagged the repulsion box albulm cover as incorrect tag. It was wrong. The image uses the correct audio recording fair use tag. Dr dozzy (talk) 21:28, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

{{commons ok}}

Hello BetaCommandBot, I recently tagged several images to be moved to the commons including adding categories, and you performed the move relatively well. However, It seems that MetsBot has detected that some of the images were not categorized. These images include:

I can fix the categories myself, but I thought you would like to know about this fluke, so that you might improve the code, if it is a bug, or inform my of some error on my part (none which I can see, All images categorized and tagged in AWB, and as several images went out without MetsBot's disapproval, I assume that I am doing it alright). There were also a few false positives by MetsBot, but I will address those with him instead. Thanks for contributing to Wikipedia!--Vox Rationis (Talk | contribs) 01:53, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

Corrected underscore in my sig?

Called it an RFC error?[9] Just an FYI on the novelty, possible bug. -- Kendrick7talk 03:19, 21 January 2008 (UTC) I always knew I'd be first against the wall when revolution came.

there was an error with the template, the bot attempted to fix that but could not, but it also does a little code cleanup too. βcommand 03:25, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Image:Soaring Magazine January 1972.jpg

I have noted the single article that links to this image along with clear rationale for free use, Rsduhamel (talk) 06:39, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Removing Blanked Pages

Hi ... please stop reverting the two page blanks. This issue was resolved many months ago by senior wiki sysops. Google crawlers are indexing the COI links and because of the number of links to wikipedia, it is associating these links in front page google search displays which is inappropriate. The full history on these issues remains in the edits, but the COI issue was resolved (we will have no further involvement with wikipedia) and the pages should be blanked as per SysOp action. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Popperian (talk • contribs) 20:04, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

WikiProject tagging (rant)

Mate if I see another boilerplate text left by BcB I'm going to scream. Stuff like:

==WikiProject class rating==
This article was automatically assessed because at least one article was rated and this bot brought all the other ratings up to at least that level.

Just put it in the edit summary. People (general editors) don't really care about this stuff anyway, they don't need a talk page message about it. Or, make and use a template.

Likewise, instead of leaving a message saying you auto-assessed as stub class (these add up to MBs in the database and are just clutter) add an auto=yes parameter to the WP's template!

I've already had to clear up crap like this left by SkiersBot; if I see any boilerplate text being spammed across talk pages again I'm going to block the offending bot and send my bot out to clean it up.

Summary: Use edit summary, a template parameter, or a new template, in that order. Don't spam talk pages about assesment grades etc, most people don't care. An edit summary, an auto=yes, or a *small* HTML comment next to the grade is enough.

Sorry about my harsh tone but as a BAG member you should know better, and I'm seeing so many of these as I do my own tagging it's driving me mad. It's like you have a goal to get a message onto every talk page or something. --kingboyk (talk) 23:15, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, I got yelled at for not doing that. :) βcommand 23:21, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

I have a somewhat radical proposal - what about adding a parameter "auto-explanation" to the templates, that the bot can fill in identifying itself and briefly explaining how it made the assessment (is in a stub category; higher assessment rating found on whichever other wikiproject's tag, etc), rather than leaving a large message on the talk page. —Random832 14:52, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Rationale reverted

Why? I think I provided a completely legitimate rationale here; why did you revert it? -Justin (koavf)·T·C·M 06:30, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

there was an edit conflict, I just saw your removal, and reverted that. I never saw that you added a rationale, sorry about that. βcommand 13:05, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
Good, good All's well that ends well. -Justin (koavf)·T·C·M 20:39, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Bots template ignored

Tell your asinine bot to take notice of the "bots" template on my talk page, which I placed there after the last time I complained about said bot's misguided attempt to make me give a damn about whether this twit-ridden archive has any images on it at all. It clearly says "allow=grafikbot" meaning deny everybody else. Djdaedalus (talk) 14:06, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Images

Why don't you just mark EVERY IMAGE for deletion, and save everyone a lot of time and trouble? Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? 14:08, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Templates, your bot and fair use

BetacommandBot is posting on article talk pages about images only in templates used in the article (see: User talk:BetacommandBot#Template_confusion). This lead to me to post a question at the copyright help desk that you may be able to provide advice about (see: Wikipedia:Image copyright help desk#Fair use on templates). Cheers! Vassyana (talk) 15:30, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Wow! Thanks for that ultra-fast reply on your bot page (even before I posted the above message). That makes sense, as both the image and template are transcluded. Hm, just a thought: Is there a way to detect double transclusion (or a tranclusion "tree")? Vassyana (talk) 15:34, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
there is no simple method of doing that check. βcommand 15:35, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
I didn't think so, but it was worth a thought. :) Be well! Vassyana (talk) 16:15, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Don't abuse warning tags

You placed a tag accusing me of violating the policy against personal attacks. Let's take a moment and review (we're going to set aside the fact that it's a bot, not a person). I sincerely believe your bot is one of the worst things to happen to Wikipedia, and I make that point with a good faith argument:

  • The bot doesn't actually do anything to fix problems, it just deletes/eliminates things that could've been fixed quickly.
  • To me and my philosophy about this Project (inclusionism, eventualism, anti-copyright paranoia), that makes it a lazy answer.
  • Lazy answers are counterproductive.
  • Because this is a bot, it greatly magnifies the damage I believe it does to the Project.
  • So, for those reasons, I absolutely stand behind my statement that "BetacommandBot is the worst thing to happen to Wikipedia in quite some time".

You've basically accused me of the Wikipedia equivalent of libel; but, for the above reasons, what I have stated is in good faith and, in my opinion, truthful. Do you chose to disagree? That's fine. However, don't let your own emotions escalate to threatening or bullying me like you did here. Thank you. --Bobak (talk) 16:50, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

The threat to delete them within a week is unfair. Some of us have other things to do, like work for a living. Also, many of them already have a FU rationale, they just don't happen to have the template. This is definitely abusive and highly offensive. Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? 17:10, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

the bot does not check for a template, and Bobak, those comments are attacks. βcommand 17:11, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
They may be hyperbole, but they are not far off the mark. If you're not checking for a template, how do you justify complaining that there is no FU rationale, when there is one? Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? 17:23, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
Point me to image that BCbot tagged that you "think" had a rational, and Ill point you to what was wrong. βcommand 17:25, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
This one, for one, which isn't mine, its uploader posted it like 3 years ago. Image:Superman ii ver3.jpg - Now tell me (1) what's wrong with it and (2) how a "robot program" can determine that. That is, what combination of words is it looking for that would make it "right" in your eyes? Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? 17:52, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
The issue with [:Image:Superman ii ver3.jpg] was fixed here. and every image BCBot tags does have a problem with it. βcommand 18:09, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
The exact name of the article in which the image is displayed. Woody (talk) 18:08, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
The rationale was easy to fix.[10] All I had to do was follow the instructions at Wikipedia:Non-free use rationale guideline, as conveniently linked by the tag placed on the page. If you encounter a case you know to how fix take the advice of {{sofixit}}. Vassyana (talk) 18:09, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for the explanation and for fixing. That should help in the future. Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? 18:18, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Image tagging

I wonder, isn't having one screenshot per episode compatible with the current guidelines on the non-free content? Because your bot is tagging them for deletion. --Tone 21:58, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

they need rationales something that has not been provided. βcommand 22:04, 21 January 2008 (UTC)


Without an example, a best guess is that their rationales are not complete, they need to specifically name the article they are being used in. --MASEM 22:02, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
For example, take this one: Image:Stargate Atlantis -- 3x08.jpg. It has all rationale needed, IMO. --Tone 22:21, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
there is no rationale for the use of that image for McKay and Mrs. Miller. βcommand —Preceding comment was added at 22:52, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
It is believed that the use of one still screencap (per episode) to visually identify a key moment and the episode in question will not limit the copyright holders ability to profit via any medium. Furthermore it is of web-resolution and is of a lower quality then the original broadcast. This is not enough? To identify the episode? And there is no free alternative either. Thanks for your time. --Tone 23:20, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
the rationale needs to state the exact article in question. How is somone not familar with SG supposed to know what article/episode you are talking about? βcommand 23:35, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
Ok, this explains. I will fix those images tomorrow. Greetings. --Tone 23:45, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Please explain the revert

could you please explain the reason why you reverted edits in Talk:Makara Jyothi‎. --Avinesh Jose  T  04:56, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

you have a malformed RFC template. βcommand 04:58, 22 January 2008 (UTC)
I corrected, just check it again. I manually edited the list page? Or else, will it automatically be added into the list? Tell me how it works? --Avinesh Jose  T  05:11, 22 January 2008 (UTC)
the template is not correct again, and BCBot will add it to the list when the template is formated properly. βcommand 05:12, 22 January 2008 (UTC)
please check it now. --Avinesh Jose  T  05:28, 22 January 2008 (UTC)
Its on the list now. βcommand 05:32, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

RE: Disputed fair use rationale for Image:UMass-Lowell-logo.png

Your bot sent me a message: "Thanks for uploading Image:UMass-Lowell-logo.png. However, there is a concern that the rationale you have provided for using this image under "fair use" may be invalid. Please read the instructions at Wikipedia:Non-free content carefully, then go to the image description page and clarify why you think the image qualifies for fair use. Using one of the templates at Wikipedia:Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to ensure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.

If it is determined that the image does not qualify under fair use, it will be deleted within a couple of days according to our criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the media copyright questions page. Thank you.BetacommandBot (talk) 16:01, 21 January 2008 (UTC)"

Just delete the bloody image. God, I am sick of getting these messages YEARS after an image is posted. I don't care. I'm not on here enough to deal with this stuff. Just do what ever you feel is necessary. Thanks. --C.J. (talk • contribs) 05:35, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Image:Surteeslogo.jpg

Used Template:Logo rationale to clarify fair use. If not enough let me know. Scottanon (talk) 14:02, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Template confusion

The bot left a message on Talk:Bosnian Mujahideen due to the use of the template {{Yugoslav wars}}, which contains the insufficiently justified image. Is that intended or should it only be posting to article talks (and template talks) with directly linked images? Cheers! Vassyana (talk) 15:23, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

its intended as there is no simple method of figuring out where the image is from. βcommand 15:24, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

WFCI.jpg (Blue Network)

A rationale has been added for this image, and the tag removed. Eric O. Costello (talk) 20:46, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Image:Wright Airlines Logo.png

A rationale was added to the talk page. If there is no response from BetacommandBot then the fair use tag will be removed. Mfields1 (talk) 23:43, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Any chance you could whitelist User:Melesse?

Hi Betacommand (and the eponymous bot),

I just wanted to see if it's possible to whitelist User:Melesse so she doesn't receive warnings about invalid rationales/orphaned images. I ask because she does a lot of valuable gnome-ish work resizing images marked with {{Non-free reduce}}, and so the bot warns her as the most recent uploader when there is something wrong with the rationale, which she doesn't touch. I don't think she's particularly bothered by it--she just removes the notices from her talk page--but I imagine that seeing the orange bar every time you log on starts to wear on you after a while.

I haven't contacted the user in question about this; I wanted to bring it to you first to see if it's possible. Thanks! --jonny-mt 02:10, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

 Done βcommand 03:29, 22 January 2008 (UTC)
Thank you kindly :) --jonny-mt 03:38, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Image:Allaboutradiation2.jpg

I tagged this image with {{di-no fair use rationale}}, and the tag was removed with the edit summary of: "rm demand for excess bureaucracy - fill in the obvious box yourself". Rather than put the tag back, I am coming to you for advice. You are more expert in Image Policy and Fair Use Rationale than I, can you weigh in on this? Is it the job of the image tagger to be responsible for putting fair use rationales on all images that that editor tags as having none? Cirt (talk) 14:22, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

I re-tagged, it is the responsibility of the uploader, not the tagger. βcommand 14:37, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
Thanks, I am glad to have the input of a more experienced, NPOV third-party editor on this one. Cirt (talk) 14:40, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
No problem see #6 in the template above. βcommand 14:41, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
I see. Is that your own comment, or something derived from policy/consensus somewhere? Cirt (talk) 14:42, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
It is derived from policy/consensus. You have to prove why you need it, not why we dont need it. βcommand 14:48, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

It took me all of fifteen seconds to fill in {{rationale}}, and this discussion took twenty-five minutes. Just a data point. —Random832 14:49, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

  • Yeah, but when you're in the process of tagging lots of images that have zero fair use rationales, one can't be expected to add rationales for all of them themselves. Cirt (talk) 15:08, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
    • Maybe, but for book covers and logos you could have a rationale ready to go that's filled in with everything but the article name. A bot to do this was not approved because it can't tell whether the article it's being used in is the right one, but it could be done fairly rapidly and accurately by a human. —Random832 17:43, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

Image backlog deadlines

Hi Betacommand. Do you think you could have a look at ANI sometime? I'd like to get involved editors to agree on a date for when each of these big backlogs you are producing need to be processed by. The relevant thread is here. The backlog currently stands at 1561 for 15 January and 4109 for 21 January. See here. Have a look at Category:Disputed non-free images as of 15 January 2008 for an idea of the wording of the notice, which was designed by east718. I'd like to put a similar notice on Category:Disputed non-free images as of 21 January 2008, but I am aware that you probably have some numbers for overall images, and calculations based on the March deadline. Do you think it would be possible to discuss this and sort out a deadline for that backlog? Short version: What sort of numbers do you intend to tag and when? Carcharoth (talk) 18:06, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

I broke the list down to 60 groups of 5,000 images and saved the lists as text files, (which can be found on my toolserv page). When I started tagging back in june we had 350,000 images. at last count we had ~293,000. of the 60 groups Ive checked 40 (g). the remaining 20 Ive checked 40-60% of those. After the first sweep there should not be any more of these massive groups. βcommand 22:04, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
First sweep? You mean this recent sequence of several thousand every week or so? When does the first sweep end and how many more runs will be needed to complete it? Maybe that is a better question. Carcharoth (talk) 06:05, 23 January 2008 (UTC)
Like I said, Ive checked 200,000 images out of the current 293,000 images. Ive been checking images 1/3 at a time. the last run was on the final 1/3. I stopped that before it was done. it stopped at around 60% of that final 1/3. so Ive probably checked 240,000 images or so. after the first check the repeat checks will mainly be for upkeep and what ever might have been missed in the first run. I should be able to finish the first sweep in the next run or two. and that number should not be as big of runs. βcommand 06:23, 23 January 2008 (UTC)
OK. Thanks. Carcharoth (talk) 07:04, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

stop plz

this bot keeps annoying me about fair-use articles, and i want it to find another bot-job! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.79.167.218 (talk) 22:50, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

RFC template

... :O Forgive me. It will not happen again. - Mtmelendez (Talk) 13:08, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Whoa! BroadwayWorld.com is not spam

Hello. BroadwayWorld.com is an important, verifiable reference source for musical theatre articles. I wish that, before you blocked links to websites entirely, you would leave a message at the project talk page for the projects whose articles use the links, so that the question could be better discussed. This has happened in many articles that I edit, especially in the WP:G&S project. What should I do in the future when I notice valuable links being deleted? It seems like it is usually too late by then. It may be that some editor misused links to the website, but that doesn't mean that the website it no good. Are they permanently blocked? Best regards, -- Ssilvers (talk) 15:55, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

I agree. I have used this website as a legitimate source for some information in a Featured Article, information that is not listed anywhere else that I can find. Now that FA is left partially unreferenced. Isn't there a better solution to this problem?--BelovedFreak 17:21, 22 January 2008 (UTC)
See ANI, I have stopped removal for now. βcommand 17:22, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

wright93

Hi. I don't disagree with your rulling however I would like to know why so when I apply later I can have changed these problems.

Thanks very much J.Wright —Preceding unsigned comment added by Wright93 (talk • contribs) 16:34, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:WNMU seal.gif

Is now in place. Madmaxmarchhare (talk) 16:41, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

StarCraft and petition reference

Can you please explain your recent edit to the article StarCraft. Randomly turning up, removing a primary source to a point discussing that source and replacing it with a {{fact}} tag without any useful statement of how it qualifies as spam isn't exactly helpful. Don't take this as a complaint, just an enquiry into the logic behind this move, especially as the url has suddenly been blacklisted. -- Sabre (talk) 18:03, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

that site has been a source of repeated mass link addition and spamming. If that petition is notable there should be no problem finding a third party reliable source. βcommand 18:13, 22 January 2008 (UTC)
Right, thanks. -- Sabre (talk) 18:30, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Regarding: References

Hey Betacommand,

just wanting to let you know, mate, when you are adding a reference list to a page it doesn't automatically delete the references that are already there, therefore they appear twice. This has happened now a couple of times in some articles, I cleaned up the football articles you edited, no big deal, but can you please check in the future, it looks pretty messy otherwise. Thanks, EA210269 (talk) 23:36, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Can BetacommandBot be slowed down?

I am not sure what your real goal is regarding non-free images, but the reality is that they are simply be automaticly deleted because you tag them with a 7 day warning in such large numbers that it is impossible to fix them before the 7 days expire and then an admin such as User:Maxim goes ahead and blindly deletes them, unless you want to claim that someone can delete images at a rate of over one per second and not do it blindly. See the following log entry: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Log&limit=250&offset=750&type=&user=Maxim&page=&pattern= It should be noted that many of the images are being use correctly and only need minor fixes in the FUR's than can be easily done, but not at the necessary speed to keep up with the current deletion process. Dbiel (Talk) 05:52, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

Maxim does not blindly delete them, he spends several hours prior looking through them. As for the large numbers of tagging the massive tagging should be over within the next run or two. after this first sweep it will mainly be upkeep of that we do have. βcommand 05:56, 23 January 2008 (UTC)
  • You expect us to believe that he checks carefully over 1500 images before mass deleting them in the span of minutes? I don't buy it, sorry. And deleting per "article name must be in the FUR" thing is ridiculous. Why not simply put the article name in the FUR himself, if he actually does check each image before deleting them? It's a technicality that image deletionists are quite fond of, it seems. -- Bellwether BC 06:09, 23 January 2008 (UTC)
I buy it. I can point you to a point where he said "I'm starting to check the images in about 10 minutes". The deletion run then started two hours later. I can't prove that he spent that two hours checking the images, but I'm prepared to trust that he did. If you want him to make an edit every ten minutes or so, saying "checked another 100", then that might be reasonable. I agree with the "put the article name in the FUR" thing, but many of the images deleted simply had no FUR at all. I've asked in the past for those images with FURs to be distinguished from those without any form of FUR, but that has proved difficult for some reason. Carcharoth (talk) 06:17, 23 January 2008 (UTC)
Over a two day period he delete something like 3,000 images. Would you say to properly check an image page and review all the information on it, check the pages it is linked to and determine that it is being used correctly might require 5 seconds? 3,000 images at 5 seconds each = over 4 hours. I just find it hard to believe than anyone could actually perform that task. Dbiel (Talk) 06:35, 23 January 2008 (UTC)
I was removing a blacklisted link with about 1200 links, and did it in about 2.5 hours. using AWB, and checking every edit. so what Maxim is doing is nothing. βcommand 06:37, 23 January 2008 (UTC)
I've done something similar. About two years ago, I went through a day's uploads to see if the copyright tags were being used correctly (about half of them weren't). I could do 150 images an hour, but that including things like tracking down sources to see if license claims were correct. For simply checking fair-use rationales, 500 images an hour is quite reasonable. --Carnildo (talk) 06:48, 23 January 2008 (UTC)
I think what Dbiel is asking is whether Maxim (and Dbiel should really go and ask on Maxim's talk page) does a full triage on every image, checking everything about the image. I suspect not, and that only the rationale gets checked. What might happen is that if a rationale looks OK, the image might still get deleted if the admin sees something else wrong - in those cases, it is essential that the deletion reason given states the extra concerns, as no-one here is a mind-reader. When I check images, I do check other things as well, but fully checking out all the concerns with some images can take a long time. Sure, restricting this to NFCC#10c is a back door way of achieving lots of deletions, I've no doubt about that, but I agree that something needed to be done. As long as some of the images are saved, people will now see the correct way to do things, and will be able to upload new images and repair the damage in cases where an image was needed. And people can also concentrate on managing the inflow of new images. And more important things can be checked, like sources and verifying whether images are genuine, and so on. Those take more time, so in essence this reduces the amount of images that will need more intensive checking. Carcharoth (talk) 07:11, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

I hate your bot

It's so annoying. Instead of your bot blacklist every image ever uploaded on Wikipedia, why not have it add the non-free image rationale? It would be a far more progressive conbribution. - Throw (talk) 03:41, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

I'm with Throw. It's ridiculous and incomprehensible and WORSENS THE QUALITY OF WIKIPEDIA. Turn the damned thing off! Garth M (talk) 04:38, 22 January 2008 (UTC)
See below: BetacommandBot choking Wikipedia.... -User:Wikid77 23 Jan 2008 —Preceding comment was added at 11:20, 23 January 2008 (UTC)
I concur, this bot is deleting images left right and center, and detracts from the quality of the encyclopdedia significantly. Images such as film posters and album covers are quite obviously fair use, and there's no need to blatantly delete them. Quite frankly I can't be bothered finding and uploading a lot of the images I've put up for articles again and again. It's this sort of mindless deletion which turns people off contributing. Please tone down the severity of the bot's actions, or disable it completely. --— Hugh 04:50, 22 January 2008 (UTC)
If I may interject, the bot simply tags pages for deletion; it doesn't delete them itself. As the Wikimedia servers are located in Florida, the non-free content criteria are based on U.S. law, which is immutable. Your images would thus be deleted whether or not the bot tags them and notifies you--it's simply speeding up the eventual.
If I may be so bold, then, I suggest that your time would be better spent adding rationales to your own images than on this talk page asking a user to disable a valuable service. A series of templates to help you do this can be found at Category:Non-free use rationale templates. --jonny-mt 08:21, 22 January 2008 (UTC)
  • This is a common refrain from people opposed to this bot. Please read points 6, 9, and 13 from the great big whopping stop sign box at the top of this page. --Hammersoft (talk) 13:36, 22 January 2008 (UTC)
    • ...which, in turn, are common refrains from people who support the bot, aggressively stated as if they were objective facts. It's no surprise that those involved with this bot come under fire, as the bot's actions constantly make Wikipedia a more unpleasant and lawyerly place. Simply repeating "THERE ARE NO ALTERNATIVES" is a poor substitute for thinking of a reasonable alternative. rspeer / ɹəədsɹ 00:32, 23 January 2008 (UTC)
  • I don't like the wording that the bot leaves. It makes it seem as if there was some human review and not just a mindless bot. I thik the wording on the message should be changed. --evrik (talk) 14:28, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Talk:Makara Jyothi‎

Talk:Makara_Jyothi#Removing_tags I had reverted bot's edit. I think this bot mistakenly did it. --Avinesh Jose  T  04:20, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

you have a malformed RFC template, that is why it replaced it with {{RFC error}} βcommand 04:21, 22 January 2008 (UTC)
Will it automatically add to the list?. --Avinesh Jose  T  05:27, 22 January 2008 (UTC)
Yes. βcommand 05:28, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Superman vs. Spider-Man

Hi. I got your notice on my talk page that a fair-use rationale was needed for the comic-book cover-image Superman-spiderman.jpg. However, the image was deleted after only one day. Isn't it the usual process to tag the image on the page on which it appears and to give us a week to respond? Thanks for any info-- Tenebrae (talk) 01:21, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

Oddly, there seem to be no deleted revisions for that image. Perhaps the name of the image was parsed incorrectly? Vassyana (talk) 01:28, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

Endash

Betacommand today replaced the endash code (–) with a long dash but the edit said it was for 'fix refs' diff. I've reverted the edit but I'm not sure why it was hit in the first place. Cheers, •Florrie•leave a note• 07:49, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

If you look I also added a reference tag <references/>. What I did there was replace the HTML code for endash with a real endash. βcommand 14:44, 23 January 2008 (UTC)


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Thanks for notifications

Thank you for your bot's notifications regarding copyright problems on the Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna of Russia article. I've been neglecting an improvement of the article due to lack of time and I'm hoping to do a major revamp in early March. However, I must say I was upset to see 2 of the images already deleted. I'm sorry but I don't think the notifications and speedy deletions take into account the fact that many Wikipedia users are not fortunate enough to be able to constantly check up on their edits. Thank you for keeping Wikipedia safe from copyright violation. -- AJ24 (talk) 19:56, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Seven days is NOT a lot of time especially when many of the images were uploaded over a year ago and the bot will tag well over 1,000 in a single day. Dbiel (Talk) 01:13, 23 January 2008 (UTC)
  • So you are saying that it is better to simply delete the images than to fix the simple problems related to them for the sake of speed? I would really question if this is really what the project needs. Dbiel (Talk) 12:26, 23 January 2008 (UTC)
  • No, I'm not saying that. This issue has been discussed a bazillion times if it's been discussed once. The short of it is the project, as a whole, feels this work is progressing the way it should. I'm sorry you disagree. You're not alone. But, the consensus is to continue as this bot is doing. --Hammersoft (talk) 12:37, 23 January 2008 (UTC)


23-Jan-2008: I have noticed the non-free image memos and other Bot memos generating about 10 gratuitous wikilinks to repeated topics, such as "WP:FU" or "Fair use rationale". All wikilinks, even red-line links, are stored in the Wikipedia page-link database(s) on each server, to support the "What links here" option. Why is option "What links here" so fast...because all those links to "WP:FU" are pre-stored as backlinks to every Bot memo that links them. Consequently, I have been unlinking the 10 overlinked Wikipedia policy ("WP:FU" etc.) articles in some BetacommandBot blurps, because wikibarfing 10 overlinks for every image problem is choking Wikipedia with millions of overlinks in every article talk-page (like people can't type "WP:FU" to look it up: no, have every Bot wiki-spamlink over 10 links per Bot memo). What do bots generate, perhaps, 200,000 overlinks per week? And those wikilinks remain for years until people delete the Bot memos from talk-pages.

I'm not focused just on BetacommandBot, because AntivandalBot is just as bad, wikilinking each Bot memo to 10 topics along with "Wikipedia:Reverting" rather than tell them "see WP:REVERT for details" again acting like people will die if they have to type "WP:REVERT" to look up more details. Of course, AntivandalBot is even worse because it quickly wikilinks people back to those same articles to vandalize them again: at least make the vandals re-type or copy/paste the name of the vandalized article!

Proposal: Of course the Bot memo blurp is way, way too much spammed text, and the wikibarfing of 10 overlinks per Bot memo is choking Wikipedia. The whole blurp could be reduced to simply identify the tagged images, and use the concept of wikilinking for more details, such as:

  • "See WP:BADFU for details or the image might be deleted in 7 days."

For each Bot memo, even those being stored into inactive talk-pages, the only wikilink would be the image name, or perhaps also the hypothetical "WP:BADFU" (for those users who can't type "WP:BADFU"). Explain to legal, how the concept of wikilinking, directly to a legal-explanation article, means you don't need to repeat an entire legal contract every time you notify a user: no one guaranteed the user that their images would remain on Wikipedia until the end of days. A simple 3-line Bot memo would be sufficient, and stop choking Wikipedia with millions of overlinks and untold megabytes of Bot essay-memos every week.

If there is an interest in working along with AntivandalBot (or others), then please coordinate changes there, as appropriate. Thank you. -Wikid77 (talk) 11:11, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

Im sorry but you have no clue about how the database works. every time you sign a talkpage you "spam" 2 more links. what the bot does has very little impact on the servers. βcommand 14:58, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

Use of repost criteria for speedy deletion

Repost criteria for speedy deletion is only for articles that are near-identical reposts of AFD-deleted articles only. If an article has never been through AFD, then db-repost is not a valid tag. This is in reference to: Neighborhood House Portland, Oregon, which has only ever been speedy deleted. Now, the article has been speedy deleted as G11 advertising, but just be careful to use the correct tag in the future, as it makes it easier to assess the article. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 04:28, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Image question

Your bot marked a couple of images on Michael Savage (commentator). The one I have a question about is Image:SavageNation2.jpg. It is only used in this one article and appears to have a perfectly valid fair-use rationale. What needs to be done to make the fair-use claim more clear or more valid? Ursasapien (talk) 06:04, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

the rationale is not for the page where the image is being used. βcommand 06:06, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
This edit [11] made it compliant. MBisanz talk 06:12, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
Thank you for your help MBisanz! Betacommand, you could be a little more specific. Ursasapien (talk) 07:36, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Notifying

Discussion here Wikipedia:Image_copyright_help_desk#BetaCommandBot_screwup:_Image:Silverbranchcover.jpg that concerns you. MBisanz talk 06:25, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Serious problems of the bot

It is trying to tag every non-free fair-use picture that is not the single one on the page. Which created a lot of problems for articles like character lists and serial games. It is overwhelming to users with a certain number of uploads, once it place 31 notice on my talk page just to notify me with images on 2 pages which are all specifying different characters. It also tried to place the same notice on my page right after I delete one. Now my watchlist is just full of the edits of this bot and can I can hardly find normal edits. Can it at least stop placing notices on both of the uploader talk page and the article talk page at the same time? MythSearchertalk 06:11, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

== I complied ty --

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Sitearm#Disputed_fair_use_rationale_for_Image:Sample_city_building_character_going_home_after_shopping.jpg —Preceding unsigned comment added by Sitearm (talk • contribs) 07:02, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:Tajik rouble reverse detail.png

Image:Tajik rouble reverse detail.png is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Wikipedia:Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to insure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.

If there is other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Note that any fair use images lacking such an explanation can be deleted one week after being tagged, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you.

BetacommandBot (talk) 06:34, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

{{PD-TJ-exempt}}

My talk page

Please stop posting to my talk page about image fair use rationales. Each and every image I have uploaded here is an album cover, and is used in an article describing the album in question. If you wanted to be contributory, you can add the rational to each image page yourself. If not, go ahead and delete the images. Either way, LEAVE MY TALK PAGE ALONE UNLESS YOU HAVE SOMETHING MEANINGFUL TO SAY TO ME!!!! Talk pages are for messages, not automated bot pet-droppings. LEAVE ME ALONE ALREADY!!!!Alcuin (talk) 21:07, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Starherelogo.gif

I created the image. My own work. I decided the font. I decided the color. I used it on the website of the library as well, but I know for a fact that I created the image. If you have a question about the rationale, tell me and don't just post 'disputed' without some explanation. Pejorative.majeure (talk) 00:25, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Vandal Proof

Are you ever going to approve anyone for Vandal Proof - the list is quite large now.- Milk's Favorite Cookie 02:20, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Regarding album cover for Raw Material

I'm curious as to why the image I uploaded for Raw Material does not fall into the category of fair use -- it is, after all, an album cover image that's being used to identify the page for that particular album. I'd love an explanation. Thank you. Wardomatic (talk) 00:18, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

If bbc or Deutsche Welle's logos can be used here why not the logo of Radio Pakistan that is Radio_Logo.jpg‎ .

Khalid Mahmood —Preceding comment was added at 14:47, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

The remark did not say that you can't use it, you can. The problem is that you need to provide a fair-use rationale (the description page of the image has to tell why it can be used on which page). See Wikipedia:Fair use rationale guideline for a guideline on how to do that. Thanks. --Dirk Beetstra T C 15:16, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Images for renaming

How goes the bot for images for renaming?--Esprit15d • talk • contribs 13:30, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Disputed Fair Use Logo on Saint Francis House (Boston) article

The low-resolution image of the Saint Francis House logo was modified by me and edited and it was done with permission of the organisation. I wish that this challenge be lifted to the logo on the Saint Francis House (Boston) article. Please advise. Thanks. -- (Bob) Wikiklrsc (talk) 21:15, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Osmond Barnes

Would you please explain your edit just now to Osmond Barnes? Xn4 05:23, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

it the wrong button, sorry. I just meant to remove the link to a un-reliable source. βcommand 05:25, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

Earthrise disabmiguation

Hey. Why did you delete my contribution to Earthrise (disambiguation)? Not that it's that big of a deal, but it seems relevant. I found out about the game through IGN and it turns out all gaming sites are reporting about it. So it seems at least as important as the other entries (excluding the NASA picture). --Prizrak (talk) 20:34, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

You, placed an external link on a disambiguation page. DaB pages should only have wikilinks. βcommand 21:06, 26 January 2008 (UTC)
Thanks. I read this manual page and fixed the page accordingly. Guess disambiguation pages weren't exactly what I thought ':) --Prizrak (talk) 21:46, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

Request for bot work

I've got a task your bot might be able to help with. Could it scan Category:All non-free Logos for NFCC-noncompliant images that contain one or more of the terms "source, from, scan, www, http, com, net, org, info, gov, co, biz, info, int" and then drop them in a list at User:MBisanz/Logos. Basically I'm trying to take a proactive approach to fixing the NFCC problem in this tiny area that I'm skilled in working on. MBisanz talk 22:07, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

define, noncompliant. βcommand 22:29, 26 January 2008 (UTC)
noncompliant=the checker you run through BCB that drops images in Category:Disputed non-free images MBisanz talk 22:33, 26 January 2008 (UTC)
Basically its pre-running the image tagging process with an extra qualifier so I can tackle it now when I have free time, as opposed to late February/early March when I won't. MBisanz talk 22:38, 26 January 2008 (UTC)
/me grumbles. Give me a week or so to code this. /me goes to spend anothoer 10 hours working on code βcommand 22:58, 26 January 2008 (UTC)
O then don't worry about it! I assumed this was a quickie fix. 10 hours isn't worth this when East718 can do a Cat scan->list as BCB actually tags the images in 20 minutes with his current script. 01:46, 27 January 2008 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by MBisanz (talk • contribs)
I was joking about the timeframe, its going to be about an hours work to get this perfect. βcommand 01:52, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Disputed fair use rationale for Image:Rac1.jpg

I added the fair use rationale. Check Image:Rac1.jpg now. --Aleksandar Šušnjar (talk) 17:46, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

You need to specify on which page the image may be used (that is, specify with a working wikilink for which fair use rationale is valid, you can find those at the bottom, section 'File links'). Hope this helps. --Dirk Beetstra T C 17:49, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

My talk page

Please stop posting to my talk page about image fair use rationales. Each and every image I have uploaded here is an album cover, and is used in an article describing the album in question. If you wanted to be contributory, you can add the rational to each image page yourself. If not, go ahead and delete the images. Either way, LEAVE MY TALK PAGE ALONE UNLESS YOU HAVE SOMETHING MEANINGFUL TO SAY TO ME!!!! Talk pages are for messages, not automated bot pet-droppings. LEAVE ME ALONE ALREADY!!!!Alcuin (talk) 21:07, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Unexpected tagging

In this edit BetacommandBot flagged Image:RS1ModuleCover.jpg as lacking a fair use rationale for the use in List of Dungeons & Dragons modules (as evidenced by the warning on the talk page. This is surprising and seems wrong. As the first link above shows, there is a fair use rationale for that article already present. I wanted to let you know because it seems like it might represent a bug. — Alan De Smet | Talk 03:19, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

you used the HTML version of & in your page title. I fixed it. βcommand 03:55, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Nontrinitarianism RFC

Hi - I was asked to help with a technical issue. User:Zahakiel tried to put Talk:Nontrinitarianism on the RFC/Religion list template, but it didn't work, and some days later BetacommandBot removed his attempt to add it. I think I did it better, but am not sure. Could you check if the syntax is correct, and whether it will be added when the bot will run the next time? Thanks. --AnonEMouse (squeak) 20:30, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

I don't understand why the logo I uploaded for SIBC Radio has been tagged for deletion. It was uploaded in October 2006 and I have not had one complaint about it until your Bot reported it a few days ago.

I looked at other Radio Stations where other people have uploaded logos and included the same information as me.

pjb007 (talk) 13:02, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

I've just had another look and I think I know what you meant, I have now added some information to the Image page, is this the information you were talking about?

pjb007 (talk) 13:15, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

"undo"

Please don't undo good faith edits without explanation. 69.17.73.214 (talk) 16:23, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

I will revert changes to policy pages that do not have consensus. βcommand 16:28, 27 January 2008 (UTC)
You are a strong man! 69.17.73.214 (talk) 16:51, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Cultural Interest Fraternities and Sororities

I'm not sure why my contributions to the Cultural Interest Fraternities and Sororities LGBT section were immediately deleted; they conform to the "good faith" expectations of free information exchange, and further provided information on LGBT fraternities and sororities (7 more, nearly tripling the available information) that was otherwise not available on Wikipedia. What was the reason? (or... please un-undo it). Thanks! Aeonmagu3250 (talk) 22:13, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Please dont change a bunch of internal links into external links. βcommand 22:15, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

The only linked changed was Iota Lambda Pi, which didn't have a wikipedia page to otherwise be linked to. Delta Lambda Phi, Kappa Psi Kappa, and Omicron Epsilon Pi remained internal; the other fraternities and sororities listed were new additions. Aeonmagu3250 (talk) 22:20, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Disputed Fair Use Logo on Saint Francis House (Boston) article

The low-resolution image of the Saint Francis House logo was modified by me and edited and it was done with permission of the organisation. I wish that this challenge be lifted to the logo on the Saint Francis House (Boston) article. Please advise. Thanks. -- (Bob) Wikiklrsc (talk) 21:04, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

proper tagging

Could you please tag images properly? An example of incorrect tagging: [12]. You can't dispute a rationale that isn't there. Thank you. Please respond to this request when you have free time. --Rockfang (talk) 00:34, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Image:Joanbennett13.jpg

I'm not sure where to ask, or report this, so I thought I'd try here. This image [13] has a rationale that says it is a cropped, low resolution screenshot used to illustrate a film article taken from Video Treasures. The only truth I could find in this was that it is used to illustrate a film article. This is a studio publicity shot, taken directly from a webpage - [14] and doesn't even pretend to hide it. The file name is identical, as are the size and dimension. It can't be a coincidence. Hopefully you will know what should be done about it. As I looked at the contribution page of the person uploading it, there are a number of images being added with nearly identical rationales. Thanks in advance. Wildhartlivie (talk) 09:08, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

that appears to be valid use of non-free content. βcommand 15:01, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Stop

deleting my edits, I remind you to review the wikipedia policy of "don't bite newcomers". What is wrong with an expert opinion? it avoids weaselwords and is perfectly legal as per wikipedia. stop trying to start revert wars--216.110.236.243 (talk) 19:16, 28 January 2008 (UTC)


commons ok

How does {{commons ok}} work? There's no description there. Is it available for anyone to use? I noticed it from an image that was rejected because it needed commons tags (which I fixed and retagged). Royalbroil 02:50, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Please see WP:MTC βcommand 03:34, 29 January 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for the response. I don't transwiki many images. I upload Creative Commons images that I find on flickr or take myself directly to Commons. Moving images from the English Wikipedia to Commons is painful, especially considering that I have a relatively slow broadband connection. Here's the image that Betacommandbot couldn't upload because it had no categories: Image:McFarlan Wreck Indianapolis 1912.jpg. I added Commons cats to it so you can deal with it if you wish. Royalbroil 05:17, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Cleaning up the bot status page.

On WP:BON, see my comment here.

You're a bot-master, so it'd probably be a lot easier for you to do all that stuff I suggested than for me to do it manually by hand. ☯  Zenwhat (talk) 04:25, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

dont archive anything. If you want just clean it up. its been on my todo list for a while. βcommand 04:29, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

Betacommand: The "discontinued" bots don't really need to be on there, do they? I mean, if a bot is flagged "discontinued," wouldn't they need to get approval to bring it back? Since obviously, all the discontinued bots would probably need substantial revisions to the original code to be brought back into activity. I just wanted to move those and only those to a "list of discontinued bots" page, to avoid clutter. ☯  Zenwhat (talk) 05:01, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

a single master list is better. as those bots that are not active do not always need code updates. βcommand 05:03, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

Would you mind if I made it all one-single wikitable? If you would mind, then would it be possible for you to set it up so that clicking one sort button would sort every wikitable on that page in the same way?

Otherwise, sifting through the list is tedious, because you have to hit the sort button for each sub-section, meaning 7 times. ☯  Zenwhat (talk) 07:47, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

go ahead that is how I had it configured at first. βcommand 08:12, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

UA 175

Re: Talk:United_Airlines_Flight_175#Arthur_Rubin_sabotage_-_Golbez_Vendetta

Editing from 124.197.2.220 (your account, IP address, or IP address range) has been disabled by Golbez for the following reason(s): vandalism - repeatedly putting in a moronic conspiracy theory


Fact is: I have NOT "put in" any conspiracy theory into the MAIN article. 

       my addition was not only entirely factual and illustrative of the 
       actual event, but also void of any opinion.  The word "melt" is an 
       accurate observation. Just watch the (official!) video and find a better
       word.   My original removed the phrase "visible disintegration" because
      it is not accurate.  Nobody has ever shown a picture that showed disintegration
      of the plane.


User:TableManners reminded me of manners towards editor Golbez I have accused Golbez of a personal vendetta because he deleted my factual entry, and blocked my IP

  • without giving a reason
  • while denigrating my person
  • his jumbled choice of words shows that he is not fully concentrating, he is rushing his work
  • he probably did not read what I wrote, properly.. he just saw hologrammes and switched off
  • my additions to the article were factual, referenced and stand up to scrutiny
  • my additions to the article were NOT AN OPINION whereas my contribution on the TALK page *WAS* an opinion.
  • Golbez based his deletion and blocking on my OPINION in TALK, he probably did not delete the MAIN ARTICLE addition by me because if it's content (which was, as I said, factual and pertinent ONLY)

I hereby request arbitration from you and ask you to revert the deletion in the main article.

211.233.41.27 (talk) 06:35, 30 January 2008 (UTC) (formerly 203.172.184.19 formerly 124.197.2.220)

Burnout Paradise Cover

I didn't upload that picture. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Calvins48 (talk • contribs) 10:27, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

User:BetacommandBot/Sandbox 3

Aologies for the late reply, all those appear fine. Thank you! SGGH speak! 11:44, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

Free bandwidth

If you know anybody that needs or would otherwise be helped by someone offering bandwdith:

(Copied and pasted from WP:BON)

I have a pretty decent connection on broadband and I have two computers (a little wannabe\mini-workstation). If any bot-owners here need somebody to run a bot for them, I'd be willing to do it either my main PC (Windows Vista) or my secondary PC (Ubuntu Linux, but I can wipe it clean and install any version of Linux you like, so long as you can walk me through setting up the KDE/GNOME GUI). Preferably, I'd want it to be on my secondary PC, the Linux box, since I rarely use it.

Also, a thought suddenly occurred to me: I'm no programmer, but wouldn't it be possible to create a botnet that helps Wikipedia? In other words, the same type of technology used in modern filesharing like Bittorrent, Freenet, etc.. Having bots be run by "individual bot-owners" who each donate "individual bandwidth" seems pretty counterintuitive, considering the UL\DL bottleneck. Regarding bad-faith users who might try to upload corrupted data, there's probably some way to deal with it, right? ☯  Zenwhat (talk) 23:31, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

Great idea. Maybe the system could use the distributed computing power of computers run by trusted users like admins and other contributors who have the trust of the community like people who have the rollback feature so that security is ensured. This computing might be set up to run in the background or at times specified by the user when theses computers are on and idle. I would prefer the latter if it were my computer. Royalbroil 00:52, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

Royalbroil, as I understand it, technically it could be run by anyone, couldn't it? I say that because Bittorrent and Freenet are both open to all users, not just "trusted users," but somehow they have some way of protecting against users from uploading corrupted data. As I understand it, data is passed from one user to the next with fool-proof encryption keys (there's no such thing in computing, but you get what I mean). If any client submit an inappropriate encryption key, suggesting corrupted data, then they are automatically blocked from the system, and thus there'd be no security risk to Wikipedia that I'd be aware of... But then again, like I said, I'm no programmer, so maybe I'm wrong, maybe there is some way to crash Bittorrent networks, or maybe there's something about them that makes them unique (i.e., files are being distributed equally across all users? maybe that wouldn't work, since, in this case, we're all distributing information to a central source -- the Wikipedia server).

In any case, in keeping with the spirit of open-source, it would make more sense for automated stuff on Wikipedia to be run by a single open-source botnet, plus a lot easier to use. If anybody has an idea of a new feature to implement, new modules could be implemented, as opposed to having to create a brand-new bot from scratch every time you wanted to automate a new feature.

And the modules could be written in some kind of Javascript-like pseudocode so that programmers of all different backgrounds could easily contribute. Maybe? Just throwing this idea out there. ☯  Zenwhat (talk) 01:05, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

botnets are not a good idea. there is not a good method for running a program that works with wikipedia aross multi-hosts splitting the work up. one method is having a main todo list and each seperate host would be assigned a part of that. but a true botnet would not work for doing any real bot work. Also I would not trust my bot account password to that many users. βcommand 01:31, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

Not a single account, but what about setting up a string of accounts? You could use them like temporary IPs on a DNS. I.E., generate 255 accounts on Wikipedia (it's unlikely this botnet would ever have more than 255 users). Every time one of them logs into the botnet, they're assigned a specific temporary account among one of the 255 accounts used for the botnet. A central hub (your computer, maybe?) could coordinate this login procedure, authenticating the user is who they say they are, keeping a record of what IP was assigned to what bot account and when. To prevent corrupted data, you could occasionally request a copy of the data sent to the Wikipedia server and verify that the information you receive is correct by double-checking it with the information on Wikipedia itself. ☯  Zenwhat (talk) 02:00, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

Like I said, I'm not a programmer. I just sort of know how to think like one, a little bit, since I took Visual Basic in high school (failed, but I took it!!), took C in college (failed, but again, I took it!), and studied a little bit of Javascript and PHP on my own.

Also I posted my computers' stats on WP:BON. ☯  Zenwhat (talk) 02:02, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

Creating a botnet like what you are asking is not a viable method. what could be done is assign each unit part of a central task. IE checking NFURG, the first unit would get image 1-5,000 and the next unit would get 5,001-10,000 and so on. But each Unit would be independant of the others, except for getting the starting list. βcommand 02:08, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

Your idea still sounds good, then. ☯  Zenwhat (talk) 02:52, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

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Uncategorized tag

Thanks for the bot, any chance you can have it tag uncategorized at the bottom of the page so I don't have to edit the entire article to add a category and then remove the tag, just the last section. I thought most bots used to do it this way, has there been a change in policy? Oh Snap (talk) 23:03, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

Carl Linnaeus tagging

In this edit, Carl Linnaeus was tagged as being part of WikiProject Christianity. I don't understand why. This article doesn't appear even remotely related to Christianity. Why was it tagged like this? -- RoySmith (talk) 04:52, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

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