Crap articles

[Poetlister]

"The local landfill site has welcomed 150,000 tonnes annually of domestic and industrial waste".

[greyed.out.fields]

Monday (T-H-L) templated since 2008, despite some 600+ edits.

Superb lede:

According to the traditional Christian, Islamic and Hebrew calendars, it is the second day of the week, and according to international standard ISO 8601 it is the first day of the week. In the West, it is the first day of the work week, whereas in most Muslim countries and Israel, it is the second day of the work week.

Now I'm guessing here but I suspect that the second day of the week is not called Monday in neither Israel, nor in most Muslim countries. How about Buddhist and Hindu countries don't they have a second day of the week too? Where did that famous NPOV has go?

Indeed, it is not called Monday in most Western countries either, though the French lundi and the German Montag, for example, come from the same root "Moon-day". In Israel it is called by its Biblical name, simply "Second day", יוֹם שֵׁנִי

You likely should note that "Monday" is a word in English, thus the cavils are a waste. Newspapers in English in Israel use the word "Monday". Newspapers in Saudi Arabia in English use the word "Monday." Newspapers in the US in French use the French word "lundi". Amazingly enough, the word for the day of the week in any language is determined by the language in use.

In the CJKV sprachbund:
Japanese: 月曜日 - "moon-day"
Korean: "moon-day"
* hanja: 月曜日;
* hangul: 월요일 (I can barely read hangul, though, so this may be wrong)
Chinese: 星期一 - "day of the week one", but literally "star time-period one" (but was historically "moon-day")
Vietnamese: thứ hai - "day two", but I'll be willing to bet good mooney (ha ha) that it was "moon-day" in chữ nôm

North Germanic languages:
Danish: Mandag - "moon-day"
Swedish: Måndag - "moon-day"
Norwegian:
* Nynorsk: Måndag - "moon-day"
* Bokmål: Mandag - "moon-day"

West Germanic languages (that's us):
Dutch: Maandag - "moon-day"
German: Montag - "moon-day"
English: Monday - "moon-day"
Manchester Mafiaian: Pills 'n' Thrills and Bellyaches - "happy moon-days"
(In the Germanic languages, it is technically "goddess of the moon day": see Máni (T-H-L)).

Romance languages:
Latin: Dies lunae - "moon-day"
Italian: lunedi - "moon-day", "di" an abbreviation of the Vulgar Latin
French: lundi - "moon-day", "di" an abbreviation of the Vulgar Latin
Spanish: lunes - "moon - " with "day" implied. (Do I really need to write what "moon" is in Spanish?)
Romanian: luni - "moon - " with "day" implied. "Moon" in Romanian is "lună", and it's not pronounced "loo-nah" (/lu:na:/) but "loo-nuh" (/lu:nə/). In Romanian, when an <a> has a little half-smiley above it, it means it used to be pronounced as the <a> in "father" but is now pronounced as like the <a> in "about". (See: Schwa (T-H-L))

Máni, Máni, Máni, usw.

[Johnny Au]

Bark Lake (Ontario) (T-H-L)

I don't understand why there is an article about an unspectacular lake in a region filled with other unspectacular lakes.

[Earthy Astringent]

Kancho (T-H-L)

The Japanese never cease to amaze me, but neither do Wikipedia shitforbrains who write stuff like this.

[scribbler004]

Kancho (T-H-L)

The Japanese never cease to amaze me, but neither do Wikipedia shitforbrains who write stuff like this.

If you'd ever visited Japan, you might regard this with less derision. Many female teachers find this intolerable.

I wrote a brief blog post on the topic of Kancho.

http://www.altinsider.com/kancho

[Poetlister]

Kancho (T-H-L)

The Japanese never cease to amaze me, but neither do Wikipedia shitforbrains who write stuff like this.

If you'd ever visited Japan, you might regard this with less derision. Many female teachers find this intolerable.

I wrote a brief blog post on the topic of Kancho.

http://www.altinsider.com/kancho

scribbler004. Glad you've stopped lurking.

It does sound like an unpleasant thing to do to someone, but the Japanese are often weird.

[Jim]

... the Japanese are often weird.

[scribbler004]

Kancho (T-H-L)

The Japanese never cease to amaze me, but neither do Wikipedia shitforbrains who write stuff like this.

If you'd ever visited Japan, you might regard this with less derision. Many female teachers find this intolerable.

I wrote a brief blog post on the topic of Kancho.

http://www.altinsider.com/kancho

scribbler004. Glad you've stopped lurking.

It does sound like an unpleasant thing to do to someone, but the Japanese are often weird.

Thank you.

And yes. They are frequently very strange.

I'd recommend my friend Jeff's (often very funny) insights into Kancho. A 10-year-old blog listing, from his days as a JET teaching assistant. He's married with a daughter now, and is still in Japan.

http://classic.dryang.org/japanese/teacher.html

Removing this would be like Wiki not listing wedgies. But Wiki's a yellow pages of shit businesses and puff pieces for vain cunts, not a cultural encyclopedia, after all.

Wedgie (T-H-L)

[The Joy]

... the Japanese are often weird.

[Jim]

... the Japanese are often weird.

Ok, that's weird.

---

But now we're off-topic, so Bhagu (T-H-L)

Sant Bhagu was Bhakti movement sant. She belonged to Mahar caste. Nothing much is known about her neither she is part of Chokhamela family. Shrisakalsantgatha recolonize her as Bhagu Maharin.

That's the entire article, to save you a click.

[tarantino]

... the Japanese are often weird.

[Hex]

Kancho (T-H-L)

The Japanese never cease to amaze me, but neither do Wikipedia shitforbrains who write stuff like this.

See my reply to this at List of Wikipedia's worst lists.

[Poetlister]

Bhagu (T-H-L)

Shrisakalsantgatha recolonize her as Bhagu Maharin.

[Earthy Astringent]

Kancho (T-H-L)

The Japanese never cease to amaze me, but neither do Wikipedia shitforbrains who write stuff like this.

If you'd ever visited Japan, you might regard this with less derision. Many female teachers find this intolerable.

I wrote a brief blog post on the topic of Kancho.

http://www.altinsider.com/kancho

I would introduce that kids ass to my belt. New traditions meet old.

[thekohser]

Bark Lake (Ontario) (T-H-L)

I don't understand why there is an article about an unspectacular lake in a region filled with other unspectacular lakes.

Not to mention, the coordinates aren't even lining up with the lake. They're about a mile off, to the east.

[Poetlister]

Not to mention, the coordinates aren't even lining up with the lake. They're about a mile off, to the east.

Maybe the system is a bit inaccurate. Notoriously, if you stand on the meridian line at the Old Royal Observatory, which by definition has a longitude of 0 degrees exactly, a satnav will tell you that you are several metres west of longitude 0.

[Hex]

I currently have some kind of winter infection that's made the lymph nodes below my jaw feel like a pair of marbles for the past 24 hours or so. It sucks. I figured I should probably know what's going on inside my own body, so I decided to read up on the topic. The top Google hit is this article on MedicineNet.com, which does a pretty good layman's-level job.

Of course, that made me wonder what Wikipedia had to say about it - Lymph node (T-H-L). It was created on 8 September 2002, and has been edited 1,205 times since then by 770 different authors. Heavy on the technical details, the article is subject to poor grammar from the first sentence ("A lymph node is an oval-shaped organ of the lymphatic system, distributed widely throughout the body including the armpit and stomach and linked by lymphatic vessels."), bad layout (heavy detail of structure before function; uses a variety of terms that are presented unexplained until later in the article), sloppy, imprecise writing ("bean or oval shaped" - because an "oval" is a 3D shape, and all beans are the same shape), and scattily illustrated.

Let's expand on that last point. The WP article has three illustrations that are essentially the same thing:



However, they all have differing subsets of features labeled. Look more closely, and you'll notice that the first one is not like the others. How? It shows a blood vessel entering the lymph node. The other diagrams are simplified, dealing with the flow of lymph only - but as the other one is the infobox image, by the time you've got to the stuff about structure it's scrolled way off your screen. And hang on a minute. A blood vessel just going in? Well, as it turns out, that's not right either. If we look at an illustration from a reputable source:



Surprise surprise. Blood goes in, blood comes out. Out of the three images from the article, the second and third ones were copied from professionals' work illustrating a subset of the topic. The infobox image, however, with its depiction of an organ that receives blood, but doesn't release it, and yet also doesn't explode, is predictably enough the work of a Wikipedian.

Now, I'm no biologist but a few seconds with a search engine suggests that blood flow through the lymph nodes is pretty important. The topic isn't addressed directly in the article, either. It's alluded to a couple of times: "The reticular network... allows exchange of material with blood through the high endothelial venules", and, later, "The medulla contains large blood vessels", but that's it. As usual, information is spread piecemeal throughout different articles; if you look at the section about lymph nodes in Lymphatic system (T-H-L), it says "The arteries and veins supplying the lymph node with blood enter and exit through the hilum." But that's not repeated in the main article.

In conclusion, for a 13-year-old article about an extremely important part of the human anatomy, this is pisspoor work.

It's 2:45 in the morning and this post has been brought to you by a literal pain in the neck.

[Poetlister]

There's a comprehensive plan to improve all the medical articles. Look at it again in another 13 years and no doubt it will be much better.

[Ming]

Divinatory, esoteric and occult tarot (T-H-L) never actually gets around to the fortune telling stuff. There used to be a Tarot reading (T-H-L) (which when it last had content looked like this) but that was back in the dim times.

[Poetlister]

Divinatory, esoteric and occult tarot (T-H-L) never actually gets around to the fortune telling stuff. There used to be a Tarot reading (T-H-L) (which when it last had content looked like this) but that was back in the dim times.

Maybe they think that the fortune telling side of tarot is non-notable?

[Johnny Au]

Smashboards (T-H-L)

It is a fan forum for the Super Smash Bros. video game series (that happens to be owned by Major League Gaming for four years, until Smashboards's moderator purchased the forum back).

Much of the references are primary sources and user-generated.

[The Joy]

Blue Laws (Connecticut) (T-H-L)

The stupid article doesn't tell you the laws were a hoax until well into it. It misleads you into thinking the laws were real and if you just skim it, you might miss the explanation of the hoax.

[Johnny Au]

Toys-to-life (T-H-L) needs a significant rewrite.

[eppur si muove]

1997–98 in English football (T-H-L)

This glorious section caught my eye:

Grief for the red and white part of Stoke, and the blue half of Manchester

While the red half of Manchester reeled in disappointment at being beaten to the Premiership title by Arsenal, the blue half of Manchester had to come to terms with the agony of relegation to Division Two for the first time in their history. City had started the Division One campaign badly and manager Frank Clark (footballer) was fired in March, with former Everton manager Joe Royle being appointed as his successor.

City went into their final game of the season at Stoke, with both sides knowing that they had to win to stand any chance of avoiding relegation. In the end City won 5-2, but both teams were relegated because the three teams above the drop zone all won their games.

To the dismay of the Stoke fans, Stoke were relegated in the first season of their new stadium. Many fans did not take to moving to the Britannia Stadium from their sacred old Victoria Ground. Stoke City were in the top flight in 1984/85 season.

[Johnny Au]

Going Dutch (T-H-L)

Just take a look at the entire article, especially the references section.

[Poetlister]

Going Dutch (T-H-L)

Just take a look at the entire article, especially the references section.

The Oxford Dictionary is obviously an excellent reference, but most of the article is unreferenced.

The references section is headed "Surprisingly no reference found for the most obvious country the Netherlands. Please update with factual references."

[Drijfzand]

High Frequency Active Auroral Research Program, aka HAARP, seems written by the PR division of DARPA, or by someone who cares more about (not) being quoted by conspiracy nuts than about scientific accuracy.

At an altitude between 70 to 350 km (43 to 217 mi) (depending on operating frequency), the signal is partially absorbed in a small volume several tens of kilometers in diameter and a few meters thick over the IRI. The intensity of the HF signal in the ionosphere is less than 3 µW/cm², tens of thousands of times less than the Sun's natural electromagnetic radiation reaching the earth and hundreds of times less than even the normal random variations in intensity of the Sun's natural ultraviolet (UV) energy which creates the ionosphere. The small effects that are produced, however, can be observed with the sensitive scientific instruments installed at the HAARP Station, and these observations can provide information about the dynamics of plasmas and insight into the processes of solar-terrestrial interactions.

Source given is the HAARP website, which isn't available anymore. And they didn't copy it correctly, "few meters thick" should be "few hundred meters" thick.
- hundreds of times less than even the normal random variations in intensity of the Sun's natural ultraviolet (UV) energy which creates the ionosphere: highly misleading, and inappropriate use of the words "even" and "normal": "random variations" are variations that occur due to solar disturbances, like solar storms, solar proton events, coronal mass ejections, solar flares etc. EUV/XUV radiation during these events can indeed be hundreds of times stronger, sometimes more than 1 W/m², causing SIDs (sudden ionospheric disturbances). But the non-random variation (during both the 24 hour cycle and the 11 year solar cycle) in solar EUV/XUV radiation is of the same order of magnitude as the energy density from HAARP (a few µW/cm²).
- the small effects that are produced: increasing the temperature of the electron plasma from 800° to 2400° K in 7 microseconds is not what I would call a "small effect" (data from older ionospheric heating experiments with the Arecibo installation).

[Johnny Au]

Big Smoke Burger (T-H-L)

When did hamburgers became considered Somali cuisine?

Said burger chain also sells bacon cheeseburgers, which is anything but halal.

In fact, if you look at the menu in Big Smoke Burger's website, it does not look as if it serves Somali food at all. Even poutine is listed and poutine is Canada's unofficial national dish and cannot be found in Somalia at all (except at perhaps the Canadian Embassy in Mogadishu).

[AnimuAvatar]

Kancho (T-H-L)

The Japanese never cease to amaze me, but neither do Wikipedia shitforbrains who write stuff like this.

Linked from Kancho is this, while interesting (as in, "this exists, huh"), more or less unnecessary article about the video-game adaptation.
Boong-Ga Boong-Ga (T-H-L)

Only source is an article hosted on Shaw Webspace.

I can't wait for the movie adaptation.

[lilburne]

Coicent (T-H-L)

Plot

In 2710, a boy named Shinichi is on a school field trip to a rebuilt 21st century version of the city Nara. When he wanders from his class, he spots a talking white deer and it steals his bag. Shinichi follows the deer and sees a strange girl named Toto and falls in love with her. She is being pursed by two brothers and they try to get away from them.

[lilburne]

1755 in paleontology (T-H-L) complete drivel. Apparently someone sent some fossils to someone, who was a friend of someone famous, but never got a reply.

[Jim]

1755 in paleontology (T-H-L) complete drivel. Apparently someone sent some fossils to someone, who was a friend of someone famous, but never got a reply.

Yeah, but "Joshua Platt" was not deterred by this setback...

3 years later, as we learn from 1758 in paleontology (T-H-L)

...[he] continued prospecting for fossils in Stonesfield. He met with success, finding an incomplete Megalosaurus thigh bone, which he noted and illustrated. This bone was included in the 1773 catalogue of his large personal fossil collection.

Bless.

[thekohser]

Big Smoke Burger (T-H-L)

When did hamburgers became considered Somali cuisine?

Said burger chain also sells bacon cheeseburgers, which is anything but halal.

In fact, if you look at the menu in Big Smoke Burger's website, it does not look as if it serves Somali food at all. Even poutine is listed and poutine is Canada's unofficial national dish and cannot be found in Somalia at all (except at perhaps the Canadian Embassy in Mogadishu).

This is presumably the sort of food they serve in Bahrain.

[Ming]

High Frequency Active Auroral Research Program, aka HAARP, seems written by the PR division of DARPA, or by someone who cares more about (not) being quoted by conspiracy nuts than about scientific accuracy.

Up until the shutdown most editing on this was devoted to beating back the tinfoil hat crowd. At that point the uncertainty over whether it would pass to a university or the like took over for a while; now it's pretty quiet. Ming guesses that a lot of what inaccuracy there is coes out of a lack of will to do much more than keep the article from getting worse.

[thekohser]

...coes out...

Ming does typos?

[Poetlister]

...coes out...

Ming does typos?

Hold on - I'll write a Wikipedia article explaining that to coe means to go rapidly, like Sebastian Coe (T-H-L).

[The Joy]

Walk of shame (T-H-L)

[Hex]

Anglo-Saxon law (T-H-L):

Charters

A fourth group might be made of the charters, BUT they are based on Old English private and public law and supply us with most important materials in regard to it. Looking somewhat deeper at the sources from which Old English law was derived, we shall have to modify our classification to some extent, as the external forms of publication, although important from the point of view of historical criticism, are not sufficient standards as to the juridical character of the various kinds of qq33aa1

[Poetlister]

Anglo-Saxon law (T-H-L):

Charters

A fourth group might be made of the charters, BUT they are based on Old English private and public law and supply us with most important materials in regard to it. Looking somewhat deeper at the sources from which Old English law was derived, we shall have to modify our classification to some extent, as the external forms of publication, although important from the point of view of historical criticism, are not sufficient standards as to the juridical character of the various kinds of qq33aa1

There is clearly some vandalism here, now two months old. The next edit, by the same IP, was reverted, but not this one.

[Johnny Au]

24 Sussex Drive (T-H-L)
The article mentions twice about the swimming pool installed there, along with the use of two references to cite each of the mentions; those two references are actually the same Globe and Mail article, just referenced differently.

[Earthy Astringent]

Parliament Act 1911 (T-H-L)

I was reading an article about foxhunting, and this was mentioned. The Wikipedia article left me scratching my head. The Britanica article, in 4 short paragraphs did far more in explaining the purpose of the act.

It's bad enough wasting time writing Wikipedia, but wasting time reading it? I'd rather waste my time vandalizing it.

[Poetlister]

Parliament Act 1911 (T-H-L)

I was reading an article about foxhunting, and this was mentioned. The Wikipedia article left me scratching my head. The Britanica article, in 4 short paragraphs did far more in explaining the purpose of the act.

It's bad enough wasting time writing Wikipedia, but wasting time reading it? I'd rather waste my time vandalizing it.

Yes, Wikipedians often say rightly that many of the articles in Wikipedia are much longer than the corresponding ones in Britannica. The implication is that they give more information. This is not always true! Britannica articles are written and edited by competent professionals.

[Drijfzand]

Rape schedule needs a rewrite ...

The concept of the rape schedule is applied to women more so because they are larger victims of rape than men.[4] Men are therefor less likely to think of a rape schedule, where some women may think of it on a daily basis. Rape schedules can supply a steady stream of fear into a person's mind and then making a person very cautious of their actions. Those that do not have rape schedules are seen as privileged[5] Privileged by the fact that one may not have to think a rape schedule or live by one as opposed to a person that does.
[..]
One might assume that only individuals that have fallen victim to rape are the only people that abide by these rape schedules, however, that is not the case. There are many people in the world that have never been the victim, but yet are far from being carefree and are highly concerned with doing everything they possibly can to avoid a tragic instance, such as rape from occurring. A particular quote by Jessica Valenti in her book Full Frontal Feminism stated, "When I was in college a teacher once said all women live by a 'rape schedule.'"[10] This goes to show that men see women as easier targets and thus they fall victim more easily to rape and live in constant fear.

[Earthy Astringent]

Rape has (in the US at least) a "penetration" requirement.

[Poetlister]

Not to denigrate the awfulness of rape, but are there such things as "mugging schedule" or "assault schedule" in general? I think that most people, female or male, would change their behaviour to avoid such things.

[Zoloft]

Not to denigrate the awfulness of rape, but are there such things as "mugging schedule" or "assault schedule" in general? I think that most people, female or male, would change their behaviour to avoid such things.

Although "mugging schedule" or "assault schedule" were not named as such, I have escorted many women to safe areas because of their concerns about being victimized.

One of my friends is about 90 pounds and four feet tall. You better believe she plans her life around time of day, quality of neighborhood, and likelihood of problems.

I'm an elderly man, and for 90% of my life have had much less concern.

[Zironic]

Not to denigrate the awfulness of rape, but are there such things as "mugging schedule" or "assault schedule" in general? I think that most people, female or male, would change their behaviour to avoid such things.

Although "mugging schedule" or "assault schedule" were not named as such, I have escorted many women to safe areas because of their concerns about being victimized.

One of my friends is about 90 pounds and four feet tall. You better believe she plans her life around time of day, quality of neighborhood, and likelihood of problems.

I'm an elderly man, and for 90% of my life have had much less concern.

Maybe you should? Statistically you're about twice as likely to suffer a serious assault then she is.

[Zoloft]

Not to denigrate the awfulness of rape, but are there such things as "mugging schedule" or "assault schedule" in general? I think that most people, female or male, would change their behaviour to avoid such things.

Although "mugging schedule" or "assault schedule" were not named as such, I have escorted many women to safe areas because of their concerns about being victimized.

One of my friends is about 90 pounds and four feet tall. You better believe she plans her life around time of day, quality of neighborhood, and likelihood of problems.

I'm an elderly man, and for 90% of my life have had much less concern.

Maybe you should? Statistically you're about twice as likely to suffer a serious assault then she is.

I do pay more attention to when and where I go out now. Hence my use of the "90%."

There are other security measures I've taken now as well that are better left unspoken.

[Zoloft]

Menwhile, SoHo (magazine) (T-H-L) - a stub about the obscure Colombian version of Maxim.

Bonus: Magazine cover which is NSFW.

[thekohser]

Bonus: Magazine cover which is NSFW.

They'd be hard pressed to find a SoHo cover that is not NSFW, though it looks like Edition 183 could work. (I had to do some painstaking research to find that.)