Hello, this is the fourth of my archive pages (see also my other archives). Please leave responses even to this page, on the main talk page where I and others will see them! Thanks!
zoney ▓   ▒ talk 20:01, 12 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Hi. I found my way to your user page through FAC. I see that you've been making substantial contributions here for about five months, which is more than enough to qualify for adminship. Would you accept a nomination on Wikipedia:Requests for adminship? 172 23:21, 6 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Thanks for the response. There are many admins whose backgrounds are similar to yours, but I understand your reservations. 172 18:29, 8 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Hrm, maybe they did get more scrap off BR

The MKIII Internationals were swapped for 001 and orignal 201 class locos at the scrap yard - for each loco IR dumped, they got a MKIII carraige back, and for the one that was torched in Dublin they got another one free.

I'll eventually remember to get a user account :-)

OK, I got a username now..

No, the "original 201's" are the C-class and the 001's are the A class. I think that they were all Metro Vicks

Because I can't find my ITG book I can't check about the MKIId's, although knowing Irish Rail its very possible they are also scrapyard. I also can't even remember what the E class became when the numbers came in.

hrm, I think my brother may have been banned from that group. my surname is somewhat tarnished amongst transport circles - Ewan Duffy being my brother...

Well - he's been posting away - last post was less than a week ago - don't think he's been banned! Zoney 22:20, 9 Aug 2004 (UTC)

In the sig box in Preferences, one can put, for example Zoney]] | [[User talk:Zoney|(talk) to produce a sig like "Zoney | (talk)". In this sig you can then use html tags like <font size=+1 color="gold">(talk)</font> to produce "(talk)" etc. [[User:Sverdrup|❝Sverdrup❞]] 11:31, 12 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Interesting... zoney ███ talk 14:09, 12 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Testing... zoney ▓█▒ talk 16:33, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Testing... zoney ▓   ▒ talk 18:13, 6 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Testing... zoney ♣ talk 18:05, 15 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Firstly, it is, in my opinion, accurate to suggest that Londonderry is the official name of the city. The Council does not have the power to change city names; that power rests with the British Government. As to the Republic of Ireland's claims, I frankly find them ridiculous. The Republic of Ireland is not sovereign over Derry/Londonderry. Consequently, it cannot decide the city's name; that power belongs to the UK. For the Republic of Ireland to decide that Londonderry will henceforth be called Derry is somewhat like the UK deciding that County Offaly will now be King's County, or that Mumbai will now be Bombay.

Secondly, my action was not unilateral. I was supported in it by another individual (whose comments can be found on the talk page of the article in question), who, despite being an individual of "Irish republican descent," etc., suggested that "Londonderry" would be appropriate. It was in response to his comments that I made my move.

Thirdly, the solution that was previously determined was, in my opinion, flawed. Clearly, the aim was only to placate both Unionists and Nationalists. It was not an attempt to use correct terminology.

Now, if you can demonstrate that "Derry" is the official name of the city, as far as the government which has de facto control over the city (i.e. the British government) is concerned, then of course I would not object to putting the article at "Derry." I do not think that the opinion of the people of the city, or the opinion of the Republic of Ireland, or of the Council is relevant, as these bodies do not have the authority to determine the names of cities.

-- Emsworth 20:04, 14 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Just as I may prefer "Londonderry," you (an Irish nationalist, I gather from reading some other comments) would prefer "Derry." Consequently, neither of us would be a neutral judge of the subject. As for "Republic of Ireland" and "Ireland," I have read the Republic of Ireland talk page, concluding that a consensus has been reached to use "Republic of Ireland," not just to please people, but on the basis of actual correctness and appropriateness. Ireland, in any event, has already been used for the article about the island.

And official status is not the only criterion to be used. I would not, for instance, write in the article Juan Carlos of Spain that he is "King of Jerusalem," although that title officially belongs to him. I would follow official regulations only if they reflect, at least partially, actual usage.

To use "Derry" simply to please individuals, I believe, is entirely absurd. But to use it because of some concrete reason (for example, because it is more commonly employed) would be permissible. I would personally prefer "Londonderry," but it would appear from a number of polls relating to the cities of Mecca, Calcutta and Kiev (which I have discovered after your comments on my talk page were made) that common usage should trump official status. Although I oppose these results, they seem to constitute official policy now. Consequently, if "Derry" is indeed more common than "Londonderry" in everyday usage, I would be unable to oppose the move back to "Derry." On the other hand, I would expect the article to continue to maintain that "Londonderry" is the official name used by the British government. -- Emsworth 20:28, 14 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I am a little sceptical about a smaller image - it would work well within a county only map and we would have to select a standard size - but within the country i'm not to sure. The map is very small and if this policy is to be done to all the republics cities this is fine until a large title like waterford means that a unnessarily small image below? Djegan 21:05, 14 Aug 2004 (UTC)

we have had an on-off-on discussion on the city maps in the last month but no decision. If you want to raise it to the irish wiki notice board, please do, any input is valuable. I think that we should use maps that show no more than the containing county but the downside to this is that irish cities (especially Kilkenny) are quite small compaired to the county also a source image would be neccessary to base the image on (not always easily obtainable). I am prepaired to do the artwork and research as long as a (final) decision can be made, any ideas? Djegan 22:02, 8 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Congratulations on the change to my Aer Lingus pic captions. It's so much better if the caption wording relates to the article material. Well done! - Adrian Pingstone 08:14, 15 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Thanks! Someone pointed me to Wikipedia:Captions some time back, since then I've been randomly attacking sparse captions. I'm still not entirely sure on how to manipulate the English to achieve an "active" sentence though. zoney ███ talk 12:01, 15 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Thanks for the pointer to the caption discussion page, I didn't know it existed - Adrian Pingstone 14:20, 15 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Hi, I have responded to you on my talk page.
Bobblewik 16:35, 16 Aug 2004 (UTC)

OK, you've swayed me. I still don't think that the Wikipedia is particularly enriched by this information, but since the cleanup, I don't think there's anything wrong with it any more, and as such I don't think the work that's been done on it should be deleted. Cheers! —Stormie 01:13, Aug 18, 2004 (UTC)

Ditto. Neutrality 01:23, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I appreciate the amount of effort you've put into it, but I'm afraid I object even more to the new version. It's now less factual and more theoretical, it's still POV in places ("unlikely to ever result in", "What is altogether probable", "would provide numerous benefits"), and it focuses on the the idea of the EU forming or not forming a united Olympics team rather than ignores it. As such it's beginning to look like original research. I said that I wasn't opposed to something like 2004 Summer Olympics medals count by International Organization, and I'm still not: it's inclusive rather than focusing on one group, and it's only a list of sums that doesn't attempt to assign them any meaning. I sympathize with your hopes for a more united EU (as much as I can, not being a part of it), but I still don't think an encyclopedia is the right place for this topic. What I would love to see is, as someone else suggested, a web page that could do the math on medals for user-defined groups of countries. —Triskaideka 01:43, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Ok... the page now appears to be focused more on the state of cooperation between EU members in sports (not that I mind - as an American, I think it's quite interesting, and much moreso than the previous version). If you wanted to focus the page on that (by renaming it), and include the medal count as a small part in discussion of the results of increased cooperation, that would be good. I do worry about the original research question, though... if you could provide some citations and rephrase a few things, that would likely take out the research/POV concerns, I think. As it stands now, though, I don't know if I like it enough to change my vote - if it's focused on the medal count, I don't really see the point of it in the Wikipedia. If you really are changing the focus, then let me know and I probably will switch. -- Mike J. 02:19, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)

The only reason to include national medal totals is to play the "national penis size comparison" game. The EU cannot play that game at the Olympics because it gets to cheat by bringing multiple teams. Until the EU fields a single unified team, judging how well the EU does relative to other nations cannot be done. -- Cyrius|✎ 02:39, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I deleted the grand total. If that stays, the VfD has to stay. RickK 05:09, Aug 18, 2004 (UTC)

Zoney, I appreciate your efforts to rescue this article from VfD, but I've got to stick with my original vote (which wasn't precisely a vote against including this material in the Wikipedia in the first place):

I wish to reiterate my vote: STRONG KEEP for 2004 Summer Olympics medals count by International Organization, delete for European Union Olympic medals count for 2004 (only because its material should be in the International Organizations article, less NPOV that way). While I appreciate the rewriting efforts for the EU article, I don't feel that the material is appropriate for the Wikipedia — even if it is fascinating to read about. As others have pointed it, it's original research. I modified the intro text of the EU article for NPOV as best I could and put it on the talk page of "International Organizations". I'm sure that some pundits of the EU will make similar statements. If they're notable enough, the content can (and should) be added to the bottom of the "International Organizations" article.

• Benc • 07:27, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Hmm, well you have emphasised the collaboration, but frankly international collaboration of a form is there already - the GB team have coaches from Germany and Australia, and many of their athletes do overseas training already. I still don't feel it is particularly useful (compare to, say, a tally of European Athletics medals, since that would tell you how significant on the world stage the European Athletics championships are). Average Earthman 08:50, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)

um. replying to your post on my usertalk page, I haven't made a "decision to delete" but have indicated (along with others) that I see this article as personal theorising and having no place on WP. "how the area has fared as a whole" is meaningless as the area hasn't competed "as a whole". POV-based rubbish. --[[User:VampWillow|VampWillow]] 09:02, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I think you need to take another look at the article. Every single sentence in it, except the first one, is POV. Take out the two paragraphs, and I might reconsider. [[User:Supadawg|supadawg - ]] 14:26, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC) P.S. I would probably throw my support behind a page like 2004 Summer Olypic medals by continent. What do you guys think? [[User:Supadawg|supadawg - ]] 14:28, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)

OK, you may be right. My edits were mostly an attempt to have something more sensible than the previous discussion (united EU team?). I do think the table is a valid piece of reference material (note that what it also does is compare EU members). It's a useful subset of the main table. zoney ███ talk 14:42, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I stand by my delete votes for both articles. POV is only one problem; there's also the fact that the statistics are misleading and ultimately irrelevant. — Gwalla | Talk 19:11, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Cheers. Altough you did a good job on cleaning uo the article, as I've added later in response to Pgreenfinch, an article on medal tally with hypotethical scenarios would be more suitable and, at a point, diffuse POV. The problem: many of those opposing the idea could call it "original research" (I'm suprised nobody did it with this article).WolfenSilva 23:52, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Sure, you've put a lot of work into it, but its still worthy of deletion. First of all, the very idea of an EU Olympic Team is POV, and secondly, you are making up facts (there is no 'EU Medal Count'). We don't need Wikipedia being cluttered up with loads of hypothetical nonsense- how about 'medal table for athletes who ate cereal for breakfast' or 'medal table for athletes with brown hair'? They're about as relevant as an EU medal table! --Cynical 15:12, 10 Sep 2004 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure QED is just Benc. He appears to have made the second account for playing around with MediaWiki's message notification feature. He put in a feature request on SourceForge to have all User talk: namespace pages generate the "You have new messages" notice. He would have needed to edit his subpages with either a second account or logged out in order to trigger the new messages notice for his test.

Such uses of sockpuppets are not a problem. It's when people start using them to try to rig votes and sway discussions that problems emerge. If you're still concerned you could drop him a note. I don't think it's a problem. Benc's just pushing the limits of the software in a non-destructive manner. -- Cyrius|✎ 02:37, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)

If we are going to include every world-wide complaint about USA and Bush, let's also include the reciprocal. Many in USA cannot understand why Ireland stayed neutral in WWII and refused to oppose the NAZIs... [1]. Perhaps that's why they don't like Bush - they have bad judgement? Rex071404 09:38, 20 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Hey, Ireland is not the only place where many consider Bush as the world's biggest threat! And for someone to be so widely regarded as such, yes, I think it deserves a mention. Now I suggest that what should be added is carefully considered, you will note that I am not actually participating in an edit war. zoney ███ talk 14:08, 20 Aug 2004 (UTC)

P.S. Re the Nazi/Neutrality thing, of course there are many valid criticisms of Irish policy (past and present), and I'm sure the Eamon De Valera article mentions his giving condolences to Germany after the death of their Fuhrer! (I kid you not!) If it doesn't, I suggest it warrants addition! Certainly I'm sure Ireland's "neutrality" in the war is discussed in the history pages of the country.

Of course. I don't know the precise issue you were debating, but the rhetoric seemed to be getting a little heated, I was just trying to head things off at the pass. Hope I didn't offend, [[User:Meelar|Meelar (talk)]] 14:22, 2004 Aug 20 (UTC)

Thanks for the tip. I assume the Norwegian and Icelandic flags would be too complicated to attempt. Io 15:41, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I notice you changed standardized to standardised on the euro page with the reason that it was a non-US topic so a non-US spelling should us used.

The spelling with -ize is not an Americanism. It is in fact the spelling recommended by the editors of the Oxford University Press, on historical principles. (OUP is the publisher of the 14,000+ page Oxford English Dictionary, the standard by which all dictionaries are judged.) The suffix is a Greek suffix, first attested in the word baptize from βαπτίζω, and was spelled with a -z- from the earliest period in England. Oxford suggests that because of this, and because it's pronounced as a [z], there's really no justification for spelling it with an -s- except in imitation of French practice (which is how the spelling -ise came into English in the first place.

Spelling colour, centre, civilize is good European spelling. Evertype 16:16, 2004 Aug 22 (UTC)

"s" is quite common in European publications, and more clearly differentiates between US spelling and English spelling. zoney ███ talk 16:28, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Hey Zoney, thanks for your note. The present situation is unfortunate. In some cases the content issues are less infuriating than the editing behavior of my "opponents", which I find appalling. But no matter; this aggression will not stand, man, however long it takes (I once fought an edit war for three months). As for sleep, hm, interesting suggestion, but that alas goes not well; but, hey, that's more Wikipedia editing! From 8/16 to 8/19 I edited for about 64 hours straight with only minor interludes. BTW, FWIW, I'm not very interested in the 2004 election or its outcome. And the Anti-American sentiment article I'm just trying to protect from being made, well, anti-American (while denying it). Well, see you round, VV 07:01, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I liked your old signature with the flag in it! Where did it go? Marnanel 16:45, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)

It wasn't very subtle, and was a bit vain. There's been a discussion on fancy sigs, and the likely consensus is to be to keep it simple. I'm avoiding the possibility of complaints. Plus, what happens if I stick it on the talk page of someone who hates republicanism? It's no good for debates on contentious nationalist topics - it's like a red rag to a bull. It also was a tad too much code to be cluttering up pages with. Also if I double signed (response to a response within a few lines), I had to remove previous flags to avoid cluttering the page. I've kept the "idea" of the flag though. zoney ▓█▒ talk 16:53, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Hi As far as I know everyone still welcomes newbies with individual welcome messages, so feel free to welcome your friend with any message you like. It is pretty standard to include, the open tasks template though. {{Opentask}}. This template is constantly updated so never goes oit of date. HTH. Theresa Knott 08:27, 25 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Ok. I think it's a fair case for moving the page, but I'd have to delete regional rail first. I don't want to lose the history at regional rail, so I'll be moving the page to a temp, deleting regional rail which will at that point be a redirect to the temp, moving commuter train to regional rail, deleting commuter train, and then moving the temp to commuter train. And then it should all be hunky dory. :) I'm writing this down for my benefit as much as yours. Mintguy (T) 12:05, 25 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Done. Mintguy (T)

Zoney, thanks so much for your comment today about the Ridge Route article. Lucky and I have been working like dogs to get a lot of wonderful info and photos into it. . . You made my day! I guess we could say "You like me, you really like me!" (Sally Field) Kind of a Hollywood kind of saying for Southern Californians like Lucky and myself. Happy Trails, --avnative 00:03, Aug 27, 2004 (UTC)

You're very welcome! And please check out my user page - I have more articles of note on that theme that you might also like, I believe. --avnative 00:33, Aug 27, 2004 (UTC)