Talk:Single Action Mounted Shooting

Merge proposal
Single Action Mounted Shooting is a not-for-profit charitable corporation and not to be confused (or merged) with the generic sport of "cowboy action shooting" or other for-profit mounted shooting and cowboy themed organizations such as CMSA, MSA, and SASS. The terms "Single Action Mounted Shooting", "S.A.M.S.", and "SAMS Cowboys", SAMSCowboys.com, among others, are trademarks of the corporation.

Clearly the person who made the suggestion to merge this article is uninformed of the sport and the organization. Any inquires can be directed to ********, President of S.A.M.S., ********* or email to ************


 * The article does not make it entirely clear that this is an organization, as it also extensively describes the sport. If there are competing organizations or slightly different events, then they should be discussed or linked, perhaps improving the "generic" article in the process.  You also need to understand that this is an encyclopedia, not an advertising forum, so descriptions need to be clear for the lay reader, as it sits, the two articles sound somewhat like they are about the same thing.  Clearly the person who wrote this article has not read the wikipedia Manual of style or there would not be this confusion. It's nothing that can't be fixed with a little effort and goodwill.   Montanabw (talk) 03:35, 10 March 2009 (UTC)


 * Also, do not remove the tags until the issue is discussed. The merge tag is a proposal, not something that will necessarily happen unless there is consensus.   Montanabw (talk) 03:35, 10 March 2009 (UTC)


 * Modified the first line of the article: Single Action Mounted Shooting (SAMS) is a not-for-profit Charitable Corporation. Basically changed the word "organization" to "corporation". I'll do more research on like articles but in the past there are no like articles. Cowboy Action Shooting is significantly different from Cowboy Mounted Shooting in more ways than a single paragraph can describe if the lay reader does not get-it in the first couple lines. I would respectfully suggest that those who do not want to invest the time to learn the differences, then either leave or spend their time wiping out 80% of Wikipedia. I can suggest some topics they could begin with: All car racing is the same, all football leagues are the same, all basketball governing bodies are the same, all gasoline powered vehicles are the same - so there is no need to have different articles. Basketball could be shortened to: Basketball is a game played with a ball and a basket. End of article. I'm off to research how other sports and articles are structured but I suspect I will see similar structures to SAMS - I may have to remove the rules section - but I was trying to differentiate from Cowboy Action, etc.

As Wikipedia warns, don't add anything that you don't want mercilessly modified! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.189.154.176 (talk) 00:28, 14 March 2009 (UTC)

As I suspected: This article is similar in basic structure to Formula One Racing: History, description, major people who helped the sport, basic rules - plus they list major events - Guess our major events should be listed but it is on the website. This SAMS article is also similar to NASCAR. It is not an advertisement but an article describing the sport, history, major people in the sport, etc, etc... The sport of Mounted shooting in all it's forms and rules is NOT similar to Cowboy Action shooting who fire live ammo, not similar to SuperHorse events which MS is only one-third of (SuperHorse has less than 50 participants per year. Mounted Shooting has over 5000). It is also not similar to Xtreme Cowboy competitions, who run horses over 20 different obstacles. It is also not similar to Dressage, Hunter-Jumper, jousting, mounted archery, or rodeo or any other equine sports.

References added. Minor maintenance. Removal of Wikispam projects, etc

Merging articles: Against. Reasons: Single Action Mounted Shooting is a not for profit corporation where Cowboy Action Shooting is a generic term for a type of shooting sport.66.236.143.130 (talk) 21:50, 19 May 2009 (UTC)


 * Is a possible merger, of Single Action Mounted Shooting and Cowboy Action Shooting, still under discussion? If it is, a "merge" (or "mergeto") template should be added to this article.  If it's not, the "merge" template should be removed from the other article. — Mudwater (Talk) 01:25, 20 May 2009 (UTC)


 * No consensus. Only two people discussing.  No comment from the other article. Apparently a huge difference to those who care.    Montanabw (talk) 03:18, 20 May 2009 (UTC)


 * Since it's undecided, I've added a "merge" template to this article. But, I'm opposed to the merge.  Single Action Mounted Shooting seems to be a notable subject, and the article has enough references already to demonstrate this, I think.  Also there's a lot to be said about Single Action Mounted Shooting, probably too much to merge into the other article.  Single Action Mounted Shooting is a subset of Cowboy Action Shooting, but that doesn't mean it shouldn't have its own article. — Mudwater (Talk) 03:33, 20 May 2009 (UTC)


 * I think it's almost the same sport, only one person seems to be running one club and another person is running the other. But I honestly don't care enough to fight about it.  I suppose it's like the difference between a Friesian Sporthorse and a Friesian Sport Horse.  Those who care, really care, the rest of us couldn't tell the difference, but if people want their own club, then whatever, I guess.   Montanabw (talk) 05:28, 20 May 2009 (UTC)


 * Honestly Single Action Mounted Shooting is a CORPORATION engaged in Wild West Reenacting, Educating Children, Helping Handicapped Children, Civil War Reenacting, and "Shooting in Competition from Horseback" - called "Mounted Shooting". "Mounted Shooting" is NOT the same as Cowboy Action Shooting. There will be NO merge or I will immediately revert or replace the webpage. Those suggesting the merge, including Montanabw, refuse to educate themselves on the subject and are basically acting as appointed Cyberbullies or Judge-jury-and-executioner of their will over everyone else. I REALLY don't know how to make it more clear that SAMS COWBOYS and Single Action Mounted Shooting is a Not-For-Profit CORPORATION NOT any Different than NASCAR or Formula-One or the NBA or other Sport and Activity Regulatory Body. Apparently WRITTEN WORDS fail to get the point across! I feel like I'm in arguing with the uneducated - It wastes my time and pisses off the other party. Please HELP! How do I educate those who are ALWAYS RIGHT? I'm embarrassed I have to write these words on a public forum but I am at a loss for a solution! These editors wouldn't hack Disney, or the AFL or NFL or NASCAR or F-1 racing!!! Why are they suggesting hacks to S.A.M.S. Cowboys? We have 2 votes against merge and 1 for merge. Anyone else want to turn this into an American Idol popularity contest? HowesR1 (talk) 17:11, 28 May 2009 (UTC)


 * I honestly don't care all that much. I think you have a private club going here that is to the NFL or NASCAR what Football and Stock Car Racing are -- you have a specific offshoot of a generic sport.  Except that there appears to be only one person running it -- you.  And personal promotion and advertising (even of a non profit corporation) is not allowed on wikipedia.  So instead of your behavior that is not helping you make your case, how about just taking a few deep breaths and reading WP:NOR and WP:V and asking any questions you may have on how to write a better wikipedia article?  We really ARE trying to help.   Montanabw (talk) 00:37, 29 May 2009 (UTC)


 * I'm no longer going to discuss or argue with you. I'll just undo any hacks I see to the webpage.66.236.143.130 (talk) 20:58, 9 June 2009 (UTC)


 * I believe that this article needs to be removed as it is clear that it is nothing more than mere personal promotion by one individual. I have tried to help you only to be repeatedly attacked. Please reconsider your attitude.   Montanabw (talk) 21:47, 10 June 2009 (UTC)


 * I have reconsidered my attitude and I have come to the same conclusion. Unfortunately it would be a violation of Wikipedia Civility rules to go into further detail. —Preceding unsigned comment added by HowesR1 (talk • contribs) 04:34, 8 July 2009 (UTC)


 * You appear to very much want to hear my opinion on the matter so, to let you know, wiki guidelines have some room to edit or redact your OWN edits, though keep in mind two things: one, they still live in the edit history, and two, while it's one thing to edit immediately to fix something you realize you didn't mean to say, it's probably a more marginal thing to edit your own material many days later, though in this particular context, where no one has replied (and hence no conversation that suddenly makes no sense if someone redacts part of it)  I certainly do not personally have any objection to it and I doubt the wiki gods care enough to worry about it, either.  An alternative method to "take back" something once others have weighed in is to use strikeout, which looks like this: This is another way to take back something you didn't mean to say, except you didn't change your mind until after you hit "save page" By the way, you are free to do anything you want on our OWN talk page, just not on article talk pages.  For example, I routinely delete other people's stuff on my own page.  Sometimes even the friendly comments that are just chitchat.  Hope that helps.   Montanabw (talk) 02:49, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia Wikiproject
There does not seem to be any benefit of having this non-profit-charitable organization information page being hijacked by this wikiproject. The "importance" rating and other "status" levels are arbitrary and subject to interpretation. High importance pages may or may not get more traffic and low importance pages will be lost in a mixed of unnecessary and confusing levels and ratings. No one who is researching Laminitis, for example, is going to care how many pretty pictures of horses their are - they are going to want to see facts, x-rays, drawings, and read information about the problem and how to cure it. Whether or not that page is part of a wikiproject or is rated HIGH or LOW or whatever is immaterial to the person who's horse is lame. I hate to see wikipedia facebooked or myspaced-out. This is not a popularity contest. It is a source of facts and information, linked externally to reputable sources such as national organizations, research groups, universities, governmental and NG organizations, etc.


 * Once you post anything in wikipedia, you fall under the rules and customs of wikipedia. I was flat-out pissed when the animal rights crowd tagged rodeo, but I just had to take a deep breath and deal with it.  This IS a horse sport article.  You may find the gun and shooting sports people also have a wikiproject and tag it.  We do not "own" our articles.  (See WP:OWN).  Montanabw (talk) 06:09, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

That's RIGHT! YOU do not own the articles. Other projects REQUEST that articles be placed into a project. They do not FORCE it to be part of the project. I find the best way to get help is to politely ask for it, not demand that people do as I say or force them into it. Additionally the more I look around Wikipedia about subjects that I have a very good knowledge of I find that Wikipedia is full of opinions and ignorance (meaning "lack of knowledge") and basically myspace and facebook crap. This is supposed to be an encyclopedia, not a self-referenced op'ed website with "It's true because it says it is true." 70.189.154.176 (talk) 16:41, 8 May 2009 (UTC)


 * Um. That is a personal attack.  I have chosen to try and work with you and try to be of help.  You are not listening to me and you are not engaging in good faith collaboration.   Montanabw (talk) 23:58, 12 May 2009 (UTC)


 * If you feel it is a personal attack - I'm sorry you feel that way. My statement still stands. Wikipedia is not supposed to be a Facebook or myspace popularity contest. I think your hacks are not in good faith collaboration.HowesR1 (talk) 17:14, 28 May 2009 (UTC)


 * We agree that Wikipedia is not a place for advertising or personal promotion. However, I think that is precisely what you are doing with this article. Nonetheless, I have been trying to help you out and it seems that everything I say is interpreted to mean precisely the opposite of what is intended.  At this point, I hope I am not asking too  much to suggest that you at least try to listen to those of us trying to help you learn the rules of wikipedia just like the rest of us have done?    Montanabw (talk) 00:24, 29 May 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia Internal and External References
I guess I need to create another wikipedia page called the History of Mounted Shooting, Cite examples from medieval and military sources, cite the newspaper articles already linked externally, copy and paste from 5 and 10 year old emails about Nevada and Vegas and Pony Express events into the article. And then link that page to this page? When does it end? There seems to be a lot of Bosses around here telling the lone worker what to do, but not how to do it! How about some of those Bosses do some of the work as a learning-experience? They can feel empowered-to-succeed in leading-by-example to support the long-term-growth of the realized-success of the informational-distribution-network that is the embodiment of that essential-existence in Wikipedia! HowesR1 (talk) 20:22, 10 April 2009 (UTC)


 * No need for a break out article yet. Just visualize footnotes.  (smile)  For help, start with a read of WP:CITE.  Frankly, I picked up a lot just copying the formatting style from other articles.  An easy way to create footnotes is to just sandwich the info you need between ref tags. Yes, it's a pain in the butt to learn all the various wikipedia rules and customs, and many of us who have still been here a while are either still learning (I don't even want to START on template syntax!  Bleech!).  I'd take you up on your offer to help, but I happen to currently have about 1,800 articles watchlisted and other than those where I personally have a strong interest, the rest I just sort of pop in and out of with little comments or small edits.  However, with the shooting angle, you may want to drift over to some of the other guns and shooting articles and see if anyone wants to help you with basic article formatting.   Montanabw (talk) 00:07, 13 April 2009 (UTC)


 * After long and careful thought I've determined that internal links are the same as a book encyclopedia citing itself as a source. You would never see this in the original Encyclopedia Britannica. Footnotes, End notes, and bibliographies cite facts from outside sources. It is the only way a statement can be considered creditable. I agree that the statements of facts should be annotated and referenced to the external references and I will get to that eventually. HowesR1 (talk) 23:17, 4 May 2009 (UTC)


 * You misunderstand wikilinks, Verifiability and CItation. Wikipedia clearly does not allow self-referencing to other wikipedia articles.  The wikilinks (blue text) are more of a vocabulary and cross-referencing thing to help people find out what odd terms mean, or to find out more about a related subject.  They aren't sources.  SOURCES are what you had in your external links section, a bibliography of sorts, and that is a starting point from which you work them into footnotes as you go, which I did for you this time. (Every place you referenced link 1,2,3 or A.BC, I made it into a proper reference and then they allshow up at the bottom of the page.)  For an example of extensive footnoting, see an article like Thoroughbred which is heavily footnoted -- to proper external sources -- and has a list of the works cited.  Basically think in terms of a great big college term paper or research journal article:  Footnotes and bibliography.  Hope this is now clearer.  Montanabw (talk) 06:09, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

Split Off
Due to excessive harassment from an unnamed editor the Non-Profit Organization of Single Action Mounted Shooting board of directors held an emergency meeting in which it was decided to actively split off the Cowboy Mounted Shooting Sport section to a new article and remove the heavily Sport aspect of SAMS from this article. This will allow this article to have a more balanced view of the Charitable businesses activities and history and allow the SPORT side to be regulated by editors who are competitors and others who are knowledgeable of the sport. It was also decided that because the Non-profit corporation is not exclusively equine based, in fact horses are only a minor part of our activities, that SAMS will be removed from the Equine Project. This will also (hopefully) help to alleviate the on-going harassment of one particular editor. With these changes, a Wikipedia editor should transfer the majority of this talk page over to the Cowboy Mounted Shooting Article so that it can follow that article, instead of remaining here to confuse readers of the discussion. Future decisions will be made on continuing with the Firearms project. These decisions are the Final Actions of the SAMS Board of Directors. If Wikipedia should chose to delete this article completely - That will certainly prove beneficial to the SAMS Corporation as it will decisively remove any opportunity for the harassing editor to continue his destruction. So be it this date and signed: HowesR1 (talk) 17:32, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Delete the Article
It is the decision of the SAMS Board of Directors to have this article deleted. Sufficient time has been given to discussion and no one cares. Good enough. The article has been roundly attacked by one particular person who refuses to go away, until he gets his way. He wins! No one wants to fight his inflated ego any longer! I will delete the entire content until such time as an administrator deletes the article. Harassment will not longer be tolerated.HowesR1 (talk) 23:51, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Blanked content
Blanked (hopefully) for discussion of relevance of comments to the new article Cowboy Mounted Shooting and the split from the SAMS article.HowesR1 (talk) 19:36, 15 July 2009 (UTC)


 * I understand that HowesR1 and Montanabw have been having extended arguments over the contents of this article, and I admit I've only been halfway following the dispute. However, it is against Wikipedia policy to unilaterally blank out the contents of an article.  For an article to be removed, it must be submitted to the Articles for Deletion process.  When submitting an article, sufficient reason must be give for the deletion -- see Deletion policy.  An article being subject to protracted dispute, or even, hypothetically speaking, harassment, is not one of the reasons accepted under the guidelines.  The leaders of an organization requesting that an article about their organization be deleted is also not one of the accepted reasons.  Furthermore, there was already a discussion about whether or not this article should be merged into the Cowboy action shooting article, and the consensus among editors was to leave this article separate.   Additionally, the contents of discussion pages should generally not be removed, or merged with the discussion pages of other articles.  Also, whether or not the article falls within the province of a certain WikiProject is really up to the members of that project.  If they decide that it is part of their project, they don't "own" the article more than any other editors, and the project members' opinions aren't more heavily weighted in any discussions about the article.  So, I'm going to restore the contents of the article.  I would request both editors involved in the recent disputes to take a deep breath, so to speak, and try to take a more amicable approach to their future discussions, if any, about the article.  I would also request other editors to help with resolving any further disputes. — Mudwater (Talk) 01:07, 16 July 2009 (UTC)


 * Here's an additional thought. It would be valid under Wikipedia guidelines to propose that this article -- Single Action Mounted Shooting -- be merged into the new article -- Cowboy Mounted Shooting.  If anyone were to propose such a merger, they should follow the procedures at Help:Merging, including (1) starting a discussion section for the merger, on the talk page for the Cowboy Mounted Shooting article, (2) the use of Template:Mergeto and Template:Mergefrom, (3) waiting a sufficient time -- one to three weeks would be a general guideline -- for editors to discuss the proposed merger, and (4) actually merging some or all of the contents of this article into the other article, although, about that last point, one could argue that that's already been done, with the creation of the other article itself. — Mudwater (Talk) 01:23, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

Merger proposal
I'm proposing that this article be merged into the "Cowboy Action Shooting" article. Please join the discussion, not here, but at Talk:Cowboy Mounted Shooting. — Mudwater (Talk) 12:01, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

Response
I am deeply troubled by the false accusations of "harassment" that have been raised against me on this page. I have restored my comments because I think they speak for themselves. At no time have I attempted to "own" this article, rather the opposite has been true. I initially tried to provide some information on formatting, tone, sourcing, and wikipedia policies and guidelines. Yet, I have been viciously attacked and my motives questioned by a single editor who seems to be staking out this corner of wikipedia to promote his own organization. This disturbs me deeply. Per WP:WWIN, this is not a place for a free web site, wikipedia is an encyclopedia. WIkipedia cannot be controlled by any single person or editor, nor have I tried to do so here. I have mostly been trying to help improve the quality of an article that falls within the scope of WPEQ, only to have my motives questioned and my actions misunderstood. I have an extensive track record on wikipedia and I believe I have been more than patient here. Montanabw (talk) 23:25, 17 July 2009 (UTC)


 * Since it seems likely that this article is going to either be merged into Cowboy Mounted Shooting or deleted entirely, I would propose to all editors involved that they drop their quarrel and move on. I just left a comment on the other article's talk page about this, with this edit, which I would request all involved parties to read.  I know there are some ruffled feathers on all sides, but instead of revisiting the past, let's move on from here please, and concentrate on the articles themselves.  — Mudwater (Talk) 23:38, 17 July 2009 (UTC)


 * Be glad to.  Montanabw (talk) 00:11, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

Reorganization
It may be a moot point but I've Hope that helps. ++Lar: t/c 14:42, 18 July 2009 (UTC)
 * undone blanking of discussion by User:HowesR1... removing all or most comments by one participant from a page disrupts the flow of that discussion and is not a good practice
 * tried to reorder the discussion into chronological order so it makes more sense


 * That's fine with me. I removed my comments to protect the integrity of Wikipedia. But if you want to see the truth of the matter, I won't tolerate being treated the way I have been by some editor who thinks he owns an article and a project... leave them in! —Preceding unsigned comment added by HowesR1 (talk • contribs) 01:40, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

Unverified and unverifiable content in History section

 * Being more specific as requested: This entire section is unverifiable. The reference links provided do not support the content. To be more specific and still brief, the only section that CAN be verified is this one line of text:
 * "... a group called the Cowboy Mounted Shooting Association was created in the 1990s so that horse people and cowboy action shooters may enjoy the competitive nature of shooting sports while riding horseback.[1] "
 * The rest of the contents of HISTORY are not verifiable. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.236.143.130 (talk) 16:53, 22 July 2009 (UTC)