User talk:Computron

From Wikinews, the free news source you can write!
Jump to navigation Jump to search
Welcome to Wikinews

A nice cup of coffee for you while you get started

Getting started as a contributor
How to write an article
  1. Pick something current?
  2. Use two independent sources?
  3. Read your sources before writing the story in your own words?. Do choose a unique title? before you start.
  4. Follow Wikinews' structure? for articles, answering as many of who what when where why and how? as you can; summarised in a short, two- or three-sentence opening paragraph. Once complete, your article must be three or more paragraphs.
  5. If you need help, you can add {{helpme}} to your talkpage, along with a question, or alternatively, just ask?

  • Use this tab to enter your title and get a basic article template.
    [RECOMMENDED. Starts your article through the semi-automated {{develop}}—>{{review}}—>{{publish}} collaboration process.]

 Welcome! Thank you for joining Wikinews; we'd love for you to stick around and get more involved. To help you get started we have an essay that will guide you through the process of writing your first full article. There are many other things you can do on the project, but its lifeblood is new, current, stories written neutrally.
As you get more involved, you will need to look into key project policies and other discussions you can participate in; so, keep this message on this page and refer to the other links in it when you want to learn more, or have any problems.

Wikipedia's puzzle-globe logo, © Wikimedia Foundation
Wikipedia's puzzle-globe logo, © Wikimedia Foundation
  Used to contributing to Wikipedia? See here.
All Wikimedia projects have rules. Here are ours.

Listed here are the official policies of the project, you may be referred to some of them if your early attempts at writing articles don't follow them. Don't let this discourage you, we all had to start somewhere.

The rules and guides laid out here are intended to keep content to high standards and meet certain rules the Wikimedia Foundation applies to all projects. It may seem like a lot to read, but you do not have to go through it all in one sitting, or know them all before you can start contributing.

Remember, you should enjoy contributing to the project. If you're really stuck come chat with the regulars. There's usually someone in chat who will be happy to help, but they may not respond instantly.

The core policies
Places to go, people to meet

Wiki projects work because a sense of community forms around the project. Although writing news is far more individualistic than contributing to Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, people often need minor help with things like spelling and copyediting. If a story isn't too old you might be able to expand it, or if it is disputed you may be able to find some more sources and rescue it before it is listed for deletion.

There are always discussions going on about how the site could be improved, and your input is of value. Check the links here to see where you can give input to the running of the Wikinews project.

Find help and get involved
Write your first article for Wikinews!

Use the following box to help you create your first article. Simply type in a title to your story and press "Create page". Then start typing text to your story into the new box that will come up. When you're done, press "save page". That's all there is to it!



It is recommended you read the article guide before starting. Also make sure to check the list of recently created articles to see if your story hasn't already been reported upon.


-- Wikinews Welcome (talk) 16:41, 24 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the welcome! I quite enjoy English Literature and enjoying keeping up-to-date with current affairs, nice to discover Wikinews after I learn about Wikibooks! --Computron (talk) 17:38, 24 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Hi. :-)
Well... the Howdy template is added automatically by a bot. But, speaking as a non-bot, welcome to Wikinews! --Pi zero (talk) 18:24, 24 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks :) --Computron (talk) 18:36, 24 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Review labor[edit]

You may have gotten a false impression from the review of your one article that got reviewed and published. From what I hear, the reviewer was already intimately familiar with one of the sources, drastically reducing review time. Fact is, in general, review of a synthesis article tends to take more time than writing it — and we are always chronically short of reviewer labor (this was true, btw, even at times when we had lots more reviewer labor on hand: however much review labor we have, demand always expands to exceed it). Flooding the review queue with small articles has, so I've heard, actually discouraged one regular Wikinewsie from writing an article today. Surely there is some happy medium to be found, in writing output. (Re review, see WN:Pillars of Wikinews writing.) --Pi zero (talk) 14:22, 25 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry, I didn't know all this - I'm fairly new here as you'll know. I wasn't aware that you didn't have many reviewers and I don't of course want to discourage any of the regular "Wikinewsie's" from writing articles as mine probably are not very good as it is in comparison. If you wish I will stop writing as many articles. I hope this is OK (please say if not). --Computron (talk) 16:16, 25 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]
No problem. :-)  We value our new contributors; they're the future of the project, after all. It's just when things come on too fast we can get overwhelmed.
LauraHale has lately done some awesome original reporting coverage of some big sporting events (there's another one coming up late next month) that created a big review load during, and for a little while after, each event — she gave us warning ahead of time, asking if reviewers could prepare themselves and make themselves more available for review during the crunch. And there's also things like the suggestion she made below, about how to help make review easier. So, there are ways to work with the system to help things go more smoothly; it just takes some thought for how the system works. --Pi zero (talk) 16:32, 25 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah! Sorry, I wasn't aware of the protocol on here, I am now though.
Should I 'abandon' any of the current articles to reduce the 'review' load? If so, which would you suggest? --Computron (talk) 16:55, 25 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I wouldn't presume to advise so specifically. Fwiw,
  • When submissions really exceed our capacity, what happens is that some of the articles go stale waiting on the queue. It then becomes (sadly) easy to review them, because one can simply assess them as stale.
  • The eventual fate of any article that fails to get published is that, after four or more days of inactivity, it is tagged abandoned, and two days later (if activity on the article does not resume — and it usually doesn't resume) the article then qualifies for speedy deletion.
--Pi zero (talk) 17:35, 25 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Making reviews easier[edit]

Hi. Can you put inline comments that reference the source? This will speed the review process along in terms of checking sources and checking for plagiarism. --LauraHale (talk) 14:47, 25 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Sure. :-) --Computron (talk) 16:17, 25 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Recession story[edit]

Hi, I've reviewed and published UK economy shrinks by 0.3% in fourth quarter of 2012. Just a small thing: LauraHale gave some useful feedback on the first review. It'd make it a lot easier for reviewers to get articles published quickly (which we all want) if you fix up all the feedback given by the first review. I hope I'm not being preachy here, and I'm willing to put a bit of effort into fixing articles up, but the more ready they are for publication and the less work the reviewer has to do, the quicker they'll get on the front page. Tom Morris (talk) 18:29, 25 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Advertising/spam[edit]

Hi. When you see a page created for advertising/spam, the thing to do is to add a {{delete}} tag to it, to flag it for speedy deletion ("advertising or spam" being the top selection on our menu of canned reasons for speedy deletion, because it's the most commonly used :-). -Pi zero (talk) 12:13, 26 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I realised in the end when I did a Google search for "delete Wikinews" - a "Speedy Deletion" policy came up. I wasn't logged in at the time. --Computron (talk) 12:15, 26 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Ohh. This explains much. :-) --Pi zero (talk) 12:24, 26 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I saw a link on the side under 'Wikinews' for 'Live Chat' - do I need to download some sort of software to get on to it? --Computron (talk) 18:16, 26 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Good work[edit]

Just wanted to say that the work you've put into the stories you've written recently is admirable. Sorry if the reviewers have been a bit harsh: we tend to baptise by fire here. If you can stand our good-natured hazing, you'll be just fine, and you'll be able to develop the suitably pedantic approach to news writing and sourcing.

In the meantime, have fun and enjoy yourself. —Tom Morris (talk) 22:53, 26 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks (and for reviewing them). I guess that a keen eye for detail is important but everyone's been really helpful here.--Computron (talk) 23:08, 26 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Alas, I'm not in top form, or I'd have tried to fix the problem within my purview as an independent reviewer. Review comments. --Pi zero (talk) 00:14, 30 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

One good, one not so good[edit]

I've passed British Prime Minister David Cameron makes unannounced visit to Libya, but I had to fail Russia expresses concern at Israeli airstrike on Syria. I hope the review comments are useful in improving the story. —Tom Morris (talk) 12:20, 1 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Also, United States economy shrinks by 0.1% in last quarter of 2012 is published too. —Tom Morris (talk) 12:39, 1 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks. :) Yes, the comments were very useful actually and I've made changes to the Russia-Israel article. --Computron (talk) 13:44, 1 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Breaking news[edit]

The article has not been reviewed within a day and refers to events that took place over a day ago. It is unlikely that the events from yesterday are continuing to change. Is there some new, breaking news aspect to the story which will result in you adding information and continuing to develop the article as it may be reviewed? If not, then breaking news is inappropriate and looks more like an attempt to get a quick review... which that article was not going to get. (Because despite the breaking news status, no one updated the date and relative dates in the article. I had to do that when I was considering reviewing it.) --LauraHale (talk) 14:28, 23 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

What new sources do you plan to the article in the next 20 minutes containing news that has just come out? Breaking news is for developing stories. This one does not appear to be developing. --LauraHale (talk) 14:32, 23 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]


It shows up in the breaking news section for reviewers. If you want to use quick review, it needs to be abundantly clear why and it really was not in that case. In any case, the article has been marked as needing more work before being published so it isn´t an issue right now. It will not be able to get a quick review when it goes up again because the repeated not readies mean it needs to be vigorously checked. --LauraHale (talk) 14:44, 23 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Please stop[edit]

Please stop nominating the article for review in that manner. You have already been asked twice. Continuing to do so appears to be an attempt to waste community time and circumvent community processes. If it is nominated for review again in the same fashion, I will consider blocking you for a week to prevent you from inappropriately nominating things for review. --LauraHale (talk) 16:59, 23 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Bombing article[edit]

Good article, it's just gone stale....sorry. --Bddpaux (talk) 15:16, 27 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

However, you could back up, take a deep breath and re-focus on something that is more current.....like the hunt for the bomber? Or family members speaking out about the death of loved ones?? Just food-for-thought. --Bddpaux (talk) 15:17, 27 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for reviewing the articles, it was unfortunate they didn't get seen at the right time but that's how things go. I might write about that, and no I don't know Strike Eagle, I saw their photos on the Wikipedia article of the Hyderabad blast. --Computron (talk) 21:16, 27 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

On things stale and things not[edit]

Just to wanted to clarify a small matter: You'd commented about LauraHale's contributions and the submission/staleness issue. Yes, she's been a busy little bee covering a very BIG event.....and a bombing is also a VERY BIG event. However, you began the article on Monday Feb. 25th.....the EVENT ITSELF happened on Wednesday Feb. 20th.......that's a pretty long stretch of time. When considering staleness, we focus on the actual event itself.....the event IS THE NEWS. Sometimes, with good, hardcore OR, we'll give a few inches (if it's earth-shattering stuff....the OR I mean), but 5 days past, for what was essentially a clustering of photos is stretching credibility. --Bddpaux (talk) 02:41, 28 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

OK, yes. There were other articles such as Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh makes visit to Hyderabad blast site, and Oscar Pistorius granted bail over Reeva Steenkamp killing that went stale. --Computron (talk) 07:01, 28 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Locally uploaded images[edit]

So you're up-to-date on this saga: In my copious free time I'm going to make a list of all the local uploads you've done, and then I'm going to check them off one at a time as I recheck that the permissions are solid. This means that at some point I may be getting back to you about anything that's still not good enough (groan); I'm not looking forward to that any more than you are, but, well, ultimately we have to do our due diligence that we aren't hosting something we don't have copyright permission for. --Pi zero (talk) 13:37, 16 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I've already been keeping a track in an Excel spreadsheet, but a checklist seems OK as well. --Computron (talk) 13:40, 16 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Processed[edit]

Hi, I processed all images you uploaded here. They are now tagged. A few are permissions pending - this should not happen. I gave an exception for your first images batch only. Your future uploads without a permission available will be deleted on sight. If a tag is incorrect or out of date, please edit that image adding your line above the tag, leave here a message. I'll get an email (this page and images files are in my watchlist).

It is more difficult to get images from Twitter, because it's hard to tell whether the tweet author is actually the photographer. We have to assume it is so. This assumption may be wrong. When using Twitter to ask for permission please try to get the folk confirm that they are the photographer, and ask for a free license first. A short message that fits in 100 characters could be: "Hi, did you take this photo, can I use at WikimediaCommons (please pick license <a tiny url>)?" If they accepted, fine. Otherwise "Hi, thanks, can I use image for Wikinews article once only with rights reserved? <a tiny url>" Or something similar. Thanks! --Gryllida 13:00, 17 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Images[edit]

File name Permission received (Y/P) Link with permission
Y Crown Copyright
Y https://twitter.com/Carla_cbr/status/312652286151258112
File:Snow in Europe 2.jpg Y https://twitter.com/MoynatParis/status/312640596709896192
Y https://twitter.com/cstross/status/312649092461383680
Y https://twitter.com/California1923/status/311847732555952129
File:Snow in Europe 5.jpg P https://twitter.com/TeenageDr__m/status/311454554543779840
File:Snow in Europe 6.jpg Y https://twitter.com/DounS_/status/313343722035245058
Y https://twitter.com/vperrin/status/311753208114589696
Y https://twitter.com/BellandaInParis/status/312143127295164416
Y https://twitter.com/BellandaInParis/status/312143127295164416
Y CC-BY released on Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/enneafive/8552088088/in/photostream
Y https://twitter.com/RandyTahtouh/status/310695320227049472
Y https://twitter.com/RyanOConnorSA/status/311771928199299072
File:Snow in Europe 14.jpg P https://twitter.com/omilcent/status/311793455280050176
Y https://twitter.com/DhTier/status/311043400268918786
File:Snow in Europe 16.jpg P https://twitter.com/CableGuyG/status/311359338520395776
Y https://twitter.com/transitrecord/status/312685358598987776
Y https://twitter.com/TatyanaIlyin/status/311077359845527552
File:Snow in Europe 21.jpg P https://twitter.com/CherryRedCheeks/status/312268782515154945
File:Snow in Europe 22.jpg Y</span> https://twitter.com/petitwifi/status/312264802321977344
File:Snow in Europe 23.jpg Y https://twitter.com/ArmenianDancer/status/312282857454309378
Y https://twitter.com/ArmenianDancer/status/312637114703552512
Y https://twitter.com/ninja_padrino/status/313242288790855680
Y https://twitter.com/ninja_padrino/status/313230217168683008
Y https://twitter.com/colm_smyth/status/313246162331258880
File:Snow in Europe 25.jpg Y https://twitter.com/sheraton_ffm/status/312675047317843968
P Ambiguous situation.

Image names[edit]

It occurs to me to point out, you really should be trying to chose image file names that will be unique for all time, just like article names need to be. --Pi zero (talk) 17:37, 22 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Image use[edit]

I've been struggling with what position I should take on the images in this article. I realize you're trying to iron out the procedure for this approach to aquiring nifty sets of images for articles. We're all aware (I hope) the procedure is still a work in progress; each time we try this we have a different set of problems, it seems. At least that means we're not making the same mistakes over and over, but it also means success in a particular case is still pretty uncertain. And on the far side of the issue, I do also take Laura's point: you were after all told we want things uploaded to Commons under a rock-solid free license if at all possible, but on this latest set of pictures you didn't ask for a free license, you asked for use on Wikinews. If, as I think you once suggested, a tweet is too short to ask for both by order of preference, ask for CC-BY in the first tweet, and only if they refuse that, then perhaps ask for permission to use them on Wikinews (and don't use the term "fair use", please).

So, what to do about the specific article. Truthfully, in this instance I think Laura probably has the right of it. If we're going to use a whole bunch of images under non-free license, we need a very strong news reason for it. I think probably the best thing to do is to, for now, withdraw all but one or at most two of the images — it's a short article, after all — and, if you really feel you want more of them, approach the holders about CC-BY and upload them to Commons. It's a bit of a disappointment, I know, but as I say, the procedure for this is a work in progress. --Pi zero (talk) 02:38, 23 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

  • OK. What you have done doesn't qualify for Grant of License, because you haven't asked the copyright holder for a free license first. Having looked at WN:Image use policy and WN:Fair use#Fair use whitelist, it looks like a limited number (usually about 1) of the images could be used without a grant of license if they match a whitelisted item. Which one?
  • If this isn't clear within 24 hours, we can't keep the images locally. We also can't publish the article before this question is clear (seeing as you re-added the images). (If not kept locally, simply try to have the copyright holder ACK a free license; once they reply, we may consider keeping the image if it is valuable as an illustration.)
  • The GOL approach is _not_ desirable; it is a last resort. It has been used _very_ rarely (see User:Gryllida/gol for a full list of GOL images over the years; you'll see that there was very few of them during every year, and some years had none. Article never had more than three Gol images (this is not typical; it's the upper limit that was hit once or twice during the entire Wikinews history). It's a load on reviewers and should ideally be avoided at all costs unless the image is particularly useful and a story wouldn't be the same without it. Thanks. --Gryllida?? 04:05, 23 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Original reporting[edit]

You may be interested in this and that notes. I regret to admit that for an article to qualify as original reporting, it has to contain a substantial amount (usually 100% except the lede) of new, original information or media. --Gryllida?? 01:39, 24 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Pictures from Twitter[edit]

This is depressing, but, here it is:

A large fraction of all pictures put up on Twitter may be copyright violations, where the person tweeting the picture does not hold copyright and does not have permission to tweet it. People don't even realize that permission may be needed, or don't care because they think copyright is immoral or something. Ask them 'may I use this' and they'll say 'sure'; it's no skin off their nose since it wasn't theirs in the first place. So even asking for permission isn't adequate; before it's even meaningful to ask for permission, one has has to know whether the tweeter is the copyright holder in the first place. Before 'will you release this under CC-BY' would be 'did you take this photo yourself', but it gets even worse than that. On a case by case basis we'd need to consider whether we know enough about the tweeter to judge whether we can believe their answer to 'did you take this photo yourself'; often we would conclude the answer is 'yes', but not always.

All of this adds up to an awful mess. I fear the concept of getting permissions for tweeted pictures, while interesting, is just not going to be viable. It's extremely labor intensive and filled with pitfalls both for the person going out looking for permissions, and the reviewer back here who's trying to check whether the permissions are solid.

:-(  --Pi zero (talk) 14:23, 24 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Writing[edit]

As seen at Flooding and heavy snow cause widespread disruption across the United Kingdom's talk page, you had great photos, however you tried to put effort into writing a large chunk of text at the top. This was your time. Then this was some errors. Then this was some not-ready reviews. All of that took away time, especially as you didn't put effort into rewording the text in a timely and substantial fashion:

  • this small edit which changes tense of words which already existed instead of adressing the "this is all from bbc sources only" problem;
  • another one supposed to address the "the sources are as old as 22th" issue but you didn't re-focus in the lede and added your bit to article last line (no way this fits in pyramid style);
  • this attempt to address the "Could we have a bit of content in the article body that's specifically from the Guardian source, please?" concern, but you only added one line to the bottom and it didn't have a clear date, while most article content at the top was untouched and still had the BBC-ishness problem.

I will recommend that you practice writing multi-sources (synth, as they say) articles more to get a firm hold of writing, so it becomes easy for you and things like "this is all based on one source", "this is phrased similarly to source", "this isn't fresh" become something you spot easier (even in your own work). Gryllida 00:09, 27 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

You can see an examples of the volume and nature of work involved when addressing reviewer concerns here and next diffs. I wish I had more, but I'm not seeing enough recent edits to give an example of something that was not-readied, corrected, submitted for review, and published. Gryllida 00:20, 27 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

After looking and asking around a bit, this is another example: even though there was no reviewing involved, the article author spotted issue with timing and refocused the article on a more recent event. A ping-pong with reviewers here: added (C)ed material, removed it and attempted to add a couple of words, a substantial rewrite (a Good Thing ), pre-publish edits by reviewer. Gryllida (talk) 00:34, 27 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I wondered if the text of the article may have suffered from some lack of sharp focus, and lack of attention, due to starting life as kind of an incidental to the originally intended photo essay (which, as we all know, fell apart in slow motion, kind of an exercise in Murphy's law). Computron needs to practice synthesis more, I agree — xyr synthesis has improved slowly — but one problem the synthesis articles don't usually have is weak focus. --Pi zero (talk) 01:08, 27 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, the article had several problems that arose which could have been improved better and I didn't do that properly. I've had a lack of time the past week or so but will take the advice on for my next article. --Computron (talk) 10:12, 27 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

North Korea Interview[edit]

Hello Computron. I have begun to translate your interview for de.wikinews. Can you tell me how this interview was done? Personal interview, IRC, Mail? --95.114.163.106 (talk) 20:26, 5 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Hi, there were three sections of the interview, an e-mail with Scott Snyder, an e-mail with Dr Robert Kelly and then the last three questions were done over Skype and uploaded with Dr Robert Kelly. Hope that helps! --Computron (talk) 20:34, 5 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Heaven Knows[edit]

....this is long overdue!!

The Order of the Modest Pencil


For completing 5 edits.

Great work! Keep it up!--Bddpaux (talk) 20:26, 6 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

.....as is this![edit]

This award is presented to Wikinews reporters upon their 11th published news article.
This award is presented to Wikinews reporters upon their 11th published news article.




--Bddpaux (talk) 20:28, 6 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks :-)






Do you think it can now be sent for review? - Jayadevp13 (talk) 11:33, 7 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I haven't an idea, - you could ask Pi zero or LauraHale? --Computron (talk) 11:50, 7 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Re: Translation of North/South Korea interview[edit]

Hello. I'm not sure if we have anyone compenent enough to translate it, at least not me. Except me, three contributors appeared in the last days, hopefully they have interest and will have time, I'll place a link on their talk pages to the relevant section in Water Cooler. Regretfully, because nobody of us is good enough in French, we missed translating the news about an attempt to censure French Wikipedia which is already available in six Wikinews projects.

BTW, you can leave me messages on my English Wikinews page. Although I don't contribute here, I check the site more than once daily for new entries because I love adding interwiki links. --PICAWN (talk) 20:54, 8 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Nice work[edit]

Computron, I've noticed your stories and you're doing some very good work on Wikinews! Thank you, Crtew (talk) 09:09, 13 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. :-) --Computron (talk) 13:36, 13 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Translations[edit]

When asking someone to translate, please let them know that their name will be on the translation: either by them creating an article, or otherwise it's still a requirement to mention their nickname on the article talk, per this. Understandably the former is easier. I would appreciate if you figured out who translated the previous articles for you and left notes on the articles talk pages. Thanks! --Gryllida 01:38, 30 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

WORTNET[edit]

I really owe you an apology for things I did a few months back. :( I'm sorry about that. I am really glad despite my idiocy that you stuck with the project. (And you do a really good job with Original Reporting. It would be great to see more of that from you.)

That out of the way, I am vaguely aware of it. We really need to centralize it across projects, possibly move it to meta as a subpage of The Wikinewsie Group, and do more translation work... with an emphasis on translating original reporting. Wikinews works best when it does quality original reporting. It is an area of strength. We can bring "local" news to an international audience by translating it to different languages. --LauraHale (talk) 06:14, 13 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I thought it may also be an idea into translating generally to all language Wikinews's where there is little activity and risk of closure. The best example is Hebrew Wikipedia where there was nothing since 2011 and then a couple were translated and now there are being 1-2 articles a day there and Norwegian Wikinews.--Computron (talk) 06:26, 13 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah. Would be good to get those wikinews projects open, and possibly seeing if we cannot get the two projects that have been closed already moved to incubator where we can then do translating work. I think Hungarian Wikinews is closed but I cannot recall off hand the other closed project kept around for archival purposes. --LauraHale (talk) 07:02, 13 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Assistance with understanding how much original reporting costs[edit]

Hello and I apologize for writing in English. As all language Wikinews improves, The Wikinewsie Group wants to be able better support original reporting done by contributors like you. One of our newsletters at The Wikinewsie Group/Newsletter said you have recently published an original report. This is why I am contacting you.

Members of the The Wikinewsie Group are trying to assess the costs associated with original reporting across all Wikinews projects. This way, we can determine how much original reporting currently costs, who is paying for it, what Wikinews and other projects get for these costs (especially when paid for by unpaid, volunteer contributor reporters). This information can then be used in applying for grants, measuring the success of Wikinews original reporting and seeing how reporters can be better supported. If you could complete this survey on that topic, we would very much appreciate it. We will try to anonymize the responses as best possible when writing up any report. Thank you very much for taking the time to fill it out (especially in English). Please do not hesitate to ask me or pi zero about any questions you may have about this research. We hope the results will enable us to better assist you in conducting more original reporting on Wikinews. --LauraHale (talk) 08:41, 14 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Reviewer[edit]

Hi! I've suggested on WN:FR/RFP that you be granted the reviewer right. Please head over there and indicate if you accept or not. Blood Red Sandman (Talk) (Contribs) 16:27, 8 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

We need your feedback on what happened with the image at the article talk thread. Since it's past archive horizon, we can't just add it, and we need to be sure what happened in order to know what we can do and how to do it. --Pi zero (talk)

Your reviewer nom[edit]

I've gone ahead and closed this as not ready. I hope you're happy with how I phrased it. I feel a little bad for piling on the presure — encouraged by BRS' enthusiasm — but, I think it was still a worthwhile discussion. You've sussed some of the important parts of doing good OR, maybe had a bit of a rocky start on synthesis stuff, and there's — probably, as Pi zero says — some way we can all work to get you there.

"I don't care"? I'd like to read into that, and better you flip it off because, you see what a 'bear pit' the responsibility is.

The best-guess I can put on how (with current contributor base) is you need to go "OK, ready for publish; I want to make 3-6 edits to dramatically improve this as-if someone else wrote it." After that, you mark the article for review. What those edits are is something we need to capture. --Brian McNeil / talk 01:56, 12 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, OK. I think "I don't care" was more, I wasn't bothered either way the vote goes. --Computron (talk) 13:30, 12 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

More fun than stamp collecting[edit]

The (newly-minted) Wikinews interviewer barnstar.

For, as I remarked upon elsewhere:Seriously putting a lot of highly-paid journalists to shame in-terms of serving the news' functions of "education, and informing debate", you most-certainly deserve this one. --Brian McNeil / talk 23:28, 22 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Gari Ledyard[edit]

Did Gari Ledyard refuse to release the photo under a free license? If not already could you please send the correspondence to scoop? Gryllida 12:33, 5 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I will send it altogether when I send the transcripts for the interview. Brianmc concluded recently that fair use photos can be obtained for the purpose of the article and then a free license obtained afterwards. --Computron (talk) 17:03, 5 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]
To clarify on that: Assuming a subject provides a photograph of themselves for use in an article, we have — provided the image was not taken by a working press photographer — an excellent case for claiming Fair Use/Fair Dealing on the photograph's use for that article.
As was done for one of the prior interviews, where photos were 'limping in' around publication-time, we can use the Fair Use rationale and ask the subject to pass whatever paperwork Commons needs sorted to the photographer. That gets us out of having the risk of Commons zapping an image we're trying to get use cleared on. You'll note on the WN:FU policy page that (somewhere in the dim and distant past) I added a 'deprecated' option for subject images. That wasn't particularly popular with some of the folks over on Commons; but, it'd be crazy for us to go "oh, delete the non-free image of John Doe on that ten-year-old article, there's now a free one on Commons." It goes against the principle of Wikinews being a record of what was known at the time — a part of that is what someone looked like at the time. --Brian McNeil / talk 09:52, 13 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Interview assistance[edit]

If you're around, can you assist me in formatting/writing up an e-mail interview with a US congress person? --LauraHale (talk) 19:05, 8 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, I can certainly help with this. What sort of assistance can I give? --Computron (talk) 00:04, 9 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not sure what this page is, but I've moved it to your userspace. --Pi zero (talk) 19:39, 4 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

There should be a synthesis source for the statement about US-UK-and-France. It's not usual for an interview to have no synthesis sources at all, exactly because an interview usually has some introduction, which says some things, which therefore need to be verified. --Pi zero (talk) 22:52, 4 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Published. Last night, actually; figuring its value as an interview on a hot topic would change by the hour, I stayed up to get it done (and thus was tired enough when I finished, to forget to leave a note here). --Pi zero (talk) 13:02, 5 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for reviewing it! Sorry, I forgot to dot-the-i's-and-cross-the-t's - first time of writing an interview up since last year. I seem to have forgotten to add in a Related News section so I will do that now. --Computron (talk) 18:31, 5 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
:-)  --Pi zero (talk) 19:12, 5 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry I missed you on IRC. I feel this needs some kind of explanation, at least on the collaboration page. (Review comment.) --Pi zero (talk) 16:59, 23 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Missed you the secondtime on IRC, too.
Thanks for the clarification on the collaboration page. I hope what I did to resolve the matter works for you. --Pi zero (talk) 02:39, 24 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

London cannabis rally[edit]

I've left Tom, who's London-based, a note about a big rally in the city celebrating cannabis. Expect pro-legalisation talks and good entertainment. Myself and possibly Brian are going to the one in Glasgow, and as you were able to photograph stuff outside Downing St recently I wondered if you were in the area and able to possibly attend the London event (maybe with Tom)? BRS (Talk) (Contribs) 21:11, 4 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Image licensing[edit]

Hi there. You have uploaded one or more images to Wikinews in the past, but it is missing important information. All images uploaded to Wikinews require both a source (who made the file) and licensing information: anything that doesn't have both is assumed to be copyrighted and therefore ineligible for usage on Wikinews. Please check your files and ensure that your files fit the image use policy – especially File:Sit-down protest.jpg. Thanks, Microchip08 (talk) 10:13, 4 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

FA[edit]

Promoted Wikinews interviews meteorological experts on Cyclone Phalin. --Pi zero (talk) 22:31, 11 September 2014 (UTC)[reply]