User:ImprovedWikiImprovment/experience

Wikipedia has a large community of editors, the majority of which strive to improve and maintain the greatest collection of all human knowledge there has ever been. A minority of mostly outsiders strive for the opposite, whether it be pushing their opinions, advertising, or just straight up vandalising. In my opinion, paid editing should not be something that one must disclose; it should be against policy entirely as nobody being paid to edit can possibly have a neutral point of view. Any (especially mainspace) edit that is not intended entirely to improve the encyclopedia should not be made. Edits shouldn’t be made to make a point and certainly not to attack another user. On top of this, regardless of ones view, whether in good faith or not competence is required. This means that even if your edit would definitely improve the encyclopedia, you must go through the process of the community. This can be frustrating if you are in the right but continuing to enter the disputed information will only result in a block.

Policies must always be followed, except when this isn’t helpful and rules can be ignored. Guidelines do not have to be followed as they are not rules but are simply there to advise the editor on a standard. They should be approximatley followed. There is a tenedency for editions to make or revert edits based on the so called "rules" in guidelines such as the manual of style. At the top of a guideline page it states "It is a generally accepted standard that editors should attempt to follow, though it is best treated with common sense, and occasional exceptions may apply". If people continue to follow guidelines as firm rules then these guidelines will never be able to develop, which goes directly against the fifth pillar of Wikipedia. You’d think something that goes so directly against the foundational pillars wouldn’t be common but it absolutely is, even with some very experienced editors. This leads me on to my next point: experience is not entirely directly proportional with the quality and knowledge of the editor. An editor who has been here for a month can be a much better editor than someone who has been here for ten years. Just because someone is experienced or is an administrator does not make them more important or better than anyone, nor should it make them any more immune to a block. There have been instances of users reverting me with little explanation citing a "I am a much more experienced editor than you" variant. This is not acceptable and an admin that behaves this way, in my opinion, should have their administratorship taken away from them. Many admins behave in a similar way to this and can often be seen on a "power trip". All adminship is is a user being given extra rights because the community trust them to do so, it doesn’t give them any more weight in an argument (although in practice it often does). Many admins are very good however. While civility is important, if being somewhat uncivil helps you improve Wikipedia faster; do it. We’re not here to have a friendly chat, we are colleagues and not friends while building the encyclopedia. I’ve tried to keep this essay organised, but it’s just my ideas really for me to leave behind for other future Wikipedians.

Administrators

On the topic of myself, currently I have no plans at any point to be an administrator on this Wikipedia. This may change but I don’t see the necessity in even trying; there are enough of them and I wouldn’t be a good admin in the eyes of the community (I can picture myself being held to this statement in about ten years, as most aspiring admins are).

Now for existing administrators. I have had many good experiences with administrators and also bad ones. There are many admins who behave in a manor of self-righteousness and narcism. This represents about a quarter of admins I have came across. I’m talking about the ones that think they are VIPs because they have been given a few extra tools and think it’s ok to, for example, revert a user with a mediocre explanation leaving the lesser experienced user confused. In this example, the user would ask said admin why they reverted, to which the admin says something that basically means "I am more experienced and therefore more important than you; don’t worry about it and move on". This is not ok. We are all equals, I don’t talk to admins in a different way to anyone on this website, including brand new users, and I will stand by that statement for my whole career on Wikipedia. I will not accept admins or experienced users (or anyone) talking down to me or anyone. They might seem like they’re in a position of power but really they have the same powers as everyone else, and just execute tasks like blocks. That being said, the other three quarters are good for the most part, although I’m not a fan of the general hostile tone at AN/I when any non-admin participates, even when what the user is saying is valid (meaning they are dismissed because they are not admins, rather than what they say).

Policies & guidelines

One of the five pillars of Wikipedia is "Wikipedia has no firm rules". This essential principal allows both policies and guidelines to change over time; policies and guidelines can and sometimes should evolve. This means if necessary, policies can be ignored (although without a good reason, policies should be followed). Guidelines are even more flexible, because the very essence of a guideline is to simply give newer users guidance not how to write an article. Sometimes it is better for the encyclopedia to go against the guidelines. By far the most popular guideline is the Manual of Style. There are infinite reasons why one would want to go against part of it, and they should. Guidelines are not rules. Newer users should be encouraged to do what is best for the encyclopedia and not what is supposedly against or not against the "rules". Reverting someone based purely on them going against a guideline, without any thought for whether the edit is good for the encyclopedia is ridiculous and not a valid reason on its own to revert someone. Sadly, guidelines continue to be used as absolute rules that cannot be broken; if this trend continues, flaws in guidelines will never be highlighted.

Addendum

2019

• While writing this essay I realised how similar the content is to Beyond My Ken's thoughts essay. This wasn’t intended but I do like that essay a lot. These ideas are my true beliefs of Wikipedia based on my personal experience since joining in 2014, and not simply a rewording of that, which would be pointless. I have always wanted to record these beliefs in my userspace but never got around to it until now. With that being said, BMK is much smarter than I am and I have a lot of respect for him as an editor. I encourage anyone to read his thoughts that he has developed since before I even joined. 17:30, 27 November 2019 (UTC)
• I’ve come to realise that competence is required can also be applied to real life. Desepite whether you agree with the society you live in, you must comply with it or else suffer. You might disagree with capitalism and the idea of a job, but you still need one. 13:41, 9 December 2019 (UTC)

2020

• I’ve enjoyed the last decade of editing (since 2014 that is). I’m glad to go into this new decade of editing and hope it’s a decade of great progress on this project. 18:23, 8 January 2020 (UTC)