User:Jaxhere/old stuff/2006

user sig
J A X HERE  | Pre vari cate at me

Pre Nov 2006
Hope to make some positive contributions to Wikipedia on an occasional basis.

I know you have been here some time, but anyway - Welcome!

Hello,, and welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for your contributions. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are some pages that you might find helpful: I hope you enjoy editing here and being a Wikipedian! Please sign your name on talk pages using four tildes ( ~ ); this will automatically produce your name and the date. If you need help, check out Questions, ask me on my talk page, or place  on your talk page and someone will show up shortly to answer your questions. Again, welcome! -- Beardo 15:40, 17 October 2006 (UTC)
 * The five pillars of Wikipedia
 * How to edit a page
 * Help pages
 * Tutorial
 * How to write a great article
 * Manual of Style

Old page
New Page sign here   — s d 3 1 4 1 5  14:30, 22 December 2006 (UTC)



My name is Jack Feka, born in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada.

I've been an inveterate traveler throughout the Americas, and in the past few years have spent considerable time in Chile.

I'm a volunteer to help improve wikipedia on a sporadic and occasional basis.

Often I'll look up a word or concept and believe that I can express some of the ideas more clearly and attempt some changes. Other times, in looking for some information I will be reminded of something I know something about and discover that this hasn't been included. In this case I may start a new topic, or provide a stub, or simply leave a comment hoping someone else will expand on what already exists.

links

 * "Blog" where I attempt to post some procative thoughts and oberservations which, I hope will stimulate others to think about their own situations and reach their own conclusions.

Useful links

 * User:Jaxhere/sig.css-my sig file


 * User:Jaxhere/sandbox-my personal sandbox


 * Template messages


 * /old stuff




 * User Page Design Center


 * User:Tennis Dynamite

quotations
TBA

Afro-Latin American
Jaxhere, the main point of what I was trying to get at is that people do not use any references or even try to read a book, academic article or other factual representation before they write in Wikipedia. That is what I have tried to emphasize. That posters actually learn and know about the subject before they try to define what the topic is for others. I'd rather see information deleted than convey information which may be correct or not correct as verified fact. Chriscarlos 02:27, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

Can you see what is going on with Afro-Latin American. Why did Squeakbox delete so many links. While some may not have been factual, he deleted a link to Bobby Vaughn's link, who is an academic who lived in the Costa Chica of Mexico and knows alot on the subject. chriscarlos 06:59, 1 November 2006 (UTC)
 * I don't claim any ownership to this article, I've only lent some efforts towards cleaning it up and clarifying some aspects. Squeakbox would have to respond to your query. --Jaxhere 15:34, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

This is Chriscarlos. How can Squeakbox be responsible for the entry as he was advocating for its elimination/deletion and has gone about editing and deleting sections of the entry without any type of debate or efforts at getting a consensus of those who have participated in the writing of Afro-Latin American. To put it simply, Squeakbox is not an impartial observer, but a person who has actively changed the entry to fit his perception of what is or is not correct. If you review the discussion history, you will see my entry of last week regarding what I thought of his unilateral editing of the entry and deleting of links, such as Bobby Vaughn's website. --Chriscarlos 00:30, 9 November 2006 (UTC)


 * The reason I labelled the edit Afro-Latin American vandalism is that it was repeated, and conducted over more than one article (Afro-Cuban, Afro-Latin American and Afro-Brazilian). User talk:203.164.93.248 had cut and pasted the same text into 3 different articles and continued to repaste it after reversion. User:Zleitzen had asked for help in dealing with the situation on Village Pump (assistance). If only one article was involved I might have considered it a mere content dispute, but the same text repeatedly pasted into 3 articles from an anonymous source looks more like vandalism. Switching IP addresses to repaste the material reinforced the perception. I reverted the latest edits and placed a warning on the user page. This appears to have been effective as the repasting stopped immediately. --Dave 22:41, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

You are doing a great job, keep it up! SqueakBox 18:36, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

Hi Jaxhere, regardless of the apparent dispute between the above users, thank you for your work on improving the Afro-Latin American article, it is most appreciated. --Zleitzen 15:04, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

Your request for help
Sure would be glad to help if I can, what exactly would you like? If you ask a specific question, I could give a specific answer. Welcome to wikipedia and thanks for your contributions. User:Pedant 21:22, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

help part 2
Pretty much, my advice is to be tolerant, oh boy, especially if he contributes valuable resources... everybody contributes in different ways. It's just good practice to sign and date one's comments, but you can cope with it better than having to read the whole page:


 * the history page has that 'compare' function, in a case like yours, this is how I'd use it to track new comments from unlogged users -- scroll down the page to your last entry and click the button, and back up to the most recent entry, and compare those, it will show everything since your last entry. THEN after you check it, make a 'null edit' (like delete a period, and then put a period where it was) and then (this is important so it doesn't annoy other users) put an edit summary of 'null edit', so people don't go crazy wondering what you wrote.

Other than that, it's really not possible to do anything to compel anyone to follow wikipedian customs or good practices, unless they are disruptive or vandals or something serious enough to ban them or block them... and that is flat worthless in the case of someone persistent, they can just log on with a new account or anonymously.

I myself have made extensive contributions to the Jesus series of articles, but mostly on the talk page... it's a controversial series, and I prefer to help facilitate the discussion rather than get involved in edit wars, so I will often rewrite a paragraph, but post it to talk rather than into the article, and invite others to comment. So it sometimes works to contribute on the backstage side, rather than in the article itself.

Pretty much, I just advise you to be tolerant, unless something really harsh happens.

You could try talking to him on his talk page, along the lines of


 * "Thanks so much for your valuable contributions. I really encourage you to sign your comments, so more people will be able to appreciate what you've written.  Please feel free to edit the article directly if you want.  (see WP:BOLD for more encouragement).  Thanks again for the references you've provided!"

and like that. Some people just need a little reassurance.

Other than that, really, just try not to get aggravated, I think. It's pretty fundamental to Wikipedia that "anyone can edit" so that also includes "anyone can edit pretty much however they please and if necessary someone else can edit it back". (see our founder's user page for some more insight into that).

Hope this helps a bit. If you know of some way I could help more, let me know, I'll be glad to do whatever I can. User:Pedant 03:17, 26 November 2006 (UTC)

part 3
yep, anyone can edit pretty much sums it up. The key is choosing how you want to edit, in such a way that it works most effectively for you, in terms of improving the encyclopedia. Some people spend all their time making things look pretty, others fact-check, others write new articles, others rewrite those same articles so they make sense, some correct mistakes, some start new projects, some help others with stuff, some vandalise articles and others track the vandals and fix it...

You just gotta do the best you can cause you can't control others. But some tact and diplomacy can help a lot if you want to try affecting how others do things. I'm one of the 'help anyone who asks' group, so if you have any more questions, or want some help with, really, anything at all, please feel free to ask me. If I can't help, I'll try to point you at someone who can. It's good to meet you, glad that you are here. User:Pedant 21:47, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

Re: Mythology
Sorry about that. I tend to formalize things automatically, especially when both "e.g." and "for example" have been used. No offense intended. :) IrisWings 19:43, 29 November 2006 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the clarification. I must confess that, though I looked at the Manual when I joined, I glossed over most of it. Oops. IrisWings 20:42, 30 November 2006 (UTC)