Talk:Dubai/Archive 2

message: Laborers come to Dubai for the same reason they come to the US from Mexico. This section is biased and makes it sound much worse than it actually is.
I also note that someone cannot edit Wikipedia from Dubai, as the proxy IP address used by the national ISP has been blocked from posting. Imagine if Americans were unable to edit the entry on United States.
Not quite correct. Most internet users in the UAE are supposed to go through Etisalat's (the ISP) proxy server which has a dynamic IP assigning system. Some wikipedians block IPs from editing - User:Khoikhoi, "User:Can't sleep, clown will eat me", and User:Naconkantari are three that seem to do this habitualy eg I tried twice to edit this page and IP changed while editing to one that Naconkantari had blocked, hence I signed in. A PITA.
signature 20:20, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  NPOV dispute Human Rights section 

message: The Good article nomination for  has failed
:Short lead section
 Anonymous_anonymous_Have a Nice Day 14:46, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Wikipedia:Good articles|Good Article]] [[Wikipedia:Good articles/Nominations|nomination]] has failed 

message: Flag is confusing, looks like it is just a red box. Should a black outline be added, perhaps? Damiancorrigan 19:29, 9 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Grey outline added. --LambiamTalk 08:50, 24 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Didn't see the outline was, it removed? (132.20.251.4 06:26, 18 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Flag

message: More is needed on this. This is as much a note to myself as to anyone else, as I'll do it at a later date if no one else will. I don't have time now. Damiancorrigan 19:34, 9 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Motor racing

message: This article failed to become a GA due to existence of unsourced statements. Cheung1303 02:49, 22 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Failed GA

message: The end of Physical Geography tries to explain street numbering, but I was confused: "even numbered streets run perpendicular to the coast and increase in number as one goes inland." What is increasing, the house numbers? The street numbers of streets perpendicular to the ocean would increase away from the creek, not the coast. ChrisEich 00:16, 26 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Street numbering 

message: Greetings,
I have made an Asian repository of images, similar to the one that exists for Europe. Please complete the part pertaining to this country as you see fit, preferably similar to those of France, Britain et al:
Wikipedia:List of images/Places/Asia
Thanx.--Zereshk 14:56, 23 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Repository of images

message: According the the CIA website (cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/ae.html), the UAE's oil and gas account for 30% of its GDP, yet here it says 6%.  So what's the real deal?
:The UAE includes more than just Dubai, whose oil and gas revenues are much smaller than that of Abu Dhabi.  Both figures are correct. siafu 15:25, 9 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Economy 

message: Is the following statement that all Jews are strictly banned from entering Dubai accurate?
"If one accepts the commonplaces of the debate on world cultures, Dubai is an impossible city. On the one hand, it's more cosmopolitan than eastern Germany and southern Italy, more tolerant than Poland or Louisiana, and consumers spend more here than in Munich or Madrid. But on the other hand it's a dictatorship, almost a rogue state, a desert regime without a parliament or a political opposition, without trade unions, political parties or associations. All books and newspapers are subject to censorship. Sharia law is observed, including corporal punishment, and all Jews are strictly banned from entering the country."
From Der Spiegel online edition http://service.spiegel.de/cache/international/spiegel/0,1518,druck-437017,00.html
:: I don't think this is accurate — many American Jews have previously visited Dubai.  However, the UAE, like almost all Middle-Eastern countries does not recognize the state of Israel.  AreJay 21:05, 20 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Jews entering Dubai 

message: how safe is dubai for americans? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 86.130.187.53 (talk • contribs) .
:Like most of the Middle East, it is very safe for Americans - there have not been any issues at all concerning foreigners in Dubai. --Amjra 09:09, 7 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  safety 

message: Jerusalem is not the Palestine capital.
:I guess that's good, because it doesn't say it is any sort of capital in the article.  The only point to be made about twinning is that the Jerusalem that Dubai considers itself twin to is not Israeli (a state that Dubai, along with most other Arab states, does not believe to be legitimate) but Palestinian. siafu 12:39, 18 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes and Jerusalam is not one of the citys in the Plastine authority. And I don't think that what Dobi thinks or not about Israel make any diffrence about it :).--87.69.100.4 16:59, 18 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  BTW using another name for Jerusalem (e.g. al-Quds) is not acceptable. plz change it to Gaza or Palestine authority.
--87.69.100.4 17:04, 18 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: You lost me.  "Al-Quds" is the Arabic name for Jerusalem, why is it not acceptable?  Jerusalem != PLA or Gaza, so why would we want to change it to that?  As for the first point, it absolutely does matter; "Dubai maintains cultural, economic and educational ties with:" CANNOT apply to any place in Israel as that would be a blatant falsehood.  Dubai does, however, maintain ties with Palestine and Palestinians living in Jerusalem specifically. siafu 19:01, 18 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Because: Jerusalem, Yaroshalim (ירושלים) , al-Quds or any other name, is the name of the same place (Jerusalem in English). None of this cities belong or at the authority of Palestine. If Dubai want to help Jerusalem then fine write Jerusalem Israel, if Dubai want to help Palestine even better ( god know they need all the help they can get) but don't include cities witch r not at their authority. Thank u for your time. If the Dubai can't ties with Israel then I guess they can't tie with Jerusalem becuse is Israeli place.--87.69.100.4 20:49, 18 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Ah, if only it were so simple.  Of course, you keep changing it to say "Palestine, Palestine" which is worse than any other option because "Palestine" is not a city, and a fortiori not a twin town.  It's not just Dubai that sees things this way; if you look at List of twin towns and sister cities under Palestine, you will see: "Al-Quds – New York City, New York (USA) (1993), Toledo, Spain".  In an effort to defuse this, I've been looking through the Dubai government portal and other FAQ websites to try and find the source of the claim that Jerusalem and Dubai are twin towns at all, and I haven't found anything.  Even more disturbing is that I haven't been able to find a source for any twinning with Dubai at all except for Detroit, Michigan , so this whole issue may well be moot. siafu 14:21, 19 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  If u can't find then erase it, because Jerusalem is not a city of Palestine and if Dubai don't see it as her twin city then here is another rezone whey u should remove it from the list... I really don't understand the problem here... and don't forget its WIKIPEDIA    u should write here only facts. In the mean time Jerusalem is not Palestine city so work it out or remove it. (sorry for my bad English) and thenks for your time.--87.69.100.4 15:29, 19 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Being the only one who has even attempted fact-checking in this discussion, I think the lecture on facts is rather misplaced. siafu 15:45, 19 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Check your facts again. I live in Jerusalem and as far as I can c it's not part of Palestine. More then that, I will quote u - "try and find the source of the claim that Jerusalem and Dubai are twin towns at all, and I haven't found anything." if u can't find justifications, then don't write those things! And if u find Jerusalem (or "Al-Quds" or whatever name u come up with for Jerusalem) then write Israel. Again, Palestine has many cities but NONE of them is Jerusalem. This is not a political debate it's just a simple fact. If Dubai have a problem with Israel, let her solve it.--87.69.100.4 22:47, 19 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Your English skills are apparently insufficient for this discussion. siafu 23:40, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

text: Jerusalem is a DE FACTO Israeli city, and the only reason that the annexation of Jerusalem was never recognized was because the countries out there needed Arab oil. Were it not for the oil, the international community would be stampeding over to Jerusalem to put up embassies, instead of having to ferry diplomats to the Knesset from Tel-Aviv. 204.52.215.107 19:06, 30 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Jerusalem

message: Under the Air subsection of the Transporation section, they note that Emirates has ordered "46 of the new Boeing 777".  Considering the 777 has been around since 1994 and I know Wikipedia didn't exist back then, it can't be that it just wasn't updated in 12 years (sarcasm).  I'm curious if that's meant to be the Boeing 787, which is the new aircraft.  --MPD01605 (T / C) 04:58, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Air 

message: This section mentions "Dubai is also home to some 100,000 British and other western expatriates." There  is some disagreement on this figure.  The British embassy puts the total of British Exapts in the UAE at 120,000.    The UAE census (http://www.zu.ac.ae/library/html/UAEInfo/documents/CensusResults2005.pdf) puts the Dubai population at 1,200,309, meaning Western expats make up approx 10% of the population which I believe cannot be correct.  Other sources (http://www.mydsf.com/dsf/eng/dsf_people.asp) put this percentage at 4%.  Does anyone have a citation to confirm the breakdown of the Dubai population by nationality.  Thx Iwallace 13:00, 2 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Don't equate "western expat" with "british expat". There might be 100,000 british expats in Dubai, but there's many thousands expats of other european nationalities, making this 10% a low estimate!
New information on this subject but still no citation on this subject to confirm the number in this article. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/6161705.stm.Iwallace 09:28, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

text: I think you may be looking at this wrong.  If the British Embassy puts the population of British nationals in the UAE at 120,000 then we're talking about British nationals in Dubai, Abu Dhabi and other emirates.  UAE's population should add up to more than 3-4 million, which means British nationals consitute about 5% of the population, which seems plausible. AreJay 20:39, 29 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Demographics:  Expat Population 

message: I am being offered a job in Dubai.  What is the local (Ex-Pat) cost of living for a 30-plus American Female?  Compared to, say New York City or London??  Also. are there any restrictions on single females in Ex-pat-Land and in Old Dubai? 216.164.192.157 21:14, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Cost of Living?? 

message: The last paragraph under "Human rights and labour" is confusing and seems out of place. I think it should be deleted or rewritten to fit the heading and for clarity. 216.83.24.242 12:06, 20 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Confusing Paragraph 

message: I would like to add a link to a web site that has high quality independent reports on four and five star hotels in dubai. The site is not a booking engine but provides high quality independent information based on physical inspections and has many independent photo's. For any person wanting to find out more about dubai hotels this as the richest source on the web and therefore a useful addition to Wikipedia.
The url is:
 http://www.cranley.com/hotels/Middle-East/United-Arab-Emirates/Emirate-List/Dubai.shtml
—The preceding unsigned comment was added by Mgm2007mgm (talk • contribs) 20:45, 23 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Want to add an external link 

message: I think :Image:DubaiSkyscrapers.JPG would be the better lead image, becuase it simply looks better than some of the other images.--Sefringle 04:15, 3 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Skyline image

message: I cannot find on either the Fresno Wiki page, nor on the Fresno official Web site, any mention of Fresno and Dubai being sister cities. Can anyone else find a source on this? Ag1246 15:23, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Fresno: Sister city? 

message: would it make sense to split the article in two? --Diligent 18:00, 9 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Dubai City]] vs [[Emirate of Dubai]] 

message: The Dubai article has for sometime needed some major housekeeping and I made a series of changes today to make the article more readable and encyclopedic.  Here is a summary of the changes that I made: 
* Images The article was image heavy, with most images centering around a common theme (sky scrapers and exotic buildings).  While there is no doubt that there is a real estate boom in Dubai, a balance needs to be maintained for the article to retain its relevency.  Wikipedia is an enclyclopedia, not a travel brochure.
* Subsections most of the subsections were extremely verbose and were not written in Wikipedia:Summary style.  I have moved extended commentary around most of the subsections to new independent articles and have consolidated the subsections to make them more readable
*Statistics Various figures had been quoted without citation (eg., 6% of Dubai's revenue comes from oil and natural gas.  I discovered this to be untrue and have provided appropriate citations).  I have also provided citations around other sections.
* A summary of my changes
* General grammar and spelling corrections as needed. 
AreJay 01:27, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: The image in the infobox should be restored. There should be at least 1 skyline image there, and I personally like :Image:DubaiSkyscrapers.JPG best of the image choices. Compared to most major city articles I have seen on wikipedia, this article actually has very few images. I suggest maybe making a gallery box.--Sefringle 03:14, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  I disagree. Most city articles in WP:FA have no images in the infobox, and certainly no gallery box.  Gallery boxes do not help in users getting a better understanding of the article in question.  Besides, there's already a link to Wikipedia Commons in the article, which already has a gallery box of images from Dubai. AreJay 03:38, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: See the following featured articles: Ann Arbor, Michigan, Boston, Massachusetts, Cape Town, Chennai, Cleveland, Ohio, Detroit, Michigan, Hamersley, Western Australia, Houston, Texas, Kochi (India), Kolkata, Louisville, Kentucky, San Francisco, California, San Jose, California, Sarajevo, and Seattle, Washington. All of these featured articles have images in the infobox. Most of the city articles have an image in the infobox. Only of the Indian cities are the majority without an image in the image.--Sefringle 03:54, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  That's fine. I still don't like the idea, but I'm willing to compromise on that.  However, none of the articles mentioned above have gallery boxes, so my stance on gallery boxes still stands, I think it makes the page look ungainly and does little by way of providing value added content. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, first and foremost. AreJay 04:00, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

text:  I will try to address this tomorrow.  I'd like to make a quick comment though — the question isn't "how many paragraphs are unsourced"...many of the subsections draw from 1 or 2 references and they are sourced earlier on in the section and as a consequence some of the later paragraphs of the section appear to be unsourced, but are infact appropriately cited.  That being said, I'll try to do what I can to add more clarity tomorrow. AreJay 03:44, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  With regards to the Infobox image, I'm going to have to go with 213.42.2.27.  The other image that is being used is a random photo that someone took from within their car while driving on Sheikh Zayed Road. It doesn't even give you a good enough view of the actual road, much less of the entire city. I am completely against the idea of using photos in infoboxes, but if we're going to have to use one, I would go with the one that gives you at least a decent enough view of the city. AreJay 22:20, 30 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Major revamp

message: The  tag is here because the introduction is partially unsourced, the history section contains no sources. The demographics section, two paragraphs are unsourced, economy, last paragraph needs sources, transportation, last paragraph is unsourced, and other paragraphs need to source last sentence, the education section needs to source the last paragraph, and the meida section contains no sources. So basicly, much of the article is unsourced.-Sefringle 03:39, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  I will try to address this tomorrow.  I'd like to make a quick comment though — the question isn't "how many paragraphs are unsourced"...many of the subsections draw from 1 or 2 references and they are sourced earlier on in the section and as a consequence some of the later paragraphs of the section appear to be unsourced, but are infact appropriately cited.  That being said, I'll try to do what I can to add more clarity tomorrow. AreJay 03:44, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  With regards to the Infobox image, I'm going to have to go with 213.42.2.27.  The other image that is being used is a random photo that someone took from within their car while driving on Sheikh Zayed Road. It doesn't even give you a good enough view of the actual road, much less of the entire city. I am completely against the idea of using photos in infoboxes, but if we're going to have to use one, I would go with the one that gives you at least a decent enough view of the city. AreJay 22:20, 30 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Things still unsourced

message: You should write more about this Fact
all the world must know what the Dirty Work this Country UAE do for Money and Torism —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 66.228.123.44 (talk) 13:25, 25 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  sex trade in Dubai 

message: The current picture of the "Margham Desert" is really beautiful!  Unfortunately, it's also computer-generated.  Appropriate? 68.160.58.152 14:25, 2 May 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: It looks fairly realistic to me...how do we know that it is computer generated? Thanks AreJay 14:49, 2 May 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Margham Desert photo