User talk:Cashmagic

Recent edits to The Maori Troubadours
Hello, and thank you for your recent contributions. While the content of your edit may be true, I have removed it because its depth or nature of detail are not consistent with our objectives as an encyclopedia. We recognize that your edit was made in good faith and hope you will familiarize yourself with our policies so we maycollaborate in the future. Thank you!  smt cha hal  (talk) 07:57, 27 April 2013 (UTC)
 * Hello! This is in response to the email you sent me. The most basic problem with the edit you made to the article was that it was not in accordance with the Wikipedia's policies and guidelines. First: Wikipedia, being an encyclopedia, requires proper capitalisation and grammar, just as any other encyclopedia does. I hope you agree that was evidently lacking in the text you added. Second: your text was unreferenced, i.e., it was not cited to a reliable source. If you can find a reliable source to cite the information to and you can convert it into proper English as well, the edit is not likely to get reverted by anyone. I hope I was helpful.  smt cha hal  (talk) 12:01, 27 April 2013 (UTC)
 * From how Wikipedia defines "reliable sources", they are not dependent on individual people or their experiences. It is usually something like a newspaper publication, books written by well-known people, etc. that is considered to be a "reliable source." Please refer to Identifying reliable sources for more, detailed information on what reliable sources are.
 * Also, I would suggest you to post any new messages or queries here on your talk page instead of emailing me. Make sure you sign your posts by adding four tildes (" ~ ") at the end. I check Wikipedia much more often than my email, so I'm likely to reply faster when I'm asked something directly on Wikipedia. Unless the matter is really confidential, it is usually advisable to use talk pages (like this one) for discussions/queries. Thanks,  smt cha hal  (talk) 18:45, 29 April 2013 (UTC)

FRUSTRATING -- Unbelievable, the Problem I am having, just adding some facts to a story that as  I just noticed  came up as  an unreliable source   with a heading that requests people to add if they can. When I first opened this webpage, the first thing I saw was the invite  that says "anyone can edit", well obviously that's not true, you need a university degree  in English  and Publishing and Computer Language to understand all this. As for reliable sources, obviously that's debatable and a grey area at best, Newspapers  and other so called public publications don't always tell the truth, we know that, but who are we to question them, as long as Wikipedia is happy that someone said they are reliable. My personal experience with my story and several Business  Accolades with  a degree  in Jewellery Engineering and being an author of 6 books, don't mean a thing as a reliable source and my story can't be told because I made some mistakes in my Grammar  and my word is not good enough because of that. After 50 or so years of life's learning curves "Do I really need to get a degree to tell my story?" and look for people who are still alive to corroborate my story or companies who may have written about me and my association with the Maori Troubadours  and who is to say that they may have told the truth about us  even, do they also need  a reliable source  to verify what they may have said. When I wrote my books, I had no problems, as someone had pointed out some mistakes I made, but obviously, here there is no-one  to do that, only someone to say that you made mistakes and removes your story,  thus you are on your own  and left in the deep end, so to speak, with plenty of references to pages of what they want before you are accepted as reliable. I appreciate the responses I had from the one person who referred me all over this website, the problem is,  you even need a degree in legalese  to understand what they want you to do  before you are believed. Thank you for that much help anyway, but I won't be doing anymore adding to a story in this neighbourhood, too confusing with technical red tape. Obviously they also want me to sign off with  a few tildes  for some reason,  so here goes. Thanks for the confusion!. This will probably get removed too, as I am not in a position to get someone in higher office to verify what I just said, as an example, someone like Bill Clinton, he didn't lie did he?. UPSET - regards Bert Cashmagic (talk) 23:29, 29 April 2013 (UTC)
 * Here are a few things I would like to clarify:
 * Wikipedia can be edited by anyone - indeed, or rather most of the Wikipedia articles can be edited by anyone. The rest of them are protected for various reasons, temporarily or permanently, at different levels. See Protection policy for further information on protection of Wikipedia pages. But while Wikipedia may be edited by anyone (not considering protected pages), it is also watched and taken care of by some people. The actual slogan by which the site goes is "Wikipedia - The Free Encyclopedia that anyone can edit". That would mean that as long as it still is an encyclopedia, it can be edited by anyone (without the edits being reverted). Now to make sure that it does remain to be an encyclopedia, there are numerous policies and guidelines.
 * Reliable sources - This is rather a part of any encyclopedia. Almost all information on Wikipedia should be cited to reliable sources (with some exceptions). You are right to say that publications are not always true. But Wikipedia (again), being an encyclopedia, must depend on those sources, whether they're true or not. See Verifiability, not truth for more information on this.
 * Signing posts - It's just considered to be a good etiquette here at Wikipedia. Nothing else. Also, it is generally more convenient to type " ~ " than your name repeatedly in posts on talk pages. I noticed that you added a name along with your comment. You can change your signature so that it shows your preferred name instead of your username ("Cashmagic") by clicking here, so you only have to type " ~ " and not your name every time you post a message on one of these talk pages.
 * No, any content on talk pages does not get deleted ("reverted" would be a better word to use) just like that. Talk pages are not a part of the encylopedia and don't need "verifiability". They're just used for discussion between Wikipedia's various contributors on improving Wikipedia. As long as there are no copyright violations, blatant and unambiguous advertising or personal attacks at a particular user, talk messages are not likely to get deleted or even reverted. Clearly, none of your messages violate those "rules".
 * Conclusion - Basically, it all comes down to the same concept: Wikipedia is an encyclopedia that can be edited by anyone, as long as it it still is an encyclopedia. I hope you can imagine what can potentially happen if no one takes care of any of the Wikipedia articles and everybody is allowed to edit Wikipedia with no restrictions. Wikipedia is the 6th most-visited website on the internet, which makes it extremely important to make sure edits (especially on more-frequently visited pages) are monitored. While there are many contributors (like you) who try to help improve the encyclopedia, not everyone is as good. Your intention of adding that reverted edit was not a bad one by any means, but it only failed to comply with the Wikipedia guidelines.
 * No, I don't think one really needs to be very good at English for being able to edit Wikipedia. I would not have reverted your edit if you had provided a reliable source. Since you're a new user, I can't expect you to know how to do it, but there are some Wikipedians willing to help and I am one of them. Feel free to request me to add information to particular Wikipedia articles if you have a URL to a web page or if you know a book published by a remarkable author that mentions the information you want to add. As long as you can communicate with me (I never had a problem regarding that so far), you can indirectly contribute to Wikipedia this way if you find it difficult to learn doing so yourself. I hope you reconsider your decision of never editing Wikipedia. Most kindly,  smt cha hal  (talk) 17:46, 30 April 2013 (UTC)