Wikipedia:Editor review/Gaff

Gaff
Hello: I have been working on WP on and off for a couple of years. I've contributed a handful of articles and stubs, reverted a mess of vandalism, nominated a few unsalvagable articles for deletion, and done some other editing tasks here and there. I guess that I am requesting a review to gain a sense of what else the community needs from me as an editor. &mdash; Gaff ταλκ 16:34, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

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 Questions

Review by Chrislk02 First off, looks like you started strong, then a year and a half break with a few casual edits in the middle. In an essense, you have only really become active this month. As well, your edit summary usage shows that you are still fairly new. While your edit summary usage has increased from your first month of heavy editing (in 10-2005), it still needs some improvement. Perhaps you might want to change the setting under my preferences that will prompt you for an edit summary if you forget one.
 * 1) Of your contributions to Wikipedia, are there any about which you are particularly pleased, and why?
 * I am pleased mostly with the minor editing tasks that I have performed (reverting vandals, patrolling RC, correcting mispellings). This kind of work is minor if seen as a sinlge edit, but as a whole is extremely important for the upkeep of WP.  I have a list of articles I have made significant contributions to on my talk page.
 * 1) Have you been in any conflicts over editing in the past or do you feel other users have caused you stress? How have you dealt with it and how will you deal with it in the future?
 * There have been a few times that personal POV has become an issue. I have encountered this when editing articles on politics, and even on occasion authors/literary figures.  Typically it is me objecting to another's obvious POV edits.  If I find myself to caught up in the topic, I try for NPOV or take a break from the article.  I find it best to keep a cool head, talk things out on the article talk page, and try to get other editors involved to reach a consensus.  Even the most contentious articles should be able to be written NPOV.  One episode occured a few years ago over a White Supremist pop band named Prussian Blue.  An AfD was started over the band.  It became pretty obvious that the article would stay up.  I found the article and topic distasteful, but ultimately had to sucki it up and realize that it was notable.  My opinion of the music and the politics had to be set aside.  I was also up in arms over the AfD debate over Brian Peppers.  I find this person to be incredibly tragic.  Granted he became something of an internet phenomenon, but I really was bothered that WP was turning into a place to drag people through the lowest level sort of muck.  I was very pleased to see that Jimbo Wales himself had commented against keeping this page.
 * There have been a few times that personal POV has become an issue. I have encountered this when editing articles on politics, and even on occasion authors/literary figures.  Typically it is me objecting to another's obvious POV edits.  If I find myself to caught up in the topic, I try for NPOV or take a break from the article.  I find it best to keep a cool head, talk things out on the article talk page, and try to get other editors involved to reach a consensus.  Even the most contentious articles should be able to be written NPOV.  One episode occured a few years ago over a White Supremist pop band named Prussian Blue.  An AfD was started over the band.  It became pretty obvious that the article would stay up.  I found the article and topic distasteful, but ultimately had to sucki it up and realize that it was notable.  My opinion of the music and the politics had to be set aside.  I was also up in arms over the AfD debate over Brian Peppers.  I find this person to be incredibly tragic.  Granted he became something of an internet phenomenon, but I really was bothered that WP was turning into a place to drag people through the lowest level sort of muck.  I was very pleased to see that Jimbo Wales himself had commented against keeping this page.

A Namespace breakdown shows a decent start with contributions to the wiki namespace in xfd's, as well as WP:AIV. This is a great start. Are there any articles that you have written from scratch? Are there any that you feel exmplify your best work? When it comes down to it, contributing is an important part of this project. Even though I spend most of my time blocking vandals and dealing with other disputes, I try to make sure to that I write an article or 2 a week. I would be interested in seeing an article you have written to see if you show proper use of inline citations etc etc.

Overall, it looks like you are on the right path! Keep up the good work. -- Chrislk02 (Chris Kreider) 18:58, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * On a random note, you might want to watch your vandal warning accuracy. this warning was posted on the userpage, not the talk page.  A user could possibly not know that they were warned because the yellow bar of doom does not appear to edits to the userpage, only user talk page. -- Chrislk02 (Chris Kreider) 19:01, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * My training as a physician can get hairy at times and pull me away from WP projects. I have listed several articles and stubs that I have heavily edited on my user page.  thanks. &mdash; Gaff  ταλκ 03:51, 18 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Your level of care in screening articles for deletion is rather weak: You nominated Jim Deacon for deletion as a non notable biology professor, without noticing that the article began "All characters in the following programme are fictional, even the real ones. Their voices are impersonated, badly." and that the part that wasn't a joke was a copyviolation. If the career is real, a full professor at a university is notable, if not, its a hoax, and if it's half a joke and half a copyvio you should have noticed both. DGG 03:58, 5 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the comments re: AfD for Jim Deacon. I did notice the lead, which struck me not so much hoax as somebody trying to be witty, similar to the lead of Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn.  As to the copyvio, I have in the past marked things for CSD by copyvio from university pages such as this and received negative feedback on the explanation that its not the sort of copyvio anyone would care about.  Given that there seemed something fishy here, I though AfD rather than CSD the proper channel.  I was not aware that being a full professor was in and of itself an instant keep, but will review WP:Notability.  Thanks again.  &mdash; Gaff  ταλκ 17:16, 5 June 2007 (UTC)