User talk:Jamie Mercer

Welcome!

Hello, Jamie Mercer, and welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for your contributions. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are some pages that you might find helpful:

I hope you enjoy editing here and being a Wikipedian! Please sign your name on talk pages using four tildes (~~~~); this will automatically produce your name and the date. If you need help, check out Wikipedia:Questions, ask me on my talk page, or ask your question and then place {{helpme}} after the question on your talk page. Again, welcome!

Edits to Orders, decorations, and medals categories[edit]

re. your recent edits to the above. I am unclear as to your rationale for removing the WP:ODM header. Unless it has been mandated against by Wikipedia policy I'm not sure why you would be removing it. As you can see from [1] including a link to the appropriate WikiProject within categories is widespread and accepted practice.

Xdamr^talk 03:16, 17 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Well I think it looks pretty bad. You won't see any such thing in Encyclopedia Britannica. But if lots of people want to keep doing it anyway, I guess we're stuck with it. There is a lot of other mess in Wikipedia anyway. I just found an article where most of the content had been replaced with the comment, "History kicks ass". Jamie Mercer 15:15, 17 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Your category creations within Indonesia[edit]

Are you aware of the Indonesia project ? - before you create many more - it would be well worth your checking in at the project - having a look around and maybe check whats there...Satu Suro 10:55, 8 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Are you aware of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WP:CATEGORY#Look_before_you_leap ? It would be well worth a read Satu Suro 11:02, 8 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

It would appear you have created parallel categories for official residences/palaces - can you give a clear reason why you are creating these extra categories? Satu Suro 11:05, 8 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

"Palace" and "Official residence" do not mean the same thing, which is why dozens of countries have both categories. Jamie Mercer 21:33, 12 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Category:Castles in France[edit]

I've let it live, as a redirect. My concern is that if we don't leave a redirect someone will just create it again as "missing". If you disagree let me know and I'll kill it as scheduled. -- Prove It ^(talk) 14:21, 11 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

To User:Angusmclellan, User:Cool Cat, User:Jamie Mercer, User:Bluap, User:Postlebury, User:LukeHoC, User:Johnbod, User:Sam Blacketer

I'm writing to you because you contributed to the discussion on Category:Castles in France, which resulted in the category being deleted, or redirected articles in that category. This decision, as I hope to show, was wrong and needs to be reversed. Please take the time to read the following and respond.

Firstly, I should say that I did not take part in the discussion because I did not know it was taking place. (I was actually in France following the presidential election campaign and, ironically, taking photos of French castles!)

My reasons for questioning the decision are:

1. As far as I can discover, the debate was not advertised on the Wikipedia:WikiProject France page, so that editors with a declared interest in topics related to France could be aware of it.

2. Similarly, no mention was made on the Wikipedia:WikiProject Castles page.

It would have been sensible to at least mention the proposal in these projects and to seek advice.

3. The problem identified is very real. The French word château does not translate easily into English. It can mean a castle (in the usual English understanding of the word - a medieval, military defensive structure). It can mean palace/stately home/ mansion (and in fact, English speakers will frequently use the word château with that meaning). It can mean a vineyard, with or without a castle or palace attached. And, even more confusingly, the thousands of water towers in France are named château d'eau.

4. Even the French sometimes need clarification. In recent years, French language guide books have often described castles as châteaux-forts to distinguish them from the palaces.

5. Some months ago I came across a page in Wikipedia called List of castles in France (see original). This made the mistake of including article links solely because of the word château in the title; in fact only about half of the list were real castles - the rest were palaces etc and even some vineyards. I set about revising the list and along with other editors we managed to get the page as it appears now. We have gone on to add dozens more articles, particularly by translating pages from the French Wikipedia. All of these articles were categorised as Castles in France; any then categorised under Châteaux in France were moved over to Castles in France. The Châteaux in France category was left to be just for French palaces etc (i.e. what we as English speakers would call châteaux).

6. The Category:Castles by country lists 56 sub-categories and many of these are further divided (e.g. Castles in the United Kingdom is divided into Castles in England, Castles in Scotland, etc). The only country without a category concentrating on castles is France and this is a serious oversight. Anyone looking for details of castles in France now has to wade through a category that is not dedicated to castles!

7. The problems you identified with the original Category:Châteaux in France are real and need to be sorted, but this has been made worse by now lumping in all of the castle articles. Château de Puivert, for example, does not belong in the same category as Palace of Versailles, any more than Conisbrough Castle belongs with Buckingham Palace.

I would be interested in your comments, particularly on how to give French castles the same category status as castles in Denmark, Spain, England and other countries. I have to say, the only way I can see that happening is to reinsate the Castles in France category as it was and for some work to be done on where the real problem lies - in the Châteaux in France category. Emeraude 10:40, 23 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The process and assumptions described in 5 seem to have been quite wrong, as it simply isn't the case that English speakers think of a chateau as being mostly the same thing as a palace. Point 7 can be resolved by moving a few articles around. Jamie Mercer 15:58, 24 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Small text[edit]

If you think you need small text for your signature, ALWAYS remember to /small it at the end. You screwed up other people's text which followed yours on a page. I fixed it once I scrolled up to find that you were the source of the problem. Wryspy 16:52, 8 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I have never consciously used small text for my signature, and have no intention of ever doing so. I do not format the default signature in any way. Jamie Mercer 00:39, 28 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

No content in Category:Seminaries and theological colleges in the United Kingdom[edit]

Hello, this is a message from an automated bot. A tag has been placed on Category:Seminaries and theological colleges in the United Kingdom, by another Wikipedia user, requesting that it be speedily deleted from Wikipedia. The tag claims that it should be speedily deleted because Category:Seminaries and theological colleges in the United Kingdom has been empty for at least four days, and its only content has been links to parent categories. (CSD C1).

To contest the tagging and request that administrators wait before possibly deleting Category:Seminaries and theological colleges in the United Kingdom, please affix the template {{hangon}} to the page, and put a note on its talk page. If the article has already been deleted, see the advice and instructions at WP:WMD. Feel free to contact the bot operator if you have any questions about this or any problems with this bot, bearing in mind that this bot is only informing you of the nomination for speedy deletion; it does not perform any nominations or deletions itself. To see the user who deleted the page, click here CSDWarnBot (talk) 00:31, 7 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

ArbCom elections are now open![edit]

Hi,
You appear to be eligible to vote in the current Arbitration Committee election. The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to enact binding solutions for disputes between editors, primarily related to serious behavioural issues that the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the ability to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail. If you wish to participate, you are welcome to review the candidates' statements and submit your choices on the voting page. For the Election committee, MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 16:39, 23 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]