RationalWiki:Saloon bar/Archive60

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, (new)(back)

Fucking boot licking...

cock sucking maggots who aren't worth the shit on my toilet paper. Do those fucktards have any sense of right and wrong? Doctors can deny a woman complete information just because a fetus might not be born, and then claiming that it is so the woman can make informed medical decisions? Motherfucker... *is completely pissed off at religious fucktards* Javasca₧ watches pricey chisels agree 03:39, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

I almost think "informed decision" needs to go on the code words article. It's used a lot but it invariably means "a decision we agree with". It's kind of like card forcing but often less subtle. ^bomination 08:00, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Good idea. I added it to the article. --^{Ask me about our disaster} 08:13, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Skeptical Voter

http://skeptical-voter.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page Look familiar? ^bomination 16:25, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

This was covered earlier, I believe.  Lily ^{Inspirate me.} 16:49, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Was it? ^bomination 16:52, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Here. ^Contribs_Talk 17:06, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Ah shit, that's where I've seen it before. I'm slowly slipping into dementia in my old age... ^bomination 17:09, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

It is horrible, this age thing, I am actually starting to have to make notes to remember things....tmtoulouse 17:12, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Yeah but you can be selective if you try: forget the less good, remember the more good. I've many times looked around for my glasses while looking through my glasses. Age isn't horrible: it's a sign that (so far) you're winning: it's a consequence of outliving a whole load of others; at least you're still here to forget things. Trent: as you're studying sleep, you should be familiar with the instant dream noting on awakening to prevent forgetting the dream. 17:35, 28 April 2010 (UTC) ^Contribs_Talk

As technology advances we should have fewer things to remember, at least in theory. I remember in the 90s when email addresses at my Uni were pretty cryptic and I never bothered putting them in to Pine's address book. I remembered an insane number of cryptic addresses, but now I barely remember any due to the fancy address books. Same with website, since most things can be found pretty quickly via Google. Yup, the future is looking bright. --^{Ask me about our encyclopedia} 17:50, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

I remember when you needed to remember telephone numbers rather than just logging them into your mobile, digital handset or skype and forgetting about them.  Lily ^{Inspirate me.} 18:39, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

I was thinking just the other day how lucky we are that the web uses domain names which are magically matched to IP addresses. Imagine if we had to enter the IP address to go to a site? And re: the OP, I for one feel mildly flattered. We worked hard on that layout. ħuman 20:11, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

It seems to have been done by our own Genghis Khant. Professor Moriarty 21:15, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Thunderf00t vs Ray Comfort

Here is a link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2FskTKrx40 Mei (talk) 23:08, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

For people who have not seen it. Mei (talk) 23:08, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

Too good to let it go to archives so fast. Thanks everyone for the fish, and especially to Mei for being useful. ħuman 08:48, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

For those that like this sort of thing........

I am big fan of mid 1980's techno/electro up to the current stuff (Derrick May, Jeff Mills, Adam Beyer and the like - none of that trancy or disco house bullshit though) and found a great resource for fast, free dowloadable live sets. Have a gander if its your thing. If not, well, go fuc......never mind. Aceⁱ⁹ 05:50, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

• waves the Gary Numan and Kraftwerk flag* --^{Ask me about our Nintendo 64} 08:19, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Jeff Mills aka the Wizard WJLB Detroit 1986. Aceⁱ⁹ 08:27, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Jean-Michel Jarre. For my birthday I bought a copy of Les Concerts en Chine, which my brother used to have on vinyl back in the day. Still holds up very well, a great listen. --Kels (talk) 15:08, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Another Jarre fan? I thought I was the last one left! I was listening to Les Chants Magnetiques just the other day. –SuspectedReplicant retire me 16:07, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

You are not alone. If there's one thing that really gets my spirits up it's Rendezvous No. 4.  Lily ^{Inspirate me.} 16:48, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Yah, I've been a Jarre fan ever since my brother bought Equinoxe way back when I was a kid. And sweet! This site also has a bunch of Boards of Canada shows! I love them. --Kels (talk) 14:50, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

There was a group of fans at school when I was about 15 and they got me into it. Two of them went to his concert in Docklands, for which I was insanely jealous. I remember buying Waiting for Cousteau on CD on the day of release and making 4 copies of it onto tape for the others that night so they wouldn't be too jealous. Happy days! Oxygene is one of the best ways to chill out ever recorded. –SuspectedReplicant retire me 16:46, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Goats

Have fun - http://funnyjunk.com/funny_pictures/388084/Goats/ ĵ₳¥ášÇ♠ʘ Over 2700 edits! Thats over 440! 21:08, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Evidently Sacha Baron Cohen's new film will feature goats.  Lily ^{Inspirate me.} 07:39, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Meh

Pizza, but no stone.

Wow, what a crap night. The wife isn't here, so I'm bored anyway, and then I cook a pizza (so I can use my new pizza peel) in my new oven which goes super high. Unfortunately it goes a bit too high, and my pizza stone shattered into three (pizza was OK though). Then I go to play Modern Warfare 2 only to come to the realisation that it's fucking shit, and is only good for remtards who are able to spend 3 hours a night every night for 3 months playing it, and is populated with screechy-voiced prepubescent scousers who don't understand that you don't have to shout when a mic is an inch from your mouth. So then I go play 3 poker tournaments, and only get in the money in one of them. I'm gonna go hang myself in the loft now. Excuse me. Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 22:32, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Get a motherfucking life. There is life outside of online games you know. DeltaStar_{Senior Sysop}^{Speciationspeed!} 03:52, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

hahaha, Crundy is miserable. Ha ha. Aceⁱ⁹ 22:38, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

I make homemade pizza all the time. I can give you the recipe its super good. Use a pizza pan too -- the circular pans with the holes on the bottom. Work just as well. PS how hot was ur oven??--rational ghey (send a message) 22:41, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

The census people just showed up at my house and I chased them off with a shotgun yelling, "get the hell off my lawn! I'm white goddammit!!1!"...hope that helps...PACODOG^{woof, bitches} 22:47, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

I went the other way. I attached five single spaced pages to my census with no parapgraph breaks and only a couple of periods essentially telling everything them everything I could think of about everyone I know. It was very cathartic but i think there is a warrent out for my arrest now. ^Me!Sheesh!_Mine! 23:41, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

@Ace: I'm always fucking miserable, what's new? @RG: Pizza was great, observe attached photo. The problem was my faithful pizza stone splitting in three. I'll post a picture of the stone if anyone's really interested. If the rotation of the dial is anything to go by then it must have been around 280-300c. Oh, forgot to mention, I also opened my expensive duck pate (NOT fois gras) I bought when in the Cotswolds and it was fucking shit. No taste at all. I'm sticking to making my own. Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 00:04, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Who cares about your pizza, please upload trinity stone. And what the fuck is "C"? Please translate to American like my stove so I can follow. PS, did we lose the guy who was killing himself? ħuman 07:46, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

@Crundy: I am always excited and happy. Particularly when speaking to Crundy. Aceⁱ⁹ 00:12, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Because your life doesn't seem so shit when you're talking to me? You on Skype atm btw? Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 00:18, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

At work sorry dude. Oh hey, remember what I told you would happen if I didn't stop smoking? yeah well that only lasted about 3 days. Ace Wins! Aceⁱ⁹ 00:23, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

You should have it written into your contract that you are allowed to have drunken skype chats with friends in different timezones. Move to Australia, it's practically the law there. I quit smoking again. In fact, quitting smoking is easy, I've done it thousands of times </MarkTwain>. Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 00:26, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Pizza dough looks too thick for my taste. Most pizzas I have had in Italy are really thin.  Lily ^{Inspirate me.} 07:50, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

I do always try to make it really thin, but I suck at rolling it out thin and always seem to add too much yeast. Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 09:03, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

I've taken up smoking again in light of recent life events. I feel sickened with myself for doing so, but I'm fucking weak. Also Crundy, I'm gonna be super pissed off if you actually kill yourself. You can't leave me on Skype surrounded by a load of Americans and one drunk New Zealander. I wouldn't know what to say. SJ ^Debaser 10:45, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

This sort of thing helped me through some of my younger confusion. ħuman 07:40, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

More about Rasmussen

In this discussion I mentioned that Conservatives love citing Rasmussen but that they have a flawed polling model that gives more weight to Republicans. FiveThreeEight.com has come out with another story related to Rasmussen and their poll showing overwhelming support for Americans for the new Arizona immigration law:

The Rasmussen poll says that 60 percent of Americans (and 70 percent of Arizonans) favor the new law, but how would those numbers change if people were read a longer or more complete description of the measure? Since there's been no other polling on the subject, we have no idea. It wouldn't shock me if the law indeed proved to be popular, especially in Arizona, if a fuller description were read. (Liberals, who uniformly seem to think that the law will be unpopular with certain key demographic groups, are a bit too sanguine about this). But this poll is so simplistic as to provide very little informational value. To their credit, Rasmussen later asked people whether they were concerned that "efforts to identify and deport illegal immigrants will also end up violating the civil rights of some U.S. citizens"; 58 percent said they were in fact somewhat or very concerned. But that finding did not get their lede, nor was that concern expressed relative to Arizona's law itself.

Just FYI - sigh. Except to see them quoted more and more by the conservative media and blogs to cheer up their ideological brethren. --Leotardo (talk) 18:28, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

WIGO UK

“”"In a free constitution such as ours there is an important distinction to be drawn between the law's protection of the right to hold and express a belief and the law's protection of that belief's substance or content." While the Judaeo-Christian tradition had exerted a "profound influence" on the judgment of lawmakers, "the conferment of any legal protection of preference upon a particular substantive moral position on the ground only that it is espoused by the adherents of a particular faith, however long its tradition, however long its culture, is deeply unprincipled."

—Lord Justice Laws

I'd WIGOWorld it but I think it's worthy of more attention. 22:55, 29 April 2010 (UTC) ^Contribs_Talk

It's already on WIGO World ;-) Complete with Lord Carey's threat warning of CIVIL UNREST if Christians are required to behave a bit like decent humans in the workplace - David Gerard (talk) 23:02, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Aah! Hadn't seen it. But I think the above quote's lovely and worthy of note here. 23:11, 29 April 2010 (UTC) ^Contribs_Talk

And so they found Noah's Ark. Again.

But I only have news articles written in Cantonese. If you got links in English, please post them. This time, it seems to come with Wood! [[User:K61824|]][[User_talk:K61824|]] 21:17, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

Google translator does a good job of it, but I'm wondering if this is, in fact, a rehash of the original hoax story. Quite often newspapers will do that and get confused, and a language barrier can only add to that (remember when one in China reported The Onion?). ^bomination 21:42, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

Aussies sound a bit skeptical. Šţěŗĭļė lawnmower 23:06, 26 April 2010 (UTC) Add: Dutch pics look fuzzy. Šţěŗĭļė lawnmower 23:08, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

http://rationalwiki.com/wiki/RationalWiki_talk:What_is_going_on_at_ASK%3F#THE_ARK.21

Fake News has the story, along with all the other fair and balanced news items about why Obama is wrong on, eh, everything. DogP^{Marmite Patrol} 16:03, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

I like how they instantly denounce any outside ideas of a settlement by saying 'Its never been found at this altitude around here before' and immediately going to Noah. And they call us narrow minded for not accepting it. Also, it pisses me off that carbon dating is inaccurate unless its Their carbon dating, which then means it's just as infallible as the bible. -- CodyH (talk) 07:48, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Good observation, but the hypocrisy (maybe it's just inconsistency, rather than actual hypocrisy) doesn't just end there. Take the AIG link and particularly the points at the end where they say "oh, these articles discussing debunked observations have no bearing on this current story". Next consider creationist use of the words "piltdown" and "man". Clearly, only when it suits them do previous forgeries and hoaxes relate to current events. ^bomination 19:14, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

I love how they date it to 2000 something BC, then conveniently forget that at the same time there was water all over Mt Ararat, the Egyptians were quite happily plodding along, next to that river of theirs. De Nile, anybody? (yes, that was a terrible pun) --PsyGremlinZungumza! 08:55, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Now baraminologist (i.e., creationist) Todd C. Wood is panning the find. Although, you have to love his reasoning as to why this can't be the ark:

"1. They claim that radiocarbon dates the wood to 4800 years before present, but the Ark was constructed of pre-Flood wood, which would mean that the carbon dating should be much, much older.

2. The modern 'Mt. Ararat' (Agri Dagh) is a post-Flood volcano. The Ark could not have landed on Agri Dagh because it did not exist at the end of the Flood, and even if it did land on modern Agri Dagh, it would have been destroyed by the many, many eruptions of Ararat since the Flood. You can observe all the fresh lava flows on Agri Dagh at Google Maps.

3. Given that the Flood survivors left the Ark to find a devastated world, the Ark would have been the best source of timber for the first decade or so. I think it highly likely that the Ark was dismantled to supply the growing population with building material for shelter."

Gottaloveit. Šţěŗĭļė lawnmower 03:22, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Bah. Noah's Ark is in Frostburg, Maryland. Everyone knows that. Secret Squirrel (talk) 03:56, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

The wood was used to build developments in Chevy Chase, MD. Everyone knows that. ħuman 04:23, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

I think any "career Creationist" would immediately distance themselves from claims like this so that they don't set themselves up as an Aunt Sally if and when they are proven to be false (though in their hearts they're probably hoping like mad that it is the one-true-Ark). But you need to admire their gall as they try to use the radiocarbon dating to their advantage after they have put in so much time trying to discredit it when it has been used to prove dates greater than 6000 BC. The best source of wood for the first decade would most likely have gone into fires to keep away all those hungry, man-eating animals. Is there any evidence that people were making wooden houses in the middle-east at that time? And "growing population" in the first decade - what were they, manrabbits? Furthermore, even if the timber was used for just roofing beams how far are they going to transport great lumps of wood even using the half a dozen beasts of burden that they would only have had? Effing moonbats, the lot of them.  Lily ^{Inspirate me.} 16:22, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

More fun on Wikipedia:Talk:Conservapedia

I have just posted the following to Talk:Conservapedia:

==Someone is trolling this discussion==

(Sorry to post a topic not directly related to article improvement here, but this is the one place where users who need to know this will see it.)

I have had a number of emails claiming they have received an email from "TK-CP" that states that TK is meeting with me and Jimbo Wales to discuss this article and RW, and that the recipient's WP account is in danger of being suspended or deleted.

This is, of course, entirely false.

I am sure TK-CP would not send out any such ridiculous claims, so I assume someone is trolling this discussion. People's WP accounts don't get suspended just for editing at another wiki. This just doesn't happen.

So if you get an email like this, you shouldn't worry. Though you may wish to forward it to the Arbitration Committe or the functionaries list, because this sort of intimidation is completely unacceptable at Wikipedia. I've also emailed TK to alert him this is happening - David Gerard (talk) 10:39, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

- David Gerard (talk) 10:53, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

TK has just emailed me to say "Yes, very clever. Tell Trent he will soon know the very real pain he has put me through for three years. Thanks." (Quoting because he did say to pass it on.) This suggests his problems with RationalWiki as cited on Talk:Conservapedia are in fact nothing to do with the Wikipedia article, and so any discussion on that page by him of RationalWiki is not really in the right venue at all - David Gerard (talk) 11:53, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Looks like the TK lie machine is moving up a gear over there. Note the "forged screenshots" comment. I thought even TK had realised that was a lie too far. –SuspectedReplicant retire me 12:17, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

I'll be honest, despite TK's bluster I see no compulsion to keep threats, intimidation or harassment confidential. If he'd mailed you personal details about himself that's one thing, but threatening to visit "pain" even in the form of a scolding from Jimbo crosses several lines, as does his repeated contention that he'll shop this around to as many admins as he has to until he finds one that'll do what he wants. Rob's been doing similar by going to all those message boards, and I can only assume he got the idea from TK. It's all a bit odd, since as sickening as TK is, he's not usually stupid. --Kels (talk) 13:31, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

While it's possible that the mails were sent by some impostor/troll, TK really comes over as a sneering bully in that section. --Sid (talk) 13:57, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

"In that section"? You're too kind to him! –SuspectedReplicant retire me 16:42, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

By the way: those who feel they are individually being slandered on Talk:Conservapedia may wish to avail themselves of an email to info@wikimedia.org with a list of diffs and a note that it's been going on for a while now. BLP applies to talk pages too - David Gerard (talk) 14:12, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Hmmm. Very interesting. Not sure what to make of that. --Kels (talk) 21:32, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

"Tell Trent he will soon know the very real pain he has put me through for three years." That sounds like a threat to me. So does this: "I will now see your removal from the Bar. Take that to the bank. " (From Nutty Roux's page) I don't know about anyone else, but I find this very disturbing. Refugee^{talk page} 00:41, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Is this right?

TK wants to remove all mention of his real name from both WP and RW, because it shows him for the lying, backstabbing person he is. Part of this involves trying to show the LA Times interview (containing a mention of TK's name) to be unreliable, and thus have it removed. They are trying to show it is unreliable by trying to show that she was wrong about the founding of RW. EddyP (talk) 14:14, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

That is exactly correct. ħuman 20:55, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

You forgot Terry Koeckritz's plagiarism.  Lily ^{Inspirate me.} 11:05, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

This is technically old, but I don't recall seeing the screen name, so...is TK^img still denying it's his name, or is he just objecting to it being pointed out without permission? ~ Kupochama^[1][2] 11:53, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

His first name was all over the SDG that he opened as well. Not sure if his full name is in there though. EddyP (talk) 12:07, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

I believe that refers to his former ZIP code so he's just proffering information about himself.  Lily ^{Inspirate me.} 12:14, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

His contribution to Rob's stupid straw poll (how many people agree with this BS everyone's already told me they disagree with) seems to suggest that he finally figured out that all this is making him look really bad, and it's time to pull back a bit. Or he's trying to make it look like he's not in bed with Rob on this whole thing, either way. --Kels (talk) 13:34, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

I love how Terry and Rob have managed to do more harm to CP's image than any number of vandal sites possibly could. Also, there was that time on CP when Terry was whining about losing property to an eminent domain claim. So he can't whine about his name being out there. If I was him, I'd be more worried about getting this removed from the innertubes. --PsyGremlinKhuluma! 14:36, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

What the fuck is that all about?! DeltaStar_{Senior Sysop}^{Speciationspeed!} 15:02, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Is this crap at WP still going on? How tiresome. Wẽãšẽĩõĩď^{Methinks it is a Weasel} 18:54, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Very tiresome indeed. As a matter of interest, does anybody know roughly how old Rob is? I had always thought he was 40+, but the level of reading comprehension in the current debate is so low that I'm beginning to think he must be one of Andy's homskollarz. And no I'm not stalking - just finding it necessary to question one of my assumptions. –SuspectedReplicant retire me 19:57, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

To go by his WP antics, I'd say four, and an ill-behaved four at that. Perhaps it's early-onset senility or something. --Kels (talk) 20:31, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Rob once gave us a brief autobiography in TWIGO:CP and if I remember correctly he spoke of being a kid during the 50s. So that would probably make him 55-60. As for low reading comprehension, that is one of the qualifications for being a sysop at CP.  Lily ^{Inspirate me.} 16:37, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

RW reviews

Following the massive attention RW got recently, I decided to look up what the world are saying about us. I hope people try to take this on board, postiive and negative.

• http://forum.nationstates.net/viewtopic.php?f=20&t=45086
• http://www.evidencesoup.com/canopener/2010/04/rational-wiki-uses-evidence-to-refute-pseudoscience.html
• http://www.stumbleupon.com/url/rationalwiki.com%252Fwiki%252FScientific_evidence_of_evolution_being_a_hoax%252C_and_God%252527s_existence
• http://elnaschiewatch.blogspot.com/2010/02/hilarious-rationalwiki-entry-for-el.html
• http://www.topix.com/forum/news/evolution/T59K7JTC2E13PM1P4 (search "rationalwiki", as it's 1/3 down the page)
• http://scienceblogs.com/sunclipse/2008/11/conservapdia_legitimized.php (again, search for it in the comments, talking about the Demski case)
• http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showthread.php?t=187521 (Ron Paul fans can go fuck themselves, but I'm including this for completeness)

^bomination 15:37, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Why did we get so much attention? Someone mentioned FB, but I don't believe that. EddyP (talk) 16:13, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

The I'm all right jack Ron Paul fan's reactions only go to show that extremists are... extreme. Jack Hughes (talk) 17:07, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

RationalWiki is destined for great things. It's possible. Ron Paul, not so much. Mei (talk) 19:34, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Just thinking out loud:

I regularly try and sort through discussions about RW that pop up. There is not a lot of specific or constructive criticism to really draw upon. In general I think it can be summarized as either people criticizing us as overly cp-centric, as created for the purpose of merely mocking CP or as a vandal hub. This is a tough one to address, RW was originally created in response to CP, there are several high profile areas of the site that are completely CP centric, and CP matters do have a tendency to over dominate at times. However, we have branched out considerably, and to be honest the "newer" discussions of RW have a tendency to be focused on different aspects of the site. I think there is nothing really to do but just keep developing the site on multiple fronts, as more people engage with us from different sources and view points CP centric issues will drift ever lower. That is all ready happening, talk:WIGOCP used to be the only place you could really post anything if you wanted to get peoples attention.

The other most common criticism is a lack of seriousness. Articles have a tendency to go through phases, with the initial phases been short stubs that are full of mockery and jokes, if those articles are important they get developed over time, and while often maintaining a certain level of sarcasm and mockery they become more and more "dry" as they develop. I think there is a strong link between "in order to be taken seriously you need to be serious." I think we could be a little more careful in certain important topics. A good example of this is the shift we made with the Andrew Schlafly article, which started off as nothing but extreme parody with gerbling jokes. Mockery and sarcasm can be effective tools, but if that is all we have on a page people can legitimately criticize it. This also has to do with the whole concept of wiki, and wiki development. Every wiki has problems with "stubs."

A final criticism is a little harder to work with. And that is that we are not really providing anything "new" that can't be found elsewhere. I actually think this is an invalid criticism, and I have elucidated on this point in the past. But maybe others see it differently, or see how we might improve on this. tmtoulouse 20:35, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Just one thing to think about: The emphasis on wikis is usually collaboratation. But they also have other features that make them interesting, such as ease of hyperlinking and tagging, ease of updating, etc. That is, even if the content or ideas aren't new, it does represent a different way of presenting them, especially things like the side-by-sides. It's hard to know how to take advantage of these features, but there ought to be some way. (Oh, and I get the CP-centricity issues, but the CP criticism deos fill a need when there isn't much else to do there; it's just that there is a tendency to get carried away with it because of the history and the personal back-and-forth eds have had with CP. It's more figuring out a balance at this point.) Šţěŗĭļė lawnmower 03:02, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Good points. When I go to edit my two main websites, I deplore the lack of wiki-tools, even though I have a very good program to work on them (arachnophilia). To think of the efforts I went through to make "random" page work at humanthoughts... of course, I can hide some pages from being randomized, and make other one only available that way. ħuman 04:06, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

also I forgot the "history" feature. Since I move to digital, I often have no "intermediate" notes of changes to poems, etc - just the latest version edited and uploaded. A private one-person wiki would be an awesome tool for a writer. ħuman 04:08, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

It's easy enough to set up a one-person wiki on, say, Ubuntu, because there is a version in the software repositories which will wet everything up for you. It's harder on Windows, though. MW's site has instructions. Professor Moriarty 06:56, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Actually, if you are not wed to Mediawiki there is other software for wiki-ing. wp:Personal_wiki#Single-user_wikis Šţěŗĭļė lawnmower 10:59, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

I've noticed one recurring theme which is that are overt critics often focus on individual articles, "RW must be crap because this article says something that is wrong". This just ignores the nature of wikis and I'm never sure what to make of it. On the one hand, such criticism can't be applied to the site as a whole so is essentially useless. On the other hand, it does indicate that there are articles out there that may be seriously crap but no one has stumbled upon them yet - I'd say I'm familiar with 90%+ of what you might call "important" articles, but that's just a fraction of what's in all the spaces. I tend to click "random page" occasionally to clean them up, but often they fall so far outside my interest or expertise that I really can't do anything. All we can do to solve this issue is to carry on as normal and let the normal process sort it; people are always going to find faults with individual bits. ^bomination 08:13, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Just thought I'd add a few more:

• http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20100209152851AAIVTOq Used in Yahoo answers as a "good" resource. These are the passing links that Trent talks about, very encouraging.
• http://www.sherdog.net/forums/f7/ufo-best-footage-ive-seen-1161890/#post36860666 Interesting link to our pseudoskepicism article. Nice.
• http://www.frugal-cafe.com/public_html/frugal-blog/frugal-cafe-blogzone/2009/06/22/no-global-warming-in-arizona-coldest-june-on-record-since-1913/ An interesting one, someone links to us to help fight against some "global warming is a hoax" morons. A little tl:dr, if you ask me. However, it's worth noting the response from the guy who takes issue with our now infamous tumbleweeds and claims that his source is better because the guy has a "BA in Natural Sciences" - if we want to play that game, for the record, I have an MChem with natural environment and atmospheric chemistry, I believe I win. ^bomination 01:24, 1 May 2010 (UTC)
• http://newsgroups.derkeiler.com/Archive/Talk/talk.origins/2007-08/msg08315.html I'm not quite sure what to make of this, but it's something about the "ultra-liberal" LA Times. ^bomination 01:28, 1 May 2010 (UTC)
• http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2008/06/26/oh-snap-creationist-smackdown/ Possibly one of the longest coherent discussions about this site that I can find. Recommended reading if you're serious about improving the site. Still, the criticsm mostly falls into the category I outlined above; picking faults with articles that are hardly complete to start with, yet alone fully checked out. This is possibly why I'd certainly favour the brainstar system of bronze, silver and gold for articles so when people get pissy we can point and say "yeah, we know, RW didn't exactly spring from the womb fully formed and perfect you know?" ^bomination 01:50, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Please ignore

I just got a new and really interesting job to replace my old and fairly interesting job that no longer exists. I'm pretty stoked that I will be able to continue to pay my mortgage (as is my habit) while not doing something that will slowly suffocate me due to alack of will to breath the same boring stale air on a daily basis. So, yeah. I've already told both of my friends and those members of my family to whom I'm still speaking, so I decided to post in here in the hopes that telling virtual strangers will excise my need to announce it. Also, my wife is tired of hearing me say "whew, I'm glad we can pay the mortgage" every three and a half minutes. Feel free to ignore this. ^Me!Sheesh!_Mine! 22:04, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

22:24, 29 April 2010 (UTC) ^Contribs_Talk

Congratulations on having a new job that you can love, Sheesh!! Radioactive afikomen ^{Please ignore all my awful pre-2014 comments.} 22:16, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Well done Sheesh Kebab. That's my nickname for you. "Sheesh Kebab." SJ ^Debaser 22:18, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

my wife is tired of hearing me say... —Sheesh!

Is it just me, or does it seem like everybody here is married? Radioactive afikomen ^{Please ignore all my awful pre-2014 comments.} 22:22, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Don't you lump me in with the rest of them. DickTurpis (talk) 22:32, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Marriage is so last year. Friends wif benefits FTW. --PsyGremlinSpeak! 14:59, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

I empathise. I did much the same when I got this job, six months ago (gosh!). And it's much better than the old job. I liked the old job in theory, I like the current one in practice - David Gerard (talk) 22:35, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

In theory, theory and practice are the same thing. In practice, they're different. alt (talk) 22:38, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Practice is Just A Theory - David Gerard (talk) 23:02, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

You dang kids changing jobs every five minutes, how's an old man supposed to keep up? (I've kept my current job for 15 years, and have only held two full-time jobs in my entire life...) --The Emperor _{Kneel before Zod!} 22:40, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Goddamn, you're old. Radioactive afikomen ^{Please ignore all my awful pre-2014 comments.} 22:43, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Fuck, you're young. ħuman 04:11, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

I've never had a job that's lasted more than three years. And I've had more than 20 by now. And since I'm going into a business that's almost entirely on contract basis, I'll probably never have a long-term job. Dunno if that's something to be proud of or ashamed. --Kels (talk) 04:26, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

I'm going to be the world's biggest rockstar (no, really) so I'm gonna be on contract basis too. SJ ^Debaser 15:03, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Cool story bro. Congratulations though, Mr Sheesh. I've been in the same company for about 10 years now, although the job changes so frequently that I don't have to bother applying for new positions. The joys of re-orgs. --^{Ask me about our peanut} 18:48, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Congrats on the new job! Refugee^{talk page} 05:50, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Shoo!Tag redux

I am now in possession of two Shoo!Tags. Before anyone berates me for buying obvious woo, I bought them for next to nothing and wouldn't have wasted $24.99 on one. They come wrapped in a static shielding bag. First thing I checked was whether they have any magnetic field at all. They do but it is negligible. They barely make a compass needle quiver a little, and only if held against the compass. No discernable magnetic field more than a millimeter away. They do look pretty cool on the cat's collar. Now that Kitty has her magic deflector shields up, The Force is with her and Ceiling Cat will surely keep fleas away, um, or maybe she can impress the local stray tomcats with her new age status symbol. Any suggestions for how to further test this? Secret Squirrel (talk) 01:59, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Run it through a card reader? User:SusanG 02:29, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

That could be interesting. Anything could be there - quotes from Jabberwocky, 666, magic "fleas begone" incantations... Secret Squirrel (talk) 02:39, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Apropos of nothing, I just got my new debit card, and noticed two odd features: One, the mag stripe is not the traditional brownish black, it's in the Bank's trademark green. Also, two, and more interesting, the numbers aren't in bas-relief, they are just flat. Should I now throw away the imprinter the bank gave me 20 years ago and the multiple-copy carbon things? Dang, I customised a cabinet drawer to hold all them! (Pix upon request) ħuman 03:11, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Our article says However, no trials have really been done on the tag and no RationalWikian has thought about buying enough to launch our own trial (as fun as this would be). So come on all you scientists, let's have a proper trial. This is our mission.  Lily ^{Inspirate me.} 07:00, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

I would totally endorse that. Did you check any credit cards to see what their strips are like? ^bomination 07:58, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Of course, setting up a proper trial with just two of them is hardly going to be great, but if these things work the way they're supposed to it should be enough. How easy would it be to create a "placebo" one? Then you just need 6 friends to try them - 2 control, 2 fake tags and 2 real tags and let the trial go for a few weeks. ^bomination 08:20, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Do your cats have any other sort of protection? If not then the simplest test would be to leave the tags on and see if they get flees. I suppose you could set up a control to see if it got more flees (or conceivably less) but any flees on your cat would invalidate the claims wouldn't it?--Bob^{Spring is sprung!} 08:40, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

I just have one cat, she doesn't have any other flea collar, but then again has not had a flea problem. For a placebo, that could just be a regular credit card cut to size I would think. A quick check of a credit card: it also moves a compass needle just barely, about the same as the tag does. But I would need another cat, and perhaps a third cat with a regular flea collar, and some fleas or ticks which seem to be a rarity around here. My big insect problem has always been wasps and hornets. Hey, maybe they can make a "wasp" Shoo!Tag I can hang on the house! (ha ha) Secret Squirrel (talk) 09:19, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

The claim is that they keep "pests" away not just fleas. Alas, I'm afraid hanging them on the house wouldn't be a valid test as the "science" page says it utilizes the power of the bio-energetic field which surrounds all living things to create a frequency barrier for up to four months While your house may have an electric field it is probably not bio-energetic in their terms of reference.  Lily ^{Inspirate me.} 09:36, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

And they're "tuned to specific animals" so you can't get away with using a horse one on your dog. Although I imagine that in reality they're exactly the same and it'd be interesting to buy different ones and give them to people with the wrong animal (without telling them, of course). ^bomination 13:38, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

I live in a warm climate, so our cats get terrible flea problems. At the height of summer I usually have to resort to bathing them in flea shampoo, then keeping them indoors as long as I can. After about three days they usually get bored with being indoors and insist on being let out, then come back with fleas again. I'd love to find something that really works on fleas and isn't a toxic substance. Refugee^{talk page} 01:44, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Fleas ain't nothin'. Ear mites, that's a pain in the ass. --Kels (talk) 02:45, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Blow flies are a pain in the ass. Especially for sheep & goats.  Lily ^{Inspirate me.} 16:49, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Traffic

Number crunching is still not done, and likely to never get a great estimate but it looks like we are going to hit over 150,000 unique IP addresses accessing the site for the month of April, might be closer to 200,000. From that the number of "visits" will be close to 300,000. IP addresses are difficult to parse in terms of individuals, as both one person can come in with multiple IP addresses, and one IP address can correspond to multiple people.

I think it is safe to say though that over 100,000 people have visited this site this month in one form or another. Just think thats kinda cool. tmtoulouse 02:16, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Kinda cool? Sorry Trent, but I disagree. To quote Peter Griffin, "That's freakin' sweet!" Lord of the Goons ^{The official spikey-haired skeptical punk} 02:24, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

The death of atheism on the internet is imminent! Faster Higher Stronger! Aceⁱ⁹ 02:30, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

It's "Faster, deeper, harder!", Ace. --The Emperor _{Kneel before Zod!} 02:33, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Indeed. At Alexa we are on track to mirror Andy's Colbert Bump. OLE! OLE! OLE! I'd bother to link to Queen vids but I'm too lazy. ħuman 03:06, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Looks like you're the Wayne Gretzky of reason on the internet!--^talk 04:38, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

I'm afraid that reference is lost on me. Radioactive afikomen ^{Please ignore all my awful pre-2014 comments.} 05:56, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Yup. ħuman 07:44, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

I was checking Alexa and while pageviews and a few other stats look well within the normal flux ("pageviews/user" has been an all time low for a month or so) the "reach" stat went off the scale to the point of being outright scary. ^bomination 07:56, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Alexa keywords: poe's law, esther hicks, rational, esther hicks scam, affair ^{(I am a person not a template)} 08:30, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Women + Boobs = earthquakes????

Get a load of this crazy shit! The Goonie 1 ^{What's this button do? Uh oh....} 02:39, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

You mean this? User:SusanG 02:44, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Sorry, it doth appear my chronic insomnia has made me a week behind. Punky ^{Your mental puke relief} 02:45, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Ooh! Does this mean I can spam you talk page with week-old news? : ) Radioactive afikomen ^{Please ignore all my awful pre-2014 comments.} 03:00, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Go right ahead and spam it with weak, old news. But what did poor, weak, old news do to you? The Goonie Punk ^{Can't sleep, clowns will eat me!} 03:02, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

It may be poor and weak now, but when it was young and strong, it committed great crimes against me. Radioactive afikomen ^{Please ignore all my awful pre-2014 comments.} 03:14, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Nonsense. We all know that it was mutual. You cannot forget the crimes you committed against it. We remember when you broke its Wiki, so you can't say you didn't also wrong it. The Goonie Punk ^{Can't sleep, clowns will eat me!} 03:18, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Keep this up, Goonie, and the wiki isn't the only thing I'll break. >: ( Radioactive afikomen ^{Please ignore all my awful pre-2014 comments.} 03:25, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Try me. And the evil smilie is , you tool. Gooniepunk2010 ^{Oi! Oi! Oi!} 03:27, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

low frequency high amplitude vibrations might be a trigger. So to stay on mission with wiki we must have large breasted women who can jog slowly in place to test this. Please record results and videos after this message Thanks Hamster (talk) 03:35, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Did you just try to solicit sexy videos from users here? Radioactive afikomen ^{Please ignore all my awful pre-2014 comments.} 03:48, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

I think both Queen (ironically) and Monty Python have performed this experiment and recorded it on video. ħuman 03:52, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

So did Mika, and the vid's super-fun too. --Kels (talk) 04:30, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

This section title is wrong. Women + Boobs > earthquakes. Mei (talk) 18:46, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Peter Jackson

errr I mean the recently knighted "Sir" Peter Jackson....anyway, everyone knows the guy from such hits as Lord of the Rings and producer of District 9. However, when I grew up Peter Jackson was well known for his splatter fest, low budget zombie flicks. Shit, he used to live in a modest house nearby to my suburb. If you get the chance please take time to review and enjoy his classics....Bad Taste and Brain Dead. For some reason this is important to me. Aceⁱ⁹ 11:15, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, Brain Dead (I saw the "Blood Edition" whatever that may be) was teh awesome. One of those films, like Starship Troopers, that's so bad it's good. --PsyGremlinFale! 12:41, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

"when I grew up..." When did you grow up, Ace, hm? The trauma which shadows everything you do indicates you as a child of the 80s. I say it's time for you to come clean on this matter : ) Radioactive afikomen ^{Please ignore all my awful pre-2014 comments.} 15:04, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Ahem. As a fellow child of the 80s, I'm going to have to ask you to step outside. --PsyGremlinPraat! 15:08, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

I like the way that some of the biggest directors strated out with no-budget straight-to-video horror flicks. James Cameron's classic Piranha II: The Spawning deserves a mention, I think. It's probably more fun than bloody Titanic. Totnesmartin (talk) 17:51, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

That was the one with fishes on sticks wasn't it? Hilarious (in places).  Lily ^{Inspirate me.} 18:15, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Heavenly Creatures is worth a look as well. Its a bizarre telling of a famous (apparently) murder/love affair that happened in NZ in the 50's. Very well told, won a few oscars I think. --Damo^Hi 02:05, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Screw all that, it's got Kate Winslett naked in it!!! She could seriously have me if she asked nicely. –SuspectedReplicant retire me 02:24, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Glenn Beck at his best

Ratings are down 30%. I love it when he says if something happens to him to blame Obama.--Thanatos (talk) 20:08, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

On a related note... Sarah Palin calls Beck 'America's professor of common sense'. Hopefully her endorsement is more like the kiss of death. --PsyGremlinKhuluma! 20:29, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Nice! ħuman 00:24, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Important

Forum:Upgrades!. tmtoulouse 00:39, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

I think we have another crank to add.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ann_McElhinney Here are some choice quotes I found: On "environmental radicals": they're elites - very, very rich. And the richer they get, the more idiotic their ideas become. and "They think poverty is a culture that needs to be conserved,"

You can just smell the conspiracy theories can't you?Ryantherebel (talk) 01:21, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

So write it! ħuman 05:06, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

YouTube video & parody

Please ignore this section - I had posted links to a couple of videos, but they don't seem to be as funny as I thought, in fact they are apparently pretty stupid (but not as bad as being rickrolled or Bieber'd) and on second thought I really don't want anyone to waste their time on this, so nevermind. Sorry! Refugee^{talk page} 05:46, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Twas aboot "Single Ladies Devastation". I said "Nope" since I hadn't seen it. Oh well. ħuman 06:06, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Cpedia continues to delight

Most accurate description ever - David Gerard (talk) 14:41, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

I'm not familiar with the kind of thing I'm seeing here. I recognise most of the words on that page, but I can't make any sense out of it. Wẽãšẽĩõĩď^{Methinks it is a Weasel} 14:50, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

"61 Economist Tyler Cowen blazing saddles dvd as Citizendium Scholarpedia Conservapedia and Google's I turned the charts they are not based on a clear conceptual are blazing saddles dvd portable nor was all there was I would opt blazing saddles dvd. [2.1]" This seems fine. What's the problem Weasy? Nutty Roux (talk) 14:51, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

That's actually very fair and even handed. Perhaps we could use this text on the Wikipedia article? –SuspectedReplicant retire me 15:07, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

This one is even more appropriate. "2 guys 1 horse" - David Gerard (talk) 14:58, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

“”Information is we murkin over further considered as an which can be smooth we murkin over editable encyclopedia 22 management structures these are exchange distribution circulation processing or are on we murkin over Roughly 2000 articles in said "I realized technical Scholarpedia Conservapedia and Google's Wharf" we murkin over the biggest they are not based Platonic Academy Aristotle's Peripatetic to provide thorough well powered with batteries except to the game the.

WTF? Is Ken writing for these guys? --PsyGremlinSnakk! 15:10, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

It's compiled directly from a search engine. Basic details are here. The CP article may be nonsense but some of the others aren't too bad... –SuspectedReplicant retire me 15:16, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

I want not approve on it. I think polite post. Particularly the designation attracted me to read the unscathed story. Wẽãšẽĩõĩď^{Methinks it is a Weasel} 15:26, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

It's truly a thing of wonder. Almost poetic in a bizaire kind of way.--Bob^{Spring is sprung!} 15:38, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Bob M. Professor Moriarty 15:46, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

A somewhat disturbing number of references to anorexia or bulimia there.--Bob^{Spring is sprung!} 16:18, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

I've been playing around with Cpedia some more. I have decided to make it my favourite source of on-line information. It's just so gloriously bizaire. (I assume that it's been done to death here somewhere before, but I missed it.)--Bob^{Spring is sprung!} 20:46, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

PalMD

Pal is asking for a little help. 04:22, 28 April 2010 (UTC) ^Contribs_Talk

We could post it to WIGO:Blogs if he's interested in seeing how things spread, as that's where this sort of thing would end up 95% of the time. ^bomination 08:06, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Makes sense. The alternative would to have it on the Intercom or chalk board, which may be suitable for a short-term experiment along the lines of what PalMD is proposing. --^{Ask me about our riddle} 08:18, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

I put it on WIGO:blogs - David Gerard (talk) 10:13, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

RW was the third largest source of incommings. -- -PalMD ^--Broccoli 17:30, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Does that mean we have a future in the public service announcement sector? tmtoulouse 17:37, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

EC) Saw the update. We were first single website (the first two being "social" sites). 17:41, 28 April 2010 (UTC) ^Contribs_Talk

Woot, go us. It's nice to know that in an emergency we can raise the word, and if the situation is utterly hopeless people can still learn something or entertain themselves in the CP WIGO. --^{Ask me about our exit sign} 17:46, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

I suppose it could mean that you shouldn't underestimate sites that you have a personal connection to, but aren't classed as the usual kind of "social network" type stuff. Which means maybe the good old fashioned way of making a social network can be quite powerful. ^bomination 17:50, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Indeed. I keep all you guys in mind whenever I think I may need a spare kidney. This is actually one reason why I tend to neglect Facebook and similar generic social networking sites. It's easier to form meaningful connections with people when there's some kind of theme or common interest. They do have potential as a kind of blog, but then that's bringing in a common interest. --^{Ask me about our infinity} 17:58, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Agreed, making a more serious comment than my last, Pal's connection to RW is going to aid in both willingness to post links, as well as the focus and attention it would get. This leads to a bit of a confound, since in an informational link in a disaster recovery scenario would be to a socially neutral location. However, I would be far more likely to see, process and respond to a link on RW than on facebook. Social networking sites generate so much cruft that it is easy to overlook and ignore things. tmtoulouse 18:01, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

An idea that I'm going to present at the conference is that sites could be convinced to post a link to a centralized information hub, such as a banner-like link to HSA or some such.-- -PalMD ^--Broccoli 18:08, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

It is an interesting idea, and I think it points to some interesting issues with social networking vs. blogs vs. website type stuff. To more succinctly state my point: Social networking sites (twitter, facebook, etc.) will always have the largest and easiest path for spreading a link (I.E. most potential eyeballs), but I think they suffer from cruft and clutter that makes it really easy to ignore; blogs and websites like RW will have less potential eyeballs but posted information is more likely to get the attention of the eyeballs on the site. tmtoulouse 18:13, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

(aside: obligatory xkcd link alt (talk) 18:24, 28 April 2010 (UTC))

I love PalMD almost as much as I love Ben Goldacre. DeltaStar_{Senior Sysop}^{Speciationspeed!} 02:53, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Bah. I loved PalMD before it was cool to love PalMD. Radioactive afikomen ^{Please ignore all my awful pre-2014 comments.} 02:57, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Lay Scientist is also doing pretty well, currently doing a lot of science articles for the Guardian. Although I'm not sure I'd describe him as being involved with RW to the same degree as PalMD was at the beginning. And AmesG is still going pretty strong last I checked too. But anyway, nice to see people doing well in internet land, even if their link to RW is fairly mediocre. When I get my own TV series, I'll be sure to give you all a mention :P ^bomination 23:35, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

I need to vent

So I graduated from the University of Michigan in 2008 and the commencement speaker was some guy named Bob Woodruff. I had never heard of him before then and I haven't heard anything about him since (although he does have a Wikipedia article, so he's kind of famous I guess). Anyway, the year before I graduated, the speaker was Bill Clinton. The year after, it was Ken's hero, Google co-founder and Michigan alum, Larry Page. And this year? Barack Obama!! I got screwed and I want everyone to know. Keegscee (talk) 20:06, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

That sucks. Can't you gatecrash? --PsyGremlin話しなさい 20:10, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Consider yourself lucky, mine was Michael Moore. DickTurpis (talk) 20:23, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

GO BLUE!!!!!!! P-Foster (talk) 20:24, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

But did Bob Woodruff have anything interesting to say?--Bob^{Spring is sprung!} 20:25, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

His speech was fine, but the execution was poor. You could tell that he still had lasting effects from his injuries. It was kind of sad actually. Keegscee (talk) 20:30, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

I dunno, seems like a pretty cool guy to me. Those other three are just speechwhores anyway. ħuman 21:37, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

There are over 2300 colleges in the US. Most of us who went to small schools were happy to have anyone vaguely relevant. And, besides, you would probably had to wait 4 hours for security with Clinton and Obama. Šţěŗĭļė lawnmower 01:37, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Because one pants-shittingly racist law wasn't enough...

Arizona's Department of Education is now going to start firing teachers that have accents. Also, they just passed a bill banning ethnic studies programs.

Hooray for academic freedom! Radioactive afikomen ^{Please ignore all my awful pre-2014 comments.} 18:43, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Well that screws my hopes of getting a teaching job in Arizona.  Lily ^{Inspirate me.} 18:49, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

WTF? And how do they define accent, I wonder. I'm sure that's going to march straight into the courts. --PsyGremlinTal! 18:53, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

To be perhaps undeservedly fair, it doesn't ban teachers with accents, but teachers with heavy accents and/or ungrammatical English from teaching classes to students who are themselves learning English. At least, that's how I read it. Professor Moriarty 18:58, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

We had two English teachers at my school, one was Welsh and one was Irish :) Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 19:31, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

What da fuchk you on about der Lily? Scousers don't 'ave no accent like. (How do you write a scouse T, as in "alright der la?) DeltaStar_{Senior Sysop}^{Speciationspeed!} 19:32, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

I've just read the link, and do be honest it doesn't sound quite so daft or racist; English teachers should speak good english - nowt wrong with that. (assuming they'll also get rid of any english teachers with a proper southern drawl...) DeltaStar_{Senior Sysop}^{Speciationspeed!} 19:36, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

I wonder if they'd fire Tim James of Alabama for sounding like he wandered off the Dukes of Hazzard set. Nutty Roux (talk) 19:42, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

It's not racist in theory, and is in fact a perfectly sensible law. However, in practice, it will probably be used in a racist fashion. Professor Moriarty 19:45, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

It is obviously important for language teachers to present students with a good model. I have had many students who have been taught things that are simply incorrect by non-native teachers.--Bob^{Spring is sprung!} 06:57, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

You know, thinking even more about this I think that a lot of the people offended by this haven't actually read what the law does. Professor Moriarty 18:18, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

It really hinges on their coming up with a reasonably objective way of judging the English language abilities of teachers. I agree that in principle it's a good idea, so long as it's not simply an attempt to bar teachers who communicate effectively but have foreign sounding accents. HB 2281 seems more troublesome. The way I read it, the bill could prevent schools for running remedial English classes in cases where there are significant minorities of children speaking English as a second language. Overall the timing is bad and it's easy to read this as being linked to the protestors fighting to ensure that the language of Jesus remains the only official language in the U.S. --^{Ask me about our deity of personal preference} 11:51, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Oh Dear

Fox is carrying the "Ark" story and the comments section makes for depressing reading. Aceⁱ⁹ 04:45, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Faith is the rock against which reality, reason and truth are dashed. --PsyGremlinParla! 04:52, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for that Ace, now I need to get me some Prozac.  Lily ^{Inspirate me.} 07:44, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Painful indeed. But the blue links on that fox article are weird.--Bob^{Spring is sprung!} 17:38, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

That page keeps collapsing into gibberish after it loads, for me. I wonder why? ħuman 20:13, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

A promising start. The article opens with a fine display of Schlafly Statistics by stating that the Chinese Christians are 99.9% certain that they've discovered Noah's boat of woe. The line "Many experts have concluded from examining the photos that the images are of rock formations that strongly resemble the boat described in Genesis." is wonderful. It makes the Whiskas slogan "eight out of ten owners say that their cat prefers it" seem highly objective scientifically rigorous. Yup, the comments are pretty grim. Paley's watchmaker argument makes an appearance. The argument from incredulity is strong in this one. I expect though that Fox will eagerly publish a follow-up story if the claims should prove to be false. --^{Ask me about our President of the United States} 12:01, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Oh fucking SWEET!!!!

So my phone just rings and a sweet lady informs me that when I bought my new car last month, all the buyers were entered into a draw... and I've just won 2 tickets to the World Cup final! Schweet! I'm now going to crawl under my desk and suck my toes in happiness. --PsyGremlinPraat! 15:33, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Weirdo. Professor Moriarty 15:35, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Congrats! Keep or sell? :P EddyP (talk) 15:40, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Lol, definitely keep... unless I find out what the scalpers are flogging them for! --PsyGremlinFale! 15:42, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

That is fucking brilliant, well done mate! I always thought those prize draws were scams/publicity stunts (I assume they don't need your bank details and an admin fee?) DeltaStar_{Senior Sysop}^{Speciationspeed!} 16:42, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Obviously you have no friends, so perhaps you could invite me to use the other ticket.  Lily ^{Inspirate me.} 16:52, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

@Delta - hopefully it's genuine and not a fiendish plot to get hold of my kidneys for some Columbian drug lord. And somehow, I have a sneaky suspicion that I might have a lot of friends crawling out of the woodwork :) I suppose I should give Missus Psy right of first refusal. --PsyGremlinZungumza! 16:56, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Wow. That's some prize. I take it that it's not just the tickets but transport and hotel and all that stuff?--Bob^{Spring is sprung!} 17:30, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

I dunno, was too busy screaming to ask questions. I'm in Jo'burg already so no need for hotel and stuff (altho I won't complain if they offer it). Checking up, they're worth about $600 each, so I'm guessing there's hospitality involved. --PsyGremlinPrata! 17:38, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

You lucky bastard. That's all I have to say. SJ ^Debaser 18:22, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Luck? It was probably prayer or magic charms.  Lily ^{Inspirate me.} 08:23, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Actually, I sacrificed a goat every night for a week, but shhh! Don't tell, or they'll all be doing it. --PsyGremlinSnakk! 08:38, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

You've probably seen this already

But this is just too cool to pass up. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gDED_vGkTfA SirChuckB^{Boom Goes the Dynamite} 06:08, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Is that the Teabagger rant? WOGOW'd it - owe you a hat-tip.--PsyGremlin講話 06:19, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, it's the rant... I can never remember how to embed. edit Got it.... Those help pages are useful. This just killed me.. But I have had about four Long Island Iced Teas tonight. SirChuckB^{I brake for Schukky} 06:53, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Nice indeed. Gee, only four? Isn't that basically sixteen shots? Or worse? ħuman 07:11, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Thought-provoking article of the day

Found here. Brought to you by Tetronian ^{you're clueless} 18:40, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Yodkowsky is probably one of the best at explaining that sort of thing. ^bomination 19:29, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

I'm eagerly awaiting a "No True Bayesian" fallacy, though - David Gerard (talk) 19:38, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Obama comedy

WIGOW'd it, but I've been chuckling reading his chirps. best one so far: ""The Jonas Brothers are here, they're out there somewhere. Sasha annd Malia are huge fans, but boys, don't get any ideas. Two words for you: predator drones. You will never see it coming. You think I'm joking?" --PsyGremlinSermā! 19:00, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

New stuff

Yes, I know, it's a very creative name

If you forget to select a license during upload, you don't have to go looking for the template any more. Just activate the HotLicense gadget and you'll get a drop-down list like the one on the upload form on file description pages. Just select a license from the list and click add. -- Nx / talk 16:20, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Nice work, cheers Nx. DeltaStar_{Senior Sysop}^{Speciationspeed!} 16:48, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Concur. Nicely done. As far as wikis go, I mean CP has basically fuck all tweaking except for Ed bot (and that probably just downloads porn for Ed), but aren't we more tweaked than WP with nifty gadgets, voting buttons and stuff? --PsyGremlinSprich! 17:02, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Don't forget LiberalBot. I offered to run some maintenance bots for Andy but I was immediately banhammered. Professor Moriarty 17:23, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Thank you Nx! Radioactive afikomen ^{Please ignore all my awful pre-2014 comments.} 20:24, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Very nice work, Nx. That's going to be very useful. Do we have a page that lists all these toys where new users (and old ones?) can easily find it yet? ħuman 20:20, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Gadgets tab ^{(I am a person not a template)} 20:23, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Yes, I know that's where they are, but is there a place where we tell people to go look for them? ħuman 23:57, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

Help:Scripts, but it's a bit outdated. -- Nx / talk 00:04, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Great, thanks! If only there were a way we could update it... ħuman 00:23, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

https://rationalwiki.org/w/index.php?title=Help:Scripts&action=edit ^{—Preceding obvious comment added by: Captain Obvious / talk / contribs} 00:31, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Is there a way to add that very helpful magic to the help files? ħuman 00:57, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Which helpful magic? -- Nx / talk 01:08, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

The link added by captain obvious. ħuman 01:13, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

You mean how to use fullurl? -- Nx / talk 01:15, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Yes, very, very nice tool. ^bomination 16:19, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

More new stuff

I've also added a bunch of license tags and the information and fair use templates to the edit tools (the stuff below the edit form). These only show up when editing file pages. -- Nx / talk 11:50, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

allbabiesareatheists is having a "Most Annoying Non-Theist Awards"

I've asked about being a presenter, and since I asked early I think I may get it. The video announcing it is here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mg9TEUKXUcs --76.18.115.64 (talk) 23:29, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

I have to say I like the closing sentiment; just being an atheist doesn't give you automatic superior intelligence. Some people definitely need to remember that. ^bomination 23:45, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

I'd like to nominate Penn of Penn & Teller. If PZ Myers is a genuinely nice guy who occasionally acts like a douchebag, then Penn is a total douchebag who occasionally does something nice. Radioactive afikomen ^{Please ignore all my awful pre-2014 comments.} 00:32, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Seconded. ħuman 00:56, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Did any of you actually watch the video? This is for YOUTUBE atheists. Furthermore, there's even serious talk of excluding some of the more well-known douchebags because they have an unfair advantage (most notably Nuclearnight, who could do a complete RANT sweep). (this is Mustex, btw, I'm too lazy to log in at the moment)--76.18.115.64 (talk) 01:00, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

That it was you was pretty obvious, that's why I didn't bother to watch the video. Sorry. But thanks for confirming. ħuman 01:15, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

zomg that's exactly what I did! Human ftw. Mei (talk) 01:17, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, but no one really gives a shit about most youtubers, for the most part it's like blogging except people with the ability to read faster than 5 words a minute don't get the oppotunity to put that skill to the test. User:Armondikov 01:06, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

It isn't even my video, though, it's allbabiesareatheists'.--76.18.115.64 (talk) 02:39, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

YouTube is introspective: it sees itself as having far greater reach than it in fact does. I know of no-one in the real world who has ever sought out anything without being prompted to, and then it's almost always for a laugh (piano playing cats or 2G 1C etc) - not for serious points. Individual tubers have their fans and antifans, but outside them they have little reach and less import. The youtubers who have a real life is a very small subset of all youtubers, I suspect. [Just like RatWiki, I suppose.] (anyhoo apart from the very rare instances of those with subtitles the video is gonna miss a whole load of people for whom the written word is paramount - us [however temporarily] without aural abilities, I mean) ^{(I am a person not a template)} 02:53, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Pardon me for being blunt, but are implying that you're hard of hearing? Radioactive afikomen ^{Please ignore all my awful pre-2014 comments.} 03:03, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

User_talk:Toast#Toast.21 ^{(I am a person not a template)} 03:09, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Oh. Radioactive afikomen ^{Please ignore all my awful pre-2014 comments.} 03:14, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Most Youtube videos of this type would benefit from a written three sentence executive summary so you don't have to sit around wondering if they are going to say anything interesting before the end of the vid. Having said that I almost never watch them so perhaps I'm not the best critic.--Bob^{Spring is sprung!} 09:10, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

I'll remember that in the future.--76.18.115.64 (talk) 12:52, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Sorry if this post goes on a bit, I was thinking about it but never got around to actually typing it last night. Basically, YouTube needs a pretty big time commitment. When I did my media training, the woman organising it stated that it's often said that all the words in a half hour news show could be put onto just the front page of the times. This isn't too surprising, when my friends were on Only Connect, I found the transcript and read it in about 7 minutes, whereas the show itself lasts 23 minutes (and it's pretty packed and to the point compared to most TV). Similarly, I've found I can summarise a 26 minute episode of Bullshit! in just under a screenful of text. So you're talking about having to spend 3-4 times as long watching a vid than with a blog post. Secondly, you can scan through text to pick out the interesting stuff fairly easily, skipping any introductory gumph if you don't need to read it. You can't do this with YouTube because you can't scrub through flash video on the web - and even if you could you'd lose sound making it impossible anyway. You have to sit through the entire thing or nothing, and if it doesn't grab you by the balls in 5 seconds then the majority of people will ignore it and move on. And to grab your audience by the balls you need 1) equipment, as just a poorly lit talking head on a cheap webcam isn't going to look very good, if you take a look at the top vloggers, they're using proper recording equipment and sometimes VFX that make the addition of video worth it, rather than a gimmicky novelty and 2) skill and charisma, again, look at the top vloggers and you'll find they're not just talking randomly but making very deliberate use of their voice, not to mention the ones that do those quick cuts some of them do (the amount of time they put into making these must be pretty immense).

Of course, some people do have the time and the interest to put into YouTube, but these tend to be also the people who make vids themselves and are really a minority in the grand scheme of how many people watch these things. So, to answer the above question about "annoying non-theist awards" and nominations, you'd have to be aware of multiple Youtubers and be subscribed to all of them and watch all of their vids. That's a massive, massive time commitment if you're not "in" YouTube making your own vids, so the vast majority of the audience are very selective with who they subscribe to - imagine a forum based community where each post lasted about 5 minutes, it'd be pretty hellish trying to find the time to get to know everyone. I care enough to skim read a blog post and then read it thoroughly if I like it, but I don't care enough to watch 10 uninterrupted minutes of non-pornographic video on the net. I have about 3 subscriptions in total, and one of them is starting to annoy me because he takes an hour to say what could be said on a single webpage that you could go through in a few minutes (of course it's graphics work so seeing it screencasted sort of makes up for it, but I don't watch every video that comes my way and I tend to skip through them). If the award above was "most annoying non theist award" (singular) then I might be able to proffer a nomination (it has to be theamazingatheist for that time he got naked on camera) but for multiple categories, I'm kind of dead in the water trying to think of more than three-four individuals, yet alone decide which award to give out to them.

So, in conclusion, YouTube is nice, but the novelty quickly wears off because it's such a time-inefficient way of communicating ideas. ^bomination 14:25, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

He's now having a vote on what categories to include (I suggested "Oojamaflipper Award for Brown Nosing"): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iYXl9M4Qfzc&playnext_from=TL&videos=QqBpdVdktXk&feature=sub --76.18.115.64 (talk) 18:31, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Armond, exactly. A talking head reading an argument is not a justification for using audio/video. The TV news "works" because 1) you're already sitting on your ass sucking at the glass teat, and 2) moving pictures work well for dramatic news, sports highlights, and weather reports. Oh well. So I'd nominate "all of them". ħuman 20:20, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

I find that most TV news doesn't really work because most of the images are irrelevant or meaningless and just designed to provide eye-candy rather than imparting information. Very rarely do you need to see something with your own eyes. Maybe images of a major disaster or a sporting highlight but a financial pundit standing outside the NYSE or Fed Reserve, or a political reporter standing in front of No. 10 or the White House gives us no new information. Radio is much more efficient at informing the listener but then you could read the same stuff in a third of the time and probably retain it better. TV suffers from what people call the MEGO-factor (my eyes glaze over); I often watch the TV weather forecast with all its fancy graphics and still not really know if it's going to rain tomorrow where I live, or not.  Lily ^{Inspirate me.} 08:39, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Speechless

So I was on FSTDT, looking at their top100 and I saw a post (Quote# 69825) that had me thinking, "I'm not reading this" so I followed the link. Right about now, I want Ahmed2010, who wrote, "Yes sex at six can cause psychological damage. But thats only in rare occasions. Most girls are fine. Thats a scientific fact. " to die a slow and horrible death. --PsyGremlinПоговорите! 10:57, 2 May 2010

Well, I wouldn't say scientific fact, but there is some evidence to suggest that sexual encounters with minors don't deal the psychological damage people think it does. Indeed, the key point in Richard Dawkin's "religion is child abuse" centres on the fact someone he knows who was molested by a priest didn't mind too much, but a girl being told her best friend would rot in hell for being a protestant left her really scared for life. Actual scientific research into whether this is the case or not is stifled quite badly by the fact that if any psychologist produces this result is ostracised and told to "do more research [until you get the result we want]". However and this is a pretty damn big "however" - this does certainly not excuse or justify sex with a minor that violates the principle of informed consent, and I'd argue that children of that age are unable to give fully informed consent to sexual relations. ^bomination 14:32, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Agreed on that. There's also a power imbalance situation, where it's easy to exert pressure on a child. I remember doing some research into age of consent in Canada a while back, and there were three categories. Child (birth - 14), Young Person (14 - 18), and Adult (18 and up). The main restriction on Adults having sex with Young People was based on that imbalance, where the adult couldn't be a relative of any sort (second cousin, pretty much anything not already covered by incest), any sort of youth leader (priest, scoutmaster, guidance counsellor, etc.), or in any position where the Young Person relies financially or materially on the Adult. Rather an interesting bit of law. --Kels (talk) 12:04, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Thanks to the one who called the police.

It helped greatly, i just go out from the hospital psychiatric ward and i'm followed by a mental doctor (don't know how to say it in english). They diagnosed that i had a beginning of schizophrenia so i won't be posting here anymore. But i thanks everyone who supported me.Especially goonie. Thanks all.Waronstupidity (talk) 16:25, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Hey man, no problem. Good luck in dealing with your troubles. Gooniepunk2010 ^{Oi! Oi! Oi!} 23:38, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

We're glad you're ok! Remember - there's always help if you need it. EddyP (talk) 16:31, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

but why did you think i was trolling you (human) ? anyway tell gooonie his comment helped me greatly.Waronstupidity (talk) 16:35, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Goonie'll see this. Trent said he called (he's our Dear Leader the site owner User:Tmtoulouse incase ya didn't know). I dunno why Human said that. Probably because you were posting a lot of odd stuff that people can't help but be suspicious over. Good luck, Waron, we bid you a speedy recovery. SJ ^Debaser 16:55, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Good to hear. Take care now. But try not to take up smoking ;-p - David Gerard (talk) 17:05, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

thanks :-)Waronstupidity (talk) 17:08, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Eat fresh fruit and vegetables, avoid caffeine, and get in touch with the Schizophrenia Society of Canada. Good luck mate.

Thanks all again and sorry for any inconvenient i may have causedWaronstupidity (talk) 19:05, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Did I miss something? ^bomination 19:30, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

I am glad we could have helped! Aceⁱ⁹ 00:51, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

If you really are schizophrenic, the best advice I can give is keep taking yer meds, even if you feel better. I've known sufferers that get on that rollercoaster of improve-feel better-stop meds-crash-back on meds-improve again, and it's hard on you and those around you. Best to avoid that trap altogether. --Kels (talk) 00:54, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

I used to hang out with a schizoid, it was amusing. As a "sane" person, I can explore being really strange safely in a way that makes me sometimes amusing. As a diagnosed P/S, his goal in life is/was to never seem weird. Since that would get him put under close scrutiny. PS, did Trent really call the cops to help WoS, and if so, how? If the answer is private, please pmail me. ħuman 02:00, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

That's what she said! What? There was no way I was going to pass that up : ) Radioactive afikomen ^{Please ignore all my awful pre-2014 comments.} 00:55, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Pass what up? ħuman 02:24, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

the cop arivved in 5 in the morning and took me to the local hospical and then i was tranfered to the psychiatric ward of another hospital in the nearby city.Waronstupidity (talk) 02:32, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Glad it all worked out, and I hope you don't experience the agony you did the other day ever again. ħuman 03:25, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

I suffer from schizophrenia and was diagnosed around 10 years ago. I can heartily endorse the sentiments about stopping taking medicine. Going against doctors advice in this regard has dangerous consequences and can set recovery back a long time. Damo^Hi 06:59, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

One hell of a week

The last week has been one of the longest I can remember in a long time. I had my last exam of the year, been finishing up coursework, and travelled home (on a smelly bus) twice in three days to calm down one of my best friends who came out to me at the beginning of the week and has subsequently gone into a manically depressed state over it, been into hospital once or twice, and been prescribed a bunch of anti-depressants which take a week or so to kick in properly and at the moment just swing his mood around. Upon arriving home last night to visit him, apart from being informed by my family that my grandmother is ill in hospital (nothing too serious, but nonetheless disconcerting), he was more or less sedated, thus making my journey home in the cold, pissing rain futile. Now I'm back at uni happily relaxing alone, albeit feeling fucking knackered and somewhat ill. This is all just venting, really. What I need an answer to is is beer good for a sore throat? SJ ^Debaser 17:11, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Whisky is better. (Spirits in general.) Sip. That said, real ale can work really nicely. Mild is good because it tastes nice and you can sop up extravagant quantities - David Gerard (talk) 17:13, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

You need a Hot Toddy for your sore throat mate. DeltaStar_{Senior Sysop}^{Speciationspeed!} 11:44, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Fallout 3

Hella good game O.o

Just finished playing it today, managed to get the "ultimate good" ending. Very good game. Javasca₧ sysop and 'crat! (does it matter?) 20:45, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Do you have Broken Steel? God I'm such a geek right now... --Grey (talk) 20:49, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

It's a great game, but... welcome to about 18 months ago. –SuspectedReplicant retire me 20:52, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Maybe this explains it: [1] --Grey (talk) 20:59, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Hey, great games just last a long time. Also, I think I should replay it.Ryantherebel (talk) 21:51, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Just one of the many games in the almighty stack that I need to get around to playing. No joke, got around 40 games that I've bought and not played yet and what is my brain doing? It's jumping up and down and saying 'play Might & Magic VI'.-- ^{Spirit of the Cherry Blossom} 01:48, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

(EC)Fallout 3 has limited replay value (I have just finished Fallout 2 for about the fourth time) the expansions do help extend play time (I never got Mothership Zeta because I thought that it was plain stupid). I am still anxiously waiting New Vegas, which given that it has most of the development team for Fallout 2 and the cancelled Fallout 3 project, should be a big improvement. Speaking of Fallout, yesterday I bought a 2 dollar DVD of old 50s Atomic Bomb awareness footage. The thing I noticed the most was that the houses and the after effects of the war in Fallout 3 looked a lot like the atomic tests "Operation Cue" done in Nevada. The houses in Tranquillity Lane and the ones that appear throughout the game in their dilapidated state, are exactly like a two storey wooden frame one used in the test site. So I give the game full marks in capturing the retro 50s futuristic feel that I saw in the videos. - π 01:55, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

I beat you all. I've just finished playing Baldur's Gate (1999?). Bondurant (talk) 18:02, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Actually, I take that back, Baldur's Gate and Fallout 2 were both 1998. Bondurant (talk) 18:03, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

World. Of. Warcraft. Nutty Roux (talk) 19:18, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Fallout 3 has a lot of replay value. I started implementing new challenges on harder difficulties (Very Hard difficulty, no repairing weapons, only keep what you can carry, never go to your house, only heal by eating food, etc.). I hear through the rumor mill though that New Vegas will have a "Hardcore Mode" that you can activate where you HAVE to eat food and drink water to survive, ammo will have weight, healing is not instantaneous, random encounters can occur while you sleep, etc. For that I am totally pumped! Fallout franchise FTW! The Foxhole Atheist (talk) 20:06, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Hardcore mode just sounds like you have to manage your inventory better (only carry one or two weapons instead of 6, always have food and water with you) and not get bogged down in a fight you can't win. Personally I would only play it that way. - π 00:42, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

The reason why Fallout was so popular was because Black Isle gave the players the tools to be who they wanted in the game, then let the player have fun. Want to own a town? How about be a porn star or prize fighter? Maybe you want to be a heroic legend, if that's your thing. But whatever you wanted to do, you were given that choice. Much the same with the Baldur's Gate and Planescape games, in allowing your character to be just as heroic or bastardly as you wanted. Though i'm still ticked the SpellJammer game never came into existence. I would have liked to steal some planets with my giant space hamsters -- CodyH (talk) 05:55, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Is it just me?

Or does Poor Man's Gatorade sound like it should be another term for urine? Or is it just that I'm high? DickTurpis (talk) 00:43, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

You're just high. If you have sugar in your urine you're diabetic, like my kid sister's dog was. My only disappointment with that interesting article was a lack of scientific explanations of why it works. ħuman 01:57, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

[2]--^talk 04:01, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

You are meant to use wp:Lactated Ringer's solution to cure severe dehydration. But at a push a sugar/salt solution will work, however it can screw the recipient's sodium/potassium/calcium balance. CS Miller (talk) 12:29, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Mornin'

Coffee & Weetbix. Yum. Now to tackle this thing called work. Blergh. --PsyGremlinSpeak! 04:47, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

You're up early, Psy! There's not a lot of us insomniacs about. Also coffee & weetabix. Fried egg on toast in a while. ^{(I am a person not a template)} 04:56, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

It's still last night here, you bastids. Plus, why can't I buy Weetabix in my local drugstore? I used to live on that shit. ħuman 05:09, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Morning all. May have scrambled eggs for breakfast. Woke up early to a clear blue sky (on a bank holiday? Blimey!). Totnesmartin (talk) 06:58, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

'Twas all blue sky, now clouding over. ^{(I am a person not a template)} 07:05, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

I don't remember what I had for breakfast. Aceⁱ⁹ 07:28, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Yes, beautiful blue sky at 7:00 now about 33% cloud cover and a chilly breeze. Scrambled eggs, bacon and the first local asparagus.  Lily ^{Inspirate me.} 08:48, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

'Kinell! It's hailin' now! Weather, eh! ^{(I am a person not a template)} 09:47, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

ahhhh yes, I remember - I didn't have breakfast. I had a frosty reception this morning, in trouble with the missus for drinking too many cocktails and making hilarious use of helium at a wedding show. Aceⁱ⁹ 09:51, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

I've been drinking brew for breakfast, as the old saying goes. Not a great idea, especially that I was basically eating ibuprofen before. SJ ^Debaser 11:31, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Maybe you could team up with Karjou to replace his daily toons with a strip entitled The Whacky World of Ace McWicked? He can't write for shit, but his drawing is improving. Ah, helium. It's probably one reason why they don't have helium balloons at funerals. I may have to add that as a request. --^{Ask me about our muskrat} 11:33, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Sounds like something I'd do to sit alongside Schlafly Doo. The Crazy Caper of Ace McWicked and the Wacky Wedding Reception. SJ ^Debaser 11:36, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Oh, and you could have people dropping monocles in their martinis when Ace decides to do his Hydrogen/Goatse/Hindenberg party trick! --^{Ask me about our verb} 11:42, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

All I want to say is that from the moment I opened my eyes, until now, it has been raining. So much for the start of the dry season. --PsyGremlin話しなさい 18:08, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Holy crap!

Well you can't say people don't read us. Busiest day evah for my little blog. 500 imprints just from WIGOCP alone (tx to whoever WIGOd that). Another 100 from Twitter (who wuz that? Thanks) --PsyGremlinSprich! 18:05, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Both were me ;-) - David Gerard (talk) 19:14, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

You're a star! The Czech is in the male. Ironic thing is, I'd been ignoring the blog for ages, now I'm more determined to keep writing. --PsyGremlinPraat! 19:20, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

The benefits of advertising on RW (call now, our operators are standing by). --PsyGremlinRunāt! 11:01, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Ironee?

I am now in possession of a polling card saying that I'm now officially allowed to go forth and waste my vote on Thursday. The interesting bit being that my local polling station is going to be in a Methodist Church , I find this odd because I am a strong atheist with aspirations of having a drinking problem who intends on voting for the most secular party going . Not sure why I decided to go overboard with the emoticons, though . ^bomination 20:21, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

I got TWO official poll cards 'cause we've got district council elections too. Had a visit from Labour t'other day = told 'em I was voting Lib dem - I'd vote if we'd got one. I hate party politics - the party whip is despicable. ^{(I am a person not a template)} 20:47, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

And I've just checked the voting power index and found that I have 0.06 of a vote rather than the 0.2 I originally thought I did . Therefore I think I'd have more influence on the world by drawing a on the ballot . ^bomination 22:10, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

If you spoil you paper, all the candidates (or a least their agents) have to see the paper, even if it is a diatribe against party politics (if the your vote is not clear, they would normally agree who it was for). So go and write something like Such a parcel of rogues in a nation, bought and sold for a pound of businessman's gold. A plague on all your houses!, it might raise a smile amongst the more literate candidates. CS Miller (talk) 23:13, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Hmmm, so whatever kind of mess you make on the ballot paper, the candidates have to look at it? Wẽãšẽĩõĩď^{Methinks it is a Weasel} 00:08, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Have the option, rather. You can't force them to look at it (long ago I was at a election count as an officer for a candidate). ^{(I am a person not a template)} 00:19, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Each party has the right to inspect every ballot as it is counted. Technically, that means that you can ask to be shown each one, but in real terms it means you get to stand near a counter whilst the ballots are counted.

Technically, everything - everything other than a cross wholly contained in one of the voting squares is a spoiled vote. That includes ticks. I am utterly serious about this: if you put a tick by the candidate you want rather than a cross, it is technically a spoiled paper. Usually what happens is that the Returning Officer gets the party agents together and they agree not to be so stupid, but still...

The reason I know all this stuff is that I ran a few local election nights for the Lib Dems. At the Perth and Kinross by-election in 1995 our unofficial count was less than 0.5% off for each party about 20 minutes before the result was called. It was the first time we used a computer to do the tally and nobody could believe we got it so right - we had to check the spreadsheet afterwards to make sure it wasn't a lucky error. It was at a count in Islwyn (south Wales) that I got to meet Screaming Lord (David) Sutch. Brilliant guy :) –SuspectedReplicant retire me 01:19, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Have the option, indeed. The counters can not reject any ballot paper (at least if it has the official stamp on the back and any mark [something written] by the voter on the front). The counters can only accept papers with a clear, unambiguous, non-identifiable (of the voter) mark. So a paper with an 'X', a tick, or a '1' in only one box is accepted. Anything else, say a tick that starts in one box and goes into the one above, is set aside. What happens next, I'm not so sure about (one of my parents is extremely active in politics and has acted as an agent before, its rubbed of a bit on me). I think these unclear and spoilt votes are then shown to the candidates (or their agents) in the presence of the returning officer. They then decide if it should be counted as vote for one of them, or as a spoilt vote. BTW, at the count the number of spoiled votes is listed, as is the number rejected for lack of an official mark (stamp). BTW don't be stupid and threaten any candidate, your vote *can* be traced to you; its a pain to do tho. CS Miller (talk) 01:39, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Here in the States we just let the Supreme Court pick the President if he's whiny enough. ħuman 03:10, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

This morning I got A personal message from David Cameron tyring to frighten me into voting Conservative to avoid 5 more years of GB which would be the only result if there was a hung parliament. If the governor of the Bank of England is right then I might even think of voting Tory (had I not already voted by post).  Lily ^{Inspirate me.} 07:47, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Just Curious

Just wondering, why do you guys seem to associate liberalism/atheism with 'reason', and conservatism/theism with 'madness'? Just curious. JustCurious (talk) 20:35, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

I don't think fiscal conservatism is heavily associated with madness here. Social conservatism is associated with madness because it's...mad. I don't know if atheism is pushed either, I think agnosticism is the default set of reason. ^{— Sincerely, Neveruse / Talk / Block} 20:41, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

That is interesting. So you judge people on what they believe? How very smart. Just curious. JustCurious (talk) 20:43, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

"What people believe" can be a useful metric. It'd be stupid to ignore it. And you've just been judged. ^{— Sincerely, Neveruse / Talk / Block} 20:48, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

You believe you're cleverer than the average conservative. You are a hideous, judgemental creature, but I forgive you. JustCurious (talk) 20:50, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

And you just judged me on what I believe. You are a hideous, judgmental (and stupid) creature. You must earn your forgiveness. ^{— Sincerely, Neveruse / Talk / Block} 20:52, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

(EC)I wouldn't say that. We generally associate Conservapedia-style conservatism with madness, but, hell, just read the thing, there's no other conclusion to draw. I, for one, wouldn't associate moderate, or even Goldwater conservatism as madness. Nor do I necessarily associate atheism with reason completely. I do tend to think of religion as being faith rather than reason driven, for obvious reasons, and I do see a rift between reason and faith. DickTurpis (talk) 20:43, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Oh I'm sure. Your kind would always talk so reasonably when in the presence of someone who disagrees with your Stalinist world view. But behind closed doors, when amongst your chums, you can't help but mock the risen Christ, and the vast majority of Americans who believe in him. I shudder when I think of you people, plotting to overthrow the American way. Just Curious. JustCurious (talk) 20:46, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Oh, you didn't want a reply. You just wanted to troll and be a dickhead. Well, you succeeded. You are now cordially invited to go fuck yourself. DickTurpis (talk) 23:52, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

It's Marcus. Professor Moriarty 20:51, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

(Well durr) ^bomination 21:25, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Who is Marcus? Is this what happens when an atheist is challenged on their bigotry? Just Curious. JustCurious (talk) 20:54, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Go find an atheist and challenge them. ^{— Sincerely, Neveruse / Talk / Block} 20:56, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Fuck you. JustCurious (talk) 20:58, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Say, friend. Have you heard about ... Xenu? - David Gerard (talk) 21:01, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

We associate reason with reason, and madness with madness. If an atheist or liberal is acting like he deserves a swift kick in the groin, then we point that out. If a conservative does something to defend his fellow man against an increasingly oppressive system, then we prop him up. However, the brand of 'conservative' over at CP is more along the lines of insane fundamental totalitarianism, and therfor is called out on a regular basis. Nice try, MC, but you're still not able to play with the big trolls. -- CodyH (talk) 06:00, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Glenn Beck H8s women

I'm going to guess Beck is not going to buy his mother anything for mother's day--Thanatos (talk) 02:27, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Way to support the few business that are still advertising with you. - π 03:08, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

I honestly don't know what to say about this.Ryantherebel (talk) 22:31, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Does anyone actually WANT to do the Fun: Tips for starting your own conspiracy page?

Yes or no? And this is NOT tips for starting a conspiracy THEORY. It's tips for starting a CONSPIRACY! Is there any part of that that's unclear?--76.18.115.64 (talk) 03:46, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

No! ^{(I am a person not a template)} 03:56, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

My vote: Burn it! The Goonie 1 ^{What's this button do? Uh oh....} 04:01, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

(EC)Create the article yourself and if people want to work on it they will. Nobody likes an Ed Poor, "I have an idea and now you do it according to my directions which I only give out in my head". - π 04:02, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

The article is here, largely by Human. Mustex, if you want to work on it, go right ahead. If you want to discuss changes/progress, do it on the talk page. Please stop spamming the Saloon Bar about it. It really doesn't seem significant enough to make such a big deal about. Wẽãšẽĩõĩď^{Methinks it is a Weasel} 06:39, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, what, I did some some edits to that tripe to make it better, better, better, yeah... or not. Um, yeah, Musty, no one cares, as far as I can tell. Sorry. ħuman 06:49, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Oh, sry. Was suffering from lack of sleep yesterday, and was kind of annoyed by how everyone was initially interested when they thought it was a conspiracy theory, but then lost interest.--76.18.115.64 (talk) 17:23, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Them's the breaks, kiddo. You can't control what others are or aren't interested in. Wẽãšẽĩõĩď^{Methinks it is a Weasel} 17:28, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Cough cough

That's what I'm doing in the mornings these days, and it looks like I'm developing allergies for the first time, well, ever. Ain't that special? Apparently this is the worst year on record for allergies around here. It's also the worst year on record for pollen, driest April on record, least snowfall in March on record, etc., and without runoff it looks like we're headed for drought. Yeah, global climate change is fun, innit? --Kels (talk) 11:58, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

The pollen count around these parts was up around 2000. Fun times. ^{— Sincerely, Neveruse / Talk / Block} 18:18, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

Ugh, try living with WP:Asian Dust. I get in my car in the morning and turn on the wipers - the fluid turns a dark yellow and sludges down the windshield. People everywhere in Korea have terrible cough, sore throats, or infections from this thin yellow dust that carries bacteria everywhere. It is abominable.--^talk 02:33, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

You drive? In Korea? Your balls are way bigger than I expected, man. I spent two years driving an M1078 LMTV and a 45 passenger bus and I barely felt safe in those! Kudos! The Foxhole Atheist (talk) 00:38, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

I was in Beijing recently. You know that sensation in your nose like you're about to sneeze, only you don't? I felt like that on & off for most of the week. I'm not sure whether it's the dust or the pollution, probably a combination of the two. Wẽãšẽĩõĩď^{Methinks it is a Weasel} 18:07, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Addressing the point in question from the above section

Moved to Forum:Equating liberalism with intelligence 13:30, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

My imminent birthday

I'm expecting lots of presents from you guys, seeing as you all completely forgot Hanukkah last year : ) Radioactive afikomen ^{Please ignore all my awful pre-2014 comments.} 06:23, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

So I take it you haven't been told to fuck off today so you have taken to fishing for one? - π 06:25, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Man, you're breakin' my heart. Radioactive afikomen ^{Please ignore all my awful pre-2014 comments.} 06:31, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Nah, I am just pissed flash is not working - again. - π 06:34, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

My birthday's gonna be celebrated. ^{(I am a person not a template)} 06:38, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

You're the Virgin Mary? Who would have guessed it? Wẽãšẽĩõĩď^{Methinks it is a Weasel} 06:43, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

So what you're saying is, you're old enough to remember Jesus? : ) Radioactive afikomen ^{Please ignore all my awful pre-2014 comments.} 06:42, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Remember? I taught the blighter all he knew and what does he do? Goes and starts a religion, already. All I get is credit for getting stuck in a stable with my no good husband on Hannukkah! ^{(I am a person not a template)} 06:47, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Desperation smells like bitter, right? Or what? ħuman 06:50, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

I didn't forget Hanukkah, I completely ignored it. I also worked December 25 in order to get away from Christmas but that didn't work as I ended up being surrounded by people who were determined to celebrate it with cheap oriental decorations. I'm also at an age where birthdays are something I'd rather forget for a while. I've got nothing against giving kids presents but for most adults the whole reciprocal gift giving is a social minefield which nobody ends up feeling good about.  Lily ^{Inspirate me.} 08:01, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

PS Lest I appear miserly, I buy presents for adult friends and family at other times of the year as a surprise or when I see something which I think they will particularly like.

After recently coming into adulthood I've become far less enthusiastic about birthday's. I hate making a fuss over myself, and I hate even more inviting people to my house to "celebrate." Last year I turned eighteen and from what I remember I did literally nothing on my birthday except ask for the day off work. This year, assuming anyone remembers (which thanks to Facebook they probably will), I might wind up in a pub trying to get free drinks for the whole night. SJ ^Debaser 12:17, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

I always seem to have a couple of friends over and end up cooking a huge meal. Did a 6 course japanese meal last time and was fucking knackered afterwards. I think I'll just sit on the couch and drink myself into a stupor in front of the telly in the future. Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 12:26, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Ok RA, I'll say it - Happy Birthday!!! :D Hope it's a good one, have fun! Refugee^{talk page} 19:46, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Happy many returns. Wẽãšẽĩõĩď^{Methinks it is a Weasel} 17:40, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Normal service resuming

I've checked Alexa and we seem to be heading back down to normal levels again (in a way, aww, attention was good, but on the other hand, yippee, we can use the site again!). Our "traffic rank" stat is still above 100,000 and the "reach" stat seems to be levelling out a little higher than it was but "bounce%" and "search%" seem to be recovering, indicating that we're going back to our normal style of traffic which is people Googling to find out what Poe's Law actually is. ^bomination 12:49, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

We are still churning at about double our usual rate of traffic, most of it can traced to the in links from social networking sites still producing a bit of traffic. How much of the initial spike turns to sustained traffic, or if it all goes back to base line remains to be seen. I will dissect the anatomy of the traffic spike sometime this month as I think its inception, progression, and resolution are interesting to think about.

I have made some adjustments to the server beyond the added RAM, and taken together seem to be making the site function fairly well even under more heavy traffic than we are used to. The current traffic load is about 50 percent more than the load that ground our last $200-a-month commercial server to a hault. As much a pain in the ass as it can be sometimes to have to host RW on a private web server, this is a good example why we made the move. tmtoulouse 15:42, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Can you break down expenses at all? What's it cost to run things (server, connection)? - David Gerard (talk) 15:47, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

The "monthly" cost of RW I calculate at about $30, which is the costs that I have to pay above what I would normally pay for an internet connection to support the web server. Additional costs come is spikes, and apparently in bulk, when hardware needs to be replaced or upgraded. Now I have a lot of random pieces of computers laying around, some of them I have no problem shoving in the server (if a power supply goes bad I will use one sitting on my shelf) others that are more intricately linked to performance I try and get new whenever possible.

Our big costs right now are the new memory and hard drive, which I think based on a couple donations we have received I am "out" around $120 still. There are, of course, many other things in the works that need funding before I can move forward with them. We have talked about off site backup options, providing a content dump of the site, and forming up an LLC to transfer ownership to. None of these things have to happen at a particular time or RW fails, so they fit in the "nice but optional" category that await either me having disposable income (hahahahahahaha) or donations for funding.

Short version is: the basic operating costs of RW on a monthly basis I can handle out of pocket, the larger expenses some of which are optional I rely more heavily on donations from users. tmtoulouse 15:56, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Can I use a debit card to donate via PayPal, and do I need to sign up or anything? EddyP (talk) 16:27, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

With paypal you do not have to sign up in order to donate. You can donate with a credit card, a debit card with a credit card number associated with it (many banks do it that way now), or directly from a bank account using an e-check style donation. You can also send a check/money order to me directly, though an e-mail letting me know about it is always appreciated. Any help any one can toss our way is great, at the moment there is no real hurry because its the beginning of the month. But I spent my last week and a half food budget on our hardware. Ramon noodles make me cranky, and a cranky sysadmin is a dangerous thing! tmtoulouse 16:43, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Do you think it will go back to the previous baseline or stay higher for a while yet? ^bomination 16:46, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Ask me again in a week? More seriously, I am trying to make an estimate of the level of traffic that can be explained by in linking from social networking sites to should peter out over time, versus the "base line" traffic.

Assuming our pre-exposure base line traffic stays the same, and setting that value to the average of about 6000 visits a day, we have about an extra 5000-7000 visits. The break down of the number of those visits that are from social networking sites is not easy to nail down precisely. Which means it all comes down to probabilistic reasoning.........its multiple regression time! BRB. tmtoulouse 16:54, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

There we go, I've done my bit (after two years). EddyP (talk) 16:55, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Well, reposts on Facebook seem to have died off to nothing in the last week. Twitter also seems similarly blank but it appears that two individuals who will remain nameless are inviting LessWrong to come and tear the wiki apart. ^bomination 17:00, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

That post I linked on Talk:LessWrong? That was from February. Although I did post to my Twatter/Arsebook inviting the LessWrongers to stop by the article on them ... [insert 'prior probability' joke here] - David Gerard (talk) 17:44, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

I doubt LW would "tear us apart." I'm 80% sure that I'm 90% sure of that. Tetronian ^{you're clueless} 02:21, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Don't be so down on them. Sites like that are where sceptics with an actual sense of humour can be recruited from. Probably^{[citation NOT needed]} - David Gerard (talk) 07:40, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Thanks Eddy, and thanks to everyone who has donated over our years together. Now, as per Armondikov's question, there are still a lot of sources for links, something awful, reddit, stumbleupon, etc. I matched a decay curve to my estimates for the social networking traffic in order to try and tease it out, so using the decay curve and our average pre-exposure baseline traffic as predictors we have about a 20 percent residual error. That means roughly 2000-2500 visits are left over to explain, now the sources for these visits can be multiple fold: a bad fit for the decay function of the social networking visits (so they will go away with time), random fluctuations/noise in the data, and last our item of interest an increase in base line traffic. There is no way to try and tease these apart directly, though we could get a measure for the noise in our reported traffic levels, and cross check the confidence level in the decay curve......but that is getting into an all day long project. tmtoulouse 17:04, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

The extra 2000 could be people stumbling or facebooking the article and then emailing the link - is there a spike from hotmail, yahoo etc? Totnesmartin (talk) 17:08, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

The decay curve in theory takes a lot of that into account, it is a fitted curve to the decay of the traffic spike over the last few days which dominates all other sources of traffic, it is not fitted to a list of specific sources. It is not a perfect solution but its what I came up with in my 10 minutes on matlab. Beyond that more will be clear in a week or so and I can really dig into the numbers. tmtoulouse 17:15, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

I had a look at Reddit and Digg during the spike and didn't actually find much, there was a link or two to the tumbleweeds but it didn't seem that popular or out of the ordinary - maybe my searching for "rationalwiki" didn't help, especially as the Twitter generation are using tinyurl type things that hide the name of the address in the searchable text. Stumbleupon, however, I completely forgot about so I don't know if that's a major source instead. You know if you model this well and fit a nice decay curve I'd like to see it written up, could be very interesting and perhaps PalMD (as he mentioned something recently about tracking links through social networks and all) may be interested too. ^bomination 18:19, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Signs of the times

This made me laugh.Can anyone can come up with a good WIGO:World for it.  Lily ^{Inspirate me.} 18:53, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Tried my best. --PsyGremlinSnakk! 19:03, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

I keep forgetting that I have that script by Armondikov's friend installed that randomly changes words in BBC articles to "your mum". It can be unintentionally hilarious. Professor Moriarty 07:17, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Was your mum a dogging area? ^bomination 12:23, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

What I always find funny...

...is articles like this. What the heck does it prove? It seems like they interviewed two or three people and are claiming that they know how the entire freaking city of New York is feeling. Sadly, seemingly every story on our news in the US is like this; I've rarely seen it on the BBC. Tetronian ^{you're clueless} 00:00, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Well, it's just a puff piece, right? "Human interest" filler? Wait, why does a web site ever need "filler"? A book of poetry or a "record album" (remember those?) or a dead tree news product might be padded out to make it the expected size, but a web site? ħuman 02:38, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

I thought the point of that article was to reassure Londoners their "keep calm and carry on" attitude to the July 7 2005 bombings was the right one. Rather than anything about New Yorkers per se - David Gerard (talk) 07:26, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

While I don't like the excessive growth of these sort of articles, a good reporter will spend a few days just talking, hanging around in bars and feeling the mood. From that he tries to give a good overview of the situation by making it appear he spoke to only a few people to make it feel more life-like; not many people like reading sociologic statistics. Now the entire thing is obviously subjective. That isn't a bad as such, but one requires a good reporter, honesty and a bit of time. Given the source, I would dare to trust the general atmosphere of the article. — Pietrow ☏ 17:45, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

"Don't Believe Everything You Read" Fallacy?

Ok, this is another in a long string of cases of me wondering if I've found a new logical fallacy, or if it's already covered. Just told a communist about Lysenkoism, and he responded "Don't believe everything you read on wikipedia." Didn't bother to refute it, though. Is this a logical fallacy?--Mustex (talk) 05:29, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

No, just stupidity. ħuman 06:14, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

I think I may have just forced the guy between a rock and a hard place. He's in NN's camp, and they're all trying like hell not to block me from their channels because they know I want them too. On the other hand (btw, since posting the initial comment he's admitted he hasn't heard of this), if he tries to research it, it's going to quickly find out that I am, indeed, irrefutably RIGHT, and no amount of reinterpretation or spin-doctoring the facts can lead anyone to a conclusion other than "Stalin endorsed Lamarcking evolution, and applied it to Soviet agriculture on a large scale." I'm eager to see his next move. :) --Mustex (talk) 06:35, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

...on a related note, I seem to be running into alot more idiots on youtube lately. I'm now in the process of arguing with an idiot who hates Islam, and is actually BRAGGING about the fact that he doesn't actually know what Muslims believe, what the sects of Islam are (beyond a blind assertion that they're "killing each other by the thousands for not being the right kind of Muslim"), or the history of Islam. (he appears to be an atheist, although this is usually the kind of thing I hear from Rednecks) So, how about "Argument from claiming your opponents argument is based on details that aren't important."--Mustex (talk) 07:40, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Don't believe everything your read (which must surely include the Bible as well as Wikipedia) is a good piece of advice for those with a sceptical turn of mind. However it should not be used as an excuse to dismiss everything out of hand. (Wikipedia relies on verifiable sources, the Bible does not.) Like the creationism/evolution "debate" both sides are not of equal weight when determining the likely truth so when they say don't believe everything you read on Wikipedia it's more probable that you shouldn't disbelieve everything you read.  Lily ^{Inspirate me.} 07:55, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

It's probably just a non sequitor, as "don't believe everything you read on Wikipedia" doesn't follow from the argument about an individual subject. WP may get individual details in low priority articles wrong, but the system is set up so that you can't just make something up from scratch and have it as an entire article, that would require a conspiracy of a dozen editors at least. But the strengths and weakness of Wikipedia aren't really the point, you can't just dismiss an entire topic on the basis of "don't believe everything you read on Wikipedia". Although Lily is also pretty on the money with it being sound advice (more specifically, you should read everything that's on WP, links, previous versions, references, templates and the talk page to get a good view of how accurate the article will be, similarly, I'm always skeptical about RW pages where the talk page is still a red link). ^bomination 12:04, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Senator Harrison (talk) 15:07, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

The idiot is now attempting to call Lysenkoism and the Great Leap Forward "errors" that have been "exagerrated" by Western scholars with an "anti-communist bias." THE STUPID! IT BURNS!--76.18.115.64 (talk) 17:22, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

"Don't believe ANYTHING you read on Wikipedia"

On a related note, I noticed a trend while bickering about various topics on the internet that some people dismiss a link from WP out of hand as completely worthless (while holding pu the last talking point from Beck or WorldNet Daily as gospel), even the most general and innocuous article. I've the impression these folks don't have a good idea about how WP works or, for that matter, how real encyclopedias are put together. ^Me!Sheesh!_Mine! 18:08, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, this is starting to sound like another logical fallacy. "Because you don't think the source is reliable enough, you don't have to bother disproving that other person's claim."--76.18.115.64 (talk) 20:27, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

The Story of Science

For anyone with access to iPlayer, I'd suggest watching this on BBC4. If not, I'm not sure where you could get it, but never mind. It seems much better than Brian Cox's Wonders of the Solar System (not that Wonders is bad, it's just big on "oh look, WOOO!!!!" and small on information I haven't known since I was 10). Smaller budget as this one is a BBC4 series, of course, but a much more informative show. Rather than just having Cox repeat the same thing every 7 minutes and never actually explain anything, Story of Science has Michael Mosley go into some good historical depth about the development of the models used to explain the solar system. He goes on a bit about Tycho before goingto Kepler and Copernicus, which is cool because most pop science just jumps straight to Gallileo and that's that. And Gallileo made his own telescope lenses by grinding them on cannon balls. Anyway, thank fuck for BBC4. ^bomination 23:26, 1 May 2010 (UTC)

So cannonballs were actually good for something?! Cool. ħuman 01:41, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

Didn't he also drop two different sized cannonballs off the leaning tower of Pisa to prove something or other?  Lily ^{Inspirate me.} 15:28, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

I think that James Burke did a series on this about 25 years ago... --The Emperor _{Kneel before Zod!} 15:54, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

We have that one mentioned in scientific mythology. It's an old and nice story, but fairly unlikely to be entirely true. ^bomination 16:06, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

I was aware of the urban legend status of the Pisa experiment, that's why I phrased my comment in those terms. But thanks to Theemperor for the James Burke link. I never saw that series, so I'll catch up with them all on YouTube. In a similar vein the excellent History of the World in 100 Objects resumes on Radio 4 this week. Anyone, including those west of the pond, can catch up with the first 30 on the BBC website without any regional download restriction.  Lily ^{Inspirate me.} 09:07, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

My hardback copy of the book The Day the Universe Changed arrived this morning, £2.75 from Amazon and in very good condition.  Lily ^{Inspirate me.} 07:27, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

Figuring out the Teabaggers

What if the GOP/FOX News did not create the TP to protest Obama, but to make him seem weak as a leader? What if the plan is they really get out of hand? Perhaps if they get real violent, the right-wing will blame it on Obama's ineffectual leadership. Or is that too much to assume from people like Beck and Palin?--Thanatos (talk) 23:16, 3 May 2010 (UTC)

They didn't so much create the Tea Parties, as much as they fostered them. They seemed like a good thing to latch onto in terms of votes/ratings. I am sure they would never have been as big without their assistance, but I don't really see a conspiracy behind them. - π 00:45, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Just a thought though. I think the higherups at Fox News are reconsidering their relationship with the teabaggers, but Hannity, Beck and the others just can't bring themselves to write a Dear John. I am just saying that in 2012, dealing with the TP might be an actual issue. If they get worse and do something stupid (like kill someone), Obama will be blamed if he does nothing. If he does do something, he will be viciously attacked, while the TP will denounce the guilty parties while possibly getting worse still, saying they are a scapegoat. Palin, or whoever is actually going to run, will sweep in to dominate the crowd and turn them more anti-'Bama. I've thought this out, possibly too much so.--Thanatos (talk) 02:24, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

This line of thought shows up in quite a few conspiracy theories too and it's one that mildly annoys me. The fact that x organisation benefits from y result doesn't mean that they planned it, just that they're taking advantage of it. Assuming Fox is hoping that the tea partiers make Obama look bad, that doesn't mean they created them (or encouraged them) for that purpose, just that they've seen the possibility and are pushing it. X Stickman (talk) 11:51, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

Vote!

Your chance to vote in the RW UK Election on 6 May 2010. Who does RW want? Hope I've set this vote thing up properly - it seems to be absurdly easy.--Bob^{Spring is sprung!} 15:45, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Labour (Brown)	7	Vote
Conservative (Cameron)	4	Vote
Liberal Democrat (Clegg)	38	Vote
UKIP (Lord Pearson)	1	Vote
Green (Caroline Lucas)	6	Vote
BNP (Who cares?)	5	Vote

Who the fuck voted for Fat Hitler? ^bomination 16:10, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Who's Fat Hitler? I was just voting randomly while fixing a bug. -- Nx / talk 16:13, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

I ACCIDENTALLY THE WHOLE BNP - David Gerard (talk) 16:52, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

If it was accidental, you should be able to change your vote by clicking on one of the others. Wẽãšẽĩõĩď^{Methinks it is a Weasel} 17:29, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Please no! This thing is beautifully simple! Don't change it!--Bob^{Spring is sprung!} 18:19, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

We need to have a page where we stay up all night liveblogging the election, like the last US ele4ction. That was great fun! Totnesmartin (talk) 17:18, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

UK General Election, 2010/Election night special any good? Totnesmartin (talk) 17:20, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Great idea. Going to set it up?--Bob^{Spring is sprung!} 18:04, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

I'll be here. My lack of television means I'll be listening online and getting drunk. SJ ^Debaser 17:31, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

I'll probably be around too. I somehow doubt that I'll have it on wall-to-wall TV here.--Bob^{Spring is sprung!} 17:59, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

I'll be here - telly at other end of house from pooter.

I'll be here but probably on IRC more. –SuspectedReplicant retire me 18:02, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Interesting that we're forecasting a Lib Dem landslide.--Bob^{Spring is sprung!} 18:11, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Felt bad for Lord Pearson, so voted him. Timppeli 18:13, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Wow. That's the best argument I've ever heard against democracy.--Bob^{Spring is sprung!} 18:17, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Emotions have an important role in decision making process, decided to go with pity this time. Timppeli 18:33, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

If WP is 6x more liberal than America, what does that make us?  Lily ^{Inspirate me.} 18:50, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Here's what I find interesting:

• Wikipedia is the house of atheism.
• Britain is the land of atheism.

Ergo, Wikipedia is in Britain. ^{— Sincerely, Neveruse / Talk / Block} 18:55, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

50% of en:wp edits are from the US, 25% from the UK. UK has one-fifth the population of the US, so UK people edit 2.5x as much per head of population - David Gerard (talk) 19:01, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Enlighten an ignorant yank who considers himself something on an Anglophile but in this case must claim ignorance: in terms of specific policy, where do Labour and the Liberal Dems differ? I'm sure Wikipedia could tell me, but only in about 5000 words. Looking for some Schlafly-style conciseness here. Thanks. DickTurpis (talk) 19:03, 5 May 2010 (UTC) Oh, and why is Blaenau Gwent People's Voice Party not a choice? DickTurpis (talk) 19:05, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

I believe the most important difference is that the Lib Dems are not led by Gordon Brown.--Bob^{Spring is sprung!} 19:14, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Labour differ with the Lib Dems over really important stuff not at all designed to make the Lib Dems seem like the cool party to vote for. Oh, and proportional representation. The Lib Dems really want proportional representation. Because it's the fairest system, and not at all because it means there would be more libs dems in power. --JeevesMkII ^{The gentleman's gentleman at the other site} 19:17, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Not too helpful so far. I know the Lib Dems want proportional representation because its the only way they'll get a lot of seats, but if that's the only difference between them and Labour they might as well get their seats by disbanding and joining the Labour Party. Wouldn't need proportional representation then. So where are their policy differences? I assume Iraq is one, but that's recent. Where do their platforms diverge? DickTurpis (talk) 19:25, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

The essential difference is cultural. Labour is (despite New Labour's crawling up business's arse) historically the party of the working class, and a lot of its voters remember life under Thatcher and shudder. The LibDems are quintessentially middle class and don't really emotionally understand that anyone isn't - David Gerard (talk) 19:37, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Libs tend too be Protestant while Catholics tend to be Labour. Amazing how these cultural factors still play a big role while they all claim to be rational secular atheists. nobs^{don't bother me}!~

Wow Rob, so not only do you buy everything Andy says, you also believe everything 'they' say. Did you study, or are you naturally an idiot. PS The UK has more cathedrals than the US. Does that make the US more atheist then. Sounds like it to me. people want to know. --PsyGremlinFale! 20:20, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

(EC) I think you mean: It's amazing that these cultural factors still play a big role while Andy Schlafly claims they are all secular atheists. ^{— Sincerely, Neveruse / Talk / Block} 20:20, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Wow, Britain's 4.2 million Catholics sure can get the vote out! Totnesmartin (talk) 20:30, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

The comment by "Nobs" above is the funniest thing I have read today. It goes so far beyond "wrong" that it needs a status all by itself.--Bob^{Spring is sprung!} 20:32, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Protestants and Catholics claim to be rational secular atheists? Hmm... Think im missing something here. Timppeli 20:34, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Ok, let me explain. It's amusing to watch rational secular atheists root & take sides in a dispute between voters who largely define themselves based on traditional religious prejudices. Traditional, I say, because most are secularized anyway. nobs^{don't bother me} 23:13, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Actually, there is a historical association between liberalism and methodism in the UK. This page has a good history. OTOH, the Church of England is often described as "The Tory Party at Prayer" (eg here). These days, the link between politics and religion is a minor one at best, and CP (via RobS) has it wrong as usual. –SuspectedReplicant retire me 21:31, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

The big difference in economic positions is that Labour kept, and wants to keep pretty much the same tax system that the Tories set up during the eighties (the tax system that the Tories set up during the eighties is easy to understand. If you were in the band of voters that vote Tories then you paid a much lower percentage of your income in taxes, compared to those band of voters that voted for any party that wasn't Tory. The same theory was also applied for working out where government budgets would be spent), whilst the Lib Dems want to shift the way taxes are paid so that those on the lowest incomes don't end up paying a much higher percentage of their income compared to the higher earners. Apart from that there are differences on nuclear issues, the Lib Dems don't want to renew Trident unless it is really necessary, and don't want to build new nuclear power stations to plug the upcoming energy gap, basically because it isn't possible to build the nuclear power stations in time, and the stations would have to be either heavily subsidised by the government or, because your average nuclear power station is hideously expensive, there would be a massive hike in the price of electricity, one that the British public would probably look to avoid paying, a la the Fuel Tax Protests.-- ^{Spirit of the Cherry Blossom} 21:20, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Well, its 23:20 BST Wednesday 5th May 2010 and, given that Newsnight has just finished, as a Pratchett fan I can declare with some certainty that we have entered the clam before the storm. Make sure you go out tomorrow and vote, even if its only for Goat.-- ^{Spirit of the Cherry Blossom} 22:23, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

I'm not well up on Pratchett but did you really mean clam before the storm? I just wondered if it was a meme I should know about.  Lily ^{Inspirate me.} 07:33, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

Yep, not exactly a meme, but the clam before the storm is definitely a Pratchett thing. As is the saying: "The leopard does not change his shorts."-- ^{Spirit of the Cherry Blossom} 11:10, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

I voted Green just so I could legitimately say I've voted for a Green candidate. Yeah, it doesn't matter, but its not like voting for a Green candidate ever does. MDB (talk) 11:08, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

For those who want to know where the parties policies differ: Where they stand (BBC). Crundy^{Talk nerdy to me} 12:55, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

O.o

What's the official RationalWiki position on Quantum stirring sticks? http://www.quantumagewater.eu/contents/en-us/d1.html

Features include Mitsubishi Lupilon & Bayer Makrolon construction and Minerals with a High Matrix frequency! Sen (talk) 18:27, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

It's "Quantum", so it must be real.... <facepalm> -Ravenhull (talk) 19:00, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Does that mean you can only find it, if you aren't looking for it? --PsyGremlinSprich! 19:10, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

I'm really hoping that's a cynical fraud. I'd hate to think the people selling that shit actually believed their own hype. --JeevesMkII ^{The gentleman's gentleman at the other site} 19:11, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

What does one do, stick those up one's cat's bum to see if they are dead or alive? Sounds quite practical to me. ħuman 22:30, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Careful when doing that... you're likely to get quantum all over your hands. --JeevesMkII ^{The gentleman's gentleman at the other site} 22:49, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

What really hurts - For EU-citizens 19% tax will be added.  Lily ^{Inspirate me.} 11:59, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

FFS It’s said that 75% of all disease can be traced back to even short term dehydration – from hypertension to strokes to cancer, depression and arthritis. And Even if you drink enough water every day (half your body weight in ounces) does that mean 'half your body weight fluid ounces' or 'half x one-sixteenth of your body weight (in pounds) fluid ounces'? We should be able to drum up a good article on this as it gives way more scope for snark than Shoo tags.  Lily ^{Inspirate me.} 12:09, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

I see that the water question is answered in the FAQ - I was just reading the Research page. But the FAQ starts off:

“”Quantum Age products are very unique and they are becoming available simultaneously with a new appearing era of big changes that just started. These products represent the Life Force behind everything, that which enables movement and improvement. Quantum Age products are carriers for the Life Force and are the tools for humanity during this time of reality change and grow in consciousness. Not only do they help us to change our own health and personal energy, they also help with the changes in our environment, waters and crops and contribute to a worldwide change in the way we think and act, in short.. one of a change in consciousness.

And I thought the Dutch usually spoke reasonable English rather than just running it through Google translate.  Lily ^{Inspirate me.} 12:17, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

The Quantum Era is a new thing? So when they worked out the weird quantum stuff that crackpots are so enamoured of in the inter-war period, that didn't count? Professor Moriarty 14:08, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

OK, I started Quantum Stirwand. I reckon there's enough material to make it into a featured article if anyone would like to help out in transcribing some of the audios or videos.  Lily ^{Inspirate me.} 14:02, 6 May 2010 (UTC)