text:
Wikipedia talk:Spoken articles

Note: The primary discussion page for this project is at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Spoken Wikipedia.

Marking of articles
Currently it reads: But for consistency with existing practice, shouldn't it be the other way around? The Featured articles page has an image for spoken articles, and bold for appearance on the main page. I think this page should follow the established tradition, or else it can get kind of confusing. — Timwi 13:07, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)
 * Bolded article titles refer to featured articles.
 * Articles also marked with [[Image:Featured article star.png|16px|✓]] have been featured, with an audio link, on the Main Page.
 * I agree, and was considering implementing the change last week, but decided it was too much effort at the time. Joe D (t) 08:46, 26 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Redundant Info
So is there a good reason to have the same information listed "three" times on the page? --CGP 22:05, 26 Jun 2005 (UTC)
 * No, the information in the table should be merged into the sections. That leaves the info listed just twice (once by topic, and once automatically and alphabetically).  — Chameleon 00:27, 27 Jun 2005 (UTC)

This is practically a farce
Spoken articles should only be used for disabled individuals such as blind people etc... However I would really, and I mean really reconsider the people who are chosen to record and used to read out the articles, because so far they are all below average, with slurring, mis-reads and weird accents. You can't expect just anyone to do these with their computer mics (resulting in reverb and irritating interference), but I would strongly advise using professionals in audio-visual or audio-engineering instead. Piecraft 00:50, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
 * Low-quality work is better than none at all. Once all our featured articles are recorded, professional readers with professional equipment can re-record things for improvement. If any volunteer, that is. — Timwi 19:11, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

 * Well going by current wikipedia standards, there is suuposedly no room for low-quality work. Therefore I still see no purpose for this at all, unless real professionals or individuals who know what they're doing are contributing or wrking alongside this project - which at the moment I do not see. But then again, this is typical to expect such a hypocritical system in Wikipedia. Piecraft 20:12, 23 December 2005 (UTC)

 * I'm not an expert, so correct me if I'm wrong, but I would think Wikipedia must have started with a "Low-quality work is better than none at all" philosophy. But it's only due to the massive amount of contributions and edits from enthusiastic users that the quality and quantity of organization and content has come to the point where someone would say that the "current wikipedia standards" demand high-quality.  I think read that the people in charge of Encyclopedia Britannica believe Wikipedia is doomed in the end because its peer review system is too random and free.  I think it's exactly because Wikipedia trusts in its users' ability to spread, add, and improve, that Wikipedia has come to this point.  Thus, I agree that low quality is better than none at all.  If you find something that's low quality, hopefully that means you or someone else will decide to improve it one day.

 * Low quality recordings are inevitable. Equipment aside, not that many people have sufficient control over their voice and/or some accents make it sound low quality no matter what! I think that low quality is better than nothing - as long as people label their accents correctly. Why does the majority of US recordings have a "General American" label? Because most Americans believe that they and the people around them don't have an accent. Wouldn't it be better to get people to say where they have lived if they were to write General American? Temporal Fugitive (talk) 15:26, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

Which brings me to this suggestion or request - is there a page that could collect and award the spoken files for their high quality? And when I say high quality, I don't just mean sound quality, but I am talking about the quality of the speaker (so maybe it should collect names of users who are highly regarded for their spoken files). I'll go right ahead and give props to the spoken file for Rachel Green. I think the person who recorded this is a podcaster that has his own site at http://www.techonthefly.com/techonthefly/drupal/, but isn't particularly involved with Wikipedia. The first file he uploaded advertised his "techonthefly" site within the file, so someone (User:MarkSweep) cut that part out. In any case, the quality of the speech is very good. Kenumay 20:58, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
 * I was wondering about that myself, what spoken files are particularly well-read. I see that Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Spoken Wikipedia links to an attempt in that direction, User:Macropode/Spoken article review Шизомби 14:25, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

 * "...real professionals or individuals who know what they're doing are contributing or wrking alongside this project - which at the moment I do not see." — Semi-professional audio engineer and professional voiceover actor/announcer here. :D tgies 06:03, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

 * I use a Text-To-speech Program, it doesn't say words wrong or make mistakes.-Jack (User:Jacksalssome) (talk) 03:55, 18 January 2014 (UTC)

Directlinking for directdownload
Hi,

i added the hear it links because im from germany and would like to use this files to learn speaking and hearing english but my downloadmanager can only catch directlinking files and noone who have a site before. For the actually status i must write an extra ripper :| I hope the use of this file is ok for wikipedia? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 84.146.210.136 (talk • contribs).
 * I've reverted the new format because it would make the page too unwieldy if it was applied to all the spoken articles. If you need special formatting for your download manager, I'd suggest registering an account and using your User Page to make the formatted list.  Thanks - SCEhard T 03:50, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

 * look at the german page. You have there a more better overview as here! It likes bad is uninformativ and stupid for downloadmanager or people who want not have a second page to hear it. You must click 2 Links to hear it!

Who makes these?
Who makes these recordings, and how can we request that an article is spoken? -007bond aka Matthew G aka codingmasters 21:53, 29 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Hi - check out Category:Spoken Wikipedia requests; there is a request template there. Also, the main project page is WikiProject Spoken Wikipedia - SCEhard T 17:46, 30 June 2007 (UTC)

Where
The new icon for oggs is acquard, fussy, and dreadful. Where is the forum for discussing this. Thanks. Ceoil 19:55, 8 September 2007 (UTC)
 * This isn't really an issue specific to this project (see uses of the multi-listen template, and I'm sure there are others). I'd suggest bringing up the issue at the village pump. - SCEhard T 22:31, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

Hidden categories discussion
There is a discussion underway at Wikipedia talk:Categorization concerning what kinds of categories should be hidden (using the new HIDDENCAT magic word). For the moment it is proposed that hiding be applied to all categories which classify the article rather than the article subject (i.e. maintenance cats, stub cats, etc. and this category). Please weigh in. --Kotniski (talk) 08:55, 27 February 2008 (UTC)
 * I think this should be a hidden category, but I'm not sure where/how to 'weigh in' on that page. —ScouterSig 23:21, 9 March 2008 (UTC)
 * This is a category for visitors, not just for maintenance doing Wikipedians, so I would suggest to keep it visible. Jcbos (talk) 20:32, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

podcast of articles
how can i add these spoken articles to podcast of iTunes —Preceding unsigned comment added by 59.94.151.182 (talk) 11:05, 16 July 2008 (UTC)

Sports together with video games
That's a bit disrespectful to Sports. Or plain overgeneralization. --AaThinker (talk) 14:37, 26 May 2009 (UTC)

Many of the categories are awkward. Many categories are missing. Am I correct that anyone can edit the categories to make better sense? Alanasings (talk) 16:17, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

Podcasting Spoken Articles
I have been listening to a few of these on my MP3 player and really enjoy them. I wanted to suggest that it would be would a really great idea to start a spoken article podcast. Each week a spoken article can be chosen, one that is well written, and spoken and recorded, or may be just relevant to that weeks events. May be chosen by a vote or something. Then that article could be podcasted out. I don't know all the technical aspects that would be required, or weather it would need to be done some where else other than on Wikipedia. I just think it would be a cool idea and I'd love to help make it happen. --The_stuart (talk) 21:55, 26 July 2009 (UTC)
 * I think the best way to manage that would be to set up a page where spoken articles could be nominated for this and then some kind of voting system perhaps? The seraphim (talk) 02:06, 19 March 2010 (UTC)
 * I agree, I would love to do this. Is there a way to do it within Wikipedia and have an RSS feed? Or would we need to set up a whole new site? --The_stuart (talk) 16:19, 7 May 2010 (UTC)
 * I know this talk section is rather old, but I thought this was a good idea. There is also a great deal of talk about how it would be good to see more professionally done articles. I'm a voice artist with a few books (and other commercial stuff) under my belt and think a podcast is a great idea. I've currently done about 15 articles, mostly featured articles or ones that I find particularly interesting. I upload these articles to Wikipedia, but also to my podcast (www.wikipodcastproject.com), so people can get them as MP3's. The podcast also recently got accepted onto iTunes (http://itunes.apple.com/podcast/wikipedia-podcast-project/id517694217). If anyone has some feedback I'd love to hear it, or if anyone wants to get involved, I'm open to suggestions! S Whistler (talk) 09:50, 22 April 2012 (UTC)
 * A podcast as a single person project, only with own recordings makes no sense in my opinion. Because: 1. It's likely to drop off after a few month. 2. You'll never get a audience which is worth the effort. --LordOider (talk) 12:24, 5 March 2013 (UTC)
 * I just set up a new mp3-Podcast for the German spoken Wikipedia (for more info, see here). What I do is taking the latest articles and put them in the feed. As there isn't much new stuff, I'll not sort anything out, as long as the audio-quality is acceptable. I don't think a vote will work, because the participation in the spoken projects is too little. Better offer more content and let everybody choose by itself.
 * I also thought about building a podcast for the English spoken Wikipedia, which won't be much work, as I can copy some parts and know what to do now. I just can't figure out how to get the latest entries. For the German I use the Catfood tool by Magnus (doesn't work always) with the category "Spoken Wikipedia - German". When I do the same with "Spoken Wikipedia - English" or "Unreviewed spoken articles - English" I get a mess of entries from the last 5 years. --LordOider (talk) 12:24, 5 March 2013 (UTC)

This is NOT only for blind people
They can be used to jog while listening on an mp3 device. (Referring to a comment above saying this is "only" for the disabled). --94.71.106.211 (talk) 17:13, 12 November 2009 (UTC)

 * Of course it's not! WikiProject_Spoken_Wikipedia —Preceding unsigned comment added by Temporal Fugitive (talk • contribs) 15:05, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

Collaspable Template
Hi, iv been thinking, cant we put these pages in collasping templates?

it would make it a lot easier to browse the page

and different versions could be added to the articles themselfs

let me know your thoughts

Sghfdhdfghdfgfd (talk) 15:43, 4 April 2010 (UTC)

How about Text To Speech?
Just listen to the example of Portal Prelude voices: http://www.portalprelude.com/2008/09/day-sixteen-about-voices.php Three male voices used in the game sound prefect. http://www.acapela-group.com was used there. GrayFace (talk)

 * i used a text to speech program to make Syston & rearsby and will be using them on the other pages i am making. even though it takes a long time to ajust the timings for them, the output is very clear and understandable. also, having a voice what sounds like they know what they are talking about goes into your mind better.

 * also, in the software licence, the output is not under any copyright restrictions.

 * I think that there is a need in a special category for automatically created audio files., e.g. Category:Text to speech spoken articles. -- Andrew Krizhanovsky (talk) 05:46, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

 * I just tried listening to "Syston". I don't like this artificial voice at all. It grates on the ears, unpleasant. Axl  ¤  [Talk]  09:39, 9 May 2010 (UTC)
 * This sounds just like every other text to speech software. Halting, grating and terrible. Wait 5 years and maybe google will finally get it right.--RaptorHunter (talk) 18:04, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

 * I use a Text-To-Speech. -Jack (User:Jacksalssome) (talk) 03:59, 18 January 2014 (UTC)

'versity?
I think that this project would be useful at Wikiversity. It's sometimes easier to learn when listening to stuff, and it will be a great aid for visually impaired students, as many coursebooks aren't in braille. Thoughts? Manish Earth Talk • Stalk 05:56, 16 March 2010 (UTC)

Computer Generated
T2S and all other computer generated articles should either have their own section or their entries should be distinct enough to be able to tell that that's what they are without having to open them. If no objections arise, I shall proceed with making their entries distinct (I'm thinking underlined gray). Temporal Fugitive (talk) 07:45, 7 May 2010 (UTC) Done. Hope I didn't miss anything! Temporal Fugitive (talk) 10:18, 25 May 2010 (UTC)

Indications of substantial change
There are many spoken articles that no longer bear even the slightest resemblance to the current text version. I think those articles (eg dinosaur) should be indicated in the list.  Serendi pod ous  20:12, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Goog idea. It may be the number as superscript which indicates number of years passed after the recording. E.g. the article Wikipedia3 was recorded 3 years ago. -- Andrew Krizhanovsky (talk) 17:32, 25 August 2010 (UTC)

Subcategorization by dialect
Please consider providing subcategories according the dialects of the speakers narrating the articles. This request is prompted by a question in a discussion at Reference desk/Language. (This talk page is on my watchlist, and I will watch here for a reply or replies.) —Wavelength (talk) 06:38, 2 December 2010 (UTC)

Spoken articles missed in the list
There are spoken articles, which are not listed in this list:

 * Royal Maundy - audio files: File:Royal Maundy 1.ogg, File:Royal Maundy 2.ogg;

 * YouTube - audio file: File:Youtube spoken word.ogg;

 * Alexi Salamone - audio file: File:En-Alexi Salamone.ogg.

Please, add to appropriate section. -- Andrew Krizhanovsky (talk) 19:20, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

✅ Derfel73 (talk) 20:01, 10 August 2011 (UTC)
 * Thank you! -- Andrew Krizhanovsky (talk) 08:58, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

"Culture and society" section and "Erotic" spoken articles
This section contains too many "Erotic" spoken articles. I propose to make a separate subsection titled "Sexuality". -- Andrew Krizhanovsky (talk) 08:58, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

Computer generated audio?
The audio File:Acharya Jagadish Chandra Bose College.ogg is very similar to the computer generated audio. If it is true, then it should be Grayed out.

English native speakers, please, check it. -- Andrew Krizhanovsky (talk) 06:59, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

 * It's definitely computer generated; thanks for pointing that out.Derfel73 (talk) 10:45, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

Help to find same page in Japanese
I learn Japanese and me very need that page. But I cannot find it. Haven't Japanese people recorded audio articles? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 176.8.152.168 (talk) 19:39, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

Can you help me?
I have added a recording for TheChampionMan1234 04:58, 25 August 2012 (UTC)

Spoken articles related to Russian
If somebody want to create spoken version of article, which have some words/phrases in Russian, then I can record these Russian words for you and upload to Commons. Because Russian is my native language. I hope that the result spoken article (with mix of native Russian and native English) will be more high quality spoken article. :) -- Andrew Krizhanovsky (talk) 12:28, 22 October 2012 (UTC)

Music and SFX in spoken articles
All the podcasts I listen to include music and some have sound effects. - These can serve nicely as an audio equivalent of chapter markings and block text. However I haven't heard any spoken articles using these, and the result comes out rather dry. Is there a policy? Also, if an article about a TV show included background music from the show in question, (under me reading the article) would that pass as fair use? Algr (talk) 22:02, 12 October 2013 (UTC)
 * For sure audio samples, sound effects, etc. could enrich a recording. As there is no policy, it's up to every speaker to be creative. Beside voiding copyright infringements it's also not easy to mix speech and music together on a even level. Background music tends to be annoying and as far as I know it's not a fair use, as you don't only play a sample (see: music samples). --LordOider (talk) 22:33, 13 October 2013 (UTC)
 * For music beds and chapter markings, I'd use something royalty free, or something I wrote myself. I figured I'd play the first few seconds of a theme song for the title.  Algr (talk) 04:20, 14 October 2013 (UTC)

Data on spoken wikipedia files
I'm wondering if there is a way to gain bulk access to (meta)data on the spoken wikipedia files, e.g. file length, user, accent? Which script or workflow would allow you to export this data into an easy table format? Anyone know of an easy fix, or willing to help make it happen?

Incidentally, are the data on files added only by the author, or also by later reviewers?

Pusle8 (talk) 10:40, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

Downloading the collection
The torrent link on the page referred to seems broken. Is there an updated version? Pusle8 (talk) 10:40, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

 * thank you for this comment. Yes, there are some problems. Please, try this torrent: whinger.krc.karelia.ru/wp/t3505863.torrent from my home page. If it is okey, then I will update torrent link on the page Spoken articles. -- Andrew Krizhanovsky (talk) 14:36, 24 March 2015 (UTC)

Status of the page
Is this page automatically updated via some categories (couldn't find local markings) or is this curated, and updated as the moderators manage too keep up? Pusle8 (talk) 10:43, 22 March 2015 (UTC)
 * The page is curated. Adding your recording to the page is part of the workflow of creating a spoken wikipedia article (see WikiProject_Spoken_Wikipedia). When you add your recording to the article, you add it to the appropriate section. I suspect the categorization would make it difficult to update this with a bot, but I think that there might be a possibility to have a less neatly curated list (maybe to double check that everyone's adding their recordings to this page). 0x0077BE  ( talk ·  contrib ) 14:47, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

Bhutanese Passport
Bhutanese Passport lol, seriously?TomemPL (talk) 16:11, 23 March 2015 (UTC)

Finding short articles to record
I would like to record articles in my free-time, but I don't have very much of it. If I had an easy way to find short articles, are any strategies to optimize recording, it would be extremely helpful. Thanks in advance for any ideas! Tanzensally (talk) 09:06, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

Bulk request spam?
I'm finding it hard to credit that a recent bulk request is really genuine, especially as all are just tagged "important", no more explanation.

Donald Trump stuff? Sure.

Some of these though? Special:Contributions/Lionsdude148

- can you please explain why so many, and all "important" ? Andy Dingley (talk) 02:25, 23 March 2017 (UTC)
 * Hi, thank you for your inquiry into our project, the overall goal is to record any article that is requested for any reason. ThatGirlTayler (talk) 02:35, 23 March 2017 (UTC)

 * I see you noticed my many Spoken Wikipedia requests. I recently discovered the Spoken Wikipedia project and I just put in different articles on topics I felt were important. I included everything from U.S. Presidents (Abraham Lincoln, Donald Trump) to cars (Chevrolet Camaro, Ford F-Series, Willys MB) to video gaming (Nintendo Switch, Playstation, Casio Loopy, Burnout (series), Crazy Taxi, Q*Bert) to South Park (Matt Stone, Trey Parker, Mary Kay Bergman, With Apologies to Jesse Jackson, Casa Bonita, Scott Tenorman Must Die) to MLB Baseball (Boston Red Sox, New York Yankees, different world series) to popular tourism spots in the United States (Orlando, Florida, Virginia Beach, Virginia, Atlantic City, New Jersey) to popular movies (Satuday Night Fever, Miracle on 34th Street, Inside Out (2015 Film), Ferris Bueller's Day Off) to clothing brands and designers (Adidas, Aeropostale, American Eagle Outfitters, Calvin Klein, Hanes, Jockey, Nike, Ralph Lauren, Tommy Hilfiger) to a huge variety of other topics.

 * I like to listen to these while cleaning, working out, etc. and find the request tool very useful for gaps in Spoken Wikipedia.

 * To answer your question:

 * The Buick Y-Job was one of the first concept cars ever made by a major company, having been introduced in 1938 and having many features that inspired design cues on later Buick models.

 * "With Apologies to Jesse Jackson" has become a viral video on youtube, in addition to being the Season 11 opener of the South Park television series.

 * By the way, ThatGirlTayler (talk) does a great job with this stuff. You should listen to her recording of Garage Sale.

 * Thanks

 * Lionsdude148 (talk) 02:45, 23 March 2017 (UTC)

 * Thanks for responding, both of you.
 * Sorry to sound so suspicious, but I know that projects like this (Graphics Lab would be another) a lot of the work gets carried by a very small number of people. Now that's fine when they're doing useful things that add value to the project, but it's not fair to over-ask for stuff that's not going to be of benefit to more than a small handful. My concern here was just that it was an awful lot of articles, all coming at once. For that matter, not everything gets to be "important". On average, things are only ever of average importance.
 * Andy Dingley (talk) 11:17, 23 March 2017 (UTC)
 * That's very true not every article requested is important and it does increase the work load significantly. I recordt the short, silly article just for the fun of it, so it's all in good fun. ThatGirlTayler (talk) 16:42, 23 March 2017 (UTC)
 * Most of the requested articles have been removed per Category talk:Spoken Wikipedia requests. --Walk Like an Egyptian (talk) 20:50, 17 February 2019 (UTC)
 * Pinged all three of you to let you know that there has been a huge reduction in the amount of spoken articles requested. --Walk Like an Egyptian (talk) 10:49, 18 February 2019 (UTC)
 * Just now getting back into wikipedia editing and I am very pleased to see that the amount of spoken article requests have been reduced. Thank you! Sparkling Pessimist   Scream at me!  07:36, 15 May 2019 (UTC)

"The the"
Many articles use this template when the first word of the article title is "The" which leads, unfortunately, to an unnecessary repeat of "the". Can someone please fix this or at least tell me why you can't Jodosma (talk) 20:42, 9 August 2017 (UTC)

Any way to ask for a spoken article to be updated/re-recorded?
There appear to be articles that were recorded as spoken articles many years ago where the pages have likely changed significantly since and need re-recording. Is there any way to highlight this? If not I think it would be handy if we could implement a way to highlight outdated spoken articles (perhaps a new template?). For example the spoken article for the Avril Lavigne page has not been updated in over 9 years. Helper201 (talk) 22:07, 1 October 2019 (UTC)

 * That would be great! I don't know how to do that. There are audio recordings going all the way back to 2006. Right now we have a limited amount of people recording audio so it's difficult to field requests. Peppage (talk) 04:37, 2 October 2019 (UTC)

 * Unfortunately, many of the present recordings are that old or older. Most editors are going to prioritize recording entirely unrecorded pages before updating pages that need re-recording. {{u| Sdkb  }}  talk 09:02, 7 October 2020 (UTC)

"please ask the project coordinator"
This is not even a project page per se. I have removed the text  from the prominent box at the top of the page, because of concerns about ownership of content and Wikipedia's third pillar. There has been some discussion about this at User talk:Galendalia, and I would be surprised if there is consensus for adding this text, after all what has been discussed. If anyone else than the "project coordinator" agrees to include the text, I'd be surprised. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 11:08, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

Adding the year to recording links
I edited one of the list guidelines, encouraging people to include the year of their recordings to this page when they add them, and I programmatically added the year to the majority of the recordings already here. (Specifically, I added all the ones which had a date format that I could easily get my code to recognise). With a little more work I could finish the job, coding to recognise some more formats, then doing any remaining troublemakers manually. However, before pressing on too far, I want to make sure people are on board with this!

There have been a few requests over the years from people wanting to identify which recordings are out-of-date, and I think this could help with that. Have a look yourself at the ones that are up to see if it seems helpful. I'm feeling a bit cautious because the page I edited is aimed at readers, whereas this change is definitely motivated by editing; however, the information could be useful to readers too, who may want to know when a recording's from.

I first tried adding the whole date, but that made the page look too cluttered, and so I think including only the year is a good compromise. (Even if it's a bit harsh on articles uploaded in December!)

Looking ahead: it could be even more useful to get more accurate measures of how much an article has changed – e.g. detecting how much the actual text of the article has changed since the recording, or whether the article has become good/featured quality since the recording was made – but that would take time and (probably) a bot, and just the date may be enough for now. (Such changes would need a seperate page, too, since all the info would clutter this one up a bit, and it'd be harder to justify the value to non-editors.)

Thrownfootfalls (talk) 18:57, 10 May 2021 (UTC)
 * I completely agree with you. The article's contents at the time of recording should be checked against the current article and a percent difference should be calculated. However, an audit of the information might be more useful and a drive (if this was an active project) to replace those recordings.
 * As it stands now, with the project having so few recordings, newer recordings are more valuable so I don't know how useful redoing the recording is.
 * I don't personally have a need for the year but I also don't mind it's there. I don't know if it's obvious what the year means when you first land on the page and skip the intro text as everyone probably does. It wouldn't block someone finding articles though. Peppage (talk) 04:25, 16 May 2021 (UTC)
 * I don't personally have a need for the year but I also don't mind it's there. I don't know if it's obvious what the year means when you first land on the page and skip the intro text as everyone probably does. It wouldn't block someone finding articles though. Peppage (talk) 04:25, 16 May 2021 (UTC)
 * I don't personally have a need for the year but I also don't mind it's there. I don't know if it's obvious what the year means when you first land on the page and skip the intro text as everyone probably does. It wouldn't block someone finding articles though. Peppage (talk) 04:25, 16 May 2021 (UTC)

 * Showing a year really does help to see how old the recording is. Should I/we work to retrofit the missing years based from the file dates? — GhostInTheMachine talk to me 11:38, 16 May 2021 (UTC)

 * Peppage – Yeah, though I think the date (and, ideally, percentage similarity) is useful information to factor in when choosing a recording, among other factors, but I definitely wouldn't suggest re-doing a recording *just because* it already has one, especially when the project is this quiet.
 * GhostInTheMachine – I don't think it's a high priority to fill in the rest of the dates, but there's also not much of a reason not to if you want to. :)
 * Thrownfootfalls (talk) 19:50, 18 May 2021 (UTC)
 * Thrownfootfalls (talk) 19:50, 18 May 2021 (UTC)
 * Thrownfootfalls (talk) 19:50, 18 May 2021 (UTC)

Reorganisation of categories
I think the page could do with a restructure, to make it easier to navigate for listeners, and to make it easier for editors to know where to put their recordings. I have a draft for one almost ready to go on my sandbox (feel free to have a look here), but since it's a substantial change, I thought I should flag it up early instead of surprising everyone.

This started off as I was trying to shift around a few of the recordings for more consistent organisation. Then, seeing how pages like Contents and Vital_articles are organised, I started using them as guidance, and, well, one thing led to another. (This is what happens when you're keen to work on recordings, but your neighbours are doing DIY all day...)

I could understand that people might be attached to this layout, and as a relative newcomer I might not be aware of its advantages. Nevertheless, I reckon it's a good move to change it now, since it brings the structure more in line with other such overviews within the encyclopedia, and when the list on this page grows further, many of those other pages will provide a useful example for how to manage that structure. Lastly, I personally find the proposed structure easier to navigate, though I'm definitely happy to be disagreed with on that point! At the very least, I think having a separate "People" section is a very useful and unambiguous category.

Thrownfootfalls (talk) 21:49, 14 May 2021 (UTC)
 * What issues are the changes solving? There's still some confusion where some items should go. For example, Monofilament fishing line, Research & Development Establishment (Engineers), and Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. If we're going to make sweeping changes like this then we should identify the problems. I'm not sure many readers use this page since it's difficult to find which ones are new from the last visit. I expect most find the recording on the article they're interested in.
 * I have a few questions,
 * Is the unsorted a placeholder or permanent?
 * Are the headers not in alphabetical order for a reason?
 * At this point isn't "Everyday life", society, culture, and internet culture all the same thing?
 * Should Biology be a sub-header or should we move up animals and plants to the same level and remove it?
 * Are the history divisions too difficult for editors to place an article? (I base a lot of my decision where to place an article on which WikiProjects are on the talk page)
 * Some of the changes are good. It does make it easier for editors to know where to add people which is nice. A separate people section for every header would be enough? Especially renaming it from biographies. Journalism needs its own section to differentiate it from literature. I like the Physical sciences too.
 * So you know, the original organization is based on the WP:FA and WP:GA lists.
 * Peppage (talk) 04:13, 16 May 2021 (UTC)
 * So you know, the original organization is based on the WP:FA and WP:GA lists.
 * Peppage (talk) 04:13, 16 May 2021 (UTC)
 * Peppage (talk) 04:13, 16 May 2021 (UTC)
 * Peppage (talk) 04:13, 16 May 2021 (UTC)

 * The main issue's a subjective one, which is why I thought I should edit cautiously: I personally find that a more hierarchical system makes it easier to see related articles, and to identify gaps where subjects don't have many recordings. Obviously it doesn't (and couldn't) resolve every ambiguity. At the very least, I find it easier to have fewer, broader headings (like Physical Sciences), which are then divided into smaller subheadings.

 * The main reason it changes so much is this: when was struggling to adapt the current system, I tried using the Vital Articles system as a model instead, because it was similar to a lot of the other methods of categorisation I had come across, and because following an existing example felt like a better idea than inventing yet another system by myself.

 * Regarding the questions:
 * "Unsorted" was definitely a placeholder, as were the ugly < > on the page. (Both are gone now.) Some of the "General" or "Miscellaneous" categories that are still there are still quite loosely defined, but that could still be good if someone who's done a recording knows what broad category an article should be in, but isn't able to pinpoint it.
 * The headers are in the same order I found them in over at the vital articles pages. I think the rationale is to keep similar things together (the broadest categories first, then ones relating to people and society, then science and technology), but I'm only speculating. Many of the subheaders are currently in quite an arbitrary order, and it would make sense to alphabetise them. (And within each category, I can definitely re-alphabetise the articles that have been knocked out of order!)
 * The distinction between "Everyday life" and "Culture" is from the vital articles again, and admittedly it seemed a bit arbitrary to me too – or worse, it felt like it was sorting everything into "low-brow" and "high-brow" concepts. For the sake of consistency, I decided not to tamper with it. There were enough articles that fell under "internet culture" that it seemed worth its own subheading. Some of it makes sense, though admittedly other parts (like "culture" especially) are a bit of a grab-bag, even if not as much as they were.
 * Re: biology, animals and plants: I'm not sure which levels you're suggesting moving things to, but I don't expect there's a major problem either way. Unless it's a more fundamental issue than I realise, this could be figured out afterwards.
 * As for the history subdivisions, I thought it made sense to split it up a bit because of the large number of recorded history articles. Most of them are sorted by period, which I feel *should* be easy enough to manage if the subheadings have appropriate names. (I personally would have found "medieval" more intuitive than "post-classical", but on the other hand, that's because of my own European perspective that ignores world history as a whole.) There was originally another category, "History by subject", but there weren't any recorded articles that seemed to fit into that right now.

 * Thanks for pointing me towards the source of the organisation! I hadn't seen anything similarly organised before, but there's a lot I've not seen.

 * Anyway, in short: I think I should branch off some "People" subheadings as you said, and that it's worth splitting up some of the very long sections into appropriate subsections (and if the ones I used for history don't work well for other people, then something else that works better). Though the other suggested changes appeal a lot to me personally, I'll hold back unless they get stronger support.

 * (What would a good heading for the people subsections be, though, if not "___ biographies"? "War people" and "Music people" and so on sounds fun but a bit silly, and e.g. "Musicians" would exclude music producers, etc.)

 * Thrownfootfalls (talk) 19:32, 18 May 2021 (UTC)

Linking to commons
Helllo, I completed my first recording which is found in the music section. However I seemed to mess up the upload part because it has a page on here but a duplicate on Commons. I looked at the instructions on WP:CMF but this seems to be from an older version, made me more confused. The recording itself is okay. I know for the future I will just use Commons...

Is there a way u can delete the other version? Thanks Grey.vs.gray (talk) 00:11, 23 July 2021 (UTC)

Poetry
Is there an place in this project (or another project) for people like me who have been recording the poems that are in some articles? Back ache (talk) 11:46, 20 August 2021 (UTC)

 * @Back ache, the poems usually are presented in the Wikisource. I recorded several audio files with poems, uploaded to Wikimedia Commons and added links to Russian Wikisource. See, for example,
 * Воздушный корабль (Лермонтов) — my voice, poem by Lermontov in Russian Wikisource. I think the same thing is possible in English Wikisource.
 * Скрут (Саша Чёрный) — kids poetry, poem by Sasha Chorny, voice of my children years ago + some music with free license. --Andrew Krizhanovsky (talk) 21:18, 8 December 2021 (UTC)

Music for spoken articles
Welcome to use the following collection of music files with free licenses (Creative Commons BY, CC BY-SA, and similar licenses):
 * Open License Music 2008-2013 (Jamendo) — this torrent at Academic Torrents contains music with free license, which could be uploaded to Wikimedia Commons or incorporated into your spoken version of audio article. --Andrew Krizhanovsky (talk) 21:29, 8 December 2021 (UTC)

Science category
The categories are very disorganized. Shouldn't there be a category for Science? Not all Science is Biology or Physics. Alanasings (talk) 20:45, 13 August 2023 (UTC)

 * Let's see, in terms of both hard and soft sciences, we already have categories for:
 * Archaeology
 * Biology
 * Chemistry and mineralogy
 * Computer science
 * Geology and geophysics
 * Health and medicine
 * Linguistics
 * Mathematics
 * Physics and astronomy
 * Political science
 * Psychology
 * Technology
 * Certainly more than just "biology and physics".
 * These categories already do a good job of categorizing science related articles. Placing them all in one absurdly broad "Science" category would be pointless. — Toast for Teddy (talk) 21:22, 15 August 2023 (UTC)
 * Noted. Thank you. Alanasings (talk) 17:40, 8 September 2023 (UTC)
 * Rip Currents should go under which category? I am leaning toward Physics? Alanasings (talk) 17:08, 12 September 2023 (UTC)

Simple English Wikipedia?
Could spoken versions of articles be created for Simple English Wikipedia and/or other languages? I am interested in creating spoken audio files over there. It seems like spoken articles would be particularly useful there. Thoughts, anyone? Alanasings (talk) 20:14, 9 September 2023 (UTC)

Abiogenesis audio files?
Abiogenesis is listed here, but the article does not seem to have the audio files attached to it? Should it be removed from the list of Spoken articles? Alanasings (talk) 20:43, 11 September 2023 (UTC)

title: Wikipedia talk:Spoken articles


text:
Höntrop

Höntrop is a district of the City of Bochum in the Ruhr area in North Rhine-Westphalia in Germany. The population used to speak the Westphalian dialect, but now standard German is the norm. Höntrop borders inter alia to Freisenbruch, which belongs to Essen, another city, and Linden a district of Bochum. Höntrop belongs to the Stadtbezirk (district of the town) of Wattenscheid. Höntrop is a stop at the railway line S1 to Solingen via Düsseldorf and furthermore also to Dortmund and is starting- and endpoint of the tram line 310 to Heven, a part of Witten via the city of Bochum and Bochum main station.

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

title: Höntrop


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User:The Cool Water

Cool water! yay --The Cool Water 23:09, 21 Apr 2005 (UTC)

title: User:The Cool Water


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SCI Fidelity Records

Formed in 1998, SCI Fidelity Records is an independent record label based in Boulder, Colorado. It is owned and managed by the jam band The String Cheese Incident.

Artists
SCI Fidelity artists include Keller Williams, Umphrey's McGee, The Disco Biscuits, Railroad Earth, Younger Brother, Lotus, The Infamous Stringdusters, EOTO, Emmitt-Nershi Band, Kyle Hollingsworth, The New Deal, The Greyboy Allstars, 30db, Tea Leaf Green, The Radiators, Steve Kimock Band, Brothers Past, New Monsoon and DJ Harry.

Staff
Kevin Morris – Consigliere

Matt Hogan – General Manager

Allie Hamby – Project Manager

Dave Hearn – Digital & Grassroots Marketing

Larry Fox – OTR Project Manager

Carrie Lombardi – Publicity

JD Tulloch – Daily Operations

title: SCI Fidelity Records


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Virginia State Route 400

State Route 400 (SR 400) is a primary state highway in the U.S. state of Virginia. Locally known as Washington Street, the state highway runs 1.79 mi from the south city limit of the independent city of Alexandria, Virginia north to 1st Street, still within Alexandria. SR 400 is a city street connection through Old Town Alexandria between the two segments of George Washington Memorial Parkway, one heading south toward Mount Vernon and one heading north toward District of Columbia. The Virginia Department of Transportation assigned the unsigned SR 90005 designation to run concurrently along the entire length of the parkway and of SR 400.

Route description
SR 400 begins at the south city limit of Alexandria at Hunting Creek. The highway continues south into Fairfax County and Belle Haven as the George Washington Memorial Parkway toward Mount Vernon. SR 400 is a four-lane divided highway through the Jones Point neighborhood before becoming undivided and crossing over the Capital Beltway (I-95 and I-495) on a freeway cap, a very wide overpass that shields the freeway from view of the crossing highway, between the Woodrow Wilson Bridge over the Potomac River and the Capital Beltway's interchange with U.S. Route 1 (US 1). The first intersection north of the bridge is with Church Street, which receives a ramp from the westbound Capital Beltway. SR 400 continues through Old Town Alexandria with six lanes and passes the Davis Chapel. The state highway meets the eastern ends of SR 236 (Duke Street) and SR 7 (King Street) in the Alexandria Historic District, where the Lyceum and Beulah Baptist Church line the southbound side of the street and the statue Appomattox lies in the middle of the street at its intersection with Prince Street. SR 400 continues north past the Christ Church, the Lloyd House, and the Lee-Fendall House to its northern terminus at First Street. George Washington Memorial Parkway resumes at this intersection and continues toward Arlington and Washington.

History
Most of SR 400, from Franklin Street to Powhatan Street, was once part of US 1, and the present alignment (roughly) of US 1 was then US 1 Truck.

title: Virginia State Route 400


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User:Zensufi

I'm am an obscure species of bird from South America (really).

title: User:Zensufi


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WCVX

WCVX (1160 AM) is a radio station licensed to Florence, Kentucky in the Cincinnati metropolitan area. WCVX is owned by the Christian Broadcasting System and it carries a Christian radio format. Its studios and offices are on West Seventh Street in Cincinnati and its transmitter is off Fowler Creek Road in Florence. WCVX broadcasts with a directional antenna with 5,000 watts in the daytime but at night it reduces power to 990 watts to protect KSL in Salt Lake City, the Class A Clear-channel station on 1160 kHz. WYLL in Chicago, Illinois is the only other full-time 50,000-watt station on 1160 AM, although it is a Class B station.

Hosts heard on WCVX include Dr. Charles Stanley, Joyce Meyer and Jim Daly.

At 1180 AM
WCVX originally signed on in 1984 as WFKB 1180 AM, a 1,000-watt daytime-only station licensed to Florence, Kentucky. WFKB was required to sign off at sunset to protect WHAM in Rochester, New York which is the clear channel station on that frequency. WFKB was a full-service station which served northern Kentucky, and offered news every hour along with Middle of the Road or MOR music.

WFKB changed to a country music format by 1986, and was simulcast with WIOK-FM in Falmouth, Kentucky as an AM-FM combo. In 1987, WFKB was acquired by Amber Broadcasting. The format was changed to Adult standards or Nostalgia, and the call letters were changed to WMLX to reflect a former station in the media market that had done the same format.

In 1989, WMLX was acquired by Hoker Broadcasting, which also owned then-WOFX-FM at 94.9 MHz. The two stations were affiliated until 1992, when WOFX-FM was sold to Heritage Media. WMLX was then a stand-alone station, and was purchased in 1993 by KLM Communications, which was headed by Dr. Kenneth L. McDowell.

Move to 1160
In February 1993, WMLX was granted Special Temporary Authority by the FCC to move to 1160 AM and broadcast 24 hours per day at 1,000 watts daytime power and 500 watts at night. Call letters were changed in March 1993 to WBND, to reflect the station's new identity as "The Blend." This format was an attempt to merge the very popular Nostalgia/Standards format with an Urban adult contemporary format, which had been KLM's original plan for the station.

An early attempt at a Saturday sports talk show was hosted by Cincinnati basketball legend Oscar Robertson. A Sunday jazz show was hosted by local musician Wilbert Longmire. By 1995, WBND had been sold to the owners of WNKR-FM in Dry Ridge, Kentucky and the call letters changed to WKYN to reflect an emphasis towards northern Kentucky news and sports.

The station's signal was eventually upgraded to 5000 watts daytime and 990 watts nighttime, with different directional patterns for day and night. From the station's new transmitter site near Union, Kentucky, WKYN was now directing more than 10,000 watts towards downtown Cincinnati during the day. At night, the power directed at Cincinnati was only 1,629 watts.

The lower power, coupled with typical nighttime AM skywave interference, caused the post-sunset signal to be listenable in limited areas of the market, mainly northern Kentucky and the western side of Cincinnati. (WCVX still uses this transmitter site with the same signal parameters.)

New owner, new format
Despite the nighttime limitations, the station's new, more powerful signal caught the attention of Chancellor Media, which owned 1230 WUBE, 105.1 WUBE-FM and 96.5 WYGY in Cincinnati. In 1995, WUBE had begun running a sports-talk format known as "1230 The Score."

Programming consisted of nationally syndicated "Imus in the Morning" and "The Fabulous Sports Babe" as well as a local afternoon show, and network programming from One-On-One Sports in the evening and on weekends. Chancellor purchased WKYN in 1996 and moved "The Score" to the more powerful WKYN signal.

While the new "Score" was much more powerful during the day, WKYN's nighttime signal was lacking (as noted above) in areas north of the Ohio River and east of downtown Cincinnati where WUBE had provided a strong signal.

The home of the Bengals
At the conclusion of the 1996 NFL season, WKYN stunned the local radio and sports communities by winning the rights to be the official home of the Cincinnati Bengals football team for three seasons. The games would also be simulcast on powerhouse sister station WUBE-FM, the city's dominant Country station.

On Cincinnati Reds opening day in 1997, the station changed call letters to WBOB and became known as "1160 BOB." The station eventually dropped syndicated programming during the day, and ran a live and local sports talk format from 6:00 AM to 7:00 PM each weekday. There were also various live weekend shows. During this time, WUBE and WBOB became a sports combo, simulcasting some programs to make up for individual signal deficiencies. The stronger 1160 AM was known as "BOB", while 1230 AM was known as "BOB 2."

In 1999, WBOB's parent company - by then known as AMFM, Inc. - merged with Clear Channel Communications. Because Clear Channel already owned the maximum number of stations allowed in the Cincinnati market, WBOB was spun off to Salem Communications, along with sister station WYGY-FM (now WFTK and owned by Cumulus Media). WUBE (now WDBZ) was sold to Blue Chip Broadcasting, while WUBE-FM was sold to Infinity Broadcasting.

Bengals play-by-play then shifted to competing all-sports station "1360 Homer" WCKY and "92.5 The Fox" WOFX-FM, both of which were owned by Clear Channel. In addition, WLW would also carry the games once the Reds season ended, giving the network three flagship stations. Most of the WBOB hosts also made the transition to WCKY at this time, which is still the arrangement, even though WCKY now broadcasts at 1530 AM. As of September 2008, the FM simulcast for Bengals games was moved to WEBN-FM 102.7. (WOFX-FM has since been sold to Cumulus Media.)

The Salem years
In August 2000, WBOB was officially acquired by Salem Communications. Salem kept WBOB's sports talk format, but changed the emphasis from local sports to an ESPN Radio format. There was a local show in the afternoon featuring WBOB Program Director Doug Kidd and reporter Gregg Waddell. This show would eventually be cancelled in favor of ESPN programming.

A local midday program was introduced featuring WLWT-TV sportscaster Ken Broo and Waddell, but that show would also be short-lived. Another local program featured Cincinnati Business Courier columnist Andy Hemmer talking about the business of sports during his show, "The SportsTicker with Andy Hemmer."

In late 2003, Salem dropped ESPN from WBOB and flipped it to a talk radio format. It was programmed like most other Salem-owned talk stations, using the Salem Radio Network of talent such as Dennis Prager, Michael Medved, Hugh Hewitt, Bill Bennett and Mike Gallagher. In addition, other syndicated hosts aired on WBOB including Laura Ingraham and Bill O'Reilly.

In February 2006, Salem sold WBOB to Christian Broadcasting System and exited the market altogether in exchange for a station in Detroit. At that time, Alchemy Broadcasting became the lease holder of WBOB and changed the format to Oldies and the call letters to WDJO.

WDJO
The WDJO call sign was previously used by another oldies station on 1230 AM from 1985 to 1990 in the Cincinnati area which is now urban talker WDBZ. The format was flipped by then owner of the 1230AM frequency, DKM Broadcasting, based in Atlanta, GA, which also owned WUBE-FM and had recently acquired the stations from Plough Broadcasting in October, 1984. Previously the signal had featured a "Music of Your Life" big band format. The station launched WDJO on January 1, 1985. The press release said the station would "feature rock 'n roll oldies spanning the late 50's through the early 70's with heavy emphasis on the "explosive years" of 1964–1969. The 'O' in WDJO stood for 'oldies'.  The 'DJ' implies that the format is live and vibrant, and will invite much listener involvement.  In fact, the idea is for WDJO to bring back much of the excitement that is associated with rock radio's 'golden era' of the 60s, when it seemed a new 'super group' was born every day." The initial lineup of DJs were all local and at the same time the nighttime 1230 signal was increased from 250 watts to 1000 watts early in 1985.

The first Program Director of WDJO was Chuck Dees, who was hired from WQYX in Baton Rouge, LA and initially anchored the afternoon drive airshift.

The WDJO call sign was also used by 106.5 FM in Greenville, Ohio (Dayton market) when it aired a Jammin' Oldies format. That station is now WTKD.

1160 and 1230 connections
The WMLX call letters and nostalgia format were originally on 1230 AM between 1981 and 1985. Those call letters and format would later appear in 1987 on 1180 AM, the predecessor to 1160 AM. The "Score" sports talk format was launched on 1230 AM in 1995, then moved to 1160 in 1996.

The WDJO call letters and Oldies format originally appeared on 1230 AM between 1985 and 1990. Those call letters and format are currently on 1480 AM. Robert Nolan owns and operates WDJO 1480 AM as Mustang Media.

WDJO moves to AM 1480
On May 18, 2009, WDJO announced a move to 1480 AM, the former WCIN which previously aired a smooth jazz format. As part of the move, both 1160 and 1480 began simulcasting the transition asking listeners by way of on-air promotional announcements by Charlie Van Dyke and the station's website to switch to 1480. On May 23, 2009, WDJO began its new branding "Oldies 1480." Until May 28, messages interrupted oldies music on the 1160 frequency, directing people to the 1480 frequency. Throughout May 28, a 30-minute infomercial for a dietary supplement was run over and over. On May 29, Christian programming and music began.

On May 26, 2009, Christian Broadcasting System, LTD filed a request for the WQRT call letters for their Florence, Kentucky station on 1160 AM.

On June 3, 2009, The Cincinnati Enquirer's John Kiesewetter reported that a conservative talk format featuring Laura Ingraham, Neal Boortz, Dave Ramsey and Dr. Laura Schlessinger would debut on 1160 AM on June 15, 2009. Coincidentally, 1160 AM was the original Cincinnati home of Laura Ingraham and Dave Ramsey when it was News/Talk WBOB in 2003.

WQRT Real Talk 1160
On June 15, 2009, the station's call letters changed to WQRT and a conservative talk format debuted. The station was briefly known as "Q-1160" and even registered a web address at www.q1160.com. After several hours on the air, the station's management realized that any use of the letter Q in the Cincinnati radio market was service marked by WKRQ 101.9 FM, which has been known as "Q102" for over 40 years. By the afternoon on June 15, the station had edited out the "Q-1160" reference in all imaging and had registered the new web domain www.realtalk1160.com. The station's primary image line was "Cincinnati's Real Talk 1160." The station's lineup was primarily from the 24-hour satellite feed of Talk Radio Network, as part of TRN's initiative to distribute its programming in bulk. It was also the home of former WLW host Andy Furman, who was on in the morning and in late afternoon.

As of December 13, 2010, WQRT cleared Dennis Miller, which replaced Dr. Laura, with the latter's move to Sirius XM Satellite Radio in 2011. WQRT is one of several stations that dropped the show early, before it ended terrestrial radio distribution.

On Wednesday January 2, 2013, WQRT let go its local on-air staff, after Dean Miuccio finished his "Cincinnality" morning show. Syndicated programming replaced the local content, and the station went dark after the Notre Dame football game on Monday January 7. On February 1, the station began its Christian radio format and WCVX call letters from 1050 AM, which is now known as Urban Gospel WGRI.

title: WCVX


text:
Horace Wilson (professor)

Horace Wilson (February 10., 1843 – March 4., 1927) was an American expatriate educator in late 19th century Empire of Japan. He is one of the persons credited with introducing the sport of baseball to Japan.

Biography
Wilson was born in Gorham, Maine. He enrolled at Kents Hill School in the fall 1858, and is believed to have graduated in the spring of 1862. A veteran of the U.S. Civil War, he fought for the 12th Maine Volunteer Infantry Regiment against the Confederates in Louisiana.

After the war, he was hired by the Japanese government as a foreign adviser to assist in the modernization of the Japanese education system after the Meiji Restoration. He served as a professor of English at Kaisei Gakko, the forerunner of Tokyo Imperial University.

In either 1872 or 1873, Wilson decided that his students needed more physical exercise, and introduced them to the sport of baseball. Several weeks or months later, enough interest had developed for the school to sponsor a seven-inning game between the Japanese students and foreign instructors. The first formal baseball team was established in 1878.

Wilson returned to the United States in 1877 and lived in San Francisco. He died in 1927 at age 84. Wilson was posthumously elected to membership in the Japanese Baseball Hall of Fame by the special committee in 2003.

title: Horace Wilson (professor)


text:
User:Mirad

www

title: User:Mirad


text:
User talk:Mirad

Welcome to Wikipedia. I have reverted your edits, but if your contributions are not, in fact, all hoaxes, please feel free to enlighten me. Thanks. -- Wmahan. 22:19, 13 October 2005 (UTC)

title: User talk:Mirad


text:
WVRA

WVRA (107.3 FM) is a radio station broadcasting a Religious format. Licensed to serve Enfield, North Carolina, United States, the station is currently licensed to Liberty University, Inc.

title: WVRA


text:
Frank McCourt (executive)

Frank H. McCourt Jr. (born August 14, 1953) is an American business executive and philanthropist. As of 2023, he is the executive chairman and former CEO of McCourt Global, owner of the football club Marseille and founder and executive chairman of international non-profit Project Liberty. He was the owner and chairman of the Los Angeles Dodgers and Dodger Stadium from 2004 to 2012.

In 2004, he purchased a controlling interest in the Dodgers from Fox Entertainment Group, owned by Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation. Prior to purchasing the Dodgers and moving to Los Angeles, McCourt was a Boston real estate developer, whose family resided in Brookline, Massachusetts.

In 2013, he donated $100 million to establish the McCourt School of Public Policy, the ninth school of Georgetown University. He made a second $100 million gift to Georgetown University in March 2021, for the express purpose of ensuring that "the McCourt School can open its doors more widely and build a pipeline of future public policy leaders that reflects the true diversity of our communities."

In 2016, he purchased French Ligue 1 football club Olympique Marseille from Russian-born billionaire Margarita Louis-Dreyfus. The takeover was completed in August after months of negotiations.

In 2021, he founded the non-profit Project Liberty. The initiative has multiple components which includes the development of the Decentralized Social Networking Protocol (DSNP), the founding of the McCourt Institute with founding academic partners Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., and Sciences Po in Paris, and a network of partners within the Unfinished network.

In 2023, he transitioned from CEO of McCourt Global to executive chairman and announced Shéhérazade Semsar de Boisséson, former POLITICO Europe CEO, as McCourt Global's CEO.

In 2024, he announced plans to build a consortium to buy the US arm of TikTok.

Early years and business background
McCourt was born in Boston, Massachusetts. He was raised as a Catholic and attended Georgetown University, where he earned an economics degree in 1975. He met his future wife, Jamie Luskin, when they were both freshmen at Georgetown. They married in 1979. The McCourt family has a long association with real estate and construction in the Boston area.

In 1977, McCourt left working for his father's road contracting company and founded The McCourt Company, which specialized in the development of major commercial real estate projects. The McCourt Company developed multiple condominiums in Boston, including the first and most notable development, the Union Wharf Condominium on Boston Harbor. McCourt later purchased a 24-acre plot of the Boston Seaport and played a role in the development of what became the South Boston Seaport District.

The McCourt Company headquarters moved to Los Angeles in 2004 in connection with the family relocating to Los Angeles. The McCourts owned a $16 million, 13000 sqft home in Brookline, Massachusetts, that was acquired by John W. Henry, the new owner of the Boston Red Sox.

Failed Red Sox bid
Before buying the Los Angeles Dodgers, McCourt made a bid to buy the Boston Red Sox, planning to build a new stadium on the land he owned and used for parking lots on the South Boston waterfront. Instead, the Red Sox were sold in 2002 to John W. Henry, Tom Werner and Red Sox president Larry Lucchino.

Purchase of the L.A. Dodgers
In 2004, McCourt bought the Los Angeles Dodgers for US$430 million from News Corporation, Rupert Murdoch's flagship enterprise. McCourt's purchase of the Dodgers was financed mostly by debt.

In 2004, McCourt's South Boston parking lot property was used as collateral for some of the financing to acquire the Dodgers from NewsCorp. Later, the South Boston property was turned over to NewsCorp in exchange for canceling acquisition debt. NewsCorp received approximately $200 million when they re-sold the property to Morgan Stanley and Boston real estate investor John B. Hynes III in 2006.

The Dodgers assets acquired by McCourt included significant real estate assets related to the stadium in Chavez Ravine, including stadium parking lot land. Plans were announced for new real estate developments at Dodger Stadium however those plans never came to fruition. One discussed plan was for an NFL stadium and adjacent retail complex. However after the Boston Herald reported the details of the plan, political pressure forced both the NFL and McCourt to deny that either party was aggressively pursuing the idea.

To offset the purchase, McCourt raised ticket and concession prices every year. By April 2009, the team and its related assets, in which McCourt had invested heavily in improvements, had increased in value to $722 million according to Forbes. In 2010, the value of the team was estimated at $727 million according to Forbes.

Hiring and firing of Paul DePodesta
In 2003, under NewsCorp ownership, the Dodgers' record was 85 wins and 77 losses. Shortly after purchasing the team, McCourt fired then general manager Dan Evans, replacing him with Paul DePodesta. DePodesta is featured (along with Billy Beane) in the book Moneyball, as it discussed their sabermetric-based approach to using statistics to build the Oakland A's. In Los Angeles, DePodesta made a trade in the middle of the 2004 season that sent the Dodgers' starting catcher, Paul Lo Duca, its set-up man, pitcher Guillermo Mota and outfielder Juan Encarnación to the Florida Marlins for the high on-base percentage first baseman Hee-Seop Choi, power pitcher Brad Penny and pitching prospect Bill Murphy, who was in turn flipped with Koyie Hill and Reggie Abercrombie to the Arizona Diamondbacks for Gold Glove center fielder Steve Finley and catcher Brent Mayne. At the time, DePodesta said of Choi: "I think we've acquired one of the better offensive players in the league."

Finley hit 13 home runs for the Dodgers in his two months with the team. Choi batted .161 with no home runs for the Dodgers after the trade, though he walked eleven times in 87 plate appearances. In the playoff loss to St. Louis that season, Penny did not play, Choi had one at bat (hitless) and Dodger catchers were 3-for-10.

In 2004, the Dodgers won the NL West with a record of 93-69, but lost in four games to the St. Louis Cardinals in the Divisional Series. In the offseason, the Dodgers decided not to re-sign Adrián Beltré due to his high contract demands (Beltre finished second in the NL MVP voting and would later sign with Seattle for 5 years/$64 million). DePodesta signed outfielder J. D. Drew for five years at $55 million, sinkerball pitcher Derek Lowe for four years at $36 million, and All-Star second baseman Jeff Kent.

However, the 2005 season, with a record of 71– 91, was the Dodgers' second-worst record since moving to Los Angeles, due in part to players' injuries. That off-season, manager Jim Tracy was fired. Soon after Tracy was fired, McCourt fired DePodesta and about a month later, hired Ned Colletti to replace him.

Ned Colletti/Joe Torre era
Ned Colletti's first action as GM was the signing of the former Red Sox manager, Grady Little. Colletti then signed several veteran players such as Rafael Furcal, Nomar Garciaparra, Kenny Lofton and Bill Mueller. These players were among those who led the 2006 Dodgers to the NL Wild Card spot, with an 88–74 record. The Dodgers were swept by the New York Mets in the National League Division Series. In the winter of 2006–07 the team signed Juan Pierre, Jason Schmidt, and Luis Gonzalez.

In October 2007, Grady Little resigned and Joe Torre was hired as their new manager. In 2008, with Torre, Ned Colletti signed Andruw Jones, Hiroki Kuroda and Chan Ho Park. During the trade deadline, the Dodgers acquired Manny Ramirez in a trade with the Boston Red Sox.

In 2007, Dr. Charles Steinberg was hired as executive vice president, marketing and public relations, of the Dodgers after working with the Boston Red Sox and Baltimore Orioles. In 2009, he was reported to be on his way out and was said to be allied with Jamie McCourt and had lost influence as she did, according to a report in the Los Angeles Times.

Dodgers' Dream Foundation
In 2010, it was revealed that then California Attorney General Jerry Brown was opening an investigation into the Dodgers' charitable foundation, the Dodgers' Dream Foundation. According to tax returns, the charity's chief executive, Howard Sunkin, earned a salary of nearly $400,000 per year, almost a quarter of the foundation's entire budget. Sunkin is a close associate of McCourt and has worked with him during his divorce proceedings. The courts eventually awarded the funds to be repaid, and McCourt personally repaid $100,000.

Divorce proceedings
On October 14, 2009, it was announced the McCourts would be separating after nearly 30 years of marriage. While speculation was raised on the impact upon the McCourt family and Dodger ownership, a spokesperson for Jamie McCourt said the following day that "the focus of the Dodgers is on the playoffs and the World Series." Jamie was fired from her position as Dodgers CEO on Thursday, October 22, 2009, the day after the Dodgers were eliminated from the playoffs. She officially filed for divorce shortly thereafter. He has claimed that the divorce has "no bearing on the team whatsoever."

On December 7, 2010, the judge in the divorce case of the McCourts invalidated the post-nuptial marital property agreement ("MPA") that Frank McCourt had claimed provided him with sole ownership of the Dodgers. In the wake of this decision, Frank McCourt's lawyers said that Frank would use other legal avenues to establish his sole ownership of the Dodgers, while Jamie McCourt's lawyers said that Jamie would be confirmed as the co-owner of the team as community property of their marriage.

On June 17, 2011, the McCourts reached agreement on a settlement of their divorce. The settlement was contingent upon Major League Baseball approving a 17-year television contract between the Dodgers and Fox Sports West and Prime Ticket. The discussion set aside the Dodgers' ownership issue until a scheduled one-day trial on August 4, whereupon if the judge sided with Frank he would keep the team and pay a settlement fee to Jamie and if the judge sided with her the team would be sold. However, on June 20, baseball rejected the television deal and the settlement agreement fell apart.

On October 17, 2011, the McCourts reached a settlement in their divorce case, whereby Jamie would receive about $130 million and relinquish her claim on the Dodgers. This ended what is widely believed to be the costliest divorce in California history.

Ownership dispute with Major League Baseball: Bankruptcy and sale of the Dodgers
In April 2011, MLB Commissioner Bud Selig announced that as part of an MLB investigation into McCourt's stewardship of the Dodgers, he would be appointing a representative to oversee the team's day-to-day operations. In effect, the commissioner's office seized control of the team. His statement said that he took that action because of his "deep concerns for the finances and operations" of the Dodgers. This event occurred shortly after an LA Times report that McCourt had obtained a personal loan from Fox to cover the team's payroll for April and May. McCourt vigorously disputed MLB's actions. Nevertheless, Selig appointed former diplomat and former Texas Rangers executive Tom Schieffer to oversee the Dodgers' finances. On June 27, the Dodgers filed for Chapter 11 Bankruptcy protection.

After much legal wrangling between McCourt's lawyers and MLB lawyers in bankruptcy court, he reached a deal with the league to put the team up for sale. On March 27, 2012, he agreed to sell the team to a group consisting of former Los Angeles Lakers star Magic Johnson, former baseball executive Stan Kasten and the Guggenheim Partners for a record price of $2 billion, the highest ever for a professional sports team. McCourt separately sold the land surrounding the stadium for $150 million to the same group, while maintaining some economic interest in the property. According to the Guggenheim Group, McCourt has no control or influence over the land, but will profit from potential future development of it. Also, the new ownership pays $14 million to rent the parking lots surrounding Dodger Stadium from an entity half-owned by McCourt. The sale officially closed on May 1, 2012, ending McCourt's turbulent period as Dodgers owner.

Los Angeles Marathon
In 2008, McCourt bought the operating rights to the Los Angeles Marathon. McCourt's group changed the route of the Marathon so that it would start at Dodger Stadium. His "Stadium to the Sea" course revitalized the Marathon and in 2010 it drew the largest field in the history of the race. During his divorce, he briefly considered selling the Marathon, but he chose to retain the rights and refocus on the race.

McCourt announced in 2019 that he would donate the Los Angeles Marathon and parent company Conqur Endurance to The McCourt Foundation, a Boston-based philanthropic organization overseen by his cousin, Brian McCourt. The vision for combining the entities was to catalyze the social impact potential of both organizations by creating a bicoastal portfolio of events that promote healthier communities. The McCourt Foundation is "dedicated to enhancing the lives of patients and families affected by health-challenges within the neurology community and beyond," and hosts several endurance sport events to raise funds and awareness for neurological health.

Global Champions Tour
In 2014, McCourt bought 50% of the Global Champions Tour.

In 2017, Frank and Monica McCourt founded a show jumping team, the Miami Celtics.

In March 2022, Jan Tops acquired McCourt's share and once again became the sole owner of Global Champions Tour. McCourt franchised the equestrian show jumping team Miami Celtics team for the 2022 spring season.

Olympique de Marseille
On August 29, 2016, McCourt entered exclusive negotiations to purchase the French Ligue 1 club Olympique de Marseille from Margarita Louis-Dreyfus. The purchase deal was completed for an undisclosed price tag of around €50 million on October 17, 2016. He pledged to invest €200 million in the club over the next four years. Upon his arrival at Marseille, he appointed Jacques-Henri Eyraud, a former director of communications of the Euro Disney group, as the new president of the club. On October 20, Rudi Garcia was officially appointed new coach and a week later Andoni Zubizarreta new sports director.

For the first transfer window in the McCourt era in January 2017, Marseille reinforced the team with the purchase of Dimitri Payet, Patrice Evra, Morgan Sanson and Grégory Sertic, for a total of around €45M.

In 2021, McCourt came out publicly against the proposed European Super League. In an op-ed in newspaper Le Monde, he drew a direct parallel between the opaque centralization of power in both the domains of football and technology, stating that: "We need to think of our institutions not as purely profit-seeking enterprises designed to funnel money and influence to a monopolistic private few, but as part of a larger ecosystem that impacts the public good."

Project Liberty
In 2021, McCourt announced $100 million funding for a non-profit initiative called Project Liberty, with the intention to "construct a new internet infrastructure." The investment first went into funding the development of Decentralized Social Networking Protocol (DSNP), which is an open source code that developers can use to build social apps and services. It also included the founding of a "digital governance" institution called McCourt Institute at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., and Sciences Po in Paris, to support research on "technology that serves the common good" and public discussions that aim to "influence the direction taken by technology and its players," according to McCourt in an interview with Usbek & Rica. The effort has a multi-track approach, beyond the focus on technology in the beginning; it is building on other components including governance, policy, and movement.

In 2022, McCourt appointed Martina Larkin as Project Liberty's first CEO.

Technology
McCourt founded Unfinished, and Amplica Labs (formerly known as Unfinished Labs), its technology research and development arm, in 2020. The first project of Amplica Labs—the introduction of the open-source Decentralized Social Networking Protocol (DSNP)—became the foundation of Project Liberty.

MeWe, a social media platform that describes itself as being privacy-focused, became the first platform to pledge support by migrating its platform to DSNP in September 2022.

McCourt Institute
In June 2021, Frank McCourt announced the creation of the McCourt Institute as the newest branch of Unfinished. The two foundational partners of the institute are Georgetown University in Washington, DC, and Sciences Po in Paris.

The McCourt Institute building was unveiled at Sciences Po in March 2022, on the occasion of the university's 150th anniversary.

At the McCourt Institute's inaugural event on Sciences Po's campus, McCourt announced the funding of $2.3 million to Georgetown and Sciences Po faculty to select grantees, furthering scholarship from Georgetown specialists in digital governance. Georgetown later announced the 2022 recipients of grantees, including 28 researchers and 17 projects.

The McCourt Institute also provided funding for Frances Haugen's nonprofit, Beyond the Screen, as Haugen announced at Unfinished Live 2022. Haugen received funding from Project Liberty for a "Duty of Care" initiative, aimed at studying harms and identifying practices to deter them.

Unfinished
Unfinished is an organization that focuses on bringing together a network of partners that includes nonprofits and advocacy organizations, and hosts events, including Unfinished Live and Unfinished Camp which took place in Venice in April 2022, to support Project Liberty goals.
 * Unfinished Network

The first initiative of the Unfinished Network was Unfinished Live, a four-episode digital event series which debuted in 2020.
 * Unfinished Live

The second annual Unfinished Live was held in-person in New York City from September 23–25, 2021. The event theme was "The Future is Decentralized". The event was hosted at The Shed, a cultural center in Manhattan which Frank McCourt donated $45 million to at its inception. The event was a convening of Unfinished's network partners and speakers that included journalists, technologists, and artists, together with host Baratunde Thurston. The event included a free public exhibit by artist Refik Anadol, titled "Project Liberty Experience" after the founding initiative of Unfinished. The exhibit intended audiences to "experience a world where you own and control your data."

In September 2022, Unfinished hosted the third annual event in New York City. It once again hosted a "Project Liberty Experience," an immersive installation by artist Refik Anadol. The three day event took place September 22–24, 2022, with an additional "Day Zero" event on September 21 which included the convening of a Student Assembly consisting of participants—15 from Sciences Po in Paris and 15 from Georgetown University in Washington, D.C.—who were selected from more than 550 applicants.

Land development
Entities affiliated with McCourt Partners submitted plans to the City of Los Angeles in 2023 for several apartment complexes in the Chinatown neighborhood adjacent to Dodger Stadium.

Personal life
McCourt's grandfather was part-owner of the Boston Braves along with Lou Perini and others. Inspired by his grandfather and the others' formation of the Jimmy Fund, McCourt started ThinkCure to fight cancer.

McCourt was formerly married to Jamie McCourt. In 2015, McCourt married to Monica Algarra. McCourt has six children.

McCourt owns homes in Mashpee and Cotuit, Massachusetts.

title: Frank McCourt (executive)


text:
WBOB (AM)

WBOB (600 kHz) is a commercial AM radio station in Jacksonville, Florida. The station airs a talk radio format and is owned by Chesapeake-Portsmouth Broadcasting Corporation. Weekdays begin with a local news and information show, followed by mostly syndicated programming, including shows from Mark Levin, Mike Gallagher, Dennis Prager, Jay Sekulow and Red Eye Radio. Most hours begin with Townhall News. Some hours are paid brokered programming. The station calls itself "Talkradio AM 600 & FM 101.1 WBOB".

By day, WBOB is powered at 50,000 watts, the maximum power permitted for commercial AM stations by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). But at night, to protect other stations on AM 600, it reduces power to 9,700 watts. A directional antenna, located off Lenox Avenue in Jacksonville, is used at all times. Listeners in Jacksonville and adjacent communities can also hear WBOB on FM translator station W266CX at 101.1 in Fruit Cove, Florida.

Early years
On December 9, 1933, the station signed on as WMBR, at 1270 kilocycles. It was owned by the Florida Broadcasting Company and transmitted using 100 watts. In the 1940s, WMBR moved first to 1400 kHz and transmitting with 250 watts, then move to 1460 kHz and increased its power to 5,000 watts. WMBR was a CBS Radio Network affiliate, and carried its schedule of dramas, comedies, news, sports, soap operas, game shows and big band broadcasts during the Golden Age of Radio.

In 1948, it added an FM station, WMBR-FM (now WEJZ), and in 1949, it put a TV station on the air, WMBR-TV (now WJXT). WMBR-TV was the first TV station in Jacksonville and carried programming from all the major networks initially.

Meanwhile, in 1942, another AM station went on the air in Jacksonville, WJDC at 1270 kHz. It was owned by the Jacksonville Broadcasting Company and was powered at 5,000 watts. In a few years, it had moved to 600 kHz. It changed its call sign to WPDQ and was an ABC affiliate. Henderson Belk, a North Carolina businessman, purchased WPDQ in 1964 from Brush-Moore Newspapers.

Moving to AM 600
In the 1960s and early 1970s, WPDQ carried a Top 40 format, while WMBR stayed with its full service middle of the road (MOR) format. In 1975, after Belk sold the station to Robert Rounsaville of Atlanta, the two stations made a switch. WMBR took the better frequency at 600 kHz, describing its format as "Bright MOR Personality." WPDQ moved higher up the dial to WMBR's old frequency, 1460 kHz, continuing its Top 40 format.

In 1977, AM 600 switched its call sign to WSNY, calling itself "Sunny 60", although the format remained the same. Then, in 1980, the call sign were changed to WAIV, and began simulcasting Top 40 programming from its FM sister station WAIV-FM, known as "The Big Wave".

From Country to Talk
pop country became the new format in 1981 with a call sign change to WOKV, known as "OK 60 The Unrock". Music continued on WOKV through the 1980s, with various adjustments from pop country to adult contemporary to oldies. In 1986, the station was bought by EZ Communications. AM 600 would then flip to a news/talk format, and was Jacksonville's original home of the syndicated Rush Limbaugh Show.

In 1994, Prism Radio Partners acquired the former WAPE, "The Big Ape". WAPE had Jacksonville's best AM signal, transmitting with 50,000 watts by day non-directional, and 10,000 watts at night with a directional signal. The WOKV callsign and news/talk programming was moved to 690 AM; the WPDQ callsign was again returned to AM 600, and flipped to an adult standards format.

Sports and Radio Disney
In 1996, WPDQ flipped to sports talk as "The Ball"; concurrent with the flip, WPDQ changed call sign to WBWL.

Cox Radio purchased the station in 1999, and in April 2002, WBWL was sold to The Walt Disney Company, and became Jacksonville's affiliate for Radio Disney on August 1 of that year.

WBOB Talk
Children's radio programming lasted until October 1, 2010, when Radio Disney sold WBWL to Chesapeake-Portsmouth Broadcasting Corporation. The call sign were changed to WBOB, and the format flipped to conservative talk radio, featuring Bill Bennett's Morning in America, Laura Ingraham and Glenn Beck, along with a variety of local news and talk programming.

As of the 2014 season, WBOB broadcasts games from the Jacksonville Sharks Arena Football League. Also in the mid-2010s, WBOB got a power boost, going from 5,000 watts day and night, to 50,000 watts in the daytime and 9,700 watts at night.

title: WBOB (AM)


text:
Eppendorf

Eppendorf can refer to:

 * Eppendorf, Saxony, a German town in the Freiberg district in Saxony
 * Eppendorf, Hamburg, a quarter of Hamburg
 * Eppendorf, Bochum, a quarter of Bochum
 * Eppendorf (company), a biotechnology company in Eppendorf, Hamburg
 * Microcentrifuge tubes, some laboratory tubes also known as Eppendorf tubes, named after the company

title: Eppendorf


text:
Nina Lobkovskaya

Nina Alexeyevna Lobkovskaya (Нина Алексеевна Лобковская; born 8 March 1924) was a female sniper in the Red Army during World War II. She attained the rank of lieutenant and commanded a separate women’s sniper company of the 3rd Shock Army during World War II. She was wounded twice and killed 89 people during the war.

Early life
Lobkovskaya was born on 8 March 1924 in Fyodorovka, Kazakh SSR, to a Russian family; she was the eldest of five children. Her mother was a schoolteacher, and her father was a mining engineer. Her family moved to the Tajik SSR in the 1930s because of her father’s poor health, in hopes that the warmer climate would be good for him. She completed her tenth grade of school and attended OSOAVIAKhIM sharpshooting courses before volunteering to join the Red Army, but dreamed of going to college. While the war did not take place in the Tajik SSR, many people living there were sent to the warfront, and wounded soldiers were sent to the Tajik SSR to recover. Her father went to the front in 1942, where he was a machine-gunner before he died in combat. Initially she studied at the Stalinabad Medical Institute and tended to the wounded at a hospital. She entered the Red Army in December 1942. After hearing appeals from the Komsomol to young people calling on them to join the military, she and her friend Olga Maryenkina applied to the sniper school, which had separate women's courses that later became the Central Women's Sniper Training School. She graduated from the program in August 1943. The courses were very intense – they spent ten to twelve hours a day training in the cold, learning how to crawl through trenches, camouflage themselves, and shoot at moving targets.

Combat path
Lobkovskaya went to the frontline in mid 1943 as part of a group of 50 women snipers assigned to the 21st Guards Rifle Division of the 3rd Shock Army on the Kalinin Front. Instead of being split up among different divisions, they formed a separate company, which was split into three groups, and then the snipers were put in pairs. Lobkovskaya was paired with Vera Artamonova, and on 10 August she killed her first enemy soldier. After staying with the 21st Division for a short time some of the women snipers were invited to a sniper rally, where famous snipers like Mikhail Budenkov and Stepan Petrenko were present. After the rally she and several other women snipers were tasked with training other snipers, while the rest of the women snipers from the group were sent to the 357th Rifle Division. After training the other snipers, they were also sent to the 357th Division, where Soviet defenses were holding the line at the large railway junction of Novosokolniki. Due to the conditions of the battlefield, it was difficult to go on a sniper hunt, and she often went weeks without a kill.

After the battle the company was moved to the 153rd Army Reserve Regiment and tasked with helping guard part of the Rastrubovo-Svyatoy-Kleshi line in the Nevel offensive. After the battle they were returned to the 21st Guards Rifle Division and issued flamethrowers to guard to prevent enemy forces from capturing them. They then helped defend a flamethrower unit against Nazi counterattacks and held their position in the face of enemy fire and air raids. Lobkovskaya said that it was the worst battle in her life. For their heroic defense of Nevel the division was awarded the name "Nevelskaya."

After another sniper tally Lobkovskaya was appointed commander of a platoon, which received reinforcements before joining the 1253rd Regiment of the 379th Infantry Division. Later she engaged in a sniper duel with a German officer who was training his subordinates to attack Soviet snipers, but despite being wounded by a bullet she won the duel.

After the Nevel offensive operation, the Kalinin Front was renamed the 1st Baltic Front, and 3rd Shock Army was moved to the 2nd Baltic Front. In October 1944, the sniper company was again sent to the 21st Guards Division which was fighting Latvian town of Dobele. During one of the battles her partner Antonina Boykova was killed by machine gun fire and Lobkovskaya herself was wounded.

In December 1944 after Riga was liberated by the Red Army, the 3rd Shock Army was moved to the 1st Belorussian Front and then took part in the Vistula-Oder offensive, liberating Poland. The women snipers took part in the liberation of Warsaw and continued to advanced West, marching 400 kilometers in two weeks.

In February 1945 she was appointed commander of a separate company of women snipers of the 3rd Shock Army. The company fought in the battles in the Dramburg area, where a large Nazi formation tried to break out of encirclement but the women's sniper company was brought in along with other units to prevent them from leaving the encirclement. Later they were tasked with holding a section of road. On 3 March her company was attached to a searchlight unit that was composed of women operators, where they learned how to operate the searchlights and helped the women position the searchlights during a battle when they were under heavy artillery fire. After the 3rd Shock Army broke through the Oder–Neisse line, her company was taken away from the front to guard army headquarters.

Civilian life
In June 1945 she was invited to Moscow for a Komsomol meeting of frontline soldiers. She then signed up for the history faculty of Moscow State University, but because she was not demobilized yet, she had to return to Germany and wait to be demobilized in October before she could begin her studies in Moscow. She left the army with the rank of lieutenant. After graduating she worked as a lecturer that the Central Museum of V. I. Lenin, and in 1974 she was awarded the title Honored Culture Worker of the RSFSR. After retiring she became a personal pensioner. Her death date remains unknown.

Awards and honors

 * Order of the Red Banner
 * Two Orders of the Patriotic War 1st class
 * Order of the Patriotic War 2nd class
 * Order of Glory 3rd class
 * Medal "For Courage"
 * Medal "For Battle Merit"
 * campaign and jubilee medals

title: Nina Lobkovskaya


text:
Talk:Sarah Polley

Errors in Her Age & DOB
According to IMDB, Sarah Polley wasn't born on May 13, 1873 and isn't actually 147 years old.

She was born on January 8, 1979 and is 41 years old.

I assume that her "Years Active" also aren't 1879-present.

Dedmiston (talk) 18:46, 23 September 2020 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the heads up. The vandalism edits have been removed. Msw1002 (talk) 21:09, 23 September 2020 (UTC)

fire extinguisher
a massive fire extinguisher fell onto her head and caused major damage that took years to heal. so this is not worthy of inclusion but the fact that her mother had an affair with the person who is her real father is repeated like some salacious gossip? https://www.theglobeandmail.com/arts/books/article-sarah-polley-hopes-her-jian-ghomeshi-essay-speaks-for-women-who-choose/ 70.48.36.71 (talk) 18:44, 24 February 2022 (UTC)

father
Under family on the bar on the right, her biological father is listed. Since presumably that's not her legal father, I believe her legal father should be listed as well, but I'm unclear on whether there are wikipedia standards that dictate only biological family is listed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.161.252.102 (talk) 17:26, 27 February 2023 (UTC)

title: Talk:Sarah Polley


text:
Bebe's Boobs Destroy Society

"Bebe's Boobs Destroy Society" is the tenth episode of the sixth season of South Park, originally aired on July 17, 2002. In the episode, Bebe Stevens's breasts begin to develop, and the boys are suddenly drawn to her even though they had no interest in her before. The episode focuses on and satirizes men's fascination over women's breasts.

Plot
The children return to school for the first time since the death of Ms. Choksondik in the episode "Simpsons Already Did It", for the time being Mr. Mackey will teach them. During the break, Bebe (Wendy's best friend) has started to develop breasts. Though they are small (she at first thought they were mosquito bites), they prompt all the boys in town to begin to think that she is unusually smart and cool, without even understanding why. However, this causes Wendy and the other girls to get incredibly jealous, especially since Stan, Wendy's boyfriend (who hasn't asked Wendy to hang out with Stan and the other boys), is one of the boys affected. The girls begin making up malicious rumors about Bebe and accuse her of being sexually promiscuous.

Consequently, the boys begin to fight and bicker about who gets to play with Bebe, sound-effects from Cannibal Holocaust play as the boys fight like the primitive men from 2001: A Space Odyssey and Planet of the Apes.

Throughout the episode, Cartman plays a game he calls 'Lambs', which involves placing one of his dolls in a pit in his basement and torturing it, saying, "It puts the lotion on its skin, or else it gets the hose again", as a reference to Silence of the Lambs.

Eventually, the boys get into a fight and seem to permanently turn into cavemen. Meanwhile, Bebe, worried that boys might never take her seriously (as happened to her mother, a stereotypical dumb blonde), consults a plastic surgeon about breast reduction surgery; however, he rejects the proposition because he considers breast reduction "insane" (which is made apparent especially after giving contrasting personalities to two female colleagues: One with large breasts, and the other flat-chested). He then tells her that if she wants them bigger, "now might be the time to size up"; Bebe leaves his office in frustration and disgust. Similarly when Wendy asks for a breast implant he accepts her request, but only after she announces she has three thousand dollars in cash, despite her mother's protest that she is too young. Meanwhile, Stan draws pictures of breasts on the wall of his house referring to his work and breasts as "Ah-tah", an apparent reference to the film Quest for Fire, wherein prehistoric man refers to fire as "Atar". Stan's father, Randy, has a talk with him about his breast-obsession, going along with Stan's calling breasts "Ah-tahs", and describes all women have breasts: "And one day you'll meet a pair of boobs you'd want to marry." This eventually convinces Stan to snap out of his caveman-like trance.

After this scene, Bebe is shown in bed, with her breasts glowing and speaking to each other, plotting to rule the world by taking over the boys' minds. Bebe awakens and screams, her mother quickly runs into the room to ask her what is happening, she explains what she heard and her mother calmly replies that it is only natural for a growing woman to have boobs that plot to take over boys' minds. This is where Bebe snaps, claiming she does not want boobs that are going to try to rule the world, and begins to come up with a plan to fix this problem.

The next time they are seen, at school, Bebe walks in wearing a box over her chest, which causes all the boys to suddenly break out of their trance; Stan shares his father's advice not to let breasts control their lives, and the boys all agree that it is for the best. Consequently, when Wendy shows up with her new breast implants, she is ridiculed rather than praised. Butters goes up and pokes them, saying that they are all "hard and oogy", to which Cartman replies, "What a stupid bitch!". Wendy looks embarrassed.

Production
In the DVD commentary, Parker describes the inspiration for the show came from a party where two of his friends were drunk and trying to hit on a girl. One of the guys starts stroking the girls hair, when the other guy reached to stroke the girls hair too, the first guy started making guttural gorilla noises. Stone describes how South Park takes the view that society is the only thing that keeps people from descending into savages.

On syndicated broadcasts, the scene where Wendy is in surgery getting breast implants is cut.

The episode has been used to examine the treatment of female characters in South Park.

Home media
"Bebe's Boobs Destroy Society", along with the sixteen other episodes from South Park's sixth season, were released on a three-disc DVD set in the United States on October 11, 2005. The sets included brief audio commentaries by Parker and Stone for each episode. IGN gave the season a rating of 9/10.

title: Bebe's Boobs Destroy Society


text:
Tragic Overture (Dvořák)

The Tragic Overture, B. 16a (also called the Dramatic Overture; Tragická ouvertura or Dramatická ouvertura) is an orchestral composition written in 1870 by the Czech composer Antonín Dvořák. It is Dvořák's overture to his first opera Alfred.

It was first performed on 4 January 1905, almost one year after Dvořák's death.

title: Tragic Overture (Dvořák)


text:
Jim Tracy (baseball)

James Edwin Tracy (born December 31, 1955) is an American former Major League Baseball (MLB) manager and player. He played for the Chicago Cubs in 1980 and 1981, and has managed the Los Angeles Dodgers, Pittsburgh Pirates, and Colorado Rockies. Tracy was named Manager of the Year in 2009, only the second manager to win the award after being hired mid-season, joining Jack McKeon for the Florida Marlins.

Playing career
Tracy was an All-America baseball player at Marietta College, an NCAA Division III institution in Ohio. In 1976, he played collegiate summer baseball with the Chatham A's of the Cape Cod Baseball League and was named a league all-star.

He played as an outfielder for parts of two seasons with the Chicago Cubs in 1980–81. He also played two seasons in Japan with the Yokohama Taiyo Whales in 1983–84.

Managing career
Tracy worked as a minor league manager for several organizations including the Ottawa Lynx in 1994. He is featured as the manager of the 1988 Peoria Chiefs in the book "The Boys Who Would Be Cubs", by Joseph Bosco. Tracy later served as the bench coach of the Montreal Expos (under manager Felipe Alou), and the Dodgers (under manager Davey Johnson) in 1999 and 2000.

Los Angeles Dodgers
Tracy was manager of the Los Angeles Dodgers from 2001 to 2005, compiling four winning seasons and a 427–383 record. With Tracy as manager, the Dodgers won the National League West division in 2004 but lost 3-1 to the St. Louis Cardinals in the National League Division Series. On October 3, 2005, after finishing the season at 71-91, Tracy and the Dodgers agreed to part ways citing "philosophical differences."

Pittsburgh Pirates
Tracy was hired by the Pittsburgh Pirates on October 11, 2005. In two disappointing seasons in Pittsburgh, he compiled a 135–189 record. Tracy was fired by the Pirates on October 5, 2007.

Colorado Rockies
Tracy was hired as bench coach for the Colorado Rockies in November 2008. On May 29, 2009, Clint Hurdle was fired with an 18–28 record, and Tracy was named to replace him. Tracy led the Rockies to the postseason, with a 74–42 (.638) record after taking over as manager, but lost the NLDS to the Philadelphia Phillies by a score of 3 games to 1. For his efforts in the 2009 season, Tracy won the National League Manager of the Year Award as voted on by the Baseball Writers' Association of America. He was also named the NL Manager of the Year by The Sporting News. On November 19, 2009, Tracy was rewarded with a three-year contract extension.

In 2010, the Rockies lost 13 of their last 14 games, collapsing from a $1/2$ game deficit in the wild card race to finish 7 games behind an Atlanta Braves team that went 6-8 in the same span. In 2011, the Rockies began the season with an 11-2 record before finishing the season with a 62-87 (.416) run that landed them in 4th place.

After the 2011 season, the Rockies rewarded Tracy with an "indefinite" contract extension. The Rockies went on to accumulate a 37-65 record (.363) through August 1, leading to a front office reshuffle that left Jim Tracy and his staff intact. Tracy resigned as manager of the Rockies on October 7, 2012, following a disappointing and injury plagued 2012 season that saw the Rockies finish 64-98, the 2nd worst record in franchise history.

Personal life
Tracy's oldest son, Brian, played baseball at UC Santa Barbara, and was drafted in 2007 by the Pirates. Brian later became a scout for the Pirates. Son Chad played in the minor leagues for eight seasons, including four seasons in Triple-A for three different franchises. Chad, along with Bryan LaHair and Nick Stavinoha, led Triple-A in RBIs in 2011, with 109. Chad later became a minor-league manager. Youngest son Mark also played minor league baseball from 2010 to 2013.

title: Jim Tracy (baseball)


text: Category:High schools in British Columbia


text: Category:Area

title: Category:Area