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Jack Mitchell (photographer)


Hi Valereee,

I just saw your message on my talk page re: Jack Mitchell (photographer). These days, I edit only as time permits. Thank you for reaching out. I also had a chance to see the great work you did reviving/restoring that article. As you probably noticed, I threw up my hands on it years ago. After all the work I did convincing Jack to contribute so many extraordinary photos to this project, during his lifetime I was unable to protect either his article or his images as he would have liked. Obviously, I know the very nature of this project is that it's constantly changing - and I made that abundantly clear to him. But I also know that Jack felt terribly disappointed in the way we responded to his remarkable generosity. Sadly, he lived to see all the work I did on his BLP at the time in 2012, removed before his death in 2013. And not until your recent work - some 7 years later - has any of it been restored. Jack was a genuinely lovely and surprisingly generous man. And although we never met in person, after several emails and phone calls, I came to consider him a friend. All of this is likely TMI for you. But I felt, given your work and current request, you deserved the background. Now, I understand you're requesting additional images from the person who controls his estate? What additional images are you asking for and what's the status of that request? X4n6 (talk) 04:42, 12 May 2021 (UTC)

@X4n6, actually, in the time since, I've been in contact with the manager of his estate, and they are (understandably) concerned about further donations lessening the value of the estate. I think we'll just have to go with the images we have! I was really hoping we'd get one of his dancers-in-motions images, but maybe in thirty or so years, when the copyrights start to expire! :)
I'm so sorry to hear that he was disappointed with WP's use of his works. That makes me so sad. I wish I'd come across his article earlier. I truly couldn't believe it when I saw it...I was like, wait, what? —valereee (talk) 20:07, 13 May 2021 (UTC)
@Valereee, I really am sorry that I wasn't in contact with you earlier. Or in the recent case, sooner. As you've probably figured out, Jack's catalogue is as voluminous as it is extraordinary. While he did more than 30 years of dance shots of virtually everyone famous to countless thousands much less so, as you know, he also shot virtually everyone in the film and television world. From what I believe was John Lennon's last professional session, to what I know was Whitney Houston's first ever professional session. In fact, after Whitney's tragic loss, Jack mentioned to me that he had all these early, unpublished shots of her when she was still in high school. He knew he had been the first pro to shoot her. But he thought her loss meant no one would ever be interested in those photos. I told him he was nuts(!) - because interest in them would actually increase significantly because of the public's increased interest in her life. But Jack had to be convinced to even tell his reps he had them. Finally, I wore him down and he told them. They went crazy for them, sold them immediately for well into six figures, CNN got a temporary exclusive, which they used until the last moment and the photo house owns them to this day. So that was one good thing a WP editor did for him!
But yes, WP didn't give either him or his work the respect he felt came with his generosity. Again, obviously I understand how the project works and I explained that to him. But he always felt the quality of the images he was giving would speak for themselves. So he couldn't understand why, for example, the Alfred Hitchcock page was using a washed out, generic studio shot in the infobox instead of his shot of Hitch, which became the definitive image. I think, even according to Hitch! The same with: Natalie Wood, Meryl Streep, Andy Warhol and John Lennon.
You could say it's just the expected ego of every artist to prefer their own work, but if you see how dramatic the pages are when Jack's work is in the infobox: Truman Capote, Leonard Bernstein, Leontyne Price and Ann Reinking, they do speak for themselves. If nothing else, Jack knew the quality and value of his work. So when Picasso himself gives you an original and you bury it to feature someone else's Polaroid, Pablo could be inclined to wonder why he even bothered. Again, I certainly get that this is a community and everything is constantly changing. But I also know this is also why it's difficult to get folks to make significant donations. You're essentially allowing some nameless wonder to distort, edit or worse, even ignore your work. So in short (too late!), while I certainly wouldn't presume to speak for anyone else, I suspect that may be some of what you encountered with the person in charge of his estate. Not saying you won't ever get any more images. Just saying, without Jack, the likelihood of getting more prominent individuals or signature shots is probably diminished. X4n6 (talk) 01:47, 14 May 2021 (UTC)
@X4n6 Wow. I really think maybe you should talk to the managers of his estate, whom I believe are beloved friends of his, not just business people and lawyers trying to maximize value. I think your passion might actually be worth approaching them with. I truly would love to get even one of his dancer-in-motion images, even in a small or low-res version, on his article. Do you think you'd be up for that?
I can tell you that if you and they could come to some agreement, I promise I will not let it go to waste while I am able to help. —valereee (talk) 02:44, 14 May 2021 (UTC)
It's been a while since I've been in touch with his estate. Also, unfortunately, real world issues keep me from being able to devote a lot of time to this at the moment. But if you can identify specific images or types you're looking for and how many you had in mind, it would be helpful. Also, from this point forward, let's discuss by email. Thanks! X4n6 (talk) 03:23, 14 May 2021 (UTC)

My edit to Positive Illusions

Hello, I removed a twelve-year old tag on Positive Illusions as I don't think it applies anymore. Feel free to review my edit. Firestar464 (talk) 06:01, 14 May 2021 (UTC)

Hey, @Firestar464! Yes, in my opinion that was a very reasonable removal. My thinking on it was this: there have been many many edits since that tag was placed -- enough so that it's very reasonable to believe over the years whatever tone was considered "off" has been fixed. The person who placed the tag was indeffed ten years ago themselves, so I can't ask them to take another look. A look at the version they tagged shows it at the time had zero inline citations. And a quick skim of the first few paragraphs of the current version didn't raise any major concerns about tone for me. I think you were quite right that the tag was stale. —valereee (talk) 11:14, 14 May 2021 (UTC)

Cheryl Fullerton

I'm wondering, if in the interests of transparency, we should move Cheryl's topic ban proposal to ANI? It's the most obvious place for it, and I don't want any accusations of not being transparent, or trying to shove a polite editor out of the door. Ritchie333 (talk) (cont) 13:54, 14 May 2021 (UTC)

@Ritchie333, I have no objection, and I'd have taken the issue there next if we'd asked her to stop directly editing and that didn't stop the disruptiveness. I'm not sure it's necessary, but if you're more comfortable with it, definitely move it! —valereee (talk) 14:34, 14 May 2021 (UTC)
I think my primary concern is a gut feeling that COIN is more likely to get support, while ANI is more likely to get counter-opposition, which would at least give the impression of being fairer. Anyway, I've started the ANI thread now, so we'll see what happens. Ritchie333 (talk) (cont) 14:43, 14 May 2021 (UTC)

Cleanaway

Just a heads up, I've toned down a lot of the promotional language on the article after you blocked them from editing their own page (at least, it sure looks like them doing it), and added various information I suspect they'd sooner forgot such as court cases with significant impacts. So, as the weekend draws to a close, we can expect to hear from them soon. 92.24.246.11 (talk) 22:08, 16 May 2021 (UTC)

This week's article for improvement (week 20, 2021)


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Desktop computer

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Posted by: MusikBot talk 00:05, 17 May 2021 (UTC) using MediaWiki message delivery (talk) on behalf of WikiProject AFI • Opt-out instructions

Pls revdel

I saw you were active recently at ANI.

Can you perform a revdel for all nine edits of Special:Contributions/2603:8001:400:2:4032:DBCD:8A15:6999? The person has taken a turn for the worse since previous edits from the /64 range Special:Contributions/2603:8001:400:2:0:0:0:0/64. Thanks for your time. Binksternet (talk) 03:03, 18 May 2021 (UTC)

It's not just the /64, I'm seeing the same vandalism on Special:contribs/2603:8001::/32, e.g. . That's a big range to block though, with good (or at least not-obvious-vandalism) edits on the range as well. Levivich harass/hound 03:12, 18 May 2021 (UTC)
That range certainly spent much of yesterday focused on African Americans in California. —valereee (talk) 11:47, 18 May 2021 (UTC)

I KNEW it!

Big tobacco's behind the conspiracy to suppress the truth about definite articles. EEng 08:54, 18 May 2021 (UTC)

And just when we thought we had them on the run. —valereee (talk) 10:45, 18 May 2021 (UTC)
Seriously though, that response from Mardus made even less sense than his arguments about "the". I am struggling to find another way to explain the difference to him. As a native speaker it is not even something I would ever question, let alone need an explanation for. --Khajidha (talk) 13:15, 18 May 2021 (UTC)

Revdel on ANI

Hi, Valeree, what were you trying to do with the revdel on ANI? If it's removing the RL name of the person, then you didn't revdel enough; you'd need to revdel the content of all edits between when you added the content to be removed and when it was redacted in the text, otherwise it will still be trivially visible in the intervening edits. That's a lot of edits, though, and the name is mentioned in other people's edits as well as yours. Otherwise, not sure what the point of revdeling just the one edit is? Writ Keeper  17:45, 18 May 2021 (UTC)

@Writ Keeper, it wasn't so much the name itself -- which is the user name -- as the question of whether the user was the same person as was mentioned in the book under the same name as the user name. If you have a solution, I'm all for it. :D —valereee (talk) 21:43, 18 May 2021 (UTC)
Ah, okay, I get it. Unfortunately, I don't think there's a great way to handle it AFAIK; we'd have to revdel a full two-plus days' worth of edits to ANI to actually get at it. Honestly, I'd say the best we can do is unrevdel the two revisions--it's not doing us much good, since the stuff in question is still there in all the other revisions--and just leave it with the in-text redaction. Not ideal, but probably better than however many hundreds of edits it would be to do the full revdel. That said, I certainly wouldn't fuss if we feel it's better to just leave well enough alone and leave it as-is, to avoid drawing attention to it even further with more deletion log entries. Whatever you think is best. Writ Keeper  21:53, 18 May 2021 (UTC)
@Writ Keeper, I have pretty much zero opinion other than wanting to respect the other person's concerns. The person objected to my question as outing, and I just wanted to respect that, but as you say, it's really not even possible. What they saw as outing was (to me) a simple connecting of dots here on WP, not bringing in anything from outside. I was just trying to be open to their concern. Whatever you think is best is fine with me. —valereee (talk) 22:49, 18 May 2021 (UTC)

Personal attack over pronouns

Dear Valeree, we wanted to inform you on a "pronoun war" that's been going on on the Dutch wikipedia page of Demi Lovato. As you probably know Lovato came out as non binary and thus the pronouns were changed. This became a problem when two people started changing it back to female pronouns while commenting on it in a rude and disrespectful way. We couldn't find any rules on hate speech and thus we wanted to message an admin directly to ask what we can do. Is there any place where we can properly report hate speech? Thank you, kind regard, J & K

Hi, J&K. Unfortunately there's no place here on English Wikipedia to make such a report, and I don't speak Dutch. If there is a Biographies of Living Persons Noticeboard or an Administrators' Noticeboard on the Dutch Wikipedia, that's where you would report this. It looks like nl.wikipedia has a help portal at
https://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portaal:Hulp_en_beheer/Wikipediagemeenschap#Moderatoren
If you don't see anything there, there's a Help Desk at https://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Help:Helpdesk where you can ask. —valereee (talk) 14:12, 19 May 2021 (UTC)

since you asked ...

Hey there Valereee, how's it goin'? So anyway, I was researching a "ban" discussion on ANI, and I ran across this edit you made a while back. Your edit summary caught my eye because I'm a big fan. Specifically smokestacklightnin.com is an unsecured (FANBOY) website devoted to old blues music. Now, in general: Smokestack Lightning is an old (but classic) blues song by the late great Howlin' Wolf. (yes, I'm a FANBOY for both the artist and the genre). You're probably not interested, most folks these days aren't - but there's still a few old-timers about that enjoy it. Here is a YouTube video/recording if you're curious about the song. There was also a rendition that was really pretty well done in the movie Cadillac Records a few years back too. All probably more than you really wanted to know - but since the opening was there .... :-) — Ched (talk) 14:56, 19 May 2021 (UTC)

@Ched, actually old time blues is a favorite of mine. My concern was the source rather than the reference, if you see what I mean. :D
And lol on Howlin' Wolf. Yes, I know of him. We had a local radio personality, a huge blues fan himself, who had an ongoing schtick hosting a weekly blues show as "Howlin' Blind Muddy Slim, your 60-minute jelly-belly toe-jam man." :) —valereee (talk) 16:17, 19 May 2021 (UTC)
Cool. I'll come visit. Got my shades 😎, crank up the stereo. Where should I sit? — Ched (talk) 20:50, 19 May 2021 (UTC)
Pretty sure on a bench in a bar with a sticky floor. —valereee (talk) 22:45, 19 May 2021 (UTC)

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WP:ITN posting

Hello Valereee, saw you posted the Israel-Palentine ITN blurb. In reference to Wikipedia:In the news/Administrator instructions#Credits - could you give me credit - in Wikipedia:In the news/Candidates#(Posted) 2021 Israel–Palestine crisis' Credits section it says Nominated by Starship.paint (talk · give credit) - click on give credit. I've already given credit to the other updaters, so you don't need to do that, but it would be silly for me to credit myself. starship.paint (exalt) 15:52, 22 May 2021 (UTC)

So sorry, @Starship.paint, I had a feeling there was something I was forgetting! I only work at ITN when they really, really need an admin so I'm never quiiiiiiiite sure I'm doing it right! Thank you so much for giving the other people credit! —valereee (talk) 16:10, 22 May 2021 (UTC)
It's alright, Valereee, I understood that you weren't a regular at WP:ITN, and surely as busy with other things as well. starship.paint (exalt) 02:40, 23 May 2021 (UTC)

This week's article for improvement (week 21, 2021)


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Hello, Valereee. The article for improvement of the week is:

Pork chop

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Get involved with the AFI project: Nominate an article  Review nominations


Posted by: MusikBot talk 00:05, 24 May 2021 (UTC) using MediaWiki message delivery (talk) on behalf of WikiProject AFI • Opt-out instructions

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