A couple especially inglorious examples.
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Ignacy_Jan_Paderewski&oldid=13...
Awww. Isn't a shame that people aren't one-dimensional animalistic robots that sometimes just refuse to be pigeon-holed? (Apart from that, whenever I see "Genre:Classical Music" I want to start kicking people).
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Giuseppe_Di_Stefano&oldid=1317...
For heaven's sake, you never call someone's voice their instrument. Ever. The terminology is nonsensical. Again, the box just does not fit.
The problems these bioboxes are causing are very widespread. You simply cannot twist the article beyond all boundaries of accuracy, correct terminology and common sense just to fit an infobox. Infoboxes are supposed to be a means to an end, not an end in themselves.
Accuracy is what we need at Wikipedia. Homogeneous conformity is not, especially when this leads to idiocy, inaccuracy, and proves impossible to enforce. Priorities need to be changed.
Moreschi
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On 18/05/07, Christiano Moreschi moreschiwikiman@hotmail.co.uk wrote:
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Giuseppe_Di_Stefano&oldid=1317...
For heaven's sake, you never call someone's voice their instrument. Ever.
Really? It was my instrument at GCSE - yes, that's what I had to list. "Instrument: Voice".
From: "James Farrar" james.farrar@gmail.com Reply-To: English Wikipedia wikien-l@lists.wikimedia.org To: "English Wikipedia" wikien-l@lists.wikimedia.org Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] The Madness of King Infobox Date: Fri, 18 May 2007 13:23:41 -0700
On 18/05/07, Christiano Moreschi moreschiwikiman@hotmail.co.uk wrote:
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Giuseppe_Di_Stefano&oldid=1317...
For heaven's sake, you never call someone's voice their instrument.
Ever.
Really? It was my instrument at GCSE - yes, that's what I had to list. "Instrument: Voice".
Oh, trust me, I know about GCSEs. Pure lunacy.
On the Paderewski diff, make sure you scroll down to catch the full horror.
Moreschi
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On 5/18/07, James Farrar james.farrar@gmail.com wrote:
On 18/05/07, Christiano Moreschi moreschiwikiman@hotmail.co.uk wrote:
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Giuseppe_Di_Stefano&oldid=1317...
For heaven's sake, you never call someone's voice their instrument. Ever.
Really? It was my instrument at GCSE - yes, that's what I had to list. "Instrument: Voice".
WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: http://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
I agree with James, Voice is often a degree program or specialty at universities.
on 5/18/07 4:20 PM, Christiano Moreschi at moreschiwikiman@hotmail.co.uk wrote:
For heaven's sake, you never call someone's voice their instrument. Ever. The terminology is nonsensical.
I didn't know that. What instrument, then, would you say a singer (who is a musician) use?
Marc Riddell
For heaven's sake, you never call someone's voice their instrument. Ever. The terminology is nonsensical. Again, the box just does not fit.
To be fair, as a music student and vocal major in college for a time, our voices were consistently referred to as instruments.
No clue if it's widespread, but it's not as nonsensical to me as it appears to you.
The problems these bioboxes are causing are very widespread. You simply cannot twist the article beyond all boundaries of accuracy, correct terminology and common sense just to fit an infobox. Infoboxes are supposed to be a means to an end, not an end in themselves.
What's frustrating the most is that the boxes don't break if you fail to include information. So no one ''has'' to put something for country of origin or instrument or party or anything else, and the box is still good.
There are constructive ways to deal with things, folks. I'm not directing this at who wrote what I'm quoting, but it seems like, more and more often, the path of least resistance is being ignored.
-Jeff
From: "Jeff Raymond" jeff.raymond@internationalhouseofbacon.com Reply-To: English Wikipedia wikien-l@lists.wikimedia.org To: "English Wikipedia" wikien-l@lists.wikimedia.org Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] The Madness of King Infobox Date: Fri, 18 May 2007 13:40:46 -0700 (PDT)
For heaven's sake, you never call someone's voice their instrument.
Ever.
The terminology is nonsensical. Again, the box just does not fit.
To be fair, as a music student and vocal major in college for a time, our voices were consistently referred to as instruments.
No clue if it's widespread, but it's not as nonsensical to me as it appears to you.
The problems these bioboxes are causing are very widespread. You simply cannot twist the article beyond all boundaries of accuracy, correct terminology and common sense just to fit an infobox. Infoboxes are supposed to be a means to an end, not an end in themselves.
What's frustrating the most is that the boxes don't break if you fail to include information. So no one ''has'' to put something for country of origin or instrument or party or anything else, and the box is still good.
There are constructive ways to deal with things, folks. I'm not directing this at who wrote what I'm quoting, but it seems like, more and more often, the path of least resistance is being ignored.
-Jeff
-- If you can read this, I'm not at home.
Yes and no - actually, reading some WP articles it seems that the voice is sometimes called an instrument, though I've never come across that in the UK (where I am). Seems rather odd to call Christiana Aguilera's voice her instrument, and I've never seen it done before. Oh, well.
Agreed with point 2, but only partially. On the Paderewski article, it was the main information provided by the box that was causing problems, not some small chunk that you could lop off. Check out some previous revisions.
At best, the things tend to be redundant, by simply duplicating what's already in the article. Sure, they sometimes act as a summary, but often too much gets compressed. One infobox described Beethoven's genre as "Classical, Romantic". I know that brevity is a virtue, but surely that's going too far!
Moreschi
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Seems rather odd to call Christiana Aguilera's voice her instrument, and I've never seen it done before. Oh, well.
I would say that in order to have someone's voice be called their instrument, they have to have some appreciable talent ;)
At best, the things tend to be redundant, by simply duplicating what's already in the article. Sure, they sometimes act as a summary, but often too much gets compressed. One infobox described Beethoven's genre as "Classical, Romantic". I know that brevity is a virtue, but surely that's going too far!
I think perhaps brief genres are the result of inattention to the article by an expert on the subject matter. I certainly don't know enough about Beethoven to describe his genre in any more detail than that and would pass by that statement without a second glance.
On 5/18/07, Christiano Moreschi moreschiwikiman@hotmail.co.uk wrote:
From: "Jeff Raymond" jeff.raymond@internationalhouseofbacon.com Reply-To: English Wikipedia wikien-l@lists.wikimedia.org To: "English Wikipedia" wikien-l@lists.wikimedia.org Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] The Madness of King Infobox Date: Fri, 18 May 2007 13:40:46 -0700 (PDT)
For heaven's sake, you never call someone's voice their instrument.
Ever.
The terminology is nonsensical. Again, the box just does not fit.
To be fair, as a music student and vocal major in college for a time, our voices were consistently referred to as instruments.
No clue if it's widespread, but it's not as nonsensical to me as it appears to you.
The problems these bioboxes are causing are very widespread. You
simply
cannot twist the article beyond all boundaries of accuracy, correct terminology and common sense just to fit an infobox. Infoboxes are supposed to be a means to an end, not an end in themselves.
What's frustrating the most is that the boxes don't break if you fail to include information. So no one ''has'' to put something for country of origin or instrument or party or anything else, and the box is still
good.
There are constructive ways to deal with things, folks. I'm not
directing
this at who wrote what I'm quoting, but it seems like, more and more often, the path of least resistance is being ignored.
-Jeff
-- If you can read this, I'm not at home.
Yes and no - actually, reading some WP articles it seems that the voice is sometimes called an instrument, though I've never come across that in the UK (where I am). Seems rather odd to call Christiana Aguilera's voice her instrument, and I've never seen it done before. Oh, well.
As far as I know the GCSEs referred to by one of the people who did know it, are only done in the UK. You probably just missed it all along. Voice is specifically mentioned as an instrument on the infobox information page so I'm assuming that music experts from the WikiProject Music took a look at that before approving the box and recommending its implementation.
As for genre "classical music". I personally would love to be more detailed, but I can't. If you can, please help and be more specific.
Mgm
Agreed with point 2, but only partially. On the Paderewski article, it was
the main information provided by the box that was causing problems, not some small chunk that you could lop off. Check out some previous revisions.
At best, the things tend to be redundant, by simply duplicating what's already in the article. Sure, they sometimes act as a summary, but often too much gets compressed. One infobox described Beethoven's genre as "Classical, Romantic". I know that brevity is a virtue, but surely that's going too far!
Moreschi
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As for genre "classical music". I personally would love to be more detailed, but I can't. If you can, please help and be more specific.
The point is that "Genre:Classical music" is...well..redundant? Classical music is such a broad term as to be fairly meaningless anyway, but it's a common term, so you might as well use it. But to say "Genre:Classical music" in the box, when half the article is taken up with far more specific descriptions - it just renders the box useless. It's saying nothing whatsoever.
Quite apart from which, why two boxes?
Moreschi
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I see infoboxes as an "article at a glance" thing. What's in the box is usually repeated somewhere in the article, but the point is to have bite-size bits of info easily accessible to people who don't want to read the entire article.
Mgm
On 5/18/07, Christiano Moreschi moreschiwikiman@hotmail.co.uk wrote:
As for genre "classical music". I personally would love to be more detailed, but I can't. If you can, please help and be more specific.
The point is that "Genre:Classical music" is...well..redundant? Classical music is such a broad term as to be fairly meaningless anyway, but it's a common term, so you might as well use it. But to say "Genre:Classical music" in the box, when half the article is taken up with far more specific descriptions - it just renders the box useless. It's saying nothing whatsoever.
Quite apart from which, why two boxes?
Moreschi
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From: "MacGyverMagic/Mgm" macgyvermagic@gmail.com Reply-To: English Wikipedia wikien-l@lists.wikimedia.org To: "English Wikipedia" wikien-l@lists.wikimedia.org Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] The Madness of King Infobox Date: Fri, 18 May 2007 23:17:35 +0200
I see infoboxes as an "article at a glance" thing. What's in the box is usually repeated somewhere in the article, but the point is to have bite-size bits of info easily accessible to people who don't want to read the entire article.
Mgm
On 5/18/07, Christiano Moreschi moreschiwikiman@hotmail.co.uk wrote:
As for genre "classical music". I personally would love to be more detailed, but I can't. If you can, please help and be more specific.
The point is that "Genre:Classical music" is...well..redundant?
Classical
music is such a broad term as to be fairly meaningless anyway, but it's
a
common term, so you might as well use it. But to say "Genre:Classical music" in the box, when half the article is taken up with far more specific descriptions - it just renders the box useless. It's saying nothing whatsoever.
Quite apart from which, why two boxes?
Moreschi
But when the bites in bite-sized are inaccurate or misleading? When the infobox tries to bite off too much by simplifying complex information excessively? As I recall, that was the case at [[Josquin des Prez]]. Then the problems start.
Besides, can no one tell me why two infoboxes on one article at the same time?
Moreschi
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On 5/18/07, Christiano Moreschi moreschiwikiman@hotmail.co.uk wrote:
From: "MacGyverMagic/Mgm" macgyvermagic@gmail.com Reply-To: English Wikipedia wikien-l@lists.wikimedia.org To: "English Wikipedia" wikien-l@lists.wikimedia.org Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] The Madness of King Infobox Date: Fri, 18 May 2007 23:17:35 +0200
I see infoboxes as an "article at a glance" thing. What's in the box is usually repeated somewhere in the article, but the point is to have bite-size bits of info easily accessible to people who don't want to read the entire article.
Mgm
On 5/18/07, Christiano Moreschi moreschiwikiman@hotmail.co.uk wrote:
As for genre "classical music". I personally would love to be more detailed, but I can't. If you can, please help and be more specific.
The point is that "Genre:Classical music" is...well..redundant?
Classical
music is such a broad term as to be fairly meaningless anyway, but it's
a
common term, so you might as well use it. But to say "Genre:Classical music" in the box, when half the article is taken up with far more specific descriptions - it just renders the box useless. It's saying nothing whatsoever.
Quite apart from which, why two boxes?
Moreschi
But when the bites in bite-sized are inaccurate or misleading? When the infobox tries to bite off too much by simplifying complex information excessively? As I recall, that was the case at [[Josquin des Prez]]. Then the problems start.
Besides, can no one tell me why two infoboxes on one article at the same time?
Moreschi
It was a slylistic mistake, and does not justify the complete removal of infoboxes. They provide a convenient summary. ~~~~
MacGyverMagic/Mgm wrote:
I see infoboxes as an "article at a glance" thing. What's in the box is usually repeated somewhere in the article, but the point is to have bite-size bits of info easily accessible to people who don't want to read the entire article.
Sometimes infoboxes are more than that, though. The infoboxes for various articles on planets, stars, countries, chemical elements, etc. have a lot of detailed statistics that aren't presented elsewhere in the article and would make for dreadfully dry reading if they were (eg, Rambot articles). Infoboxes work well for that sort of thing.
As for the voice-as-instrument thing, that makes sense to me too. If someone were to make beautiful music by cracking his knuckles I'd call his knuckles his instrument.
On 5/18/07, Bryan Derksen bryan.derksen@shaw.ca wrote:
MacGyverMagic/Mgm wrote:
I see infoboxes as an "article at a glance" thing. What's in the box is usually repeated somewhere in the article, but the point is to have bite-size bits of info easily accessible to people who don't want to read the entire article.
Sometimes infoboxes are more than that, though. The infoboxes for various articles on planets, stars, countries, chemical elements, etc. have a lot of detailed statistics that aren't presented elsewhere in the article and would make for dreadfully dry reading if they were (eg, Rambot articles). Infoboxes work well for that sort of thing.
As for the voice-as-instrument thing, that makes sense to me too. If someone were to make beautiful music by cracking his knuckles I'd call his knuckles his instrument.
Tried that. Did not work. Will send more details when fingers heal.
:-)
~~~~
On 5/18/07, Bryan Derksen bryan.derksen@shaw.ca wrote:
MacGyverMagic/Mgm wrote:
I see infoboxes as an "article at a glance" thing. What's in the box is usually repeated somewhere in the article, but the point is to have bite-size bits of info easily accessible to people who don't want to
read
the entire article.
Sometimes infoboxes are more than that, though. The infoboxes for various articles on planets, stars, countries, chemical elements, etc. have a lot of detailed statistics that aren't presented elsewhere in the article and would make for dreadfully dry reading if they were (eg, Rambot articles). Infoboxes work well for that sort of thing.
As for the voice-as-instrument thing, that makes sense to me too. If someone were to make beautiful music by cracking his knuckles I'd call his knuckles his instrument.
O
Organism ones (Taxoboxes) also include information that is not necessarily presented elsewhere in the article, for example the taxonomy of the organism up to kingdom level, or, oh, I forget what Cavalier-Smith calls his higher level. The problem is, the box is so abbreviated that it doesn't include enough information to be accurate--like the fact that some of the taxoboxes are based on five kingdom systems, some on 7 kingdom systems, some on clades, others on mere groups, some mixed assortments of clades and groups, mixed taxonomies by various taxonomists. One of the users we had tremendous trouble with on Wikipedia is now redoing all the Commons taxoboxes with a particular taxonomy--anything is better, imo, than the random stabs at taxonomy included right now, without clarification, in the taxoboxes used now. I try every few months to get the Tree of Lifers to agree to include the taxonomy systems being spelled out in the taxobox, but this, making the information accurate, is apparently too much information.
KP
On 18/05/07, Christiano Moreschi moreschiwikiman@hotmail.co.uk wrote:
Yes and no - actually, reading some WP articles it seems that the voice is sometimes called an instrument, though I've never come across that in the UK (where I am). Seems rather odd to call Christiana Aguilera's voice her instrument, and I've never seen it done before. Oh, well.
It's fairly common as a classification system hack, as far as I'm aware - ditto treating various forms of orchestra as specific "instruments".
At best, the things tend to be redundant, by simply duplicating what's already in the article. Sure, they sometimes act as a summary, but often too much gets compressed. One infobox described Beethoven's genre as "Classical, Romantic". I know that brevity is a virtue, but surely that's going too far!
There are some subjects where it helps - mainly those where you want specific technical values or information displayed outside the flow of text. So it's excellent for, say, chemical elements or planets (various scientific values), or for countries (basic demographic and geographic information), or for
For people... well, the basic details should be in the first sentence anyway (birth, death, occupation/field, nationality), which removes much of the reason for having a "condensed summary". I'm less convinced about the need for any more detail in infoboxes outside of specific sections...
On 5/19/07, Christiano Moreschi moreschiwikiman@hotmail.co.uk wrote:
For heaven's sake, you never call someone's voice their instrument. Ever. The terminology is nonsensical. Again, the box just does not fit.
I added a "voice type" parameter to the infobox to use on articles about singers instead of the "instrument" parameter.
You can see this in action now at the article on Di Stefano:
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Giuseppe_Di_Stefano&diff=13192...
G'day Christiano,
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Giuseppe_Di_Stefano&oldid=1317...
For heaven's sake, you never call someone's voice their instrument. Ever. The terminology is nonsensical. Again, the box just does not fit.
Maybe, maybe not. A couple of other people have talked about the appropriateness of the word "instrument" here; not being musical[0], I'm not qualified to comment.
What I *am* qualified to comment on is http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Giuseppe_Di_Stefano&action=his...
And the little edit war in which you and an IP engaged. Has this become appropriate wikiconduct in this day and age, now?
<snip/>
[0] "I must be musical. I've got *tons* of CDs!"
From: Mark Gallagher m.g.gallagher@student.canberra.edu.au Reply-To: m.g.gallagher@student.canberra.edu.au,English Wikipedia wikien-l@lists.wikimedia.org To: English Wikipedia wikien-l@lists.wikimedia.org Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] The Madness of King Infobox Date: Sat, 19 May 2007 16:10:33 +1000
G'day Christiano,
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Giuseppe_Di_Stefano&oldid=1317...
For heaven's sake, you never call someone's voice their instrument.
Ever.
The terminology is nonsensical. Again, the box just does not fit.
Maybe, maybe not. A couple of other people have talked about the appropriateness of the word "instrument" here; not being musical[0], I'm not qualified to comment.
What I *am* qualified to comment on is http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Giuseppe_Di_Stefano&action=his...
And the little edit war in which you and an IP engaged. Has this become appropriate wikiconduct in this day and age, now?
<snip/>
[0] "I must be musical. I've got *tons* of CDs!"
Try the checkuser page, and you'll see that that was scarcely some passing IP. And the user behind the IP had done that sort of thing before.
Moreschi
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G'day Christiano,
From: Mark Gallagher m.g.gallagher@student.canberra.edu.au What I *am* qualified to comment on is http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Giuseppe_Di_Stefano&action=his...
And the little edit war in which you and an IP engaged. Has this become appropriate wikiconduct in this day and age, now?
Try the checkuser page, and you'll see that that was scarcely some passing IP. And the user behind the IP had done that sort of thing before.
What sort of thing? Edit warring over infoboxen?
There are circumstances where edit-war-like behaviour is justified. Reverting vandalism, for example. Not silly infoboxen. Heck, even if it's a banned user, rather than edit-war you're better off blocking the user (or getting someone else to block him).
What's the rush to get your version to the top? It's a bloody infobox, not tubgirl.
From: Mark Gallagher m.g.gallagher@student.canberra.edu.au Reply-To: m.g.gallagher@student.canberra.edu.au,English Wikipedia wikien-l@lists.wikimedia.org To: English Wikipedia wikien-l@lists.wikimedia.org Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] The Madness of King Infobox Date: Sat, 19 May 2007 20:10:32 +1000
G'day Christiano,
From: Mark Gallagher m.g.gallagher@student.canberra.edu.au What I *am* qualified to comment on is http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Giuseppe_Di_Stefano&action=his...
And the little edit war in which you and an IP engaged. Has this become appropriate wikiconduct in this day and age, now?
Try the checkuser page, and you'll see that that was scarcely some
passing
IP. And the user behind the IP had done that sort of thing before.
What sort of thing? Edit warring over infoboxen?
There are circumstances where edit-war-like behaviour is justified. Reverting vandalism, for example. Not silly infoboxen. Heck, even if it's a banned user, rather than edit-war you're better off blocking the user (or getting someone else to block him).
What's the rush to get your version to the top? It's a bloody infobox, not tubgirl.
Now see ANI.
Actually, there are possibly more problems with this particular infobox than I thought, let alone wider issues. For starters, the time given for when he was active contradicts the article, and Grove, when I check that. Then again we have redundany: if you're going to describe him as an opera singer, then obviously he sang opera, you don't need to state that twice.
Then the image is fair use, which I'm just a bit iffy about. Can someone advise me as to the copyright status of that?
Moreschi
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G'day Christiano,
From: Mark Gallagher m.g.gallagher@student.canberra.edu.au G'day Christiano, What sort of thing? Edit warring over infoboxen?
There are circumstances where edit-war-like behaviour is justified. Reverting vandalism, for example. Not silly infoboxen. Heck, even if it's a banned user, rather than edit-war you're better off blocking the user (or getting someone else to block him).
What's the rush to get your version to the top? It's a bloody infobox, not tubgirl.
Now see ANI.
I've seen it. Okay, so the chap isn't a random IP but is in fact NewYork1956.
So, explain again why it's justified to deliberately engage in edit warring? Is it because you're the good guy and he's not? I think I've seen this reasoning before.
Actually, there are possibly more problems with this particular infobox than I thought, let alone wider issues. For starters, the time given for when he was active contradicts the article, and Grove, when I check that. Then again we have redundany: if you're going to describe him as an opera singer, then obviously he sang opera, you don't need to state that twice.
Assume for the moment that I agree with you that the infobox is
a) crap b) inappropriate
How does this agreement make one iota of difference?
Then the image is fair use, which I'm just a bit iffy about. Can someone advise me as to the copyright status of that?
The image is iffy, though no iffier than many others we've happily ignored (for now). A source would be nice. I'd prefer to see it gone.
Someone with more (much more) knowledge of copyright issues could give you a better answer. Greg?
From: Mark Gallagher m.g.gallagher@student.canberra.edu.au Reply-To: m.g.gallagher@student.canberra.edu.au,English Wikipedia wikien-l@lists.wikimedia.org To: English Wikipedia wikien-l@lists.wikimedia.org Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] The Madness of King Infobox Date: Sun, 20 May 2007 00:49:32 +1000
G'day Christiano,
From: Mark Gallagher m.g.gallagher@student.canberra.edu.au G'day Christiano, What sort of thing? Edit warring over infoboxen?
There are circumstances where edit-war-like behaviour is justified. Reverting vandalism, for example. Not silly infoboxen. Heck, even if it's a banned user, rather than edit-war you're better off blocking the user (or getting someone else to block him).
What's the rush to get your version to the top? It's a bloody infobox, not tubgirl.
Now see ANI.
I've seen it. Okay, so the chap isn't a random IP but is in fact NewYork1956.
So, explain again why it's justified to deliberately engage in edit warring? Is it because you're the good guy and he's not? I think I've seen this reasoning before.
Actually, there are possibly more problems with this particular infobox
than
I thought, let alone wider issues. For starters, the time given for when
he
was active contradicts the article, and Grove, when I check that. Then
again
we have redundany: if you're going to describe him as an opera singer,
then
obviously he sang opera, you don't need to state that twice.
Assume for the moment that I agree with you that the infobox is
a) crap b) inappropriate
How does this agreement make one iota of difference?
Then the image is fair use, which I'm just a bit iffy about. Can someone advise me as to the copyright status of that?
The image is iffy, though no iffier than many others we've happily ignored (for now). A source would be nice. I'd prefer to see it gone.
Someone with more (much more) knowledge of copyright issues could give you a better answer. Greg?
-- Mark Gallagher
Yes, I'd definitely like someone to tell me about the copyright. There must be a free image of him kicking around somewhere, after all.
All the rest is a bit of blind alley, we can talk about that more privately. Of more relevance is
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Ignacy_Jan_Paderewski&oldid=13...
Earlier on, someone said that this was a "mistake". No, it wasn't. I'm not attacking or trying to knock anyone, but someone deliberately added two infoboxes in one edit. That something like this could happen really is a consequence of the all-must-have infoboxes culture. In this occasion, it leads to disaster; common sense goes out the window. Even with one infobox, you just can't do a useful summary short enough to fit: "Pianist, Prime Minister/Foreign Minister of Poland" is useless, for obvious reasons. It doesn't tell you anything, nothing that you could possibly be satisfied with. It's completely redundant, because with a person like that you just have to read the rest.
I'm not saying anything very complex, just that sometimes rather complicated stuff just can't be adequately reduced to the one or two words required of an infobox. It doesn't always work, particularly, so it seems, with biographies, though obviously the things are more useful with more - one-dimensional? - subjects like albums, say. I'm not asking for a revolution, just that infoboxes do not get in the way of accuracy and common sense. Getting things right is more important than spurious brevity and a false illusion of conformity.
Moreschi
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