User talk:Beta500

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Honduras part 2
Beta, the problem is easily solved if we reorganize the site a little. You're right to treat the "Honduras" entry itself as a portal, and I'm all for moving some of the detail you have on that page down a level to the "History of Honduras" page that's linked to it. That's what I've tried to do with my contribution (which I saw as a bit too much) to the portal page, and as you can see I copied and then modified your contribution to that page, though I didn't change your wording in the "Conquest" section of the first page. So here's what we can do, as I see it.

First we agree to make the portal page entry short but comprehensive in terms of main themes (which means we need to include some language about the north coast and it will have to include the Miskito kingdom, I think, and then transfer most of the rest down to the "History of Honduras" page. From there, should we need to we can create, within the Colonial period section yet another still more detailed subpage, for example I think it might be appropriate to make a Pacific-Atlantic division at this level, leaving more detailed treatment of the north for that, but I can also see other architecture that might be better.  There is in theory no limit to how much detail can go in to Wikipedia, in countries with better developed entries it can be extraordinarily detailed--for example, I added a historical section which is far from complete, on the entry for Tela; and I've been working on entries for individual Miskito kings in the "Mosquito Coast" entry. I have to work around work I met on the site of course, and I want to respect everything on there that is accurate, but as long as we're conscientious about finding the appropriate level, we should be able to use this technique.

Well done, Wikipedia is a remarkable way to use hyperlinking to present history in a way that allows study at varying levels, and even including source criticism--for example you could if you wished produce a sort of critical study of Montejo's long account of the conquest in CDI, as an entry of its own, as long as you can find secondary literature that uses it. Wikipedia doesn't allow original research, and thus there are certain things that can't be put on Wikipedia--for example, I believe that the slaves on the shipwreck that founded the Miskito Zambu were from Angola, but until I publish my work on this I can't put the chain of documents and reasoning that led me to it. But it's amazing how far you can go with detail.

Forgive this long post, and I'm going to be looking at the Spanish entry very soon! Beepsie (talk) 16:47, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

Honduras part 3
I'm sorry to hear of your departure from the English version of Honduras! My own knowledge is mostly of the north/Atlantic coast, and it's been that section I've worked on, thus creating an imbalance between the two. I had hoped that your knowledge which seems to be stronger on the Pacific side, could complement what I know or at least balance out the coverage. But perhaps I can use the Spanish version to augment the English one as you put it up.

Anyway, I want to tell you that I'm going to put a brief Atlantic coast paragraph or so in the "Honduras" article, and perhaps move some of your detail from the conquest period to the "History of Honduras" section, so that the portal article will be more like a portal, as you proposed to me. Before you abandon English altogether, look at what I've done, and let me know if it works for you. Beepsie (talk) 18:14, 28 March 2011 (UTC)

ArbCom elections are now open!
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