User talk:Blackash

Welcome!

Hello, Blackash, 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 messages on discussion pages using four tildes ( ~ ); this will automatically insert your username and the date. If you need help, check out Questions, ask me on my talk page, or ask your question on this page and then place  before the question. Again, welcome! TomStar81 (Talk) 05:35, 6 August 2008 (UTC)
 * The five pillars of Wikipedia
 * Tutorial
 * How to edit a page
 * How to write a great article
 * Manual of Style

Pooktre
Hi Blackash. I think what you are doing is interesting, it just doesn't warrant an article on its own, as there isn't that much information available. A redirect to Arborsculpture plus a section describing groups/individuals practicing Arborsculpture in different forms/innovations/etc. would be more suitable. Thanks for your positive attitude so far, people 'pushing' their own stuff are usually a lot less open towards criticism. Rror (talk) 11:35, 9 January 2009 (UTC)

Tree Shaping
I have moved Arborsculpture to Tree Shaping, added in the informations from the Pooktre article, and done some edits. AfD hero (talk) 06:38, 10 January 2009 (UTC)

Recent edits Thanks for improving the article. It's always nice to have someone with first hand knowledge of the subject doing editing on an article. Now, the reason why I'm posting here is that there are a few style issues with some of your edits. I will try explain edit by edit:


 * 
 * The purpose of the lead image is to show the subject of the article, which is why originally the chair tree image was captioned: "A tree sculpture and artist Peter Cook". The key part of the caption being "tree sculpture", because that is the subject of the article. Changing it to "A tree shaper and artist Peter Cook" makes it about the artist rather than the art piece.
 * Recommendation: "Artist Peter Cook sitting on a tree sculpture"


 * 
 * Next we have the issue of the word "arbosculpture". Now I know you don't consider Arbosculpture to describe all tree shaping, but there are some people that do. In order to be a fair encyclopedia, we have to explain both sides of the issue. The original quote is "The word Arborsculpture is used both to describe tree shaping in general, as well a particular style of tree sculpture.", which is a true statement about how the word is used. Some people use it to describe all tree shaping, and others like yourself use it to describe a certain sub-style. We even talk about this later on in the paragraph.
 * The current edit removes the first part of the sentence, and reads "The word Arborsculpture is used for a particular style of tree shaping". This presents your point of view, but in wikipedia we have to present a Neutral Point of View. That means we say each side, mention the controversy, and leave it at that.
 * Recommendation: Some artists such as Reames use the word Arborsculpture to describe tree shaping in general, whereas other artists like ARTISTNAME use the term to refer to a particular style of tree sculpture." ... "Controversy exists about the branding of Arborsculpture as some of the practitioners Reames presents in his book ("Arborsculpture Solutions for a small planet") don't accept the term, or agree to be tagged by it, whereas others do".


 * 
 * In a couple places like this, the sentence directly tells the reader to do something. Here it reads: "With the Pooktre's methods it can take as little as one season of guiding the trees growth to form the design eg: The harvested mirror above. Then wait for the tree to thicken to the desired size. " Wikipedia is supposed to be an encyclopedia, not a manual or guidebook. There is a difference - an encyclopedia explains what something is, whereas a manual explains how to do something. Therefore it's a good idea to avoid directly addressing the reader and telling them what to do, like in the last sentence of the quote.
 * Recommendation: "With the Pooktre's methods it can take as little as one season of guiding the trees growth to form the design, and then longer for the tree to thicken to the desired size. For example, see the harvested mirror above. "


 * 
 * "If this is true, it should never be underestimated just how much John had achieved with this example." This sentence is purely opinion, which should be avoided. Statements in wikipedia have to be verifiable. There's no way to verify that statement, because its just an opinion. Now, if an art critic said that sentence, then we could say "according to art critic mr. smith, it should never be underestimated that ...", because the fact mr. smith said it is a statement of fact. However, you can't just insert your own opinions into the articles.
 * Recommendation: remove the sentence.


 * Ok, so I hope that helps. I'll make these changes to the article sometime later today (got to run right now), but feel free to make them yourself in the meantime if you want. AfD hero (talk) 17:10, 10 January 2009 (UTC)
 * I've left a comment on the talk page of the article. Also, I can't be sure, but it seems to me that Pooktre is the name a private company gave to a pre-existing artform. Someone should look into that. - Mgm|(talk) 13:23, 11 January 2009 (UTC)
 * I recommend using the most neutral name possible. Another possible solution is to pick a neutral basename and redirect all the other names people thought of over the years (assuming said names are verifiably used by a significant amount of people in reliable sources). - Mgm|(talk) 22:58, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

De-orphan attempts
Hey there, I noticed you've been attempting to de-orphan articles, this is great, keep it up. I just wanted to give you a tip: You should not be removing the  parameter when adding the   parameter. The date of the orphan tag and the date of the de-orphan attempt are two separate things! Instead of replacing  with   it should be placed in addition to it. This way, the date the orphan tag was first placed on the article remains (and is visible on the face of template when viewing the article), and is distinct from the date that the de-orphan attempt was made. See for an example. Other than that, I'm happy and glad to see that other people are out there de-orphaning articles (I thought I was the only one!) :) Regards, &oelig; &trade; 17:15, 19 April 2010 (UTC)
 * ps. don't worry about it being double-categorized because that doesn't happen! Once the  parameter is used it gets moved to the attempted de-orphan category.. so you're not having to revisit the same article twice when browsing through the monthly orphaned articles category.  &oelig; &trade; 17:21, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

JSTOR
Hi there. You're one of the first 100 people to sign up for a free JSTOR account via the requests page. We're ready to start handing out accounts, if you'd still like one.

JSTOR will provide you access via an email invitation, so to get your account, please email me (swalling@undefinedwikimedia.org) with...


 * the subject line "JSTOR"
 * your English Wikipedia username
 * your preferred email address for a JSTOR account

The above information will be given to JSTOR to provide you with your account, but will otherwise remain private. Please do so by November 30th or drop me a message to say you don't want/need an account any longer. If you don't meet that deadline, we will assume you have lost interest, and will provide an account to the next person in the rather long waitlist.

Thank you! Steven Walling (WMF) &bull; talk   21:13, 20 November 2012 (UTC)

Managing a conflict of interest
Hello, Blackash. We welcome your contributions, but if you have an external relationship with the people, places or things you have written about on the page Tree shaping, you may have a conflict of interest (COI). Editors with a conflict of interest may be unduly influenced by their connection to the topic. See the conflict of interest guideline and FAQ for organizations for more information. We ask that you:


 * avoid editing or creating articles about yourself, your family, friends, colleagues, company, organization or competitors;
 * propose changes on the talk pages of affected articles (you can use the request edit template);
 * disclose your conflict of interest when discussing affected articles (see Conflict of interest);
 * avoid linking to your organization's website in other articles (see WP:Spam);
 * do your best to comply with Wikipedia's content policies.

In addition, you are required by the Wikimedia Foundation's terms of use to disclose your employer, client, and affiliation with respect to any contribution which forms all or part of work for which you receive, or expect to receive, compensation. See Paid-contribution disclosure.

Also, editing for the purpose of advertising, publicising, or promoting anyone or anything is not permitted. Hello, I also left you a personal message on my talk page since you are involved there in a discussion about the Tree shaping article. Netherzone (talk) 19:40, 9 June 2021 (UTC)
 * Hi Netherzone Thanks for this. Though my editing of wikipedia a I've always done my best to observe and follow the rules and guild lines. LOL thou I did stumble in my early editing knowing nothing. I don't usually make the same mistake twice.
 * Multiple editors have acknowledged the befit the Tree shaping article has received with having expert editors working on the article. From memory experts and COI editors are welcome on Wikipedia, including expert editors with a professional or commercial interest in the subject of articles they edit. However, the guidelines concerning conflicts of interest must be observed where applicable, and expert editors must at all times avoid editing (or appearing to edit) the encyclopaedia in order to promote their own professional or commercial interest. At times I have edited wikipedia to the detriment of Pooktre or myself to help wiki be more balanced to refs. If you are interested I have created multiple articles within this field of tree shaping. A quick look at those pages before other editors had done changes to them show that I created pages from a neutral point of view following the refs. One other factor you should be aware of is Tree Shaping is very small field and takes a long time for things to change in this art form. Blackash (talk) 23:41, 9 June 2021 (UTC)
 * , you showed up on my user talk page out of the blue which was surprising. I moved that discussion to the article talk page. Regarding Tree shaping, I found it odd that in an article on a technique that has been around for hundreds of years, something seemed "off" to me that Becky Northey/Peter Cook/Pooktre would be mentioned 30 times. Becky Northey 12 mentions, Peter Cook 8 mentions and Pooktre 10 mentions. I later learned from your comments that you are Becky Northey, Peter Cook is your partner in the Pooktre brand. I also noticed that 6 of the images were yours and the external link leads to your article that mentions kits & books for sale to be odd for an encyclopedia. Netherzone (talk) 15:31, 10 June 2021 (UTC)
 * I did respond in part to this at the talk page here my diff In a nutshell our name/s have about the same weight ratio to text, as does the names Richard Reames (9), Axel Erlandson (10) and Chris Cattle (10) for 3 other examples with images captions. Also when commented that the link to our "book" became an issue I created an inline cite for the article with no link. We don't have kits??? Don't know what you're going on about there. And yes we given images to wiki and other editors like the quality of our trees. I have also been responsible for images like Richard Reames head photo and contacted other shapers to ask them to donate their images to wiki as well. Blackash (talk) 18:40, 17 July 2021 (UTC)

Speedy deletion nomination of Tree shaping methods
Hello Blackash,

I wanted to let you know that I just tagged Tree shaping methods for deletion, because it seems to be copied from another source, probably infringing copyright.

If you feel that the article shouldn't be deleted and want more time to rewrite it in your own words, you can [//en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=&action=edit&section=new&preload=Template:Hangon_preload&preloadtitle=This+page+should+not+be+speedy+deleted+because...+ contest this deletion], but don't remove the speedy deletion tag from the top.

You can leave a note on my talk page if you have questions. Thanks!

Message delivered via the Page Curation tool, on behalf of the reviewer.

John B123 (talk) 19:05, 24 June 2021 (UTC)

Disambiguation link notification for July 17
Hi. Thank you for your recent edits. An automated process has detected that when you recently edited Tree shaping, you added a link pointing to the disambiguation page Compartmentalization. Such links are usually incorrect, since a disambiguation page is merely a list of unrelated topics with similar titles. (Read the FAQ* Join us at the DPL WikiProject.)

It's OK to remove this message. Also, to stop receiving these messages, follow these opt-out instructions. Thanks, DPL bot (talk) 05:53, 17 July 2021 (UTC)


 * Thanks Blackash (talk) 18:22, 17 July 2021 (UTC)

ArbCom 2022 Elections voter message
 Hello! Voting in the 2022 Arbitration Committee elections is now open until 23:59 (UTC) on. All eligible users are allowed to vote. Users with alternate accounts may only vote once.

The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to impose binding solutions to disputes between editors, primarily for serious conduct disputes the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the authority to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail.

If you wish to participate in the 2022 election, please review the candidates and submit your choices on the voting page. If you no longer wish to receive these messages, you may add to your user talk page. MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 00:33, 29 November 2022 (UTC)

ArbCom 2023 Elections voter message
 Hello! Voting in the 2023 Arbitration Committee elections is now open until 23:59 (UTC) on. All eligible users are allowed to vote. Users with alternate accounts may only vote once.

The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to impose binding solutions to disputes between editors, primarily for serious conduct disputes the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the authority to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail.

If you wish to participate in the 2023 election, please review the candidates and submit your choices on the voting page. If you no longer wish to receive these messages, you may add to your user talk page. MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 00:25, 28 November 2023 (UTC)