Wikipedia

User:Kwh/Archive-2006-01-21

< User:Kwh

Welcome!

Hello, and welcome to Wikipedia. Thank you for your contributions. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are a few good links for newcomers:

I hope you enjoy editing here and being a Wikipedian! By the way, please be sure to sign your name on Talk and vote pages using four tildes (~~~~) to produce your name and the current date, or three tildes (~~~) for just your name. If you have any questions, see the help pages, add a question to the village pump or ask me on my Talk page. Again, welcome! --Ragib 03:27, 22 July 2005 (UTC)

Please explain.

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Why did you "archive" currently running topics in Talk:Jean Charles de Menezes? I have had to move it all back again. - Ta bu shi da yu 23:40, 25 July 2005 (UTC)

The majority were questions that had already been answered or content that had been settled in the article, and some had basically degenerated into poo-flinging, e.g. Adam Carr's "questions"; others were just plain Soapbox. I left anything that (I thought) had an actual unanswered question about content in the article or discussion thereof. I think this is a worthy article and I'd like editors to focus on improving it. I may have made a mistake in chucking some of the peppercorns in the bullshit, but I disagree that it *all* had to be moved back. -Kwh 02:55, 26 July 2005 (UTC)

Cindy Sheehan, use of copyrighted picture

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KWH - maybe I jumped the gun. This photo has been posted several times in this article before. It's already been removed several times, but there was no talk section to discuss it in the article. It cannot be used under the current license. I do feel the photo is historically relevant because it shows that Cindy Sheehan has been a peace activist for a while, not simply turned activist after talking to Michael Moore and MoveOn.org as Hannity claims. We need to find out a bit more about the context and then use it in fair use.

I'd assume that the uploader of the photo did actually read the policy and uploaded the photo under good faith that it was under acceptable use for Wikipedia; I think that if you want to rebut that, you have to support the argument. The Indymedia copyright statement you cite is similar to that on thousands of other user-contribution driven sites; the individual uploading a photo retains copyright legally, so Indymedia's copyright statement does not speak to the copyright holder's license intention. Something more specific is needed to assert that this is {{copyvio}}, and even then it is the image which needs to go to consensus voting to be deleted. -Kwh 12:41, August 13, 2005 (UTC)

Jean Charles

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Well done on that page... you are doing a great job! - Ta bu shi da yu 07:46, 17 August 2005 (UTC)

Response to message on my talk page

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I made a point about a campaign which is intrisically linked with the article, there is no reference to Justice4Jean, but there should be! The leading members of the Justice4Jean campaign (aka Jean Charles de Menezes Family Campaign) have made prominent statements in the media calling for the resignation of Ian Blair and they wrote the statement that was read out by Jean Charles de Menezes's cousin at a recent press conference. But, they are not primarily interested the welfare of the family, they are using the death as a political football, to beat over the head of the Government. This is not my viewpoint - this is the result of an invesitigation by the respected journalist Michael Crick. Yasmin Khan and Asad Rehman are two of the leading members of the campaign. They also responsible for making false statements to the media about the compensation offered to the family see http://www.lse.co.uk/ShowStory.asp?story=IG1916741A&news_headline=shot_brazilians_family_offered_us$1million and then see http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4169558.stm

Do you think this should be in the article? I do, but as you may have gathered I am likely to give it a POV slant to that information. So I do not appreciate being lectured by you on WP:POINT - making relevant comments on a talk page does not violate WP:POINT if I had altered the article and put those comments in with my POV slant on it then you you would be correct but I didn't and you do nothave a valid point to take issue with me on this. So stick it up yer arse. Jooler 09:15, 21 August 2005 (UTC)

That would be one thing, if you initially asked whether this information should be in the article, proposed an edit to be made, or made an edit. But you did not. I'm not going to explain that any more because we can all see the chip on your shoulder, and you're just hoping for someone to knock it off.
I came to you respectfully pointing out that I believe you are being disruptive to prove a point. That's valid. You tell me to "stick it up my arse." That's not.
Maybe you just need to take a break for a while, you seem to have a bit of pent-up stress. -Kwh 04:26, August 22, 2005 (UTC)
You came to me accusing me of violating WP:POINT - that was not valid. I did not disrupt the article. End of. Jooler 06:30, 22 August 2005 (UTC)

Discussion

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Is there a particular part of the discussion you're interested in me contributing to?

File Pile, Second Vote for Deletion

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FilePile is once more up for deletion. Your input would be appreciated. --tranquileye 12:55:43, 2005-08-26 (UTC)

Just a thought

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This may not satisfy all of your needs, but if you don't show some support, we're not likely to get even this much. — Xiong熊talk* 10:46, 13 September 2005 (UTC)

racism and Abramoff

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Kwh if Abramoff had called a group of Black people monkeys would that be racist?

Grazon, please sign your posts (use ~~~~). The dictionary definition per Answers.com is:
  1. The belief that race accounts for differences in human character or ability and that a particular race is superior to others.
  2. Discrimination or prejudice based on race.
Like I said, I think Abramoff's a jerk for saying it, but I think that the use of the word "Racist" does not accurately characterize the remark because there's not evidence that he actually believed the Native Americans were "troglodytes" or "monkeys" because their race was inferior or his race was superior. In this particular context, "Racist" as opposed to "Insulting" is pushing a certain POV that Abramoff is a racial supremacist, or else it is 'genericizing' racism as 'anything insensitive said about a person who is not white/European.' Abramoff might indeed be a 'Jewish supremacist', but it is not in itself evidenced by those remarks.
Also, Grazon - you blindly reverted the edit when I corrected the mistake "as well as a few Democrat". If you have more information on how Delay and Ney are closer connected to Abramoff, put it in the article - the article needs more meat. But let the facts speak for themselves. You are pressing a certain POV if you choose to say "several senior Republicans... as well as a few Democrat", not to mention it is excessively verbose. It's not a game where the Democrats come out smelling like roses if they had less people involved than the Republicans, or lower ranking, or a lesser amount of cash. Anyone, regardless of party, who accepted cash for favors is unethical filth and just because they gave the money back when they got caught doesn't earn them any points in my book. -Kwh 07:21, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

Kwh if Abramoff had just called them monkeys once it wouldn't matter but he called them monkeys repeatedly. He also called them troglodytes going so far as to explain they are ugly creatures and I think at least once he called them "ugly monkeys" hence he was refering to them physicaly when he called them these things hence he's a racist.

On another topic 4 out of the top 5 individual recipents of money from Abramoff were Republicans and that is a good representation of how bipartison Abramoff is.

Howerver if you look at all the info he gave money to virtualy everyone in congress still though he gave more money to Republicans and in greater amounts.

Having said my piece I thanks you for doing a good job.

grazon 18:39, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

Grazon - you need to understand that playing games with the statistics is pushing a point of view. Saying "several senior Rs and a few Ds", "4 out of the top 5", "8 out of the top 10", or "overall there was just more money" is only a way of putting the facts in a narrow frame to show only what you want in focus. If you want to collect all the info on donations and put it in a table, order it by donation size, and total it by party affiliation, that's great - that's a thing which shows the entire picture to the reader. Let the reader judge if Abramoff is a Republican tool. Let the facts speak and don't drown them out with your argument.
As far as this racism question - you really haven't addressed a valid argument. I believe you simply want to include the word racist as a negative power word to dump more mud on Abramoff. As far as I'm concerned, his lobbying actions are filthy enough. The facts are there, he said "monkey" and "troglodyte". Let the reader judge if that's racism or just jerkism, and don't force your opinion on the reader. -Kwh 05:11, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

hey!

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what did I do that pissed you off?

grazon 22:47, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

i'm pretty sure I'm not 'pissed off' at you. The only thing I can imagine you mean is the fact that I endorsed the RFC on your behavior. When you responded on my talk page to my edit, I read your talk page and saw mention of the RFC; I read it and could agree with what was being stated. The RFC is certainly not part of being 'pissed off' at someone or on a vendetta, it is just part of the community process. If you would take it in that manner you might do a lot better.
I'd recommend that you read the community policies mentioned in the RFC like NPOV - I re-read them pretty often - and you might rethink your response to the RFC. The RFC is your peers commenting on your behavior - it's a very open and friendly process. If you showed some of the edits or articles you are proud of making on Wikipedia, or showed some understanding of your peers concerns, you might be viewed better. If you just don't care what your peers think - don't expect them to go out of their way for you. -Kwh 04:56, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Not that I don't trust you...

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but can I get a link to the actual numbers from CRP?

grazon 05:07, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

Certainly.. -Kwh 05:08, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

I might be doing my math wrong but this looks different to me [1]

grazon 05:37, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

"According to an analysis prepared by the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics, Abramoff and his clients gave more than $4.4 million to candidates since 2000, with $1.5 million of the money going to Democrats."
That doesn't seem to say any different (only rounded numbers) from the CRP direct link I gave. But Grazon - the strange thing is that you added the mention of the CRP report to the article, together with the claim of 75%. You might want to slow down and do some more complete research before editing, because I can't figure out where you got that number, unless you just made it up. -Kwh 06:04, 3 January 2006 (UTC)
Oh also see User:Kwh/AbramoffMoney for further information. -Kwh 06:12, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

my math

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"According to an analysis prepared by the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics, Abramoff and his clients gave more than $4.4 million to candidates since 2000, with $1.5 million of the money going to Democrats"

Ok so he gave about 1/4 of the money to Democrats right?

grazon 19:05, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

Grazon - I don't know if you know how to use a calculator, but to calculate what percentage x is of y, you take x and divide it by y, then multiply by 100. In this case, 1.5 divided by 4.4 million is .34090909..., times 100 makes 34.1%. Since the actual amounts of cash were $1,541,673 and 4,454,261, doing that division comes out to 34.6%. If you want to call it a fraction, it's more like over 1/3. -Kwh 01:56, 6 January 2006 (UTC)

Sadly I gave my calculator to my brother and I try to avoid mental math when it comes to numbers of this size.

thanks though.

grazon 03:17, 6 January 2006 (UTC)

On Abramoff

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Thx for your comment. I am 99.9% sure that AP does not sell the rights to any pictures, just licenses to be used. Eg. you can buy the right to display it. I think a picture of abramoff is important as it is an important topic. You can see on the talk page many people requesting a picture to be added. My comments/problem w/ jnothman was that he deleted the image without due process. For that reason I re-uploaded it and let wikipedians decide. I wish there was a wikipedia artist that could draw portraits like they do for the Wall Street Journal eg[2]

Right, I meant the fact that AP does sell licenses, and I mentioned that only because one could certainly ask the AP to license the image under Wikipedia-compatible terms, but they would either refuse or would want an excessive amount of money. I think that's significant to the fair use claim, Unless someone wants to go and ask the AP about using photos on WP (which would probably open a can of worms), the fair-use defense wouldn't stand up in court.
Anyways, as far as getting a 'user-created' photo, there's nothing (as far as I know) preventing a Wikipedian who lives in the Washington, DC area from going to the Capitol and taking these sorts of pictures from the visitor's gallery. -Kwh 00:22, 8 January 2006 (UTC)
Responding to: "one could certainly ask the AP to license the image under Wikipedia-compatible terms"
If they gave such an image w/ such a license only to wikipedia it would not be compatible, it must adhere to copyleft. It would not be "free enough", since wikipedia allows for it's content (w/ exception to fair use) to be republished by anyone. A "wikipedia only license" would mean the image could be published by anyone else. AP pays for those images and it makes money by selling a license to display it. That would not happen.
It would be hard to use the TIME magazine since it does not confirm to WP:NPOV, im' not sure if we can edit a time cover
I got in touch and I had them send me a 400 pixel wide image of the cover (since it is not available online), I pushed the lawyer image below. Just a question, how old are you? achilles 20:19, 8 January 2006 (UTC)
Rewriting the abramoff article... I'm about to leave but don't you think that article should be rewritten? You know, at least a comprehensive overview of his dealings (the intro must be replaced)... what do you think ? achilles 02:18, 9 January 2006 (UTC)
If it helps you, here's the Time article (from LexisNexis) let me know if you need any other info. achilles 02:46, 9 January 2006 (UTC)

As far as internal and external links, I think it is convenient to have both on a subject -- talking here about the Delay linked lobbying group -- so that people can quickly see what the group is about occuring to their own definition and then see what wikipedia has found out, which could be very different. So fix it as you like, but that is my thinking. And if it is just a cosmetic issue, well, I am sure time will tell what is necessary for the general public to get what they need functionally. Holon67 17:25, 9 January 2006 (UTC)

I would say that the link to the organization's site belongs on that organization's article, if one exists. It's open for debate as to whether there is enough information out to create a new article on the organization, so I would say until one exists the external link should be used rather than the 'red link'. If we want the 'red link' there just to signify that we are looking for someone to write the article, it should be put on WP:RA and/or an article should be requested on the talk page. -Kwh 17:58, 9 January 2006 (UTC)

International Freedom Foundation

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Earlier today you wrote on the IFF talk page[3]:"Copyvio This page started out as a pretty obvious copy of a Newsday article. I found the text here[4]on the web. I don't have the whole text of the article but I would assume the whole thing is a copy with minor grammar changes. Needs to be rewritten.-Kwh 07:16, 10 January 2006 (UTC)"

To which I replied:"Your assumption is incorrect. I inaugurated the page last week and did not copy anything from the website you cite[5]which I note was dated April 8, 2005. A six-page summary of the Newsday article of Sunday, July 16, 1995 was given as the 'External link' to the International Freedom Foundation (IFF) page:[6]. If you read this link you can see clearly that the short IFF page cannot be 'a copy with minor grammar changes'. It is not a copyvio and I disagree that it needs to be rewritten.Phase1 11:51, 10 January 2006 (UTC)"

In view of this explanation, I should be grateful if you would now remove the "possible copyvio" tag from the IFF page. I shall then create a new sub-heading: References, and make the necessary citation of the Newsday article.Phase1 17:47, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

Phase1 - I'm not sure you understand copyright and Wikipedia's policy with regards to it. You should primarily be contributing your own writing to Wikipedia; you should only be copying directly from other sources if you know that they are Public Domain, or under an otherwise 'free' copyright license. You seem to be under two misapprehensions:
  1. The document at the geocities link[7] is a summary, not a copy of the Newsday article. This is not true. The person who wrote this geocities webpage indicates that "The Article Follows:", indicating that it is the article, not a summary. It is also the same text which the warandpiece author cites as being from the Newsday article.
  2. Even if it were a summary (written by the Geocities author), it would not be permittable to copy the entire text into Wikipedia. It would be first a copyright infringement, and if it was not made clear that it was a quote of someone else's work, also plagiarism.

See also Wikipedia policy statements at WP:CP which make this very clear:

Only an explicit statement that the material is in the public domain, licensed with the GFDL, or is otherwise compatible with the GFDL, makes material reusable under current policy, unless it is inherently in the public domain due to age or source. (There is no explicit statement at the geocities site.)
What about fair use? Under fair use guideline, brief selections of copyrighted text may be used, but only with full attribution and only when the purpose is to comment on or criticize the text quoted. (The copied text is not brief, nor attributed or for commentary. It does not meet 'fair use' guidelines.)

This is not a criticism of you personally, you just need to understand that the article must be rewritten in your own words to avoid legal liability for Wikipedia. Thanks... -Kwh 18:12, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

Many thanks, Kwh, for this response.
The reason I called the External link a summary of the Newsday article is that the first two paragraphs summarize the content of the article. It then continues: "A list of some of the people mentioned in the story with locations and dates of intelligence service follows: [seventeen high-profile names are mentioned]." It quotes a lengthy extract from the 1993 Encyclopedia of Associations on the International Freedom Foundation and goes on to raise a number of questions about the IFF. It then says "The Newsday article follows". But the Newsday article mentions only ten of the "17 high-profile names", suggesting that the article might not have been quoted in full.
The verbatim quotes I made in the IFF article were mainly the exact words attributed by Newsday to South African "superspy" Craig Williamson and should be considered {fairuse}, in my view, because Williamson is an admitted assassin and bomber.

As you say, Wikipedia should not be exposed to any legal liability in relation to the IFF article. This can be avoided, in my view, if the Newsday is properly referenced as the source of the verbatim quotes.Phase1 19:46, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

I did an analysis of this here. (This analysis will also need to be deleted eventually for copyright concerns) I did this analysis by:

  1. Taking the originally submitted text of International Freedom Foundation
  2. I replaced the content, paragraph by paragraph, with the same content from the Newsday source.

By comparing the difference here, it is very obvious that this is a "copy with minor grammar changes". Using Wikipedia as a tool to compare differences, the red texts shown in the column at left (the Wikipedia article text) represent the only changes and additions to the text from the geocities source. The red text shown in the column at right represents information from the geocities source which was not copied/used. In addition, there were some other paragraphs from the geocities source which were not used, but the vast majority of the article content (black text on left) excepting only the sentences on Burton, Dornan, and the movie production in Namibia, was copied nearly verbatim. The creator of the geocities page is in violation of copyright by reproducing information in full from the Encyclopedia of Associations as well as Newsday, but that is their problem. Exact quotes can be used under fair use, but this is too much quoting. You are quoting not only Mr. Williamson but also taking the Newsday text in toto, and it is not being used for the purpose of commentary on the article. This is a pretty clear-cut case. The article needs to be rewritten here as mentioned on the {{copyvio}} tag ("Note that simply modifying copyrighted text is not sufficient to avoid copyright violation — it is best to write the article from scratch.") You obviously have a great interest in this subject so you ought to be able to come up with something good. There's nothing wrong with quoting and citing sources such as the Newsday article or the geocities author's summary, but the majority of the work needs to be your own words. Thanks, Kwh 20:33, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

Wow, this is a thorough analysis and explanation! I actually came here to put in a word for Phase1 (after I already had given him a tough time regarding this page before). But I must say, your analysis swayed me. I don't see how anyone could deny such an obvious copy with the argument that the source was different. It's sad, because this was a good article. I wish there was an easy way to buy a license from the original authors. Anyway, Phase1 (if you read this), I hope you're not discouraged and that you'll keep writing on the subject. From our little experience with each other I know that you're open to reasonable arguments and I would still like to keep working with you. Common Man 22:44, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

As a result of this alleged copyvio, I have completely rewritten the article on the "Temp" page. Thanks for your guidance, Kwh.Phase1 22:09, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

Abramoff on wikisource

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I started typing out staring from page 53, headers are the most time consuming. OCR software worked pretty bad on the PDFs. (how about uploading each page individualy maybe?) I'll try some other software later. But one thing I noticed: You are transcribing a document that has 90-something pages, but I count about 300 pages [8] (139 pages) and [9] (153 pages) .Do you know how they relate? achilles 06:12, 15 January 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for pitching in on that - I've been using a blended approach, I have the OCR take a crack at it and then correct/retype. In cases like the e-mail headers, for instance, they tend to have a lot of duplication (like "From: abramoffj REDACTED To: Mike Scanlon REDACTED") so that's where some copy and paste helps. You are right; I'm just at the beginning with the 2004-09-29 documents, the documents you mention are from the latter hearings and are much more interesting since they get into more details. My plan was to transcribe a lot of the emails, but some of the more complex things, like checks, ledgers, and invoices I would just write a description of it and link the image.
I can split out the TIF images for each page fairly easily; actually I already have the pages for the 2004-09-29 document, I just don't know if there's an easy way to upload them all at once to Wikisource. -Kwh
I went ahead and created this page [10] for all the docs. I think the OCR software I used could not detect that the page was slightly rotated, that throws it off, a lot of those documents have been skewed. Why dont we just upload the whole PDF's for now? There must be an automated solution for this, look at this Wikisource-New Student Ref. I doubt they did it all manualy achilles 23:18, 15 January 2006 (UTC)

Background info

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Zen-master's abusive behavior is well-documented here. It's also worthwhile to point out that he keeps making variant proposals of the same issue and they get rejected every time, and he doesn't listen to any counterarguments - making him a vexatious litigant. Creating policy proposals to give apparent credence to your opinion is strongly frowned upon. Zenny has made at least three such proposals, and has already been citing them in discussion as if they were consensually accepted. Radiant_>|< 01:39, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

Could you provide links to the three proposals you mention? Could you provide links to where he cited them in discussion as if they were consensually accepted? Thanks. --BostonMA 01:51, 17 January 2006 (UTC)
I agree with BostonMA. I did read the RFArb, and the complaint there seemed to be related mainly to conduct in articles under Race and Intelligence. I understand that the Arbcom allowed for article bans on any one administrator's judgement of disruptiveness, starting with "Race and intelligence" and later proceeding to all articles, by accord of the ArbCom. I'm not questioning that. I am having trouble with how this is being applied to this Wikipedia:Title neutrality discussion, specifically ZM's complaint about it being moved. I'd like to see that conduct, because from ZM's representation, the proposal was being prejudged (and deemed "rejected"). If the proposal were indeed already rejected, I don't understand why it was later moved to User namespace/"deleted"... wouldn't leaving the "rejected" article serve Wikipedia better by showing historical record of the guideline being proposed and rejected? And why would lobbying for 'votes' be reverted, even considering that some of those individuals (like TitaniumDreads) complained? By moving/deleting it, justified or not, you're just giving ZM cover to claim a "conspiracy" against themselves. -Kwh 02:20, 17 January 2006 (UTC)
Thank you for identifying the three proposals. Could you also identify where he cited them in discussion as if they were consensually accepted? Thanks. --BostonMA 13:06, 17 January 2006 (UTC)
I think I understand the repetitiveness as Conspiracy theory is very clearly rejected, but I think ZM had a salient question as to what the actual process is for proposal resubmission (Although there is a question as to whether ZM has anything substantially new to present, it's not clear if you are the arbiter of that).
I agree that ZM's methods need modification, but it's hard to deny that ZM has an energy and a passion for this particular subject matter. Wikipedia does benefit from energetic personalities. There's a fine line between channeling that energy positively so that Wikipedia benefits, vs. deflecting and rejecting it, and creating yet another highly energetic Wikipedia ex-editor and critic.-Kwh 15:42, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia does not benefit from energetic personalities if energetic means "like Zen-master". He is extremely stubborn and argumentative, and causes disruption on absolutely every page he edits. Those of us who have been dealing with him for a long time and are familiar with his methods will appear to be short with him, but it's because we've learned through experience that rational discussion won't work. --Ryan Delaney talk 23:20, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for your opinion. For what it's worth - I've gained some of that 'experience'. I'm no longer interested in helping this editor. I generally don't like to critique other people's personalities directly, only their actions. It's a good way to avoid prejudice, and I'd like to think that anyone can change for the better, if they see the value in it. But the individual you're talking about has some serious thinking to do.-Kwh 00:48, 21 January 2006 (UTC)
What experience would that be and what methods need modification? The original "conspiracy theory" proposal was rejected but that doesn't mean debate on the issue should be censored, random wikipedia editors would take lack of neutrality complaints much more seriously and propose alternative ways of saying what they wanted to say (but they don't do that). I am also curious to learn of where Ryan Delaney has ever engaged in honest debate with me? Nebulous accusations aren't going to cut it. zen master T 21:51, 21 January 2006 (UTC)

Thx for your note

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I was surprised you saw it that quickly. I'm still here, you were right. As of this moment, waiting for my account to mature a tad. Somer articles have semi-protection and I can't edit them. This user has left wikipedia 07:20, 19 January 2006 (UTC)

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