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September 25

Edits deleted.

I provided 2 additional persons for the "List of people from Erie, Pennsylvania" page. I provided source material for the additions--more than any other person on the page has done. The additions were removed within less than a week, without explanation. Why was this done, and what do I need to do to have them reinstated?

Ric Thayer (talk) 03:48, 25 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

@Ric Thayer: The changes were removed with this edit, which provides an explanation. To be included in lists such as this, persons would need to be notable in the Wikipedia sense and have had an article written about them. (See also WP:WTAF). Thanks. Eagleash (talk) 04:22, 25 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Use of wikipedia in class

Hi there! I am a currently inactive wikipedian, but in the past I have been busy for a couple of few-month periods in 2004 and 2010 (in es.wikipedia.org). In other words, I think I am familiar with how things operate here, but my familiarity is neither local not recent. I plan to use wikipedia as a teaching resource towards the end of this week, for a Master of Theoretical and Computational Chemistry which contains a 6h mini-course on writing. I intend to propose the students to improve a few articles related with the topic of their Master, starting from zero (play sandbox, create new users, etc). They'll do most of the work from home in the next weeks/months; this week I'll just show them how this works. Is there any particular material I/they need to review? Thanks! -- 4lex (talk) 04:48, 25 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

@4lex: Please start by reading WP:ASSIGN. Thank you. Eagleash (talk) 04:59, 25 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

@Eagleash: Thanks! The available tools and reading material seems awesome, I'm studying it. 4lex (talk) 05:32, 25 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Fair use image given to me by press/pr department - what to enter to be allowed to use?

Hi

I would like to upload a picture that has been given to me by the pr department of the production the WikiPedia article is about.

I wanted to use "Non-free promotional" and "Fairuse" but was not allowed - possibly because the field was not for template names.

What should I insert in the upload wizard dialog to be allowed to use the above templates?

NOTE: I am trying to not use the name of the article and the production since I do not want Google to index this help. Please do the same if you answer.

Here is the screen shot from wikimedia, where you can read more. Mplungjan (talk) 04:51, 25 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

@Mplungjan: OK, sorry for that, but the following will be unpleasant.

First of all, from your post here and your contributions I get the strong feeling that you are editing on Wikipedia on behalf of Svitlana Azarova (press agent, maybe?). If so, please immediately see WP:PAID, which contains a mandatory disclosure that you have not made. Failure to do so will lead to you being blocked (prevented from editing) and possibly all your contributions being deleted.

I do not believe you can use the file in the way you intend to. You cannot upload anything on our sister site Wikimedia Commons that is not under a free license, and to upload it to Wikipedia it needs to satisfy all of the criteria for non-free content. Those are stronger than "fair use" restrictions; maybe a poster in low-resolution could do, but if I am right in assuming it is a promotional shot of the play, then it would likely fail criteria #8 (Non-free content is used only if its presence would significantly increase readers' understanding of the article topic).

So, either you get the PR department to release it under a free license (not just "free to use on Wikipedia", free to use anywhere), or you explain why it is needed. Such explanation should involve arguing the Wikipedia policy I outlined above, not something along the lines of "I want to publicize the article" - Wikipedia is not here to advertise for you. Wikipedia is not here to generate good Google results, either; I did not name the article because my answer did not need to, but you should not expect others to do the same, because it is not policy, not law, and I doubt people who do SEO via Wikipedia articles they edit get much sympathy here (see also Streisand effect). Tigraan^{Click here to contact me} 07:49, 25 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Template issue

How come commons:file:Flag of Massachusetts.svg appears so small in Template:Members of the U.S. House of Representatives from Massachusetts compared to the seal above, although both are set at 100px?--Tuchiel (talk) 07:50, 25 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Because it has lots of white space around it. The image size in the template (100px) sizes the whole of the image, so the emblem AND all of the white space around it are included when the image is reduced to that size., ~~The image needs the whitespace trimming from it~~. - X201 (talk) 08:07, 25 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Wouldn't the seal be a better image? - X201 (talk) 08:11, 25 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

@X201: Well, the thing is: All the other equivalent templates show both flag and seal at 100px...--Tuchiel (talk) 21:03, 25 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Not all of the other states have their flag on them. Of the ones that do Massachusetts has the same problem as West Virginia and Utah, a flag with a single colour and a small symbol in the centre. If only there was some way for these states to unite. - X201 (talk) 07:59, 26 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Layout issue with DJ Mag article

Hi I have recently been editing this article DJ Mag and I think I have inadvertently deleted some markup language on the page in the section 'Criticisms of the Top 100' that has knocked the page alignment out and I do not know how to correct it would grateful for any help in resolving.--Navops47 (talk) 08:06, 25 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

There's nothing wrong with the alignment, it was like that before you started. Its a blockquote highlighing a particular bit of text, in this case a long quote so that it doesn't get lost in the rest of the prose. Only thing missing was the closing blockquote which you removed, but that wouldn't cause a problem because it was at the end of the section. - X201 (talk) 08:21, 25 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

@X201: Does blockquote automatically get terminated at the end of a section? It looked as if in the OP's version the remaining sections of the article were being indented within the blockquote. --David Biddulph (talk) 08:28, 25 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Yep, You're correct. - X201 (talk) 08:36, 25 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you both very much for explaining and also resolving.--Navops47 (talk) 08:48, 25 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

BeLight Software

Good day,

Sorry to disturb you with this question. My name is Alex Romanchykov and I work at BeLight Software company as the Product and Marketing manager. We produce software for Mac, Windows and iOS since 2003 (in January, next year, we will celebrate our 15th Anniversary). We are the creators of many popular applications such as Live Home 3D (ex Live Interior 3D), Art Text, Swift Publisher and more. These programs are constantly at the top charts of Mac App Store and Windows Store. Several our applications already reached the mark of 1,000,000 downloads. Some time ago our company page was deleted from Wikipedia and all info marked as spam: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Spam/2009_Archive_Dec_1#BeLight_Software_Spam. As I understand, the users and the guy who wrote an article had a vivid discussion which resulted in this ban. Is there a way to whitelist the company and remove it from the spam list? We are ready to provide any necessary updated information and references.

Thanks for your attention.

Kind Rgards, Alex Romanchykov Product and Marketing Manager BeLight Software www.belightsoft.com www.livehome3d.com AlexR10 (talk) 08:50, 25 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Hello, AlexR10. I am afraid that you share a common misconception, that there is any kind of connection between Wikipedia and marketing or promotion. Wikipedia is an encyclopaedia, and promotion of any kind is forbidden. If there is substantial material about your company, written and published by people who have no connection with the the company (which excludes anything based on an interview or press release) and published somewhere that has a reputaion for fact-checking and editorial control, then we can have an article about the company, based close to 100% on what those independent sources say. It will not be your article: you will have no control over its contents, and what you and the company do or say will not be particularly relevant, except insofar as independent sources have written about it. (Your role in the article will be limited to suggesting changes, on the article's talk page). If there are not such sources (the Wikipedia jargon is that the company is not notable) then no such article will be accepted, however it is written. Besides the page I linked to in the previous sentence, please, also see WP:COI and WP:PROMOTION. --ColinFine (talk) 13:15, 25 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Colin. Thanks for the answer. I absolutely understand that Wikipedia is written by independent authors and its not a marketing tool. We never had an intention to advertise here or influence the authors. It just seems a bit unfair that a discussion from 2009 keeps us in a spam list, this is why we kindly ask to whitelist us as a company and allow the independent sources to submit the info about us (of course, if there will be any willing persons).

AlexR10 (talk) 13:34, 25 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

User:AlexR10 I have no idea why you think you're on a spamlist. There is an article about your company, Belight Software. It really needs some work though, all it is right now is a list of your products. That's not encyclopedic content. Mduvekot (talk) 14:06, 25 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Looks like it appeared recently and its a surprise to me as well. Initially, we were contacted by one of our users, who told us that he wrote an article about BeLight Software on Wikipedia, but his article was rejected because the company is in the Spam list and the page is banned. We could not answer why it is so. Several days ago I contacted Tone about the issue https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Toneand and he removed the ban from the previous page. But we remain in the Archive as the spammers. This is my primary concern.

You unwittingly answered your own question there. - ARCHIVE - the spam link you provided above is an archive of the activity and discussions of the Spam page. Your company was discussed on there, so that discussion will stay in the archive forever. It's just a record of something that happened in the past. - X201 (talk) 14:33, 25 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Article deleted

The article created on Ben_Cowan-Dewar was recently deleted. Was there a reason for this deletion, or are there changes that can be made to the article upon resubmission that would prevent its deletion? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Bcarroll70 (talk • contribs) 14:36, 25 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

If you click on the redlink, you can see that the article was deleted because it didn't contain any information establishing the notability of its subject. Providing information (ideally sourced information) should address this concern. DonIago (talk) 15:03, 25 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

My sandbox was deleted

Hi does anyone know how I can get back my sandbox revisions? It deleted itself somehow and I have no way to see the revision history it says that only the page creation was in history. — Preceding unsigned comment added by SamuelJHall (talk • contribs) 16:04, 25 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

The page you were editing seems to be Draft:Sandbox rather than the sandbox in your user space. this is the latest revision from the page history. (A little tip, make sure you read and understand WP:NPOV if you want to make that an article.) – filelakeshoe (t / c)  16:23, 25 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

(edit conflict)SamuelJHall Your sandbox wasn't deleted, what was deleted was content you posted to the main Wikipedia sandbox - an area of Wikipedia that is swept clean on a a regular basis. Your sandbox will be User:SamuelJHall/sandbox. Look in https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Draft:Sandbox&action=history & you will see all past content that has been removed from public view. I have gone ahead and placed the removed content in User:SamuelJHall/Rigas Ritmi Festival (Draft article) so you can work on improving it. Shearonink (talk) 16:25, 25 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]