text:
Talk:'Large-scale attack' against ex-Prime Minister Bhutto leaves more than 100 dead in Pakistan

Bhutto
Maybe someone should fix so that "Bhutto" isn't the start of every sentence.

al-Qaeda
Link to the alleged AQ connection, and support the "kill" quotation marks, or they'll be nixed. Also, not sure it's worth noting that "police cordoned off the scene", was that really in doubt following a massive bombing? Sherurcij 22:31, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

 * try reading the sources that are already there, i would suggest the BBC one maybe or should that be "nixed"?? --Mark Talk to me 22:33, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

 * A little less smart-ass and a little more attention to detail would be helpful, the BBC site says "militant" and "pro-Taleban", it does not say al-Qaeda. Nevertheless, I found a website which did use the AQ moniker, so inserted it into the sources myself.  Sherurcij 22:50, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

PD
I've pretty much had enough of this. Wikinews is not a place for political statements which the large, indiscreet, notice at the bottom of this article is. I've yet to hear a remotely reasonable argument why our current default license is inappropriate, or however you want to categorise it as "evil".

Wikinews is a source of CC-BY news articles, not your public soapbox. --Brian McNeil / talk 22:19, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

 * That's...really not relevant to this story. However, ignoring your chosen venue, it is "allowed but not encouraged" as I am told by WN administrators. So, leave it be for now, maybe it will die off, maybe it will catch on - either way, there is nothing "soap box-ish" about the wording of the template. Would it help matters if the box were put beneath the sources? Sherurcij 22:26, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

 * Nothing of what I said is relevant to this story - other than the fact that you've put a huge big template on it that says "you can't edit and ask credit". That means a lot to many of the Wikinewsies. They don't care if their name appears in print, but if someone copies the site's material they want it correctly attributed.
 * At the moment I find the signature that I've seen about changing the license offensive, it ain't happening - people are getting reputations like, "David Shankbone, Wikinews Reporter". Dropping any requirement to credit or recognise changes that to "David Shankbone, ... who the fuck are you?". And gee.. we don't get the story/interview. --Brian McNeil / talk 22:40, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

 * "You can edit and ask credit, if you add a paragraph which you want CC-BY, remove the template and the whole article is now magically CC-BY. (If, however, that paragraph is rewritten in PD format, then the article would remain PD). A better solution for things like David Shankbone's reputation, would be to allow an authorcredit for his OR stories. That way the introduction of "This interview was obtained by David Shankbone..." could be minimised to a still-valid, yet less-intrusive, credit at the beginning of the story, like all professional media outlets use. Sherurcij 22:43, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
 * I am not against PD...and this is a good article for PD...BUT...you cannot claim PD on an article unless all editors agree to make their edits PD. DragonFire1024 (Talk to the Dragon) 22:44, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Agreed. Sherurcij 22:48, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
 * So if its agreed, then take a vote on who wants it PD and who doesn't. DragonFire1024 (Talk to the Dragon) 22:51, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
 * A vote is unnecessary, the template only appears if the entire visible story has been written by authors who agree for it to be PD - which at this time, it has been. (Although the change from double-quotes to single-quotes in the headline text may be a copyrightable change, and thus allow yourself to announce the article as being CC-BY again - other than that though, you'll notice there are no contributions that are not made as PD edits. Sherurcij 22:54, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
 * I'm still saying... "All material published on Wikinews is licensed the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 License"... Wasn't Copyright a policy? Or was that flag added magically? - Jurock (reply here) 23:15, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
 * I disagree with the use of the PD template. The WikiMedia Foundation, like it or not, set forth the CC-BY standard for whatever reason. Without the WMF there would be no Wikinews and one should not be able to undermine the attribution that they seek by simply placing a tag on an article. If you wish your article to be PD then publish it in a PD domain elsewhere first, then copy it to Wikinews. --SVTCobra 23:23, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Get Jimbo to make a clear statement about not wanting PD articles, and I'll stop. Otherwise, your personal opinions don't carry a lot of wait. WMF did not set for the CC-BY standard, you'll notice Wikisource is public domain, and WIkipedia is GFDL. CC-BY is a specific torch carried by certain WN admins...which is fine, but cannot be forced to overrule PD. Sherurcij 23:27, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
 * No, the adoption of CC-BY did not come from within Wikinews. In fact when it came down from above (WMF) it caused a lot of headaches about what to do with previously published material. Some feared that it was retroactive. It is not a "torch" and it is not my "personal opinion". --SVTCobra 23:35, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Technically 87% of the voters identified themselves primarily as Wikinewsies. So you're right, it's not 100%, but a slightly "glib" summary would say that it was decided by WN members, not by WMF ;) Sherurcij 23:43, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
 * You are right. (I must be remembering the change in image policy.) Anyway, it pre-dates both of us. I guess what I am (now) saying is that you should have known the conditions under which you were contributing. --SVTCobra 00:04, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Whatsoever, it comes from WMF ruling... BTW, "CC-BY is a specific torch carried by certain WN admins..." reminds me of malvados vivlios (ebil vivliotecarios [evil bibliotecarios spelt wrongly] --> evil WP:ES sysops)... May I remind (1) I'm not admin here and yet I'm in favor of CC-BY (2) why only admins? (3) admins are not owners of WN... and nothing else... but (4) be careful with argumentum ad hominem... And BTW, Wikipedia is under the GFDL and almost all Wikisource under the PD. That's because it's what's more convenient... and voters believe CC-BY is more convenient (better, even) for WN - Jurock (reply here) 23:50, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
 * I don't think I'm disputing any of that. Voters chose CC-BY, right - just like commons encourages GFDL, WP encourages GFDL and WS (only) allows PD...but writers are free to license their own work in their own way under their choosing, so long as it is "at least" freely-licensed. That said, I'll note your advice on AH. Sherurcij 23:54, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

Markie
Your edits to the article have been this and this - please note that none of your words still exist in the article, having been rewritten as PD, and thus you cannot remove the license. Sherurcij 23:06, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
 * As I said above...if the contributers do not agree as a whole, you cannot claim PD on an article unless all editors of the article agree...and in this case they do not. DragonFire1024 (Talk to the Dragon) 23:49, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Except you will note that he has no contributions to the version of the article being claimed as PD. What exactly is CC-BY, the deleted edits? Sherurcij 23:51, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Come on! Don't disrupt Wikinews to illustrate a point! - Jurock (reply here) 23:56, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Nothing's being disrupted, for the most part his additions have been poorly-worded and overly wordy - thus cleaned up and the information re-inserted. I don't think there's any disruption. Sherurcij 23:58, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
 * using common sense... I don't quite agree - Jurock (reply here) 00:01, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
 * More or less dispruptive than users stating they'll purposely edit articles just to remove the PD tag, who are now on this talk page? Cooler heads should prevail, yes - but let's not pretend that either Markie or Brian "just happens" to be wanting to edit this page, both of them are vehement opponents to WN "not getting credit" for any stories. Sherurcij 00:06, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

Sherurcij, by doing this is it not creating two tiers of articles on Wikinews, PD and CC-BY? Some users may not want their contributions place in PD. They may be discouraged from adding to an article if the result is that their effort will be edited into PD. Especially if it is edited, not because of the quality, but simply to change it so that it is just different enough. Jcart1534 00:02, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
 * The latter point makes sense, indeed I could theoretically go rewrite every article on the main page to "be PD", but I think the process requires maturity on both sides. I don't edit articles others have started to be PD, and they in turn shouldn't go mark up PD articles just to try and remove their PD status.    Sherurcij 00:06, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
 * You accused others of carrying a torch, but you are the one that is unrelenting. Each time you edit, do you not see the Your work will be licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 License and will be attributed to "Wikinews". disclousure? Rights can only be downgraded. You cannot make what is less "free" more "free". Further, I don't even understand your motivation. What are you trying to accomplish?--SVTCobra 00:17, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
 * I think you're confused, as the author of material, you can only make things less restrictive, you cannot make them more-restrictive. Sherurcij 00:24, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Yes, when you are the sole author. However, when using the material of others, you cannot relinquish their rights, you can only impose your own restrictions on the new "product". For example, you cannot take a copyrighted song, change the lyrics, and then say it is now PD. However, you can take a PD song, then write your own lyrics and claim rights to the lyrics. The product cannot be freer than the source. --SVTCobra 01:10, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Yes, that is correct. However, there is no copyrighted source for any of these words - ideas and facts cannot be licensed in any format... Sherurcij 01:19, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Yet you seem to feel that you can rewrite stuff by other Wikinewsies, that they wrote as CC-BY-2.5, and make it PD again. Yes, these are "facts" that cannot be copyrighted (though "ideas" can), but what is your motivation? I think you hinted at CC-BY-2.5 stopping other news organizations from using the material, but, really, is that it? Often news-orgs would love to attribute someone else, that way they are clear of slander. --SVTCobra 01:38, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
 * If they want to credit us, they are welcome to do so. The template even encourages it...so your point is moot. Sherurcij 01:50, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Yet, this is the third time you have refused to answer a direct question. Why do you insist on PD? --SVTCobra 02:46, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Because I personally believe that a story shouldn't not be told, simply because a media outlet doesn't have the time/desire to rewrite the exact same story in new words with a thesaurus, and doesn't want to appear unprofessional and credit the fact they're taking the story from elsewhere. The point of the media is to spread news, not to hog glory upon oneself. Sherurcij 05:45, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

Lead?
I think this article should be the lead at the moment, but I am too technologically challenged to work with the new large template. Could someone have a crack at it? Jcart1534 00:08, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Hrm, using just the image of Bhutto at the dinner, you're thinking? A map of Pakistan? We can't use fair-use images of the actual explosion in the lead templates, as I understand it. Sherurcij 00:10, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Yes, I think the one of Bhutto might work. Jcart1534 00:14, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Seems to work, just a question though "in Pakistan" or "in Kashmir"? Kashmir is a major city in Pakistan which everybody 'should' know - and we'd say "in Seattle", not "in America" if it were a US-based article.  I'm not gung-ho either way, just curious which you think would work better? Sherurcij 00:59, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
 * I think you mean Karachi? And yes, you are probably right. It could say something like "Karachi, Pakistan" I suppose, to be more specific. I'll adjust the lead template. Cheers, Jcart1534 01:14, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Apparently I am a moron who seeks for "What's that K-city?" in his brain while typing :) Sherurcij 01:18, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

death toll?
was it 100 (in title) or 20 (in article)? could this be clarified?
 * I think it is okay. The 20 refers to police officers. The 100 refers to the total deaths, as mentioned in first sentence. Jcart1534 00:57, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

rv to remove info added with a source dated after the published date of this article
Is this actually WN policy? I've reverted it at this point, but if there is an actual policy, I can respect that. It seems ludicrous to me that something that happens Thursday night isn't allowed to include sources from Friday...aren't we presumably trying to give as complete a report on the bombing as we can? It's still our top story on the main page, for [editForCensor]'s sake. Sherurcij 19:14, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
 * This article is less than 24 hrs old. No reason not to allow some updates. Jcart1534 19:39, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Yes, the article is about 24 hours off, but I took breaking off it about 12 hours ago. It really - not as a hard and fast rule - is bad practice to have sources dated after our date of publication. --Brian McNeil / talk 19:53, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
 * I do agree with you Brian, but this one was started at 22:09 last night, not two hours before the date change. Jcart1534 19:58, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
 * I re-read the article and didn't actually see anything used from the source of the 19th. That's why I took it off, yes the future issue influenced me.
 * There is a issue of a lot of people being keen to get stuff up as published, a "push" or "drive" so to speak. I know, you can be sat there thinking "I need to go to bed in half an hour, is someone gonna help expand this a bit?". Perhaps in this case started so late in the day the story should have been published on the 19th at midnight - then we can be sneaky about updates from fresh sources and it isn't so odd looking. --Brian McNeil / talk 20:06, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
 * FYI, the only "new" update from the 19th is that two men had been detained at the scene. Sherurcij 20:33, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

Edit
editprotected Category:Sindh, Category:Karachi. Ali Rana (talk) 09:06, 1 October 2009 (UTC)
 * ✅ – Juliancolton  | Talk 16:42, 2 October 2009 (UTC)


text:
John Reed on Orwell, God, self-destruction and the future of writing

October 18, 2007

It can be difficult to be John Reed.

Christopher Hitchens called him a "Bin Ladenist" and Cathy Young editorialized in The Boston Globe that he "blames the victims of terrorism" when he puts out a novel like Snowball's Chance, a biting send-up of George Orwell's Animal Farm which he was inspired to write after the terrorist attacks on September 11. "The clear references to 9/11 in the apocalyptic ending can only bring Orwell's name into disrepute in the U.S.," wrote William Hamilton, the British literary executor of the Orwell estate. That process had already begun: it was revealed Orwell gave the British Foreign Office a list of people he suspected of being "crypto-Communists and fellow travelers," labeling some of them as Jews and homosexuals. "I really wanted to explode that book," Reed told The New York Times. "I wanted to completely undermine it."

Is this man who wants to blow up the classic literary canon taught to children in schools a menace, or a messiah? David Shankbone went to interview him for Wikinews and found that, as often is the case, the answer lies somewhere in the middle.

Reed is electrified by the changes that surround him that channel through a lens of inspiration wrought by his children. "The kids have made me a better writer," Reed said. In his new untitled work, which he calls a "new play by William Shakespeare," he takes lines from The Bard's classics to form an original tragedy. He began it in 2003, but only with the birth of his children could he finish it. "I didn't understand the characters who had children. I didn't really understand them. And once I had had kids, I could approach them differently."

Taking the old to make it new is a theme in his work and in his world view. Reed foresees new narrative forms being born, Biblical epics that will be played out across print and electronic mediums. He is pulled forward by revolutions of the past, a search for a spiritual sensibility, and a desire to locate himself in the process.

Below is David Shankbone's conversation with novelist John Reed.

On the alternative media and independent publishing
[Conversation in progress...]
 * John Reed: Yeah, exactly.  Well, working with the Brooklyn Rail is my community service.

David Shankbone: How is that?

 * JR: It's turned into a much bigger piece of community service than I thought it would be.  It started without major expectations.  At that time I had been drafted into it, there were still places to get literary books covered, it felt like.  There was a VLS; there was a New York Press.  VLS doesn't exist anymore . . . it's a big deal.

DS: All the alternative media is either becoming a conglomerate, like the Village Voice, or it's dying, like the New York Press.

 * JR: The Village Voice may be dying, too.  It's been bought and resold so many times, I don't really understand what it is anymore.

'''DS: I interviewed Michael Musto, and that was one area that I wanted to touch on, but we got involved in so many other things. I don't even know how much I could really get out of somebody who's working there, but--'''

 * JR: I would love to know what he thinks about it.  But the Rail is doing well--I like covering all those books.

DS: How does the Rail make its money in order to operate?

 * JR: Well, the Rail is really doing well.  They are getting grants and I'm a little bit astonished at how well they do.  I think the Rail is in a good position to pull it together and bring itself to the next level.  I'm not over there at the office every day, but that's my impression of it.

DS: What about this theory that the drop in advertising for the print media, even though it's going to go through a period of growing pains, in the end might actually be better for the literary press like the Brooklyn Rail, because people who have keys to funding will see more of a need to do grants, which will allow them to be more experimental as opposed to worrying about, "Are we going to offend our advertisers?"

 * JR: It may work that way.  There is a gigantic fragmenting because, because the new venues for literary books are not just in print media.  They're on the Internet; there are millions of these micropresses now.  So many I can't keep track of them.  And a lot of them are publishing really good books.  Many are not concerned with getting reviews.  They just don't care.  They're willing to do a very small print run to facilitate their sales through networking sites, and a few literary blogs or literary sites--and there are a lot of them now.  And of course, as these things condense from one thing to the next and grow into larger organisms, there's going to be a fair share of power there filtered down to the small presses.

'DS: I interviewed a musician named John Vanderslice, and off-the-record he talked about how the mainstream music press has almost lost all influence--Spin, Rolling Stone''; those kinds of magazines. He said that whenever he did some small blog interview his web site jumped up in hits. But when he got a favorable review in Rolling Stone he said, “I barely heard a word about it.”'''

 * JR: The whole music industry has shifted over into networking sites, the Internet, and it's just extremely comparable.  The way that it's functioned--and now half of the music industry is made up of this kind of independent record label--that's what's happening with books.  You don't have mid level artists recording at Sony, and you don't have many mid-list authors at the large houses.  The little presses are snapping them up.  Of course, the large houses are aware of this, in the same way that the large record labels are aware of it, and I think that they're gearing themselves to either take them over or have imprints address it.  Like, MTV Books now has Vice books.  They do like cool, beautiful books, and they've given Vice a real platform to do what they want.

'''DS: Do you think it's becoming like the pharmaceutical industry? There the really big drug companies don't have a lot of drugs in the pipeline, but there are all these like little drug companies that are existing for one-or-two-drug clinical trials, and the big drug companies are watching them. Once they have a seller, big pharma goes in and snaps up the little companies.'''

 * JR: That's exactly what it is.  I don't know if it's all bad, though.  When a big press buys a small press, the small press sort of loses its identity.  But it doesn't happen right away.  Right now, the distribution of the small presses is so piss poor for the most part, that it's just very hard for them to move units.  It's a real challenge.  Most of them don't care that much; they want to have one or two books that are hits, but to sell big numbers of books, distribution is a real problem.

DS: How does the business model for small presses make up for a lack of blockbuster books?

 * JR: They need one or two, but most small presses that don't care.

DS: It's more of an idealistic enterprise, then?

 * JR: Yeah, if it's a non-profit--they get some grants.  For the functional small presses--let's say Akashic Books, or Archipelago Books--which are very small but I believe run at a profit, the business model is to put all these books out there, and if one or two of them hits every couple of years, they're fine.  Soft Skull is another one.  I love MacAdam Cage; I don't know how they're making any money, but they do wonderful books.  They've got to have a few titles that sell a lot of copies.  One press who used to have this theory of publishing is Saint Martin's Press, a sort of "Throw shit at the wall and see what sticks" phenomenon.

DS: But they're not like that anymore, are they?

 * JR: I don't know.  I mean, now it seems like a lot of places have taken on that model.  You have all this stuff out there, something hits, and then everything goes behind that.

On Christopher Hitchens, Orwell and 9/11 as inspiration
DS: Why did you decide to take on Orwell?

 * JR: I went to school at P.S. 41.  I read Orwell over and over again and of course as a kid, I liked it.  But I didn't really understand what about it that also depressed me.  It's kind of a bludgeon for revolutionary thinking.  On a number of levels, Orwell encourages you to think that you're not as smart as the pigs--that revolution is doomed to failure.  I don't know if that's exactly what Orwell meant, but that's certainly how it's framed in school.

DS: How it reads in general?
 * JR: Really how it's used.  It's the paradigm of the Cold War and it was used to promote the Cold War.  In fact, the phrase "Cold War" is Orwell's term.  He was very aware of what was happening with this.  I don't know if he would have liked that it ended up being a real tool for the CIA to push the Cold War agenda--I don't think he would have liked it.  But that's what happened, and at the end of his life he was involved with some pretty conservative people.  Whether or not it was entirely his own doing or he was a weak, lovelorn old man is another question.  I think probably some of both.

DS: Christopher Hitchens called you an "Osama bin Ladenist.”  How do you react to that label?

 * JR: Honestly, I didn't really expect it to be so thrilling to me, but I loved it.

'DS: I photographed many of the New York academics who are featured in the David Horowitz book, The Professors:  The 101 Most Dangerous Academics in America'', and every single one of them held it up as this badge of honor. They all received emails like, "How did you get in there?" It gave them stature that they may not have had before. Is it the same?'''

 * JR: Yeah, I mean it's just also completely so absurd.  We got all this press for Snowball's Chance, and of course it was all based on whether people were conservative or progressive.  They either liked me based on their politics or didn't like me based on their politics.  Hitchens didn't read the book.  In fact, that's the only thing that makes me a little bit bitter, that he called me a "bin Ladenist" without having read the book.  But yeah, I don't mind.  It's just so completely absurd.

'''DS: He coined a philosophy for a terrorist. Like ‘Trotskyite’--there never really existed this phrase "Osama bin Ladenist." Do you think it elevated bin Laden?'''

 * JR: Yeah, it was so bizarre.  He was selling Why Orwell Matters at the time.  With that book they were trying to reorient Orwell away from this Cold War model.  I don't know if they can do it, really.  They've done so much damage to his canon.  I don't know if they can shift it out of a sort of Cold War emphasis.  Maybe they can.  The idea that Snowball brings capitalism to the farm--we see the pitfalls there--it's anathema to a sort of CIA model of the Cold War.  But they've got to change it, because the Cold War is over.

'''DS: But the thinking is there. Right after the Soviet Union ended--you could sense it, you could feel it in the air--this "Who do we set our sights on?" I think that all of us felt that way to a degree, if not just because we were socialized to think that way.'''

 * JR: Yeah.  Yeah.  I think that's what they were trying to do, to by--

DS: Denouncing ‘Islamofascism’...

 * JR: Yeah.  I think that there's a little bit of that.  I don't know if it's quite as transparent as it was with the Cold War, the Dark Empire model, but it's still there.

DS: Do you think it's a little bit trying to fit a square peg through a round hole, like the old paradigm of the Soviet Union as the evil empire, and now the evil empire is this very disparate range of peoples from Indonesia to Iran and trying to make them into a ‘Soviet Union?’

 * JR: Yeah, it's a tough sell.  But they're doing it, they're all over it over there.

'''DS: It's worked. It's sold.'''

 * JR: Yeah, they're doing it.  I can't even believe how much money they've spent over there.

DS: They are going to be spending a lot more; it'll be a trillion dollar war.

 * JR: Yeah, and that's the other thing: this whole idea that we're in this capitalist country.  We're not really in a capitalist country; we're in something else.  Because if it were pure capitalism, then these decisions would be terrible decisions.  That's why Ron Paul is so interesting.  Because he's up there just with steam coming out of his ears, saying, "We're spending too much money!  This is crazy!"  And it is.  It's not fiscally responsible.  We're bolstering these oil companies, who peddle a vestigial energy source, when we have all kinds of other options.  We know it's not where we should be.  But we're there because that's where the economy is; that's what these large corporations are.  But that's not capitalism.  That's some kind of weird version of corporate socialism--our whole government is now buoying antiquated technologies.

'''DS: Was there a moment where your switch was flicked, where you were like, "I've had enough." Was there a breaking point?'''

 * JR: For me it was 9/11.  You had these armies of people covered in chalk walking past our apartment.  I had had the idea for the book--I had a title in my head, Snowball's Chance, walking along Lafayette Street on September 10th.  I mentioned it to my wife; she said, "Uh, I don't know, it doesn't sound too great."

DS: [chuckles]

 * JR: But I was sure that there was something good about it. And then 9/11 happened.  I sat there watching TV for three days, like everyone else, riding my bike with a gas mask on and getting cartridges for my wife and brother.

DS: Did you really?

 * JR: Yeah, you know, I have a lot of really strong memories from that period.  The one that is with me right now is there was a policeman…we were downtown, so we had to go past this checkpoint. I was wearing a gas mask from minute one, because I just could feel that this was not good, the stuff that was in the air.  He looked at me--you know, most of the cops would make fun of us for wearing gas masks, because they heard that it was safe--this one cop was standing there, looked at us and said, "Do you know something that I don't know?"  And of course, we did know something, which is that the city officials were lying to us.  I always think back on that guy, and I wonder--

DS: Is he dead?

 * JR: Yeah. Who knows?  But anyway--

DS: Or suffering--

 * JR: Two or three days after 9/11, I realized Snowball's Chance meant that Snowball came back to the farm.  I had pretty much the whole book in my head at that moment.  I wrote it over the course of about two weeks, sitting there writing nonstop, writing what I already knew was there--catching it on paper.  Was my rage directed then at Orwell?  More it was like my creative energy was just into this thing.  In retrospect, I realized what it was.  A lot of the book mocks Orwell and ups his very dry delivery; all of that stuff is creative impetus.

'''DS: Orwell forms such a fundamental basis for so much neoconservative thinking, almost as an ideological text. Like The Outsiders forms our sense of what a rebel is to a degree, and Orwell gives us a worldview of--'''

 * JR: Yeah, I think that's it exactly.  Right when 9/11 happened, that period was over.  Animal Farm was looking forward into a fifty-year period, and suddenly that period was over.  That paradigm was over at that moment.  That's when it seemed like open game to me.  I was actually pretty pissed at Orwell, once I figured all that out, because the Cold War mentality had largely gotten us into that mess.

DS: What about 1984?

 * JR: Yeah, there are people really pissed about 1984.   I've gotten a few emails from people saying that they want to go after 1984, suggesting that I should, but I don't know, I just didn't--

DS: All of a sudden you'll be in an Orwell genre:  Orwell criticism--

 * JR: For some reason, I don't mind that one as much.  There are also so many dystopic . ..

DS: 1984 is used by both liberals and conservatives to attack each--each in different ways--

 * JR: Yeah, 1984, as far as I know, doesn't have that history of being backed by the CIA.

On the future of the narrative
'''DS: As a writer there's always a desire to be innovative and original, but you can't be original anymore in writing. It's very difficult. Almost everything has been done. I think that I read somewhere that the only genre of art that hasn't fully been mined is maybe poetry.'''

 * JR: Yeah, could be.  Well--

DS: How do you handle the challenge with wanting to be--

 * JR: Well, there are new art forms that are forming.  The Internet is going to have much larger--

DS: What are they?

 * JR: Well, interestingly, the narrative forms.  Americans are extremely sophisticated in terms of narrative forms.  We see it in commercials, we see it on TV, we see it in movies.  But the narrative forms we're talking about are three acts, five acts, depending on how you want to look at it.  They're all based on a Christian model of sin, suffering, redemption; which is not a large model.  We've actually got a sophisticated view of a relatively narrow sort of idea of what narrative is.  But as the Internet enables larger shows--as TV, magazines and the Internet join--you're going to have much larger narrative structures.  Sort of like a soap opera, if you could imagine a soap opera that was on the Internet, where you would have a cross-section of narratives and could go in any direction at once.  The producers could get behind any narrative at once.  Essentially, then, what you've got is large epic structures, or Biblical structures, or mythological structures, where you have strains that interconnect--different storylines that interconnect and are often discrete--that make up a whole.  But the whole thing isn't three acts.  The whole thing isn't five acts.  It's an infinitude of three acts or five acts; it can be as big as you want.

DS: Can you conceptualize that to an example?

 * JR: Well, the best example I could give would be the Bible, or Greek mythology.

DS: On an Internet forum.

 * JR: I don't think that the technology is quite there yet.  It's close.

'''DS: Once you can envision it, the technology will follow, though. Once you can start seeing it.'''

 * JR: Yeah, there are sites that are sort of attempting it, and if you look right now, there are all these new multiplatform shows, that are beginning to do it.  And there won't be just networking capabilities in these shows; they'll be much different than the shows that we see today.  But on another level, they'll still be narrative shows.

'''DS: A very common thing for a writer is to be riddled with self-doubt, and that can often ruin a lot of inspiration and creativity and make you lose your way in what you're doing. How do you handle a challenge like that?'''

 * JR: Unfortunately, I can't stop myself, whether I'm having self-doubt or not.  This new project of mine is a new play by William Shakespeare; I've taken lines from all the plays and put them together into a new play, essentially.  I liked the idea; I thought it was a cool concept.  But I didn't know if it was a publishable idea.  I didn't want to waste my time doing a non-publishable thing, but then I ended up doing it anyway.  And when I saw it, it was a complete surprise.

On changing the literary canon
DS: Do you have a memory that has stuck with you that--where you continually turn back to it to learn new lessons?

 * JR: I feel like I have a lot of memories that I turn back to all the time.

DS: Is there one that stands out?

 * JR: Right now, there's not.  Although there is a dream I had that's been sticking with me.  Memories that I'm inundated with right now have to do with my childhood, and remembering--actually, I have a picture of me standing on the West Side Highway when I was a little kid.  I was just a street urchin, and now my daughter smells like that.

DS: She smells like a street urchin?

 * JR: She smells like a little kid who runs around in the park, you know?  Is a dream too off-base?

DS: And that brings back a lot--the olfactory memories?

 * JR: Yeah, yeah.  Is a dream too off-base?

DS: No, I'd love to hear your dream.

 * JR: So, I was standing in this field--I think it was a polo ground kind of thing.  And there were a lot of sort of petite bourgeoisie/intellectuals/professors--these sorts of people.  It was late afternoon after some kind of sporting event; I think it was polo.  I don't really know.  And everyone's standing around; it's the first cooling off of a hot day.  It didn't really have a time period.  Sort of recent distant past.

DS: Sure.

 * JR: And someone came screaming out: they'd had an audience with the Queen.  They were shouting that they had just met the Queen and that the Queen had given him ... a poop.  One of her poops.  And he comes running out and he's saying this, and everyone is mocking him.  He's taking it good-naturedly, as he should.  He's standing there, and the crowd kind of quiets down, and he's holding this small plastic tub--which incidentally is the one that we put the lizard in when we're cleaning the cage--he's holding this small plastic tub that has two dry, narrow poops in it, one sort of tipped on the other.  There's a silence overwhelming the crowd.  Then he pops the lid, and he lifts it to his nose to sniff it.  And he sniffs it, and he really takes it in, and he's thinking about this smell and committing it to memory.  Then, in utter silence, he just passes it to the person next to him, and that person takes the poop up to their nose and sniffs it, and then it passes through the whole crowd.

[both chuckle]

 * JR: So, that dream I keep thinking about.

DS: Do you do dream analysis?

 * JR: I think that dream has to do with the way things become big in culture.  I have all kinds of complaints about the literary canon.  For example, there are a lot of books that are widely remembered that I think could be forgotten--

DS: Like Animal Farm?

 * JR: Well, Animal Farm, I don't know if I would forget it, but I might forget other lesser-known books by--let's pick a Trollope book and get rid of it, because that book is at the expense of a contemporary author.  I don't really see the genres as competing against literary authors; I see the backlist as competing against literary authors.

DS: What's a book that every kid in high school reads that you think should be removed?

 * JR: Well, I read Typhoon by Joseph Conrad, and that could definitely go.  I was not a big fan of those James Fenimore Cooper books, which I had to read.  I thought they were just preposterous.  They could go.  There are a bunch of Trollope books that could go.  I know there are some people who love Balzac, but frankly, a lot of those bore me to death, too.  I would have kids reading contemporary books.  A kid who reads a book and says, "This isn't for me.  It doesn't have anything to do with my time period; I don't know why I'm reading it.  Literature is completely removed from my experience."  They're right!  There's no reason to have that kid reading books that are removed from their experience.

'''DS: Clearly a lot can be gained from literature, and as you've have shown talking about Shakespeare here. But you think there might be a problem with building a new generation of readers, in that we train people to read things that they can't relate to? It would be like raising kids to watch Bette Davis movies, and then you get to watch the Harry Potter film.'''

 * JR: Exactly.  I think that is exactly the problem.  It is exactly the problem, and I can't iterate strongly enough that I feel like people should be reading contemporary books, that we should melt down the canon and have people reading contemporary authors.  There are amazing contemporary authors, and if you were to walk around the basement of the Strand for a day and look at all the review books down there, and tell me that there aren't amazing contemporary authors, I'll cede the point.  But I know.  I know you won't come out of that basement and tell me that.  There are just so many amazing authors, people who are writing extremely well right now.

DS: Is there at all a movement for that?

 * JR: I don't know but I actually think that it's going to happen, partly because of the public domain, the downloadable Internet.

DS: But can't you see such a reaction against that change?

 * JR: Yeah, I can.  No, I can already hear someone harping "Faulkner lost to Toni Morrison?!?"

DS: [laughs]

 * JR: Well, first of all, Faulkner isn't going to be lost, right?  And second of all, the Toni Morrison books you're talking about are twenty-five years old.

'''DS: There's a magical thing that happens when people feel they discover things that went to the wayside--think about bell bottoms! I remember in the early 90s, the idea of bell bottoms, or even just large pants at the bottom, was just anathema.'''

 * JR: Yeah. Yeah.

'''DS: And then all of a sudden it's like people get bored with the same thing, and boom! Bell bottoms are back.'''

 * JR: Yeah.  It doesn't seem so foreign now.

DS: People who are raised watching "Die Hard" and Schwarzenegger, all of a sudden they discover old Joan Crawford films.

 * JR: Yeah, the literary canon is not going to disappear.  Having people read contemporary authors is just going to build a readership of contemporary readers.  I don't know why we're having kids read books that bore them.  There are just so many good books out there.

On belief in a higher power
DS: Do you believe in a higher power?

 * JR: I think that my feeling about the higher power is in keeping with most of America, in a lot of ways--we think of ourselves as a Christian nation, but in fact, we also think we can pick and choose what we want about religion.  Most people, if you press them, their concept of God is something like a divine spark within them or something that we all share.  Which is very in keeping with the Gnostic principle--we call it Gnosticism now--but a Gnostic principle of Christianity.  And I would put myself somewhere in there.

DS: How do you raise your children?

 * JR: I tortured myself about this before I had kids, and now that I have them, there a couple of things that make it very difficult for me to choose any one particular religion.  I can't forgive Catholicism for the kind of pederasty that it allowed.  It's hard for me--Jewish--I can't--I don't even know, I'm afraid to publish that, but--I can't, you know, abide a religion that would distinguish a child from its parents, to say this child isn't part of this religion because its mother isn't.  To me, that's exactly the kind of distinction that makes religion sinister and destructive.

DS: How do you circumvent that in the rearing of children, then?

 * JR: I'm thinking of something like a Unitarian.  I would do a Gnostic church if they really existed.  And I know they sort of exist, but they seem a little small.  I think Unitarian is probably as close as I'm going to come.

DS: Why would you be afraid to have it published that you're part Jewish?

 * JR: First of all, I'm tired of being Jewish.  I'm tired of the fact that I'm counted among Jewish people; when I'm at a funeral, and there have been a lot of funerals on that side of the family, they're perfectly happy to have me carry a casket.  But you know, I'm not part of the Promised Land, and I'm tired of the selective tally.  Also, people say that Judaism is a philosophy, and then it comes up:  "Are your kids Jewish?  Is their mother Jewish?"  I say, "No"; to me, that makes it a religion, you know?  I'm getting baptized in the next few months, because the Gnostic principle--

DS: [chuckles] As a big "Fuck you" to Judaism, or--?

 * JR: Partly, but I appreciate Gnostic principle of--the Gospel of Thomas is meaningful to me.  I like it.

DS: So you're going to be baptized into the Gnostic church?

 * JR: Well, this is the other thing.  I've got to decide exactly how to do it.  Baptism is looked at in different ways contingent on what Christian group we're talking about.  Some think it's okay to baptize children.  Others think it's part of a later conversion in life.  For me, the ones that think it's okay to baptize children, that's precisely what I don't want, because the idea that a child wouldn't be accepted, blessed by God regardless, whether or not they've been baptized--to say that God would have anything against any child is just disgusting to me.  I can't forgive it.

DS: It's an odd concept.

 * JR: I don't really think of myself as a born-again, and they of course insist on later baptism.  I don't know.  I'm sort of currently leaning towards the Baptist church.

DS: Southern Baptist?

 * JR: Maybe.  I have a lot of Southern--

DS: They're one of the least intolerant.

 * JR: Well, that's interesting.  I don't know; I haven't decided--

DS: I went through a Southern Baptist phase when I lived in Georgia.

 * JR: Oh, did you?

'''DS: Yeah, yeah. The Southern Baptist convention is probably the most conservative out there.'''

On politics
DS: If you were forced to choose, which war would you prefer to fight in, Iraq or Afghanistan?

 * JR: Which one would I rather fight in?  Well, for whom?

DS: On the side of the United States.

 * JR: Iraq or Afghanistan...God, that's tough man.  I think Afghanistan.

DS: Afghanistan?

 * JR: Well, at least we had an endgame.

DS: Hillary or Barack?

 * JR: I think Hillary.  My reasoning is completely ridiculous: I distrust men who are that skinny.  You and I are both lean, but if I told you, you've got to go take this stump out to the backyard, and I gave you an axe, I'd be pretty confident you could do it.  Obama doesn't look like he could do it to me.  [both laugh]  There's something about that I mistrust.

DS: If you remain that lean on the campaign trail, when they're having all those--

 * JR: There's something about it I distrust, a guy who can't lift a hammer.

DS: [laughs]

On self-destruction and survival
DS: How would you choose to die?

 * JR: How would I choose to die?  I don't know.  Most men stop being afraid of dying.  Then, when they have kids, suddenly they're afraid of it again.  But not for themselves, for their kids.  So I don't really care, just as long as my kids are provided for.

DS: You think that most men, pre-parenthood, lose their sense of mortality and their fear of it?

 * JR: I think you just get tired of being afraid of it.

DS: Were you ever afraid of it?

 * JR: Yeah, I was afraid of it in my early twenties; and as a kid, I just remember being really, really afraid of dying, and it being incomprehensible and depressing.

DS: Did that affect your behavior?

 * JR: Well, my daughter, too.  We had a lizard die, and that was a big deal.  She was asking these questions, "Is it gonna be another lizard?"  You know, she has all of these--

DS: "Where does it go?"

 * JR: Yeah, she has a lot of really valid questions.  I don't know; I also don't feel that we understand everything.  For all the people who praise Shakespeare, Shakespeare is still really quite extraordinary.  The sense that I have of Shakespeare is he does understand that on some level, we as human beings, our bodies, are like the top of an iceberg that you can see.  Then there's all this other stuff under the water that you can't see.  That's my feeling about it.  I'm not that afraid of it anymore because I feel like there's all this other stuff under the water.  But it does worry me--

DS: An afterlife?

 * JR: I don't know if it's in those terms, exactly, but there are a lot of things we don't understand.  We're all part of the same thing.  For various Gnostic reasons, saying that there's this thing that existed before all of us, that we're all part of it, and that each of us is made up of a piece of this thing--it's appealing to me.

DS: What's a trait you deplore in yourself?

 * JR: The trait I hate most in myself is probably one of my best traits --

DS: Isn't that always the case?

 * JR: Yeah, probably.  Probably.  I've always been loyal to people, and I think it's one of my worst and best traits.

DS: How is it your best trait?

 * JR: I stand behind people who are really quite troubled and messed up. [laughs nervously]

DS: Is that also how it's one of your worst, then?

 * JR: Yeah, yeah.

DS: What’s a time that this trait screwed you over.

 * JR: As a young writer, I knew a lot of extremely talented, amazing people who were hell-bent on self-destruction, as are a lot of people at that age who are creative people, and yet I still believed in them.

'''DS: How so? Typical drug, alcohol problems, or--'''

 * JR: Yeah, or just really self-sabotaging.  A novelist, let's say, who refused to finish the novel and kept rewriting until it was ruined.  Or an artist who--

DS: Like Joseph Grand in The Plague where he was rewriting the same sentence over and over?

 * JR: Yeah, yeah, or just doing a gigantic revision when it was really finished, or an artist who was doing quite well and then started dating their art dealer and cheated on them.  People have all kinds of ways of destroying themselves.

DS: What do you think it is that drives many artists to sink their own ships?

 * JR: Well, because partially, I think the inclination to be a creative person is to blow things up, right?  And of course the nearest thing around you is yourself.

DS: Do you think that Norman Rockwell had that inclination?

 * JR: I don't know his history that well.  Did he?

'''DS: I don't know, either. No by his popular image.'''

 * JR: There's also a lot of bullshit in our culture, which pushes the idea that to be a successful artist you have to be utterly self-destructive.

'''DS: What's your most treasured possession? You can't include kids, because they're not really possessions.'''

 * JR: My most treasured possession?  Well--I like this painting right here.

DS: Is it your most treasured?

 * JR: I don't know if I have a most treasured, but I have a most precious possession.  Shall I go get it?

DS: Yeah, definitely.

 * JR: This is a scraper.  A red chert scraper that I found walking along in the desert in New Mexico, about a year and a half ago.  Christmas, two years ago.  With two kids I work really hard--pretty much constantly.  But the thing about this is it has such an amazing energy, to hold it.

'''DS: Mmm. I feel that, yeah.'''

 * JR: And the other--it may be prehistoric, it may be several thousand years old--

DS: What makes it a scraper?

 * JR: This is what's interesting, to me--after you killed the meat, this is what you would use to scrape the inside of the flesh off the fur.  Scraping the fat or the gristle off the top of the meat.  And it's a reminder how much harder things were, you know?  Any time I'm feeling down on myself--

DS: You could be scraping meat off bones.

 * JR: I could be scraping--and it was really like that, you know?  So--there's that.

'''DS: I have treasured possessions, but I also have treasured memories. I found a suicide in the woods when I was thirteen: a kid my age, who was probably fourteen. It's a treasured memory in some ways, one that’s lasted my whole life, and it's come back in a lot of ways. On my MySpace profile, I make an allusion to that in my narrative. I don't think people actually read that. I think that people look at pictures, and then they move on. But that's not really true. I have been contacted by both that individual's younger sister, who was eight when he killed himself, and the girlfriend he killed himself over. Separately.'''

 * JR: Yeah, people do read the stuff on there.  People do.

On raising children

 * JR: The kids have made me a better writer.

DS: Really?

 * JR: Yeah, on the Shakespeare thing, I think part of what was holding me back from finishing it was--because I had written the first half in 2003--that I hadn't had kids.  I didn't understand the characters who had children.  I didn't really understand them.  And once I had had kids, I could approach them differently.  And it's great when kids appear in your work.

DS: Gives it depth and also maybe opens you up to a new audience.

 * JR: Yeah, I can't believe I didn't have any kids in my books.  I did have kids in my first novel, but not having kids or parents in your work is so weird.  It's just such a weird lack.  You often see literary books that don't have them.

DS: Especially based in New York.

 * JR: Especially based in New York, yeah.

'''DS: Do you find that when you have friends outside the city, and they know you're raising kids here, they bate their breath? So many people still have this vision of New York from like "The Warriors,"; from the Abe Beame days of New York.'''

 * JR: That's true, it's true.  The funny thing is we were just in San Diego and my daughter, who's three, would just lie on the floor moaning in boredom, because it's so boring there.  We were in a couple of houses, one of which had a pool.  She was fine when there was a pool.  But the driving--she just hated it!  You have to drive to go anywhere, and we couldn't find our health-food-store food…and we're driving around for forty minutes, and she just would sit in the back saying, "I don't want to live in the suburbs."

'''DS: So many parents think that--my sister would be one--the preference of that controlled atmosphere is better for the kids. They don't realize what they lose not living in an urban center.'''

 * JR: Yeah.

DS: People creating this thriving environment where we can influence each other, and kids --

 * JR: --They love it--

'''DS: --have more stimulus. When you see news reports that on the discovery of an Earthlike planet does that affect your perspective or does it go unnoticed?'''

 * JR: I don't know; there's so much out there that we don't understand that it's hard for me to imagine there isn't some larger relationships, somehow.  Let me see if I can phrase it better: there's a lot out there we don't understand.

DS: If you had to choose, and you had to choose or both would be devastated and destroyed, which continent would you have blown up, Asia or Africa?

 * JR: Asia or Africa!  I don't know, I have to blow up one of them??

DS: Or they both go.

 * JR: I would just do it based on population, I guess.  I don't know their population figures, but I think that there are more people in Asia, so I think I'd blow up Africa.

DS: So it would be a sum total of human life, as opposed to your judgement of cultural significance, or--?

 * JR: I'm not sure.  The land mass thing might figure in, but mainly yeah, just the populations.

On paedophilia and the death penalty
DS: What do you regard as the lowest depth of misery?

 * JR: Before I was a parent, I was sort of wishy-washy on the death penalty; but being a parent makes you conservative about some things.  My wife is very progressive.  But then when we talk about a paedophile priest or something, and someone suggests that they be executed, she doesn't say anything.  I don't think it's just because there's a sense of vengeance.  I think it's because that would be the most miserable you could possibly be, that I can imagine.  To a person with such a damaged soul that you would harm a child--I can't imagine anything worse.

DS: Augusten Burroughs made the exact same point; the death penalty came up when we were talking, too.

 * JR: Is that right?

'''DS: He's a very dynamic person to talk to. He was like, ‘I'm not one of those people who cares about the whole taking another life. I feel like when you damage a child, you've damaged them. You've given up your right to be here amongst us.’'''

 * JR: Nobody's doing you a favor, either, by keeping you around.

'''DS: I'm pretty ambivalent on the death penalty. It doesn't bother me on some philosophical level, like the death, you know? But I think that the argument that makes me ambivalent as opposed to pro- what worries me is the idea that there's innocent people being put to death.'''

 * JR: Yeah, well, I have an easy solution for that: you don't execute someone who's been convicted once, but when they are convicted twice.  The thing is, we're not executing paedophiles.  That's not what we're doing with them.

'''DS: They're still out there. Just recently, there was some 15-year-old girl who was--'''

 * JR: I was just watching something last night, about a pederast in Idaho, who was fine because the statute of limitations was up.  (In Idaho they've recently changed it.)  So, as a 23-year-old, if you hadn't done anything by the time you were twenty-four, you couldn't do anything, ever.

On personal relationships
DS: What do you value most in your friends?

 * JR: It's funny, because I was just saying this is my biggest flaw --

DS: Loyalty?

 * JR: --probably it would be loyalty, yeah.

DS: Before you got married, what would have been a bigger turnoff for you with your wife, her speaking in a baby voice, or her being overly flatulent?

 * JR: I don't think I would have minded a baby voice; it would have depended what she was saying, of course.

DS: Say, both scenarios in bed.

 * JR: I think flatulence would have been a bigger bummer.

DS: Than a baby voice.

 * JR: Well, if she's saying smart things in a baby voice, I wouldn't mind it.

DS: Like what?

 * JR: If she was just as brainy as she is and she had a baby voice, I would have been fine.

DS: Is there a lot of brainy pillow talk in your household?

 * JR: Not with two kids around!

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/


text:
Talk:John Reed on Orwell, God, self-destruction and the future of writing

Original Reporting notes
In person interview with John Reed conducted October 6, 2007. --David Shankbone 22:35, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

Ping
--David Shankbone 22:51, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

Photo
That photo is great, the randomness of the pink pony toy, but it just somehow works well. -- Zanimum 19:06, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Thanks - I thought it worked too :-) --David Shankbone 21:24, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

On self-destruction and survival
David, there is a small glitch in your last question of this section, where you talk about the suicide. "thirteen; s a kid". I wasn't sure exactly what it was supposed to be, so I thought you should have a look at it. Jcart1534 00:32, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

On Religion
I recommend removing the last line: DS: Yeah, yeah. The Southern Baptist convention is probably the most conservative out there.

It adds nothing to the article, potentially insults Southern Baptists, and it does not have any response from the subject of the article, so it's just a standalone comment made by David Shankbone. The problem, as I see it, is that putting it in the mouth of an interviewer adds a connotation of neutrality, and therefore makes it less likely to be examined closely by someone who is not immediately offended or offput.24.205.50.170 01:49, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

Typo
editprotected

It says 'the the'; this should be only one 'the'. Van der Hoorn (talk) 17:27, 25 February 2009 (UTC)

 * Actually, it is still there. But I'm not sure whether it should be only one 'the', or that [sic] should be added. Van der Hoorn (talk) 13:46, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

 * [[Image:Yes_check.svg|16px]] Done — oops. Done now. I got caught up doing something else in the article and forgot to make the change;). Gopher65talk 02:38, 7 March 2009 (UTC)

Category improvement
"Category:Audio Wikinews News Briefs" is not appropriate here, so it should be removed. Van der Hoorn (talk) 23:42, 25 March 2009 (UTC)
 * ✅ -- Sken   my talk 20:46, 4 April 2009 (UTC)


text:
User:Saravask

I'm Saravask on the English Wikipedia.

title: User:Saravask


text: User talk:Saravask

title: User talk:Saravask


title: File:19October2007.pdf


title: File:19October2007.sxw


text:
File talk:AWN John Reed.ogg

it ends abrubtly ... was it to be the whole interview? --SVTCobra 01:21, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

title: File talk:AWN John Reed.ogg


text:
User:65.25.105.176

You have been temporarily blocked from editing for vandalism of Wikinews. If you wish to make useful contributions, you may do so after the block expires. DragonFire1024 (Talk to the Dragon) 02:10, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

title: User:65.25.105.176


text:
Quality, innovation and competitiveness centre-stage at Taipei Int'l Hardware & DIY Show

October 19, 2007

The 7th Taipei International Hardware & DIY Show, organized by Kaigo Taiwan (The representative of Koelnmesse in Taiwan) and Koelnmesse GmbH, started on October 18-20 at Taipei World Trade Center Exhibition Hall 3. This show has 183 participants using 300 booths to exhibit accessories and tools on esoteric fabricating, home-living applications, and security.

With people in Taiwan valuing on the quality of home-living, the organizer set a pre-show pavilion of "2008 Taipei Home & Lifestyle Fair" and invited B&Q & HomeBox holding DIY workshops for visitors.

This exhibition is conjuncted with industry and applications, and pursuing with three main topics of “Quality, Innovation and Competitiveness”. International factories such as Hitachi, Rexon, Ryobi participated this show for the export opportunity in the hardware industry.

After the "Product Certificates and Testing" pavilion in TAITRONICS Autumn, Bureau of Standards, Metrology & Inspection, M.O.E.A., R.O.C. (Taiwan) and DIY in Europe magazine were invited for speeches focused on certifications on hardware & DIY products and environment issues in EU.


text:
Talk:Quality, innovation and competitiveness centre-stage at Taipei Int'l Hardware & DIY Show

OR info
Partially translation. Mostly referred to Official on-line news released. Photos update later. Brock contact... 05:26, 19 October 2007 (UTC)


text:
Half of life could go extinct by century's end, warn eminent biologists

October 20, 2007

In a "fireside chat" at Yale University on Wednesday, prominent naturalists Edward O. Wilson and Peter H. Raven predicted dire consequences for the planet's biodiversity and habitability unless current trends in consumption and environmental degradation are reversed. The two scientists were awarded the Addison Emery Verrill Medal by the Peabody Museum of Natural History for their contributions to natural science before a capacity crowd at Yale's Sprague Hall. Both are known for their environmental activism as well as extensive research and popular writing.

Wilson, known for his contributions to island biogeography as well as the controversial field of sociobiology, said that humans—like all earth species—are adapted to this world. But most people have the dangerous attitude that this world is "a waystation for a better world", warned Wilson. Humans could cause the extinction of half of all species by the end of the next century, he stated.

The event was billed as a debate between the two scientists, but they found little to disagree about. (Raven quipped that he did not care for Wilson's tie, the extent of their disagreement for the evening.) Raven pointed to unsustainably high levels of consumption, especially in the United States, that will lead to ecological disaster if left unchecked. Levels of consumption have to be cut drastically, he argued. But Wilson claimed that it would be possible to maintain and even improve quality of life even while significantly reducing the population's ecological footprint. Current models, he said, predict that human population will peak at around 9 billion, and that "if we use what we have" intelligently, the world could be a sustainable paradise by the 22nd century.

Raven and Wilson both argued for the compatibility of Christian and environmentalist viewpoints. According to the second chapter of Genesis, said Raven, man was put on the earth in order to preserve it. Wilson said that we need to "form an alliance" to save life on earth—an alliance including both religious and non-religious people—and that one can be a "conservative right-wing Christian" and an environmentalist. His recent work, including the Encyclopedia of Life, has focused on creating such an alliance.

The most important thing, Raven said, is to expose children to nature. Invoking the argument of Rachel Carson's 1965 A Sense of Wonder, Raven said that children between the ages of four and ten are extremely impressionable, and that teaching them to appreciate the natural world will be the most effective way to ensure environmental consciousness in the next generation. But although Raven was a naturalist from a young age, he said that he "didn't give a thought to conservation" while in graduate school in the 1950s. Carson's 1962 book on the dangers of pesticides, Silent Spring, was Raven's introduction to dangers of environmental degradation. Wilson also emphasized Carson's legacy for the environmental movement; he proudly noted that Carson biographer Linda Lear had recently called him the "only surviving person who actually helped Rachel Carson" put together Silent Spring.

Raven and Wilson were only the 16th and 17th, respectively, to receive the Verrill Medal, which is the highest honor awarded by the Peabody Museum. Before a sympathetic crowd, Wilson tactfully avoided any mention of his own institution, Yale's rival Harvard University.


text:
YouTube announced the release of Taiwan Traditional Chinese website

October 19, 2007 YouTube announced that Taiwan Traditional Chinese website has been released yesterday in Taipei City, Taiwan, and the unique web address will be shown as "www.youtube.com.tw" or "tw.youtube.com". Users from YouTube Global Sites can access Taiwan Site. This site launch will be a benefit for users preferring reading Chinese more than other languages. In the press conference, co-founder Steve Chen explained the reason choosing ".tw" address, "With lots of good experiences using Traditional Chinese Site in Hong Kong, I think Taiwan should also be. We improved search functions to find more in Taiwan." He remarked. "YouTube has lots of international sites in many countries including Taiwan, with a keyword, you can find lots of different results in different sites." YouTube International Manager Sakina Arsiwala said. Not only the launch by the performance of Eight Generals and Steve Chen, YouTube also invited China Television Co., CommonWealth Magazine, Lion Travel Co., Ltd., and Taiwan Broadcasting System to share experiences of partnership. "We should learn some conceptions on sharing and public service needed in this networking era." Yuan-hui Hu (President and CEO of Public Television Service, Taiwan) remarked at the Partner Panel of the Press Conference.

After the Press Conference, YouTube held launch and site experience activities at Xinyi Plaza of Shin Kong Mitsukoshi and invited registered users participating in "Beautiful Taiwan" online video competition.


text:
Talk:Half of life could go extinct by century's end, warn eminent biologists

Comments
The headline is very eye-catching, but there is no mention of extinction in the article itself. The headline doesn't apprear to have any relationship whatever with the content of the article. Just a minor beef, but still - shouldn't the subject of the headline be in the article somewhere? 75.153.202.25 15:58, 20 October 2007 (UTC)
 * It's at the end of the second paragraph.--ragesoss 16:52, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

Pong
DragonFire1024 (Talk to the Dragon) 00:13, 21 October 2007 (UTC)


text:
Talk:YouTube announced the release of Taiwan Traditional Chinese website

OR info
Partially Translation. According to the Texture Version of Press Kit by YouTube Taiwan. Photos update later. Brock contact... 06:11, 19 October 2007 (UTC)


text:
Australia Votes 2007: Labor releases tax plan

October 19, 2007

Labor has released its tax plan, following the announcement from the Liberal/National coalition that they would provide tax cuts costing AU$34 billion if re-elected. The government has placed pressure on Labor since their announcement on Monday, urging Mr Rudd to release the opposition's tax plan.

Under Labor's system, the government's planned tax cuts for Australians earning more than $180,000 per year would be scrapped, saving $3 billion. The savings would be spent on health and education for working families.

Speaking in Canberra today, Mr Rudd announced that if elected he would spend $2.3 billion on tax rebates for parents with children in primary and secondary schools. The refunds would be available to those who are eligible for Family Tax Benefit A. Mr Rudd claims the plan would be available to around two million children.

A Rudd government would offer a 50 percent education rebate to parents, up to $750 per child for primary school aged children and up to $1500 for children in secondary school. The rebate could be used for a variety of purchases but not for school fees. Mr Rudd said the rebate would help to equip children for the digital age.

"If mum and dad are spending money on buying a laptop, spending money on buying a home computer, spending money on ... purchasing internet connection, education software printers and books, those expenditures, (they) will be eligible to claim the 50 per cent education tax refund that we are putting forward," Mr Rudd said.

"We need to equip our young people with the skills necessary to participate in the digital economy of the 21st century."

Mr Rudd vigorously denied that he rushed the plan out after the government's announcement. "We have been working on this education tax refund for the better part of four, five months," Mr Rudd told reporters.

Labor would spend $400 million of the savings on Labor's national health reform plan, while the remaining $200 million would go to the budget surplus.

Under the health reform plan, an elective surgery strategy would be implemented with the aim of reducing waiting times. Mr Rudd said the waiting times experienced by some Australians were unacceptable.

"We intend ... to establish through the use of other funds as well a plan which would create a national elective-surgery strategy to reduce waiting times across the nation," Mr Rudd said.

About 25,000 Australians are on waiting lists for elective surgery despite having passed the clinically acceptable waiting period, he said.

"That's unacceptable," he said.

Mr Rudd also said that Labor would embrace tax reform by flattening the number of tax rates from four to three, at 15, 30 and 40 percent by 2012-13. This contrasts to the government's planned tax cuts bringing rates to 15, 30, 25 and 40 percent.

If Labor is elected, those paying the highest tax rate would pay around $10 a week more than they would under a Howard government. Mr Rudd said that he was not waging a class war and believed those paying the top tax rate wouldn't mind investing in the country.

"If you're on $180 grand and more, as people like myself are, I don't think you really need it just now," said Mr Rudd.

"What I say instead is that most people in that bracket wouldn't mind an investment going into bridging the digital divide for the whole country."

"If we were waging some sort of class warfare, we wouldn't be in the business of outlining the long term goals that we've put forward – a flattening, prospectively, of the tax system down to three rates rather than four with a top marginal tax rate of 40."

The government has criticised the plan, with Treasurer Peter Costello claiming that Mr Rudd copied "91.5 percent" of their tax policy. He accused the opposition of never having a tax plan.

"Mr Rudd talks about education - if he'd have brought his exam paper in after copying 91.5 per cent of the answers from the student sitting next to him, he would have got an F for fail."

The Treasurer said that it would be unlikely that a Rudd government could deliver tax cuts as it could not manage the economy well enough to deliver them.

"Unless you can manage the Australian economy, these tax cuts will not be deliverable," he said.

"Mr Rudd and Mr Swan do not understand the Australian economy. This is entirely clear from the fact they have spent four days copying 91.5 per cent of our tax plan."

Mr Costello said that a Rudd government would have a dilemma if elected, in that he could not follow the coalition's policies.

"He never had a tax policy," Mr Costello said.

"He hadn't done the work, five days after our tax policy, his great contribution to the tax debate in this country is to say 'me too, but'."

"The trouble with 'me too, but' is, it's OK for Mr Rudd to say 'me too, I'll be like Howard and Costello and adopt their policies', but if he gets in Howard and Costello won't be there writing the policies."

Mr Costello said that when Kevin Rudd runs out of ideas, the union movement would step in to provide guidance. "So who is going to say 'me to, but' to them? I think the union movement will be giving him a few ideas," said Mr Costello.


text:
Fußball-Bundesliga 2007–08: Borussia Dortmund vs. Bayern Munich

October 28, 2007

Bayern Munich remained undefeated in all competitions after a 0-0 draw against Borussia Dortmund. The draw leaves Bayern at the top of the table with 27 points. However, the lead is down to four points after Hamburg's 1-0 win against Duisburg.

didn't pass a late fitness test and didn't make the 18-man strong matchday squad. Luca Toni, Martin Demichelis an Jose Ernesto Sosa replaced, and Hamit Altintop. Jose Ernesto Sosa returned after being sidelined for almost two months after ankle surgery.

Bayern Munich and Borussia Dortmund exchanged plenty of chances and almost had a 50/50 possession between them.

Bayern Munich plays Borussia Mönchengladbach at home in the while Borussia Dortmund plays Eintracht Frankfurt in the same competition.


text:
Comments:John Reed on Orwell, God, self-destruction and the future of writing

I haven't read 'Snowball's Chance', but from Reed's interview it seems like he's at least partly missed the point of Orwell's work. In 1946 Orwell stated that "Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism, as I know it."

Animal Farm was not merely a work warning of the perils of revolution and new ideologies. It was never as simple as the post-Orwellian framework that various bodies with their own agendas forced upon it. Animal Farm transcends it's own era without being rewritten or redefined. Animal Farm demonstrates the hazards of trusting good intentions to the malice and ignorance of human frailty and fallibility. This will always be applicable as long as there are ideologies and minds to follow them. That was surely part of the reason for writing the book as an allegory and not a plain history of the rise and fall of Russian Socialism.

It's also easy to see how someone with this short sighted view of history can attack literature of past eras claiming it of no importance.

As for the section on the future of writing and narrative form; I'd probably agree that writing will be popularised for the masses and repackaged in some easier, quicker more palatable form; probably via the internet. Like printing the haiku of Basho on the back of a packet of cigarettes to be glanced at and discarded. It's been done before with comics and the penny dreadful and they have almost come and gone. The written form, created from art and skill will persevere within the five act structure in one form or another for a LONG time. Something as escapist, eccentric and personal as reading a book does not need to evolve much to survive. Shane.Bell 08:15, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

John Reed Interview
John Reed interview. This is news? John Reed appears to be a lightweight who rips off Orwell and Shakespeare's work in order to gain free credibility for himself. Mr. Reed needs to do his own work. He will never be part of any 'canon' standing on other people's shoulders.-209.205.160.101 01:15, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

Thanks David
And thanks Shane, and IP address, for your thoughts.

Shane, I sympathize with your disquiet about the loss of three or five act narratives. Don't worry, there will still be plenty of them. Even now, there are novels and television series and plenty of narrative structures that are much larger than three or five acts, which nontheless employ three or five acts in their constituent episodes. And, incidentally, three or five acts, the way we think of them today, are not old structures: they're relatively new.

As for the Internet, a lot of people were quite upset about the printing press; the scribes said it was a fad.

As for my misunderstanding Orwell, if you haven't read my book ...

Again, all the best to everyone. Go read a new book.

--John R

Hello John
I wasn't sure if we'd get any reply from you here. Good to see you stayed around!

I'm not sure I'd say 3/5 act structures are new... their roots have been around for at least 2500yrs; predating the English language. When Aristotle talked about the protasis, epitasis and catastrophe the idea was already well established. Now I know what you're saying is that today's 3/5 act structure is not the same beast as the ancient Greeks knew (and that's a fair and valid point); but it is a clear descendant and tomorrow's structures will still follow the same lines IMHO. At least for as long as we're around to see it.

As for misunderstanding Orwell; I wasn't attacking your book at all, that's why I said at the start that I hadn't read it and that I was purely reacting to the interview.

What I don't agree with is how in the interview, Orwell's work was slated for being a "bludgeon for revolutionary thinking". My disagreement in this is reflected in my quote from my first post. Orwell was for reform, for revolutionary thinking, he would've probably been for your book and not seen how it was intended as an attack on his book from what I've read about Snowball's Chance.

To me Animal farm was about how good intentions and well meaning beginnings are never enough. Manor Farm was brought to ruin by a corruption of Old Major's dream which was born to bring the farm to a harmonious Communist glory. Just as the USSR crumbled at the hands of Stalin who pushed a twisted version of Socialism that was miles away from anything envisioned by Comrade Marx and Engels.

This is just as applicable to a Capitalist model where everyone assumes the role of a drone and trusts the greed of the rich guy upstairs to run the economy by some form of economic convection. It could also be applicable to the fanatics and 'believers' Who trust their direction to preachers who teach from texts with mostly good intentions and well meaning beginnings but end in something entirely different.

I do however, agree that there are a lot of books out there that are anachronistic to today's world and can be a waste of time (not animal farm) for anyone trying to 'read classics' or heaven forbid; learn something from a book! I too think that the education systems need to have a large part to play in putting this right.

I will get around to reading your book. I do think it seems like a relevant idea and may have a place in the modern world alongside Animal Farm. I don't however see it as replacing Animal Farm. Of course that will have to wait until I've read the other books on my literary shortlist and finished writing my own novel :) Shane.Bell 12:36, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

Animal Farm and the Cold War
From what I gather, it seems that Mr. Reed despises Animal Farm because he sees it as a CIA tool. First of all, that claim in itself is debatable, but even if AF were a neocon bible, I don't see why Orwell should take the blame for that. If anything, his works (especially 1984 and AF) have shown us that any ideological tool can be taken out of context and made to fit a new doctrine. Whether Orwell sold out at the end of his life or not, I don't think it's fair to brand him as a reactionary element who helped to establish the oppressive status quo of today's America. I mean AF is really more of a parable about the Russian revolution than one about the Cold War, regardless of how it has been appropriated by "the regime" during the past few decades. I really can't understand why Mr. Reed hates Orwell so much, and this interview doesn't make his motives any clearer. Personally, I found a great deal of inspiration in Orwell's work (fiction and non-fiction). I don't think AF and 1984 are meant to be pessimistic, defeatist apologies for the status quo. If anything, their message is that the revolution is worth fighting for even when all seems lost. Anyway, that's my interpretation. Mr. Reed seems to have a different one and that's great. But I don't think Orwell deserves all this hostility, and I'm not putting him on a pedestal or anything, criticism is always welcome, but I think it must be acknowledged that he was also a great positive influence for many authors and thinkers of the past century, regardless of any mistakes that he might have made in his later years.

P.S. Ron Paul is a nutbag (and a bigot). If anything, Mr. Reed you should be criticizing the likes of him as bitingly as you have done to Orwell. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.156.123.133 (talk) 22:45, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

Comments from feedback form - "John Reed is an idiot who appa..."
John Reed is an idiot who apparently has no real understanding of Orwell or his works. To blame Orwell for the Twin Towers is ignorant and leaves on astounded. Orwell fought on the front lines against fascism and devoted his life to a better world. Perhaps the CIA hijacked his work and perhaps Reed's teacher's used it to undermine progressive thought but anyone who's read Homage to Catalonia would know that those were not Orwell's intentions. If anything Orwell was a godsend in relating how Stalin and Hitler were more alike that apart. Orwell allowed those on the left to criticize the fascistic tendencies of Stalinism but remain committed to a better future for the working class and those marginalized politically and economically. At a time when many on the left felt it was their duty to support socialism in one country, no matter how steeped in blood, Orwell took an unpopular and brave stand is saying, this is wrong. —76.102.218.143 (talk) 05:39, 9 July 2010 (UTC)


text:
Blast kills 8, injures 126 at a mall in Manila, The Philippines

October 19, 2007

An explosion rocked an upscale mall in the main financial district of the Philippine capital Manila. The explosion damaged the Glorietta Mall in the financial district of Makati and killed at least eight people and injured at least 126 people, 98 of those needed hospitalization and the other 28 were given first aid at the blast site for minor injuries.

The explosion happened past 1:30 p.m. just after employees of the different companies in Makati finished their lunch breaks.

Police investigators initially said the cause of the explosion was from a leaking liquefied petroleum gas tank, but after a few hours the Chief of the Philippine National Police, Director General Avelino Razon Jr., ruled out the possibility of a gas tank leak and stated the bomb could be the cause of the explosion because ground investigators say the blast site smelled of gunpowder. Some police intelligence sources say they found traces of C4 explosives at the blast site.

Philippine president Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo meanwhile is on her way to the blast site. Currently, the explosion is still under investigation and the PNP bomb squad are inside the mall to check if there is still any bomb debris or any human remains.


text:
USPTO partially confirms validity of Amazon "1-click patent"

October 9, 2007 Today, the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) issued an office action, which confirmed the patentability of claims 6 to 10 of the Amazon 1-Click patent, US 5,960,411. The patent examiner, however, rejected claims 1 to 5 and 11 to 15. Amazon now has up to six months to amend the rejected claims to overcome the examiner's rejection, provide arguments to demonstrate that the examiner is in error and/or provide evidence to demonstrate the patentability of their claims. During this period, the entire patent is still considered valid under US patent law.

The USPTO is reconsidering the patentability of the claims due to a request for reexamination filed by New Zealander Peter Calveley. Mr. Calveley used internet archives to show that defunct company Digi Cash used a similar technique prior to Amazon. Despite costing a substantial sum of cash and requiring donations to prepare and file the request for reexamination, Calveley said he did it as a game and hopes that his success inspires others to play the same game. "One Click" shopping is an ecommerce technique, which allows a customer to purchase products via the Internet without repeatedly entering personal information such as name and address. At the time it was introduced it eased the frustration of on-line shopping.

Amazon filed the patent application for 1-click shopping in early 1997 and was granted the patent in September 1999. 23 days later Amazon sued rival Barnes & Noble for alleged infringement by its "Express Lane" ordering which was introduced in 1998. In December 1999 Amazon won an interim injunction against Barnes & Noble but the USA Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit lifted this injunction in February 2001. The parties then settled their dispute for undisclosed terms. Amazon has since successfully licensed the technique to other e-sellers such as Apple.


text:
User talk:124.106.150.136

Welcome
Welcome!

124.106.150.136, welcome to Wikinews! Thank you for your contributions I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are a few good links for newcomers:

Our key policies - if you read anything, read these! Here a few pointers to help you get to know Wikinews: There are always things to do on Wikinews:
 * Neutral point of view - tell every side to a story in a fair and balanced way
 * Cite sources - everything in a Wikinews article must be sourced
 * Introduction - overview of the site
 * Writing an article - how to write and publish a complete article
 * Content guide - what's suitable for Wikinews
 * Style guide - how articles should look before publishing
 * Contents - the contents page.
 * Existing articles need expanding and checking for spelling and mistakes
 * The front page lead articles often need updating
 * Developing stories need finishing and publishing
 * Discussions need your input
 * And of course, stories need writing!

Here are some other hints and tips:

 * I would recommend that you get a username. You don't have to log in to read or edit articles on Wikinews, but creating an account is quick, free and non-intrusive, requires no personal information, and there are many benefits of having a username.  (If you edit without a username, your IP address is used to identify you instead.)

 * When using talk pages, please sign your name at the end of your messages by typing four tildes (~~). This will automatically produce your username (or IP address) and the date.

If you have any questions, you can ask them at the water cooler or to anyone on the Welcommittee, or ask me on my Talk page. Again, welcome! –Doldrums(talk) 11:00, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

Philippines bombing article
First off, we really appreciate your contribution.

But sometimes users submit an article from somewhere else, not realizing that Wikinews cannot keep copy-and-paste versions of articles which are published elsewhere under a restrictive copyright. An article created in this way is a copyright violation, and Wikinews policy is to erase these even if they are excellent article ideas.

Another problem which sometimes comes up is press releases: Press releases are sometimes excellent sources, but they do not qualify as unbiased news articles so they can't be published as they are. Two key things to remember about press releases is that they're usually written to represent the viewpoint of an involved party (Thus likely running foul of our Neutral Point of View policy). And second, they are generally covered by copyright which can conflict with our open editing approach.

A better way to get an article on an exciting subject published here is to write an original article following the guidelines described in writing an article, or to write a brief explanation of the subject and include the url address of articles or websites to use as sources. If you are part of the story that the article is about, you may also wish to consider requesting an interview rather than writing the article yourself.

Thanks again! –Doldrums(talk) 11:00, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

title: User talk:124.106.150.136


text:
User talk:AlmezaPR

Welcome
Thanks for experimenting with Wikinews. Your test worked, and has now been reverted or removed. Please use Sandbox for any other tests you want to do, since testing in articles may disrupt the site's working and will be reverted quickly. , welcome to Wikinews! Thank you for your contributions; I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are a few good links for newcomers:

Our key policies - if you read anything, read these! Here a few pointers to help you get to know Wikinews: There are always things to do on Wikinews: By the way, you can sign your name on Talk pages using four tildes ( ~~~~ ), which produces your name and the current date. If you have any questions, you can ask them at the water cooler or to anyone on the Welcommittee, or ask me on my Talk page. Again, welcome! --Brian McNeil / talk 11:18, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Neutral point of view - tell every side to a story in a fair and balanced way
 * Cite sources - everything in a Wikinews article must be sourced
 * Introduction - overview of the site
 * Writing an article - how to write and publish a complete article
 * Content guide - what's suitable for Wikinews
 * Style guide - how an article should look before publishing
 * Contents - the contents page.
 * Existing articles need expanding and checking for spelling and mistakes
 * The front page lead articles often need updating
 * Developing stories need finishing and publishing
 * Discussions need your input
 * And of course, stories need writing!

title: User talk:AlmezaPR


text:
User talk:Waerloeg~enwikinews

Welcome
, welcome to Wikinews! I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are a few good links for newcomers:

Our key policies - if you read anything, read these! Here a few pointers to help you get to know Wikinews: There are always things to do on Wikinews: By the way, you can sign your name on Talk pages using four tildes ( ~~~~ ), which produces your name and the current date. If you have any questions, you can ask them at the water cooler or to anyone on the Welcommittee, or ask me on my Talk page. Again, welcome! --Brian McNeil / talk 11:21, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Neutral point of view - tell every side to a story in a fair and balanced way
 * Cite sources - everything in a Wikinews article must be sourced
 * Introduction - overview of the site
 * Writing an article - how to write and publish a complete article
 * Content guide - what's suitable for Wikinews
 * Style guide - how articles should look before publishing
 * Contents - the contents page.
 * Existing articles need expanding and checking for spelling and mistakes
 * The front page lead articles often need updating
 * Developing stories need finishing and publishing
 * Discussions need your input
 * Audio Wikinews could always use more contributors
 * And of course, stories need writing!

Your account will be renamed
Hello,

The developer team at Wikimedia is making some changes to how accounts work, as part of our on-going efforts to provide new and better tools for our users like cross-wiki notifications. These changes will mean you have the same account name everywhere. This will let us give you new features that will help you edit and discuss better, and allow more flexible user permissions for tools. One of the side-effects of this is that user accounts will now have to be unique across all 900 Wikimedia wikis. See the announcement for more information.

Unfortunately, your account clashes with another account also called Waerloeg. To make sure that both of you can use all Wikimedia projects in future, we have reserved the name Waerloeg~enwikinews that only you will have. If you like it, you don't have to do anything. If you do not like it, you can pick out a different name.

Your account will still work as before, and you will be credited for all your edits made so far, but you will have to use the new account name when you log in.

Sorry for the inconvenience.

Yours, Keegan Peterzell Community Liaison, Wikimedia Foundation 23:38, 17 March 2015 (UTC)

Renamed
 This account has been renamed as part of single-user login finalisation. If you own this account you can |log in using your previous username and password for more information. If you do not like this account's new name, you can choose your own using this form after logging in: . -- Keegan (WMF) (talk) 06:40, 21 April 2015 (UTC)

title: User talk:Waerloeg~enwikinews


text:
User talk:Numbah5

Welcome
, welcome to Wikinews! I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are a few good links for newcomers:

Our key policies - if you read anything, read these! Here a few pointers to help you get to know Wikinews: There are always things to do on Wikinews: By the way, you can sign your name on Talk pages using four tildes ( ~~~~ ), which produces your name and the current date. If you have any questions, you can ask them at the water cooler or to anyone on the Welcommittee, or ask me on my Talk page. Again, welcome! --Brian McNeil / talk 11:21, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Neutral point of view - tell every side to a story in a fair and balanced way
 * Cite sources - everything in a Wikinews article must be sourced
 * Introduction - overview of the site
 * Writing an article - how to write and publish a complete article
 * Content guide - what's suitable for Wikinews
 * Style guide - how articles should look before publishing
 * Contents - the contents page.
 * Existing articles need expanding and checking for spelling and mistakes
 * The front page lead articles often need updating
 * Developing stories need finishing and publishing
 * Discussions need your input
 * Audio Wikinews could always use more contributors
 * And of course, stories need writing!

title: User talk:Numbah5


text:
Ben Cousins sacked by West Coast in AFL drug scandal

October 19, 2007

Ben Cousins, the former West Coast Eagles AFL team captain has been forcedly removed from the West Coast Eagles and is 'no longer a registered player', according to an AFL spokesperson.

Cousins was pulled over by police on Tuesday for erratic driving. Police charged the player with one drug charge and failing to provide a blood test. The drug charge was dropped today but the blood test charge still lingers, after police had found the drug Valium solely in pill form - the drug is only illegal in the liquid form (for injection).

Cousins had already been temporarily suspended by the West Coast Eagles prior to the 2007 season but has never actually tested positive to illicit drugs. Cousins then underwent rehabilitation in the USA in early 2007 and agreed to return to the club under a number of conditions, including a 'zero-tolerance clause', according to The Sunday Times this morning.

West Coast still stands in its decision to sack Cousins.


text:
Comments:Blasts kills 8, injures 126 at a mall in Manila, The Philippines

Well, the insurgency of the Philippines is at work. Contralya 13:56, 19 October 2007 (UTC)


text:
User:3210

Template:Europe menu

"Adem-i zâde eger bî-edeb est, âdem nist    (âdem oğlu eğer ki edepsizdir, âdem değildir.) Fark der cism-i benî âdem ü hayvan edeb est(âdem ve hayvan cinslerinin cismindeki fark edeptir) Çeşm be küşâ-yı bi-bîn cümle kelâmullâh râ (gözünü aç bak cümle kelamullaha) Ayet âyet hemegî ma’nî-i kur’ân edeb est (ayet ayet kur’an’ın bütün manası  edeptir) Mevlana Celaleddin-i Rumi"

{| border=1 style="margin-left:2em; border-collapse:collapse; border:1px solid #b0b0b0; line-height:1" cellpadding=5 }
 * - align=center style="background:#e0e0e0"
 * Kullanıcı adım ||Wikiler ||Dili||Tüm katkılar
 * 3210||Vikisöz||Türkçe||Katkılarım
 * 3210||Wikiquote||İngilizce||Katkılarım
 * 3210||Vikipedi||Türkçe||Katkılarım
 * 3210||Wikipedia||İngilizce||Katkılarım
 * 3210||Vikikaynak||Türkçe||Katkılarım
 * E3210||Wikisource||İngilizce||Katkılarım
 * E3210||Vikikitap||Türkçe||Katkılarım
 * 3210||Vikisözlük||Türkçe||Katkılarım
 * E3210|| VikiTür ||İngilizce||Katkılarım
 * 3210||Commons||İngilizce||Katkılarım
 * 3210||Meta||İngilizce||Katkılarım
 * E3210||Wikisource||İngilizce||Katkılarım
 * E3210||Vikikitap||Türkçe||Katkılarım
 * 3210||Vikisözlük||Türkçe||Katkılarım
 * E3210|| VikiTür ||İngilizce||Katkılarım
 * 3210||Commons||İngilizce||Katkılarım
 * 3210||Meta||İngilizce||Katkılarım
 * E3210|| VikiTür ||İngilizce||Katkılarım
 * 3210||Commons||İngilizce||Katkılarım
 * 3210||Meta||İngilizce||Katkılarım
 * 3210||Meta||İngilizce||Katkılarım
 * 3210||Meta||İngilizce||Katkılarım

{|- valign="top" style="width: 100%" | {|cellspacing="3" class="europetable" width="100%"
 * colspan=2|
 * - valign="top"
 * width="50%" class="MainPageBG" style="border: 1px solid #9f8f9f; padding: .5em 1em 1em; color: #000000; background-color: #f8f8ff"|
 * - valign="top"
 * colspan=2 style="border: 1px solid #cfcfbf;padding: .5em 1em 1em; color: #000000; background-color: #ffffff"|

= Latest news =  category=published category=Turkey count=15 addfirstcategorydate=true

 * - valign="top"
 * colspan=2|
 * - valign="top"
 * width="50%" class="MainPageBG" style="border: 1px solid #9f8f9f; padding: .5em 1em 1em; color: #000000; background-color: #f8f8ff"|

Politics and conflicts
 category=published category= category=Politics and conflicts count=5 namespace=0 suppresserrors=true

Disasters and accidents
 category=published category= category=Disasters and accidents count=5 namespace=0 suppresserrors=true

Crime and law
 category=published category= category=Crime and law count=5 namespace=0 suppresserrors=true

Obituaries
 category=published category= category=Obituaries count=5 namespace=0 suppresserrors=true

 * width="50%" class="MainPageBG" style="border:1px solid #9f8f9f; padding: .5em 1em 1em; color: #000; background-color: #f8fff8"|

Start a new Turkey article
Type a title in the box below:

Economy and business
 category=published category= category=Economy and business count=5 namespace=0 suppresserrors=true

Science and technology
 category=published category= category=Science and technology count=5 namespace=0 suppresserrors=true

Culture and entertainment
 category=published category= category=Culture and entertainment count=5 namespace=0 suppresserrors=true

Sports
<DynamicPageList> category=published category= category=Sports count=5 namespace=0 suppresserrors=true </DynamicPageList>

Weather
<DynamicPageList> category=published category= category=Weather count=5 namespace=0 suppresserrors=true </DynamicPageList>
 * }

title: User:3210


text:
South African reggae star Lucky Dube shot dead in attempted hijacking

October 20, 2007

An attempted carjacking Thursday evening in Johannesburg has left famous South African reggae star Lucky Dube dead. He was dropping his children off in the suburb of Rosettenville when he was attacked.

Police said that three gunshots were fired through the car window, injuring Dube. His children were out of the car at the time. An injured Dube then attempted to drive his car away from the area, but hit a tree soon after. He died at the scene. The police suspect that three people were responsible for the attack.

There has been an outrage in South Africa and around the world over the killing. Many radio stations were flooded with calls from tearful fans condemning the attack.

Lucky Dube was one of the most prominent reggae artists of all times - often remembered alongside Bob Marley for his songs on social issues. He began his career singing in Zulu and released his first album in 1982. He later moved to reggae and released is album 'Rastas Never Die'. This album was banned by the apartheid government. His other albums include Slave, Prisoner and Together As One and Respect - his most recent album which he released in April of this year.