User talk:Sahab: Difference between revisions

Tagging

Most of the content is written by you or has been heavily edited by you in any case. Do you intend to stop at some point or tag most/all the articles on the site? --Axius (talk | contribs) 01:23, 31 July 2014 (PDT)

Hi. Yeah, of course I intend to stop, once my work is tagged. --Sahab (talk) 01:50, 31 July 2014 (PDT)

Isnt that going to be all the articles on the site? So about 2000 article tags?

What is your intention of tagging the articles? Do you want some kind of recognition or author attribution or do you want to prevent others from editing the work? etc I'm trying to understand the intent. We have tagged other people's work to mostly encourage others to edit or to encourage them to contribute more. Maybe we should re-think that and perhaps only essays should be tagged since they are of a personal nature and main content that complies with site policies should not be tagged.

We need to look at other sites to see how they handle this. Its a wiki after all and when pages are edited by everyone we can see why most wikis dont attribute their authors like this. Wikipedia doesnt make people tag their any of their articles even if they're basically the sole contributors of that page and thats a pretty big point I want to bring up here. Neither does Rational Wiki tag their articles like this. I think if its going to be all/most pages on the site that is going to discourage people from editing (thinking the pages shouldn't be edited further in any major way) so I dont think its a good idea.

We have all all worked on this site not for recognition but for charity and no one has asked for anything in return, just like how it happens on Wikipedia. If you want some kind of recognition we can create an "WikiIslam:About the Editors" page and mention all major past/current editors by name there and some short bios about them (if they want). I think that's reasonable.

Please discontinue the tagging until this discussion is settled.

Anyone else, feel free to share your opinions as well. --Axius (talk | contribs) 02:01, 31 July 2014 (PDT)

Obviously I do NOT want to prevent others from editing the work. Neither am I asking for monetary compensation, so I too have edited here as a form of charity. I simply want attribution for what I contributed to this site, just like how any other editor is entitled to the same. Nothing more, nothing less. This is not asking for too much now that I have moved on. We have allowed people to attribute their work (in this very non-evasive way) for many years now without a problem. Are you telling me now that the editor who has spent 5+ years editing the site like a fulltime job, probably contributed at least 80% of the site's content, was in charge of its networking with other sites, formulated and wrote most of its rules, administrated the site, helped new editors learn the ropes, and copy-edited/corrected/quality-controlled every single page, is going to have that right taken away from him? Other wikis may not attribute things, but we do. And if that changes now, it is pretty obvious to every one why it is only changing now. Over the years I have spoken to Ali Sina, Robert Spencer, Jochen Katz, Robert from TROP, etc., and I can guarantee that any one of them would have bit their own hands off to have me join their sites and write for them. I chose to stay here, and this is how you are going to treat me now?--Sahab (talk) 02:26, 31 July 2014 (PDT)

"Other wikis may not attribute things, but we do." - and once that was decided that should never be changed? We have done a lot of things incorrectly in the past and then changed course when we realized we should do it differently.

Once again why does Wikipedia and Rational Wiki not tag their articles? Why should we? There are editors on Wikipedia with a lot of edits (list). There's one with 1.3 million edits and there's no recognition on individual articles. Here's a note at the end of that user's page for the user [1] with 1.3 million edits so you can see how they approach the subject:

All contributions by this user are hereby released into the public domain. I, the author, hereby agree to waive all claim of copyright (economic and moral) in all content contributed by me, the user, and immediately place any and all contributions by me into the public domain, unless otherwise noted. I grant anyone the right to use my work for any purpose, without any conditions, to be changed or destroyed in any manner whatsoever without any attribution or notification.

Once someone edits a page you wrote they would take out your name or add theirs which doesnt make any sense.

"I simply want recognition for what I contributed to this site" - That can be done in a "List of editors" way (like Wikipedia does it). We can list the number of edits there too. The other way people take pride in their work is having a list of articles they have contributed to in a major way and users make that list on their own user pages for example. (others)

These are the only two ways that I know of that Wikipedia has for attributing authors. The same for Rational Wiki.

If you have moved on why would you care if you have your username on the pages and by that I mean, how would it impact you? I would be happy to mention your name in a new page "WikiIslam:About the Editors". I have thought of doing that multiple times in the past and I thought about doing that while you were actively editing and also after you left the last time (3 months ago). I thought it was important to let people know who the major contributors of the site have been but we dont do this on the pages themselves because they are open to editing by everyone and there is no ownership of pages as in "I wrote this". The point of a wiki is that it can be edited by anyone at any time. 80% of the content is incorrect by the way but you do have around 46% of the site's edits up to this point (the most by any user and that can be rounded up to 50%) and the rest of what you wrote can be mentioned with some edits (if needed) to let people know that as of today you are the most significant editor on the site. That is fair and appropriate but not the article tagging. In fact this attribution method gives you more recognition because we can tell people what you did on the site (how you created the site structure, site map, the categories etc. etc.). You can also make a separate page for your list of articles that you're tagging and we can link that there in the "About the editors" page. Your method, a name on an article wont tell people much. Many people only view a few pages in their visit in any case. So I think having a page for the editors is a better idea.

If you also need a reference letter or something like that for the work you've done with the bullet points you mentioned we can discuss that as well and I can write up something by email. --Axius (talk | contribs) 03:09, 31 July 2014 (PDT)

Content and edits are two different things. I'm pretty sure if you count the number of pages created or primarily filled with my work, the "80% of the content" statement is not so inaccurate. Since I have literally edited every single page on this wiki, even the pages which have not been created or primarily filled with my work will still likely have some of my work in there. And many of the articles that have not been created or primarily filled with my work only exist on this site through my networking with other authors off site. So another way to calculate the percentage would be to take all contributions as a whole and divide it as a whole rather than only counting pages created or primarily filled with my work.

With that said and done, the exact percentage is not really important. If you say about 50 percent, then fine. I think your ideas in how to handle this situation seems reasonable. So yeah, okay. I will create that page and even de-tag those pages for you. Thanks. --Sahab (talk) 03:42, 31 July 2014 (PDT)

Ok. --Axius (talk | contribs) 04:12, 31 July 2014 (PDT)

Suggestion

If you spent a very long time here, why dont you go ahead publishing its contents (partially) on other sites and blogs and forums? I know some sites will moderate out our posts but we need those who won't. Saggy (talk) 11:07, 31 July 2014 (PDT)

Hi Saggy. Thanks for the suggestion. However, I've done plenty of that already. Promoting/defending the site on forums, spreading the word to other websites, I even had my own blog (now inactive) where I promoted/defended the website. thereligionofpeace.com kindly featured a couple of my posts where I linked to this website (a very kind gesture from him, considering I had only recently created the blog itself). Had plenty of traffic from there and Reddit.com too. But after 5 years I have ended up leaving under what I feel are strained circumstances, so I wouldn't be interested in more of the same, at least not any time soon. I think my contributions to this site alone (minus the tech side of things which Axius handled) would be enough to make this website very nearly what it is today. So I may try to replicate that success with my own site if one of the guys/gals over at the FFI forum are willing to help me out on the tech side. Or I may inquire about joining with one of the already established sites. Some of the pages I've written (e.g. all of the Persecution pages, Priapism, 72 Virgins, Fastest Growing Religion, Muhammad and Aisha, Muslim Statistics, Lying and Deception, Muhammad in Other Scriptures, The 100, List of Genuine Islamic Inventions, and Dr. Keith Moore, among others) are completely unique to this site or have never been done in such detail anywhere else. I feel this material has added to the library of Islam-criticism in general and has provided a lot of individuals with much needed information. I'm very proud of that and am content with knowing I did my bit, so I may not even continue at all with Islam. I'm honestly not sure at the moment. --Sahab (talk) 16:09, 31 July 2014 (PDT)

You can try contacting Klingschor and TheRationalizer or post a message on the CEMB forum (the CEMB has a wiki too as you know). I know Klingschor made a post a long time ago on the CEMB forum wanting to create a new site. Maybe you can get together with these people and do something. The more websites there are for criticism of Islam the better. I'm pretty sure these people can arrange for some kind of tech help. I know TheRationalizer's email so let me know if you want to email him. They're both also from the UK and have good Youtube channels with lots of subscribers so they're somewhat accomplished and passionate about criticism of Islam. Unless one works alone they have to work through differences of opinions with other people so that will always be there when others are involved.

No one can be stopped from leaving the site or deciding not to contribute anymore. That's their wish. I've tried to be fair for example I have tried to prevent wrongful blocks and give editors more opportunities. I believe everyone has equal rights in deciding what should happen on the site. After observing that there were too many intense conflicts starting to take place I worked hard on thinking about how to create some community guidelines so people stop arguing over minor issues and instead focus on the content of the site. I added a nice quote to my user page about this. You made those community guidelines from that long document I sent in email and you can tell how much I was bothered by conflicts to have written so much on the topic. But when someone maintains that kind of approach it usually means they are done with their activism and want to slow down or take a long break or just stop (which is fine but others shouldn't be held responsible for it in any way). I don't want to debate over this for long but yes if you want to leave that's your wish. Good luck in whatever you do in the future. All of us editors on the site and its thousands of visitors are very thankful to you for the work you've done and you're welcome to come back at any time. --Axius (talk | contribs) 17:00, 31 July 2014 (PDT)

Well, we're obviously going to disagree on this, and I'm sure we could rant at each other all day long about what went wrong here, but I have no desire to do that and I'm sure you don't either. About Klingschor and TheRationalizer; lol come on Ax, be serious :) As far as I'm concerned, those guys are dishonest and part of the bigger problem. Damn privileged westerners who think they know it all. Get one of them to admit that lying is a religious part of Islam that allows Muslims to lie to non-Muslims (just like the authentic Sunni sources prove) and I'll take my words back. Until then.... You know I still have respect for all practicing Muslims. These guys do what they do because they believe what they do is from their god and is the right thing to do. These other guys only prove you don't need to believe in a sky fairy to be full of shite. --Sahab (talk) 17:24, 31 July 2014 (PDT)

Oh, and not that it really matters, but you're definitely wrong about me being done with the criticism of Islam or wanting a break. If it wasn't for the issues we encountered here I feel I could and would have continued indefinitely. Now that I have decided to leave this site, that is what has me thinking about what I'm going to do now. Who knows, I may still end up creating a few wiki article every so often. Oh and another thing; the spam filters wont let me de-tag this page. --Sahab (talk) 17:29, 31 July 2014 (PDT)

They're valuable to me for the parts of criticism where I agree with them (like his blog post on Kawaib) so I dont write them off because of differences in certain areas but ok I understand how people often approach differences. Others likely do the same. It would be a nice one-on-one debate on that lying topic and others. Well take a long break, enjoy yourself or come here, whatever you feel like doing. I fixed the spam issue, had to change something in settings. You could try Wikipedia for a while for your favorite topics and see what happens. When I was there I learned a lot of things and many people inspired me. They have some really good people there. The way that community works and handles disputes is pretty impressive. If you worked there for say 6 months or even a year you would have to work with non-Muslims and Muslims who dont agree with you and there's many more policies with a lot of supervisors and people to watch over you and keep you in check. Its a tough atmosphere. When you come back here you'll think this place is heaven where you have a lot of freedom and you'll really appreciate it and learn to compromise and not spend much time on things that are minor disagreements. Its a good place to get trained in working with others and also see how well (in general) they tolerate beginners or people who arent experienced long-term editors. Crap goes on there too. All in all its a good place to experience. So yea I really think you should do that. That's my advice. I should add this advice to the long policy document I wrote. There's also free wikis, or you can work on Sandboxes here on your articles and move them out to somewhere else if you want. Or take a giant break from all of it (thats a good thing too), its all up to you. Whatever you feel like doing. If you want to get back in here let me know if you want the admin tools back but in that case I would like strict adherence to the community guidelines keeping in mind that disagreements are going to happen all the time. It was stressful for me and I just dont have the energy to tolerate that kind of atmosphere anymore which is good because there's other people here too and everyone is affected. We aren't here to be adversaries and have nothing to gain with disputes or hostilities. We have important common goals. I have apologized in the past or have tried to if I did anything wrong. --Axius (talk | contribs) 18:47, 31 July 2014 (PDT)

It's more than minor disagreements that are the issue here, and some of them have no parallels at Wikipedia. Besides, I already have my own account over at Wikipedia. I don't use it for any Islam-related topics but it's active. I doubt I'll want my admin rights back, but I'll let you know if I change my mind. And thanks for suggesting that I work on articles here if I want. That's very kind of you. It may be helpful working on material and interacting somewhere that is familiar to me. --Sahab (talk) 04:12, 1 August 2014 (PDT)

The articles you work on over there, are they controversial? For example in Islam related articles there's a great different of opinion (obviously) while other topics are pretty calm and its all smooth sailing. Is this a good page name to talk about the editors: WikiIslam: About the Editors, or Meet the Editors, I dont know. --Axius (talk | contribs) 05:52, 1 August 2014 (PDT)

WikiIslam:Meet the Editors sounds the best I think. About the Editors sounds kind of ominous, like you're about to reveal some sort of secret. --Sahab (talk) 07:03, 1 August 2014 (PDT)

Possibilities

So I was thinking about it.

If it wasn't for the issues we encountered here I feel I could and would have continued indefinitely.

If that's the case then I don't want to be in your way. If there's a possibility of you coming back to the site and editing as before then here's something I haven't done before. I'll let you be the decision maker of the site for any issues. You can delete this testimony and.. what else: those footer Menu links that the RU site has on the bottom of their pages. There wasn't really much else content-wise to disagree on. We have always had the same ideas about most of the stuff on the site and I've told you that before. About having any other stuff that's critical of other religions I hadn't decided on that for that certain case (e.g. roots of mountains) and I would have done things in a very subtle way if we ever tried to do something (a small link or a note about that issue, etc). Nothing that would be strong criticism like we do for Islam. You can create a new wikiislam email address and be its recipient for all incoming site mail (not a huge volume of incoming so nothing much to worry about) and replace the email address in the contact page. I'll keep the old address for maintaining account issues. You can make all decisions on the site whatever they are, both for content and for managing users. I can only suggest you to give chances to other editors and be forgiving of their mistakes - or not. I care about that the most but its up to you. If people talk about their experiences off-site we cant control that and once its out there, its hard to control it. That's why I've wanted to be as forgiving as possible so no one has a valid reason to write anything bad about us because then its like a bad review for a business. It can be damaging.

The reasons I want to do this is that I haven't tried this before. I don't see myself contributing any time soon to the wiki like you have and since you have done a lot, you should be able to decide what happens on the site. The growth of the site is more important than seeing who decides what. What do you think? Maybe its already too late but in case here it is. If not then I'll just be in minimum maintenance mode as I have been for a while now and if you're here in any capacity, big or small I'll still let you do what you want to do so there. That's it. --Axius (talk | contribs) 17:07, 2 August 2014 (PDT)

Wow. Could you let me think about it for a few days? I don't mean to sound ungrateful (because I most certainly am very grateful for the offer) but I really don't know what my answer will be. --Sahab (talk) 18:38, 2 August 2014 (PDT)

Yea take your time. --Axius (talk | contribs) 19:29, 2 August 2014 (PDT)

Also wondering what changes you would make in that situation. Imagine I don't exist. That would help thinking about what you would do. For example deleting some of the testimonies you think are fake. I might not agree but you can do it if you want. --Axius (talk | contribs) 05:35, 3 August 2014 (PDT)

At the moment I really doubt I will accept your kind offer. I'm not 100% sure either way yet but there are multiple issues to consider and saying yes would be a very big commitment on my part. I need to get my head sorted and will talk things through with Al-Qaum.

Concerning changes; there wouldn't be many I don't think. For the first 4 years you did give me pretty much free reign on the wiki and it has only been the past year or so that we have been butting heads. We also agree on the majority of things so that helps. Yeah I would be more critical of testimonies and (as I've said in the past) I believe testimonies of leaving Islam should actually be testimonies about leaving Islam, not rants about how much they hate religions (of course a short paragraph of general thoughts is fine but the bulk of it should be exactly what it says on the tin).

I definitely would NOT get rid of those footer Menu links that the RU site has on the bottom of their pages. I don't particularly like them but Claustrum is a very competent individual and I would try to respect the "Sub-domains do their own thing" rule. I agree with that. If I ever overstep the mark over at the RU site it's not because I want to but because it's instinctive for me to press delete when I see pointless rants by Muslim trolls.

I haven't really thought about what I would change. I don't think it's about change, I think it's more about sticking closely to what we already claim to be content-wise (which is what I believe makes us who we are). There would be no attacking each other over belief, race or sexuality. Islam-critical sites are always accused of hatred so we need to set a shining example by showing zero tolerance. This should be shown through unambiguous policies which clearly outline our stance. Free speech is completely irrelevant in the context of a privately owned website, especially when it has contributors outside of the US. What is relevant is the religion of Islam, and also the need for us to make sure we're not tarred with the same "xenophobic right-wingers" brush. Editors should feel safe while they're here and not have to listen to other editors rants. There are plenty of other outlets for them to do that stuff if they wanted to, this place should only be about Islam. So really everything concerning content in our core principles would be followed closely (including tailoring our articles for a universal audience).

I'm not sure what the final page would be, but there definitely wouldn't be an article titled "Western Scientists" (after all, scientists are scientists, and I'm pretty sure there are plenty of great non-Western scientists in Israel, India and so on). And there certainly wouldn't be any machine translated articles on the site :) lol. Yeah, I haven't really thought of much, just what came off the top of my head. --Sahab (talk) 08:35, 3 August 2014 (PDT)

Ok. About the bottom nav boxes, yea I was talking about the EN site. So if anyone said they'd want to get them here on the EN site you would say no as you have said before - thats fine.

Alright so even if you arent here or wont accept the offer I'm just in minimum maintenance mode as I've been for a long time. If there are any decisions to be made I'm going to defer them to you if you are here. [Saggy: please take note and ask Sahab if you have any questions or ideas. I know previously I asked you to go to the forum page and you can do that but you can also directly approach Sahab.]

You can remove vandalism/troll responses on the RU site if you want, do as you wish.

Western Scientists was a temporary name. If that editor (Al Russell) shows up to work on that page and you dont like the work you can delete it and let him know.

Looking back yes this is a change in my approach for the site. Once again I should say why. I've just decided to give control over to the person who has more time for it or cares enough to defend their positions. I'm here its just that I'll just maintain stuff but not anything more. If the unusual happens and we get new editors with the same intensity of interest in the site as you we'll see what to do. A successful organization is open for change and is always evaluating new ideas. For example the development of policies and content on Wikipedia is dependent on who joins that site and takes interest in it.

Also:

"For the first 4 years you did give me pretty much free reign on the wiki and it has only been the past year or so that we have been butting heads. We also agree on the majority of things so that helps."

Yes we do agree on most things. You wont find any place in the world where you get your way 100% of the time whether its an online workspace like Wikipedia or a real-life situation like an office. As I see it if a small number of disagreements cause someone to leave the scene there's probably some other reason as to why they would leave, something else is going on; perhaps they've become busy or their priorities have changed and they needed to get to a tipping point to make that change actually happen. At that point there's a need to step back and look at the situation objectively wait till things have calmed down a little. Maybe thats happened while you were away. One can see the big picture and see that minor disagreements dont really matter. People should be open to compromise and tolerate differences of opinions. As for content quality I've always agreed that we shouldn't compromise on that. While you were away you can see how I tried to defend the quality of Scientific errors in the Quran by not allowing new errors entered unless the previous ones were fixed. I don't like banning someone outright and I like allowing people to work in their sandboxes (we do that for every thing that has not been finalized yet). Any way you're free to do what you want, leaving or staying in whatever capacity you want. If you do stay please don't stop others from contributing in their sandboxes. They are not indexed by search engines, so they dont get any traffic and if needed we can put headers on top of all sandboxes pages telling people these pages are not part of the Core content and are not meant to be viewed by the public. --Axius (talk | contribs) 11:48, 3 August 2014 (PDT)

"At the moment I really doubt I will accept your kind offer." - Ok in that case I take back the offer which means, any disputes will be resolved with everyone else's feedback involved and not just what one person says. --Axius (talk | contribs) 16:56, 4 August 2014 (PDT)

Cool. I'm just glad we managed to part on good terms. You say that contributions whether big or small are welcome from me, so (if you don't mind) I'll still pop in from time-to-time and give you a hand with finalizing stuff, copy-editing and my "no obligation" input/thoughts on good/bad ideas (at least this way you'll have a few different perspectives to consider and decide on either way). And of course if you need help on something or there is an emergency (I'm not sure what but you never know) I'm more than happy to do my best to help when I can. --Sahab (talk) 22:04, 4 August 2014 (PDT)

Yea that's great if you can still help out and also give your thoughts on various stuff. --Axius (talk | contribs) 02:29, 5 August 2014 (PDT)

List of works

User:Sahab/Lists_of_Works - you can clean it up in Word using these steps:

• Replace "^p^phttp://wikiislam.net/wiki/" by "]]^p* [["

• Then replace _ by space

• %27 by '

• Fix entries at end of each list and any other header text that is not in lists.

Other possibilities:

• Sort lists ascending (copy paste each list in Excel and sort), some entries may have to be fixed.
• Write texts of how you structured the site using hub pages and inserted and maintained hub links for almost every page on the site and how that was used in the Site map which is a very important way of browsing the site and also tells people of the breadth of the knowledge present in the site.
• Using multi-level lists for example
• Farsideology
  • Aisha (Farsideology)
  • Allah (Farsideology)

Also just wondering. Is this for yourself or for a reference of some kind for being evaluated by someone for example? You dont have to tell anything. --Axius (talk | contribs) 18:14, 3 August 2014 (PDT)

Thanks Ax! I was thinking "I'm sure Axius would know a quicker way to get this done", but was gonna do all that manually. It's for both. --Sahab (talk) 07:27, 4 August 2014 (PDT)

Ok. Thats what it looked like to me. If you want an email (mentioning your work here) sent to someone from the wikiislam address I can do that (after you approve it). I dont have any problems with that. --Axius (talk | contribs) 09:51, 4 August 2014 (PDT)

Thanks Ax. I don't need that ATM but will be sure to ask if I do. --Sahab (talk) 22:06, 4 August 2014 (PDT)

Meet the editors

Wow you did your magic. The page looks great (WikiIslam:Sandbox/WikiIslam:Meet_the_Editors). I wish there was a "Sahabify" button. I will try to fix it further. I feel this is a very important page and will make people connect to the site on a personal level (the "who" question is one of the first a visitor asks when they visit a site and they're interested in it). Lets see what else. --Axius (talk | contribs) 18:20, 6 August 2014 (PDT)

Thanks Ax :) Yeah, I'll keep working on it too. I particularly like how the description of Farside turned out :D I think visitors will definitely be left with a positive impression of WikiIslam editors as a whole. It's kind of unique also because it highlights just how different we all are. Most sites do not have this sort of diversity when it comes to its members. That's pretty cool. --Sahab (talk) 02:27, 7 August 2014 (PDT)

I agree. I liked that too, 'prophet Farside'. --Axius (talk | contribs) 02:39, 7 August 2014 (PDT)

Images

Hello, I stumbled accross this site on the Images of Jihad (Indonesia) and Images of Jihad (Indonesia): Killings, Various Dates articles, and there are several pictures which are mislabelled and have nothing to do with religious violence.

Chinese didn't actually get killed in the streets on May 1998. What happened was Indonesian looters attacked Chinese shops and tried stealing from them, but accidently started a fire and burned themselves to death instead. And then after that, dozens of rapes were reported against the Chinese. Most violence against Chinese was not killing, but attempted looting and raping. [2] [3] [4] And thats no whitewashing of what happened, since rape is a very repulsive act.

The images of people getting killed on the streets and beheaded are from other incidents, like Dayaks vs Madurese in Kalimantan, in Sampit, Sambas, and Indonesians going on a witch hunt in Banyuwangi.

Dayaks (non-Muslims) and Malays (Muslims) both participated in killing Madurese (Muslims). It was not religious, but ethnic hatred. [5]

The images labeled as "Chinese" victims, are actually Madurese getting killed by Dayaks, or suspected "witches" getting killed in Banyuwangi. The people in those photos are all non-Chinese.

The original sources can be seen here- [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11]

You can see that the Banyuwangi riots were not related to Muslims vs non-Muslims. [12]

There IS real religious violence in Indonesia, like the images of the girl beheaded by Islamists in Sulawesi, but these other images are incorrect.

These are the specific images which should be removed- [13] [14] [15] [16] [17] [18] [19] [20] [21] [22] [23] [24] [25] [26] [27]

Its because some idiots on internet forums in China heard what was going on in Indonesia in May 1998 with looting of Chinese stores and rapes, so when they looked up "Indonesia riots" on the internet, they got the wrong photos, and pasted these photos all over their forums. This is how these photos originally got mislabelled.

In Myanmar, some Islamists falsely took photos of Tsunami victims, earthquake victims in China, and of Tibetan protestors setting themselves on fire, and labelled them as Rohingya Muslims getting killed by Burmese Buddhists. [28] [29] [30] [31] [32] [33]

What happened here is not deliberate like what those Islamists did, but it still needs to be corrected. In fact you can create an article about fake images used by Islamists in the Rohingya conflict instead. Cleft (talk) 23:22, 10 August 2014 (PDT)

Cool. Thanks for that info. I will read through those links you provided and sort them out soon when I get time. --Sahab (talk) 01:04, 11 August 2014 (PDT)

Thanks again for bringing this issue to my attention. It has now been sorted. --Sahab (talk) 14:30, 20 August 2014 (PDT)

You have some time?

Axius is gone for days. Do you have the time to review one or two additions per day? Then I will make them at that rate. Also I have many hadiths on angels. eg, giant angels, carriers of the throne. Is is best fit for QHS cosmology or a new QHS? Saggy (talk) 05:42, 7 September 2014 (PDT)

Saggy, I'm sorry, I don't. It's probably best to stick with sandboxes (that goes for your angel query too), as Axius advised. I'm only helping out as a transitional courtesy here and will soon be winding down my own editing further. --Sahab (talk) 00:47, 8 September 2014 (PDT)

Page for Editing Permissions

I was thinking of renaming "http://wikiislam.net/wiki/WikiIslam:Pending_Changes_Protection" to 'Editing Permissions' or something (Editing Rights, Editing privileges) so it can be more broad and we can talk about protection of pages in more situations (vandalism or new editors or those who have been told not to edit the main space). I'll think about it and maybe make a page in Sandbox.

Also I feel editors who have been told not to edit main space should not be listed on the Editors [34] page. I'm guessing you'd agree with that. That would only mean removing Saggy (which I had added myself). I feel we want to represent editors who display at least a minimum level of good judgement. That would mean that if they've been asked not to edit main space, that doesnt show good judgement and we dont want people to see them and think they are examples of good editors. Nothing bad on them of course. If they improve their work in Sandboxes they can always be considered regular editors when they are allowed back on main space (slim chance of that happening but we want to be open to that possibility otherwise we might appear to be unkind). I've included this note as a comment on that page. --Axius (talk | contribs) 09:55, 22 September 2014 (PDT)

Yeah, I agree about the "Meet the Editors" page. I'll do that now. Concerning a "Editing Permissions" page, the idea is good, but I don't think the "Pending Changes Protection" page needs to be renamed for it. Rather, the "Editing Permissions" page could be its own separate page that links out from the "Pending Changes Protection" page (probably could add an inline link from this section]). The subject of both pages is pretty distinct and so will be the pages linking to them. The new "Editing Permissions" page could include content from this section of the help page. Maybe it shouldn't be called "Editing Permissions" but some other name that makes it clear that it is the first port of call for new editors? --Sahab (talk) 11:17, 22 September 2014 (PDT)

Yea I guess it would be better to have a new page on it. I cant think of any other name other than Editing permissions. Hmmmmm. How about these titles from Wikipedia:

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:User_access_levels
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Editing_restrictions
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Editorial_oversight_and_control
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Quality_control

--Axius (talk | contribs) 17:55, 22 September 2014 (PDT)

Actually, after reading this section of the help page again, isn't that what you basically want to put on this new page? In that case, what about, "WikiIslam:Note to New Users," or "WikiIslam:Message to New Users"? That page could then also mention and link to the Required Reading list. --Sahab (talk) 20:36, 22 September 2014 (PDT)

Ok I'll try to expand that section on the Help page first and see how it looks and then maybe move it to a new page. Maybe I just need to add a few lines. --Axius (talk | contribs) 03:48, 23 September 2014 (PDT)

No need. I've created that page for you :) That what quicker to complete than I expected. I've now linked it from other pages etc. Let me know what you think. --Sahab (talk) 09:39, 24 September 2014 (PDT)

Thats great. I think its a good idea to have a page just for new editors so they're more likely to read it and take this stuff more seriously. I linked it on MediaWiki:Welcomecreation. --Axius (talk | contribs) 17:13, 25 September 2014 (PDT)

Thanks for fixing the Account Creation page. The policies group looks good drawing more attention to it. All of the recent changes should help quality control. And Sandbox pages look good too. I'll see if there's an easy way to auto populate sandbox pages with that template. --Axius (talk | contribs) 03:34, 26 September 2014 (PDT)

No probs. --Sahab (talk) 07:49, 26 September 2014 (PDT)

Honorable mentions section on pages

How about linking Tarek Fateh's tweet on the What people say page (only because he's well known) and maybe a mention of this on the About page [35]? Throwing out some ideas.

Here's another idea. What about a section called "Honorable Mentions" at the bottom of a page if it was linked in such a way? People would love to know that and I know that would make them look at the page a second time and have greater respect for it. This will definitely encourage people to make more permanent (like a link on their website or blog) and temporary links (such as a post on a forum) to that page. This will also encourage other famous people to make such mentions (its a snowball effect).

I've also thought of having some kind of notes at the bottom of a page if for example a former Muslim mentions it saying that he was influenced by that page. This kind of information is interesting to readers. We know that there arent too many such pages. Maybe we can start tracking these kinds of things somewhere and when there's a lot we can do something about it (like how we did with the "What people say" page). Or a "Page Facts" / "About this page" / "Trivia" / "Page Trivia" section at the bottom (it could be a right-aligned box too so its less instrusive) where we can mention interesting tidbits like this about a page. For example the Page Trivia could have "1. Famous person X linked to this page. 2. Former Muslim Y was influnced by this page and mentioned it in their testimony. 3. This page was ... [XYZ] (something else interesting about this page)."

Definitely food for thought later on, if not now. Anyway whatever you think. --Axius (talk | contribs) 18:05, 6 November 2014 (PST)

Tarek Fatah is a critic of Islam. Everything he is known for, his activism, books, talks, and so on, is geared towards this. He has also been labelled an "Islamophobe" and has been likened to Robert Spencer. In some ways, he's probably more hated by Muslims than Robert, Ali, etc., because he self-identifies as a Muslim. So I don't think his tweet should be added to either page.

About the trivia section at the bottom of pages, I'm against the idea as a whole (even before thinking of what those trivia sections will consist of). I think the idea, if implemented, would look odd. Some people may find it interesting, but it definitely wouldn't be professional or scholarly. And it's unnecessary clutter to pages that are already cluttered due to our (good) practice of referencing and heavily footnoting everything, using right aligned templates to link back to Core articles, etc. Wikipedia seems to agree; they limit back links and mentions in non-linkable media (scholarly journals, etc) to a box on the talk page of articles (e.g. see the page on Robert Spencer). Considering that Wikipedia uses some very unprofessional gimmicks (such as sometimes repeating key quotes in a larger font in a right aligned box), that's saying something. Think of broadsheets versus tabloids. We have the image of a broadsheet. That's what separates us from other similar sites. Resembling a tabloid may make it more interesting, but it drags the image of the site into the gutter.

When we actually consider the potential content of these trivia sections, I don't think their effect would be at all positive. This site is different to most sites critical of Islam because it appeals even to those who are neutral towards Islam, even some orthodox Muslims use it as a resources for chronology of the Qur'an, fake hadith list etc. (think back about four years and you'll remember telling me this was your ultimate aim; to one day go around the wiki and remove all opinions, right-wing nonsense, etc. and thankfully I think that has been achieved). Of course, there's still a long way to go, and many more "neutrals" and Muslims that need to be attracted to the site (critics will already use the site, so trying to attract them is like singing to the choir i.e. pretty pointless). So:

1. "Famous person X linked to this page."

These "famous people" will almost certainly be critics of Islam. It's great that they use this site. That's what it's here for, for people to use. But celebrating this fact is counter-productive. Most of them come with unwanted baggage, such as discriminatory views on immigration, unwavering support for a certain nation over the other (regardless of their individual actions), and so on. What they believe shouldn't affect how people treat what they say about Islam, but in the real world it does. And if the wiki celebrates their use of the site, it unloads all of their unwanted baggage onto it. If a neutral or Muslim reads that at the bottom of the page (or even on the talk page) the instant reaction would be, "Tarek Fatah/Pat Condell/whoever likes this page? Then it's Islamophobic rubbish. Goodbye." It will even effect those who link to us in forum posts, because when forummers visit the link to see his/her side of the argument, they will too most likely dismiss it just as easily.

2. "Former Muslim Y was influenced by this page and mentioned it in their testimony"

This will probably have the same effect as reading number 1. In addition to that, it reflects badly on the site and makes it look too agenda driven. The point is, this site is here to educate and provide facts. Nothing more and nothing less. This (proper facts etc.) will obviously cause quite a few Muslims to leave Islam, but it should remain just that; a side-effect of eduction and proper facts. The site mission now is to "provide an accurate and comprehensive resource on Islam," not to "provide facts in order to help Muslims leave Islam" (as I believe it once was many years ago). Retaining such attitudes will result in a regression of the site's status, rather than an evolution of it. A site that still thinks of itself as a place to "provide facts in order to help Muslims leave Islam" will never be taken seriously by anyone other than the choir. --Sahab (talk) 01:39, 7 November 2014 (PST)

Ok thats fine. Well at least it was advertised to 51K followers so there's that. --Axius (talk | contribs) 09:52, 7 November 2014 (PST)

Translation of QHS:Corruption of Previous Scriptures

Damaskin (talk | contribs) sent an email saying he only wants to translate Qur'an,_Hadith_and_Scholars:Corruption_of_Previous_Scriptures and not the whole series and I told thats most likely OK but I wanted to confirm with you. --Axius (talk | contribs) 17:54, 10 November 2014 (PST)

Oh yeah, that's cool. The QHS section is not like a series written by one person, so most of these QHS pages can definitely stand on their own. --Sahab (talk) 13:01, 12 November 2014 (PST)

Cool I'll let him know. --Axius (talk | contribs) 13:15, 13 November 2014 (PST)

Correspondence with visitors

This is totally up to you. You're probably already busy but if you want, I can forward you any interesting inquiries we get and we can publish them and their response online for people to read. It should result in more traffic (people will love to read those emails) and more emails as well (which could be a problem too). You can respond in any way you like. I could forward only a few or all the ones. I had talked about this before but I couldn't find any security settings that would help two people check the same account easily without any issues.

We could also have another email address which you can make and we can have people writing to that address for inquiries. --Axius (talk | contribs) 16:59, 11 November 2014 (PST)

Hi Ax. What sorts of emails are they usually? I don't have too much time, but if you forwarded them to me I would try to answer the serious/important ones if you would like. I'm guessing you get a lot of trolling-type emails calling the site "Islamophobic". I think these can mostly be ignored, unless they include misconceptions that you and I can try to dispel. Email me if you want and we can discuss this more freely. --Sahab (talk) 13:20, 12 November 2014 (PST)

Yea half of them are 'hate' mails that happen max of around once a month and even less. The frequency of all mails combined isnt too much since we dont make it easy for people to get that page (about, scroll down and hunt for the Contact link; as opposed to a straight 'contact us' link on every page which many sites have and that would make it easier for them). That was by design so we only get contacted on that address by people who really want to do so. Ok I'll forward you a few and continue this there. --Axius (talk | contribs) 13:26, 13 November 2014 (PST)

Changing Essays

The Rising Star of Incompetent Muslim Science would look better and the site would also give a better impression if the title was changed to something more nuetral and the language was modified. Do our current policies say essays should not be changed? I'm thinking they could be changed if the material can be edited to more closely follow the Style guidelines. And then the author can still keep their name in the article. Happy holidays. --Axius (talk | contribs) 17:21, 24 December 2014 (PST)

Hi Ax. Thanks. I had a very Merry Christmas. Hope you did too. Yeah, I don't see a problem with administrators copy-editing essays for the sake of style. WikiIslam's essays policy ATM says, "If needed, essays/op-eds may be edited for relevance, clarity and language issues." So it would fit in with that, and it's hardly the same as another editor coming along and trying to alter the message/subject/focus of the essay (i.e. Sunshine). --Sahab (talk) 18:10, 27 December 2014 (PST)

I've moved that page and all associated links to "Qur’an and Modern Science: Conflict or Conciliation?", so at least the first issue is sorted. --Sahab (talk) 18:27, 27 December 2014 (PST)

Better than before, thanks. --Axius (talk | contribs) 18:22, 28 December 2014 (PST)

Spanish Template

Thanks for your message :)! I promise to complete the other pending articles on this week. Here goes:

Aelu (talk) 18:52, 10 January 2015 (PST)

Thanks a lot. I'm now going to add Spanish to the sidebar on the left. --Sahab (talk) 02:13, 11 January 2015 (PST)

Translations of textimonies

[36] For example. We can have a template note at the top of each testimony saying:

This is a translation of the original [[link|English testimony]].

Link can go to the English page. The English one can have a note at the bottom saying

This testimony has been translated into [[link|Afrikaans]].

That will be easier than putting it in the Infobox. --Axius (talk | contribs) 01:25, 12 January 2015 (PST)

Cool. I've made two templates now ([37][38]). We'll need to get the first one translated into Afrikaans. About the second (English) one; could you please add that as an optional parameter to template:apostate-top like you have with the source= thing? It would look much better without it being separated by that giant gap (the gap is in the original one obviously to provide a little space between the "legal" or "informational" stuff and the actual content). --Sahab (talk) 02:23, 12 January 2015 (PST)

Done: Template:Apostate-top and Template:Apostate-top-afrikaans. --Axius (talk | contribs) 07:30, 12 January 2015 (PST)

Awesome! Thanks, Ax! --Sahab (talk) 11:42, 12 January 2015 (PST)

Additional translation links for Russian articles

Looking back I think I didnt have the best idea to keep Russian articles linked different by saying "for other languages see the links on the left". It would have been better to keep them all in the same place (unified) at the bottom of the page like we say it for other languages. Oops. Oh well. If you agree maybe that can be fixed one day for all the translations. --Axius (talk | contribs) 17:51, 7 February 2015 (PST)

Yeah, I definitely agree. We should look to fixing that in the future. --Sahab (talk) 02:59, 10 February 2015 (PST)

Ok. I'll add it to the tasks list. --Axius (talk | contribs) 10:03, 10 February 2015 (PST)

Translation steps

I wonder if this section can be moved to the top or bottom [39] and expanded to be a good checklist of the stuff that needs to be done (taking stuff from what that page says but in shortened bullet form). This way the translators themselves can follow that checklist and make all the changes. There can be sub-bullets too like 1.1 or 1.a, 1.b.. or just bullets under an existing bullet (* and then ** will make it a sub-bullet). --Axius (talk | contribs) 10:12, 10 February 2015 (PST)

I think the way the page is set up right now is good because it covers pretty much everything, and it does it in the right order, and even splits it up into bite-sized stages. So if translators actually read the page, they couldn't go wrong. However they'd have to actually read the thing in the first place. So yeah, maybe a "Summary" section at the top of that page (or maybe even putting it back here?) would encourage that. I dunno. Maybe it will discourage new translators from ever reading the indepth part? Anyways, I'll try to write something up soon when I get time and we can see what it looks like. --Sahab (talk) 17:44, 10 February 2015 (PST)

Cool. Either place would be good. --Axius (talk | contribs) 18:17, 10 February 2015 (PST)

Shia hadith

I dono if we discussed this before. But if i want to add Shia Hadith, where is the right place? Saggy (talk) 23:16, 14 February 2015 (PST)

Hi Saggy. No we haven't discussed this before. And I don't think anyone has ever suggested/tried adding Shi'ite hadith to any pages before. I don't know how we would approach that. One thing we can't do is add Shi'ite hadith to pages with Sunni hadith or even to pages that discuss mainstream (i.e. Sunni) Islam. Doing so would undermine the credibility of those pages (they will be dismissed out-of-hand by Muslims with something like "LOL they use Shia hadith. Shia aint Muslim XD".). Shi'ite's are a minority so criticism of their religion is not really that high on the importance factor, but if it was done, it would probably be best confined to their own dedicated pages (they could then be linked from the Shi'ites hub page). --Sahab (talk) 03:13, 15 February 2015 (PST)

Highlight in RC for unchecked edits

I want to remove the Yellow and bold that comes for the unchecked edits. I think its too strong/annoying. http://wikiislam.net/wiki/Special:RecentChanges . What do you think? We could just have it in normal text.

The yellow/bold creates some kind of pressure as if its urgent and has to be done right now which is not the case. So yea I think I'll remove that. --Axius (talk | contribs) 05:05, 14 March 2015 (PDT)

Yeah, totally agree. --Sahab (talk) 15:11, 14 March 2015 (PDT)

Ok great. I got rid of it. It just looks like normal text now. -> http://wikiislam.net/wiki/Special:RecentChanges --Axius (talk | contribs) 15:27, 14 March 2015 (PDT)

Awesome. Looks much better. --Sahab (talk) 15:29, 14 March 2015 (PDT)

There's two commas in this one (after Daniel pipes):

I added the bold back but not the color so atleast there's some difference between review text and other stuff but not too strong. --Axius (talk | contribs) 16:09, 22 March 2015 (PDT)

Istinja' with the Torah and New Testament - Daniel Pipes, , Sep 21, 2010 (archived), http://www.danielpipes.org/blog/2010/09/defecation-torah-new-testament 

And one comma in this one (after the name) that doesnt have a date in it:

Istinja' with the Torah and New Testament - Daniel Pipes, (archived), http://www.danielpipes.org/blog/2010/09/defecation-torah-new-testament 

There's probably more bugs in it that I dont know of. There I put the name in the 'link desc', just to make it work but it should really be in the Author field. Hopefully I'll fix it some day. --Axius (talk | contribs) 16:43, 14 March 2015 (PDT)

Oh okay. Actually, I think the fact that you can put miscellaneous text in the desc field makes this template perfectly usable. Because if an "author" name is ever needed in an external link, then by default the editor who adds that link should also be providing us with the article's publisher and publication date. When those three fields are filled, the template works as intended. It's like with our citeweb template. Just because it can be used with a single field filled, does not mean that it is allowed on WikiIslam. As stated on WikiIslam:Citing Sources, the minimum parameters that should be used are: url= | title= | author= | publisher= | date= | archiveurl= | deadurl=no/yes. I will edit the instructions on that template to let editors know. --Sahab (talk) 16:59, 14 March 2015 (PDT)

Yea sure it can be used if those fields are filled out. --Axius (talk | contribs) 07:58, 15 March 2015 (PDT)

Translations completed

Spanish translations of If Anyone Slew a Person (Qur'an 5:32) and Fake Anti-Muslim Hate Crimes and Other Lies* are finished and ready to be checked.
*I don't know how to translate the names of the country template. Aelu (talk) 09:29, 21 March 2015 (PDT)

Hi Aelu. That's great. I'll check those pages as soon as I can. No need to worry about the names in the country templates. I'll do that myself (if you like, you can check the Diffs to see what I did). --Sahab (talk) 23:14, 22 March 2015 (PDT)

Thank you so much for your help, specially for translating the countries. Aelu (talk) 07:10, 27 March 2015 (PDT)

You're welcome! --Sahab (talk) 11:03, 27 March 2015 (PDT)

New spanish translations of Misinterpreted Qur'anic Verses and Pedophilia in the Qur'an are ready to be checked. Aelu (talk) 19:05, 8 May 2015 (PDT)

Sunnah.com

What do you think about the reliability of sunnah.com? I havent looked into it. Their About page doesnt say much about who is behind the site etc. Its still a nice site though. --Axius (talk | contribs) 17:59, 22 April 2015 (PDT)

I've never had a problem with it, but some people say they soften translations don't they? They even say on the About page that the text has gone through two stages of "cleaning". They mention one stage is correcting typos, but they leave you hanging on what that second stage is. However, it's an Islamic site so anything we use from there won't be accused of being "fake". So I think it's okay as a backup or when nothing better is available. We already use it for the hadith collections that are not on USC-MSA. Our FAQ says "The English translations of Al Tirmidhi, Al Nasa'i, and Ibn Majah are all taken from Sunnah.com." Obviously I archived every single page for each of those hadith collections and our templates link to these archives (this way they cannot delete or alter hadiths). It's come in quite handy for me actually. The set of Ibn Majah hadith they copy/pasted include the hadiths grading and I used it to debunk an apologetic argument against Muhammad's pedophilia and simultaneously pointed out how those who use this argument are knowingly propagating false information. --Sahab (talk) 03:37, 23 April 2015 (PDT)

Ok. Yea "So I think it's okay as a backup or when nothing better is available." - I agree too. I will try to make an archive anytime I use it. That's pretty good information in that Aisha link, all referenced etc. --Axius (talk | contribs) 18:40, 26 April 2015 (PDT)

Sandbox article on extremist violence

I have a feeling you might not like [40] but we can just use the references for the attacks and use them somewhere else. I think the term Rape Jihad should not be used or given much attention to so I changed the title. In any case its just a sandbox article and it has disclaimers at the top and its text can be used later for anything. --Axius (talk | contribs) 05:49, 19 May 2015 (PDT)

BG sub domain

You havent visited for a while! I hope everything is fine. Damaskin has been working hard to make the BG WikiIslam sub-domain after Claustrum set it up. He said its ready to be linked so I made the various changes. --Axius (talk | contribs) 17:36, 28 June 2015 (PDT)

Translation of pagan origins of Islam

Hi, I translate the article "Pagan Origins of Islam" here in my sandbox : http://wikiislam.net/wiki/User:Maxime/Sandbox_1, if you can tell me if the article is good or to correct, thanks. --Maxime (talk) 02:57, 20 September 2015 (PDT)

If Anyone Slew a Person (Qur'an 5:32)

Is this page [41] good enough to be added to the WikiIslam:Translations#Articles_to_Translate list? It seems like its a popular page that people are looking for when there's a terrorist attack. --Axius (talk | contribs) 11:07, 14 November 2015 (PST)

Contribute please

I have moved this article from wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=List_of_expeditions_of_Muhammad&oldid=782817488 to here (in case wiki deletes/censors it) https://wikiislam.net/wiki/List_of_expeditions_of_Muhammad

Please contribute it and kindly help make it compatible with wikiislams wikicode--Bench (talk) 13:05, 14 February 2019 (UTC)