What's happened to the Project SWORD page on Wikipedia? It was long and detailed and talked about, for instance, Operation SWORD in Captain Scarlet. I'd added to it myself. It's been replaced by this much shorter http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_SWORD, which quotes my checklist from the 1990's. I'm still getting used to Wiki. Do articles get removed and replaced like this a lot?
How odd. Maybe someone drastically reduced it as part of their editing session? Take a look at the "history" of the page ... does that explain what's happened?
ReplyDeletehttp://tinyurl.com/6tugjm2
Someone named "Bob Castle" seems to have been doing a lot of editing to it. Check the link I gave above.
ReplyDeleteAre you able to contact him if you have an account at wiki?
I'm not sure, but I gather there's been a lot of weeding of links to sites that include "copyright infringements" (that topic's been in the news a lot of late) meaning unauthorised use of other's text and esp pictures. This is why I believe both major MMM sites (John Eaton's and Keith Meyer's) are no longer linked.
ReplyDeleteWhich is a pity for so much good information is now no longer linked for interested readers.
Instead there's a link to toypedia, which (last time I looked) had just copied verbati the text from the wikipedia page. Tho that could also be due to toypedia itself, which takes a most cavalier attitude to other people's work on other parts of its site. It "syndicates" a number of toy-related blogs (this one included) without a link back, proper accreditation or (Mr Woods may confirm this) so much as a by-your-leave. They do host various other online publications (I think in an effort to generate visitors for their own auction endeavours) but still...
off the soapbox
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Paul
erm, that's 'verbatim' with an m. And re-reading that, I meant that I suspect toypedia people to have put their links on toy-related wikipedia pages. I don't know if they replaced the other links, which would be crass indeed.
ReplyDeleteAlso not the first time wikipedia editors did mass-removals (also due to wiki pages containing unsubstantiated 'primary' texts instead of substantiated descriptions based on primary information found elsewhere), but the links to John and Keith's site have been gone for quite some time.
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Paul
Having been Head of Toys and Collectables for Mr Braun's (sorry; Joshick or is it La Toyah, or both?) previous endeavour - I could tell you all sorts - some of which was on the internet a while ago (we had a bit of a scrap on a franchise forum back in 2007) - instead I'll just suggest that if he ever takes my blog without asking I'll sue him £100 for every day he has it up there! And if he asks - the answer's NO!
ReplyDeleteSeems daft that a really detailed SWORD article has been replaced with a footnote. Don't think there were any copyright problems in there. Doesn't put me in the mood to re-write the bits I did. They might get removed. I suppose that's people power!
ReplyDelete(nods) I agree. Ridiculous. It's not even categorised as an article now ... just as a "stub" ... and the cheek is it says at the bottom,
ReplyDelete"This toy-related article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it."
Pffft. I can sympathise with your reluctance to re-write. I gave up doing that with wiki a long time ago. Sadly, it was mostly a waste of effort because someone simply kept removing any additions.
@Woodsy: I haven't seen your contribution on Sword to Wiki, but knowing your enthusiasm I wouldn't be surprised if there was quite a bit of (what could be perceived as) 'primary' information?
ReplyDelete@Toad: that's exactly one of the things I don't like about Wiki. Its contents are hardly stable, and subject to (hopefully) well-meaning but (to the uninformed) arbitrary removal of what was useful information. Shame it got you discouraged - their loss.
@Maverick: being a nosey so&so sometimes, your comment has me intrigued. Any chance of a link to that forum entry (you've got my email)?
Best
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Paul
Hi Paul...which Paul? Actually I don't need your eMial 'cos it's all in the public domain! On that there inter-web wibbly wobbly way thingy...I'll sort it all out tomorrow as I'm very very drunk!
ReplyDeletehttp://everyjoe.com/work/will-auctioning4u-save-the-ebay-drop-off-franchise/comment-page-9/#comments
ReplyDeleteYou'll find the bulk of it here, I've given you the link to page 9 as the whole thing is now back-to-front, it's been edited over the years and the whole site has changed hands twice and is now an Add-driven 'vehicle' - itself ironic as it stated life as a serious site called franchisepick about the ups (and mostly) downs of franchising.
You need to scroll to the bottom to find the oldest comment, then read back up the page, then hit 'older posts' to go to the newer comments!
It keeps re-loading to the top of the page to keep you checking the Adds as well...ho hum! I come in on page 7!
I'll try to copy them all and get them in the right order, I may even have a full page somewhere...it used to be one page with the newest comment at the bottom.
There were a couple of other threads somewhere, along with some stuff on eBay blogs and some other stuff on one of his minions blogs along with various bits on other franchise forums.