User:Sommers



Hi, I'm Ryan Sommers, and welcome to my user page!

I've been a proud Wikipedian since 2005 and a Wikipedia reader since long before that. I've just (as of February 2007) come back from a long and unannounced wikibreak; I profusely apologize if I failed to reply to anyone's messages or emails during that time, or otherwise inadvertantly caused you to feel snubbed or ignored in any way. (I promise to put up the appropriate banner next time.)


 * Jump to my licensing information and other user namespace templates

About me

 * My name
 * "Ryan Sommers" is a pseudonym that I use. (As would be the case with any relatively common-sounding name, I can see on the Web that there are several real people in the world named Ryan Sommers. I am none of them. I apologize for any potential confusion; my intention is not to impersonate anyone.)


 * Vital information
 * I am a 23-year-old American male. I grew up in Antioch, California and currently reside in Walnut Creek, California.


 * Academic background and expertise
 * I'm a student of computer science and mathematics, with an educational background in physics and comparative literature. I also have dabbling interests (mostly self-taught) in psychology, philosophy, cognitive science, economics, world history (especially classical antiquity), politics, chemistry, and astronomy. I am a budding C++ programmer and I also have some knowledge of Scheme.


 * Recreational interests
 * I am an avid game-player: computer and video games, card games (including Magic: The Gathering), chess, and so on. (I also have an intellectual interest in tabletop RPGs, but don't really play them myself.) I am a fencer, golfer, and target-shooter.


 * Beliefs
 * I am an atheist, libertarian, and South Park Republican.

Internal bookmarks

 * Sandbox
 * Template messages
 * Template messages/User namespace
 * Template messages/User talk namespace
 * Articles for deletion
 * Today's AFD log
 * Administrator intervention against vandalism
 * Category:Wikipedians looking for help
 * WikiProject Stub sorting/Stub types
 * Image copyright tags
 * Subst

Articles of questionable notability, veracity, or verifiability

 * Holy Rosary Parish-East Harlem

Articles of questionable neutrality
asd
 * Corporal punishment

Articles for cleanup, copy-editing, or wikification

 * Gole Market

Articles to be expanded or written

 * MagicTheGathering.com

Awards
In recognition of your exemplary suggestions, problem-solving, and dedicated work on the DSM cautionary statement discussion page. Cheers. Davemcarlson 09:05, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

(Moved from User talk:Sommers.) Thank you, Dave! The matter about the DSM cautionary statement was complex and trying; I am very happy that my work made a difference and quite grateful for the recognition.

Contact me
Everyone is welcome to contact me by leaving a message on my user talk page or by emailing me through Wikipedia.

If you use PGP or GPG software, you are welcome to encrypt any email that you send to me. My public key follows. (Incidentally, you can obtain my email address by importing this key into your PGP/GPG software. If you do so, you're welcome to use it directly; you don't need to go through Wikipedia.)

-BEGIN PGP PUBLIC KEY BLOCK- Version: GnuPG v1.4.5 (MingW32)

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My thoughts on Wikipedia
Here are some of my opinions on Wikipedia, in brief:


 * Wikipedia is great.
 * I believe the threshold of notability for a subject to be included in Wikipedia should be very low, so in theory I am an inclusionist. But I also believe that we should have a threshold, so in practice I am often a deletionist.
 * While the GFDL represents a brilliant idea and is fine for its original purpose (and licensors), it is not at all suitable for Wikipedia. I think Wikipedia's biggest weakness is the difficulty in obeying all the conditions for reproducing its material (especially for derivative/modified versions), not to mention the difficulty in knowing whether one has actually done so successfully. Hopefully the upcoming GNU Wiki License will provide some relief. In the meantime, I encourage everyone to consult Multi-licensing and to consider adding to your user page.

Recommended open-source software
This is a list of open-source software titles (each of which can be downloaded free of charge) that I think other users might find useful in editing Wikipedia, especially if they don't already have access to an equivalent software title.


 * Mozilla Firefox – Besides its great design and vast collection of plugins, this web browser has a tabbed browsing feature that's extremely useful for viewing multiple pages at once without opening a lot of windows. This is often useful in Wikipedia for viewing or comparing multiple pages (for example, comparing a page to its "Edit this page" and "History" pages simultaneously, while also checking someone's "user contributions" list). (Download)
 * Also, if you want to participate in one of Wikipedia's IRC channels but don't have an IRC client, you can get a ChatZilla plugin to Mozilla Firefox here. Or, you can just download and install the older Mozilla Application Suite, which comes with ChatZilla automatically.
 * GIMP – This photo editor can be used to crop, resize, and re-format raw photographs for submission to Wikipedia or the Wikimedia Commons. Because it's a full-featured image-manipulator (like Adobe Photoshop), GIMP can also be used to alter and even create other kinds of images, such as icons or logos, but a proper SVG drawing tool would be better.. (Download. For an easy installation, scroll down to the "Binaries for various platforms" section.)
 * A text editor – It is often useful to useful to copy page source text from the "Edit this page" screen into a text editor, edit it, and then paste it back. This allows you to save local copies and use advanced features such as text-searching, spell-checking, and "Replace all" (as long as this is done carefully to avoid unintended consequences!). There are many good open-source text editors (I currently use jEdit); you can find a list of ones with Wikipedia-friendly features at Text editor support.
 * Word processors will often work as well, but they often introduce formatting and other details that are irrelevant to editing MediaWiki page source. For anyone looking for an office suite (which includes a word processor) that's open-source and/or free to download, I endorse OpenOffice.org (Download).
 * Audacity – As with GIMP, this software may be useful if you plan to submit a sound file to Wikipedia or the Wikimedia Commons. Audacity can cut, paste, and mix sound files, and can convert MP3 and WAV files into the required Ogg Vorbis (.ogg) format. (Download)

Internal pages not to be missed

 * Featured articles

Informative:


 * How to edit a page
 * Manual of Style
 * How to write a great article
 * Avoiding common mistakes
 * Subst
 * What Wikipedia is not
 * Glossary
 * Why Wikipedia is so great
 * Why Wikipedia is not so great
 * Replies to common objections

Useful:


 * Sandbox
 * Template messages
 * WikiProject Stub sorting/Stub types
 * Image copyright tags

Entertaining:


 * Featured pictures – To see a table of contents.
 * Category:Wikipedia featured pictures – To see them in a gallery.
 * Category:Featured desktop backgrounds – Beautiful!
 * Improve this article about Wikipedia
 * A.J. Jacobs's first draft of "Improve this article about Wikipedia"
 * Friends of gays should not be allowed to edit articles

Licensing

 * Please note that the foregoing two boxes apply only to my original contributions. Before reusing my work under a Creative Commons license, please take reasonable steps (such as checking page history) to ensure that text appearing in my edits was not originally contributed by another user. For example, I might have moved it from another page or restored it from a previous version of a page.

Currently in Wikipedia
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