User talk:MichaelDOwen

Welcome MichaelDOwen!

Now that you've joined Wikipedia, there are 47,461,625 users!

Hello, MichaelDOwen. Welcome to Wikipedia and thank you for your contributions! I'm Invertzoo, one of the other editors here, and I hope you decide to stay and help contribute to this amazing repository of knowledge.

Some pages of helpful information to get you started:   Introduction to Wikipedia   The five pillars of Wikipedia   Editing tutorial   How to edit a page   Simplified Manual of Style   The basics of Wikicode   How to develop an article   How to create an article   Help pages   What Wikipedia is not

Some common sense Do's and Don'ts:   Do be bold   Do assume good faith   Do be civil   Do keep cool!   Do maintain a neutral point of view   Don't spam   Don't infringe copyright   Don't edit where you have a conflict of interest   Don't vandalize   Don't get blocked

If you need further help, you can:   Ask a question

or even:   Ask an experienced editor to "adopt" you

Alternatively, leave me a message at my talk page or type {{helpme}} here on your talk page, and someone will try to help.

There are many ways you can contribute to Wikipedia. Here are a few ideas:   Fight vandalism   Be a WikiFairy or a WikiGnome   Help contribute to articles

Perform maintenance tasks   Become a member of a project that interests you   Help design new templates

Remember to always sign your posts on talk pages. You can do this either by clicking on the button on the edit toolbar or by typing four tildes (~~~~) at the end of your post. This will automatically insert your signature, a link to this (your talk) page, and a timestamp.

The best way to learn about something is to experience it. Explore, learn, contribute, and don't forget to have some fun!
To get some practice editing you can use a sandbox. You can create your own private sandbox for use any time. Perfect for working on bigger projects. Then for easy access in the future, you can put {{My sandbox}} on your userpage.

Sincerely, Invertzoo (talk) 22:51, 23 February 2013 (UTC)   (Leave me a message)

• Español
• Deutsch
• Français
• Italiano
• עברית
• Русский
• 日本語
• Polski
• فارسی

So... welcome!

Wanted to drop you a line to officially welcome you. Invertzoo (talk) 22:51, 23 February 2013 (UTC)

One thing

When I was talking to you today at the Wikipedia 12th Birthday Meet-up, I completely forgot to point out that generally it is not considered kosher for someone to edit an article for which they have a conflict of interest, i.e. when it is your own group that is being written about. However, if you go ahead and reveal this COI up front on the talk page of the article (once it becomes an article), and because it was so many years ago, maybe that will be enough to silence the potential critics. Invertzoo (talk) 23:17, 23 February 2013 (UTC)

MichaelDOwen, you are invited to the Teahouse

Hi MichaelDOwen! Thanks for contributing to Wikipedia. Be our guest at the Teahouse! The Teahouse is a friendly space where new editors can ask questions about contributing to Wikipedia and get help from peers and experienced editors. I hope to see you there! Hajatvrc (I'm a Teahouse host) Visit the Teahouse This message was delivered automatically by your robot friend, HostBot (talk) 01:16, 24 February 2013 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Meetup/NYC/Wikipedia Day

Hi, I was glad to walk you through your first upload. Wow, sometimes I don't appreciate how complex our procedures are. It was worse before the Commons Upload Wizard got going last year. Work is going on to simply it further but when it's not entirely your own work I expect little improvement in the legal formalities.

Mostly we get old-timers at these meetings; I was pleased to meet you and help you and others a bit with my specialty, photo work. Even better, you got to meet Jane the Snail Lady. Sometimes I'm surprised, and always delighted, at how often our smartest colleagues are also our sweetest. Remember to set your WP:Watchlist to watch everything you do and to keep on eye on future meetups, WP:Wikipedia Signpost and anything else of interest. WP:Talk page stalkers are especially welcome. And ask. Ask everyone, everywhere, everything. We're always eager for new minds, new ways of looking at the world, and in my case new, old photos. Jim.henderson (talk) 15:15, 24 February 2013 (UTC)

Actually it's Susan the snail lady, but you already knew that Michael, right? Invertzoo (talk) 22:13, 24 February 2013 (UTC)

Hey Michael

You are very welcome. And thanks for the nice note. Congratulations on working out how to leave the note, signing it properly and everything. As you may have been able to tell, I did a little more fixing up (in minor ways) on the sandbox article yesterday evening. I also left the welcome template here on your talk page, and I hope you don't mind that I even took the liberty of starting your user page for you, so it is no longer a red link. Actually I put a link to your sandbox on your user page so you can find the sandbox easily that way. You may want to bookmark your user page or your talk page on your browser so you can get to one of them quickly and easily.

With your sandbox article, you can put your note about potential COI on the talk page of the sandbox page if you like, for the time being, that way if anyone comes to look at it they will see you are aware of the issue. Oh and like I said, please feel free to call me on the phone if that would be good. I am going away on March 20th for 3 weeks, but until then (and after I come back) I will be very happy to help you in any way I can. As I said, anything I don't know myself, I probably know who to ask to get the right answer. Invertzoo (talk) 22:18, 24 February 2013 (UTC)

That press release

I am currently trying to find out if there is a copyright issue or not with your photo of that old paper press release. Invertzoo (talk) 13:03, 25 February 2013 (UTC)

OK! See the correspondence copied below. You were right Michael about being able to use that press release. Now we know what code to use to explain its copyright status. Do you think you can go ahead and upload it using the Upload Wizard or is that too difficult? Invertzoo (talk) 13:31, 28 February 2013 (UTC)

Copied from WP:MCQ note on "New image of an old press release"

This correspondence is copied from the WP:MCQ page:

What is the copyright status of a new photograph of an old (1977) press release? A new editor wants to upload his 2013 photograph of a paper press release from The Kitchen, dated October 6th and 8th 1977. The editor has not uploaded the image yet because I told him I want to check to see if there would be a copyright problem or not. I don't even know if a paper press release (which was sent out to journalists) is a "publication" or not. Invertzoo (talk) 12:59, 25 February 2013 (UTC)

Yup, that's a publication, and fully subject to copyright; taking a photo of it would not enable us to circumvent the copyright involved. --Orange Mike | Talk 17:46, 27 February 2013 (UTC)

Unless the press release had a copyright notice, which is highly unlikely since that would defeat its purpose, it should be PD, template "pd-pre1978." Press releases were intended to be published freely.--Wikiwatcher1 (talk) 18:08, 27 February 2013 (UTC)

Good point, watcher! --Orange Mike | Talk 19:17, 27 February 2013 (UTC)

Thanks so much Wikiwatcher and Orangemike! So it is indeed in the Public Domain, and should be templated as "pd-pre1978" when it is uploaded. Great! Thanks again! Invertzoo (talk) 13:19, 28 February 2013 (UTC)

I understand you can't get that one to work. Maybe you can try the more general Template:PD-US instead? Invertzoo (talk) 22:20, 28 February 2013 (UTC)

Why your upload didn't work

Sorry! I see now that it was because you selected the wrong one out of the six possible explanations as to "why you are sure you have the right to publish this work". It looks as though you accidentally selected "The copyright holder published their photo or video on Flickr with the right license". You should try again and this time select "Another reason not mentioned above". And then put the PD–Pre1978 in with the curly brackets, like you did before. That should work OK. Invertzoo (talk) 22:29, 1 March 2013 (UTC)

Well I managed to upload a file with PD-US as the license template. There is unfortunately a problem. In the time I've been trying to uploaded the image I shrank it from a 2MB PDF file which seemed excessive for a text document to a PDF file about half the size. This was a mistake and the document appears unreadable. I now need to replace the document with the original file. But after spending a lot of time in the help section of the Wiki Commons I have not learned how to replace a file or if it's even possible. I can't even find the file using the search feature in the commons.

MichaelDOwen (talk) 16:47, 2 March 2013 (UTC)

Oh dear, I am so sorry, you are grappling with the most difficult parts of WIkipedia first! Can you tell me the name of your file? Then I can ask around as to what to do about it. Invertzoo (talk) 22:31, 2 March 2013 (UTC)

If your file was uploaded to en:wikipedia, I can delete it under G6 (see: (WP:CSD) and then you you can upload the proper file with the proper license. If it is in the Commons, you can request deletion with the template {{speedydelete|<Reason>}}. . I hope this helps. JoJan (talk) 16:31, 3 March 2013 (UTC)

Thanks JoJan for the helpful suggestion. Invertzoo (talk) 23:51, 3 March 2013 (UTC)

Thank you for your suggestion JoJan. The file in question is at http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7d/Press_Release_Metropolis_Video_Rock_from_CBGB.pdf

Forgive my newbie lack of knowledge, but where / how would I place the deletion template / request in the commons? I don't see a talk page related to the image where I can do that. Thanks for your help. MichaelDOwen (talk) 02:15, 4 March 2013 (UTC)

OK, here is the actual page on Commons that you need.

I think you can put the delete request into the description section maybe? Also can I ask why you made the file into a pdf rather than just a jpg or tiff? Might be easier next time if you upload it as a high-resolution jpg. Invertzoo (talk) 14:21, 4 March 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for the page url. I requested the file deletion. I generally use pdf file type for text documents. Adobe Acrobat has built-in OCR capability. The full resolution file, over 2MB, previewed properly. I was just trying to save space. How ridiculous in retrospect. MichaelDOwen (talk) 14:46, 4 March 2013 (UTC)

I can convert it and upload it for you if you want. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 14:37, 4 March 2013 (UTC)

Hi Anna - Thank you for your offer. I have higher resolution copies of the press release document file. I was waiting for the original to be removed. However, now that you mention it, perhaps I should just upload the higher resolution version and link my article to the new upload without waiting for the original to be taken down. MichaelDOwen (talk) 14:55, 4 March 2013 (UTC)

Hi Michael. That's a good plan. In such cases, you can always upload a newer file with a slightly different name to avoid any sort of duplicate file error issue.

If there's anything you ever need, just ask. I'm always around. :) Anna Frodesiak (talk) 15:50, 4 March 2013 (UTC)

Thanks, again Anna. You, or someone else, must have fixed the problem with the press release file. It's one of the files I uploaded but somehow it appears correctly in various sizes. I don't see the record of how/when it happened. I feel a step closer to launching my first wiki article.MichaelDOwen (talk) 02:09, 5 March 2013 (UTC)

Video clips

Do you think you could get some video clips released into the public domain taken from Metropolis Video's archive footage? Anna Frodesiak (talk) 13:00, 5 March 2013 (UTC)

Thank you for your suggestion. However, we are not able to do that. When Metropolis Video recorded the bands in the 1975 we never bothered to get releases. None of the bands, venue or the limit avenues we had for distribution even asked about it at the time. Thus, while Metropolis Video owns the video recording, we don't own the rights to the music.

I did add a link to the trailer for Talking Heads: Chronology on Eagle Rock's You Tube channel. The video includes the entire song Pyscho Killer so people can see an example of what we did. It's possible in this instance because Eagle Rock licensed video from Metropolis and also had permission to use the music from the Talking Heads. MichaelDOwen (talk) 14:26, 5 March 2013 (UTC)

I see. Pity. Those clips would be a big hit. :) Anna Frodesiak (talk) 14:32, 5 March 2013 (UTC)

Improvements for the article

Two things I can think of:

1. The intro should summarize the contents.

2. It would be better if the content itself was not copied from/a close paraphrase of the content on the MV website. Therefore the prose could use some more re-writing.

Invertzoo (talk) 13:16, 5 March 2013 (UTC)

Your suggestions are appreciated. With regard to your 2nd point, the Metropolis member leading our placeholder website effort actually took the proposed wiki text which was sitting unused at the time. I had designed a very image-rich, text light website but it was too expensive to implement. Anyway, I'll work on it. MichaelDOwen (talk) 14:36, 5 March 2013 (UTC)

Discussion about your draft

Please see: User talk:Anna Frodesiak#User:MichaelDOwen.2Fsandbox 00:54, 6 March 2013 (UTC)

It's up now! See Metropolis Video

Perhaps it may be worth mentioning that many (all?) of the bands did not yet have recording contracts when you guys videoed them... assuming that is true of course. Invertzoo (talk) 23:50, 6 March 2013 (UTC)

An Award for You

		The Exceptional Newcomer Award
		For your wonderful new creation Metropolis Video, I present to you this award. Well done. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 00:27, 7 March 2013 (UTC)

A bit of advertising

[1] [2] [3]

Anna Frodesiak (talk) 00:27, 7 March 2013 (UTC)

Thanks Anna! That will help I am sure. Invertzoo (talk) 13:52, 7 March 2013 (UTC)

Logo

Did Metropolis Video have a logo or something that people from that era would recognize? Letterhead maybe? I'll add an organization infobox to the article, so some sort of graphic would be dandy. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 00:33, 7 March 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for moving the Metropolis Video article into the main space. There is a logo / artwork that I can give you. What is the best way to make it available to you? Thanks! 68.173.49.188 (talk) 05:16, 7 March 2013 (UTC)

It was Invertzoo who moved it into the mainspace.

I already added the logo. I cleaned up the image a bit, but am not sure if the faint lines were there on purpose, as part of the design. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 06:42, 7 March 2013 (UTC)

The article looks pretty spiffy now with the infobox and logo! Great! Invertzoo (talk) 13:54, 7 March 2013 (UTC)

Hi Michael, I guess you need to log in again because your note from early this morning came in signed with your IP address on it instead of your user name. Invertzoo (talk) 13:56, 7 March 2013 (UTC)

Happy Holidays

		Happy solstice-related (aka winter-in-the-Northern Hemisphere) holiday(s)!
		To my very good Wikipedia friend, I wish you a joyful "winter in the northern hemisphere holiday" or "northern solstice day(s) in the southern hemisphere holiday", whichever of the holiday or holidays you celebrate (all or any)! Invertzoo (talk) 19:35, 24 December 2013 (UTC)