User talk:Tiberiusgrant

If you want to create an article, you should ideally try to make something of it, rather than creating a tiny mini-stub, and leaving all the rest of the work to be done by others. If all you've written is a tiny mini-stub, this may not do much to convince people that the article you wrote belongs in Wikipedia at all. And lists of internal links are commonly put in a section called "See also", not "Book Compendium". Also, second and subsequent words of article names are not generally capitalized unless they are parts of names or titles... AnonMoos 15:40, 10 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Frankly, I find your casual removal of these items and subsequent harsh explanation to be counter to the community style that Wikipedia is all about. The stubs were designed to be expanded over the next few weeks - indeed, if one wants to write a large page, how do you start it without creating the first part of the page (especially in this case, where the research itself takes days).

You've now removed about two weeks of research - with a harsh 'don't do this', nor a helpful 'if you have to start a small page do it like this'.

Frankly - You seem annoyed that I am a newbie to Wikipedia - and therefore feel that it's your God-given right to smack me down for attempting to add to it. Why? Are you Gorean - do you have any knowledge of it at all, or are you randomly attempting to enrage people because you disagree with it? -- 12:46, 16 July 2006 Tiberiusgrant

Sorry, but I find it hard to imagine that these represented "two weeks of research", since as you left them, they were almost empty -- for example, "Gorean Characters" [1] contained exactly and only "Tarl Cabot" -- and no information whatsoever on him! Similarly http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Gorean_Cities_and_Locations&oldid=63042817 . And it wasn't just me, because someone else did for "Gorean Animals" [2] without my participating in the process for that page at all.

There are several things going on here: 1) The Gorean articles are especially sensitive, since people have strong conflicting opinions on many aspects of Gor, so that any addition to the Gor domain here pretty much has to prove its merit and its ability to stand up to harsh criticism from a number of viewpoints right from the start. This may be "unfair", but it's more or less a fact of life. 2) Many people were going to think that your articles were "Fancruft" or "Listcruft", so you should have taken special measures to include substantial solid content in your articles in order to avoid such perceptions. Instead, you left the articles almost empty. 3) You didn't follow standard Wikipedia conventions in a number of respects (such as including inappropriate capital letters in the names of articles, not linking to them in a standard way, etc.), which made it all the easier for other people to dismiss your contributions. 4) I was more brusque than "harsh".AnonMoos 14:10, 16 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

1) So you took it upon yourself to be the deliverer of this criticism, rather than editing the article and helping the newbie expand it properly? [fixing captilisation, helping, rather than viciously reverting?] I don't believe it's a fact of life - you're telling Me that there was no other alternative other than to revert, [not change, adjust, or help out?]. 2) So instead of gently pointing Me to these articles you chose to 'brusquely' turn Me away completely? Well done. How often do you do that and [surprise surprise] that person never contributes in that area ever again? [I'd like to hear the answer to that one] 3) No, I didn't follow standard Wikipedia conventions. That is perhaps the definition of a newb. Help Me - guide Me - Don't smack Me like a child. The standard Wikipedia approach is to 'fix', not simply revert - so - fix capitalisation, link them properly for me. The 'people' incidentally seemed primarily to be you. 4) I think that's splitting hairs - I'll still run with harsh, as there are clearly points I've made above where you should have approached this differently (in a more welcoming manner). Brusque would be 'do the right thing, but quickly', as opposed to harsh: 'do the wrong thing, and brusquely'. -- 16:27, 16 July 2006 Tiberiusgrant

Why not instead start by adding relevant subsections to the end of the Gor article, where we can "try out" some of your suggestions, and see whether they're worthy of eventually being separate articles or not? AnonMoos 14:10, 16 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

An excellent suggestion - a pity you didn't include this idea when casually erasing my work, or even moving it to the end yourself - "fix, don't revert". -- 16:27, 16 July 2006 Tiberiusgrant

P.S. If you had looked at Talk:Gor or Talk:Gorean, you could have easily seen that I've been one of the main editors on those pages over the last nine months or so... AnonMoos 14:10, 16 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Again - an excellent plan. Newbs are notorious for knowing the detailed inner workings and subtleties of new systems.-- 16:27, 16 July 2006 Tiberiusgrant

Hello and welcome to Wikipedia! I don't think AnonMoos was intentionally newbie biting :-( Sometimes people can come off harsher than they mean to. Amyway you are most welcome to contribute but we do generally like a minimum size for our stub articles. Basically we want some useful info (not contained already in another article) and maybe a couple of sentences or a short paragraph. As an example I started an article on the movie Scum with this the article has subsiquently been expanded considerably. I hope this helps, let me know if I can be of any assistance to you. Theresa Knott | Taste the Korn 13:43, 16 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for your help - much appreciated, and we'll aim to create a stack of information on a separate page somewhere before we link it in. Unfortunately, AnonMoos not only annoyed Me, but also a friend of Mine who is a gentle RL slave, and I tend to be somewhat protective of them (she was quite upset and shocked at her work evaporating - 'brusqueness' bordered on rudeness).-- 16:27, 16 July 2006 Tiberiusgrant

Probably not intentionally newbie biting, no - but his harsh attitude (which has continued above without any hint of contrition as far as I can tell) seems to be quite simple - even above there are references to items that no newbie could possibly know. In short: his attitude is "you should have known better. Why didn't you do this [you idiot]". A good example is "if you had looked at [two magic pages] ...", or "I find it hard to believe that they are two weeks of research". How long do you think it takes to read two books, noting the characters / items / towns, etc and the pages that they occur on? Tiberiusgrant 16:27, 16 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I'm moderately sorry if I hurt your feelings, but the cold hard fact is that the stubs you wrote were not salvageable in the short term unless someone were willing to do a lot of work in order to flesh them out into something more substantial -- and you didn't seem to be about to take on the task, and I didn't feel like cleaning up after you. And Wikipedia neither needs nor wants a list of all the characters in book 1 of the Gor series (including the most minor and trivial), accompanied by the page numbers on which each is first mentioned (in one particular printing of the book, that is!), but not by any other real information about them. A list of perhaps the five most important characters in the book, with some solid substantial description and information on each of them, would have been much more useful and welcome. And your outrage as a cruelly-mistreated newbie might be appropriately balanced with some of the willingness to learn suitable to someone who freely admits that he knows almost absolutely nothing about Wikipedia. Maybe you should have learned a little more, or discussed things over with some more experienced users, before unilaterally launching into a semi-major project in a very controversial subject area. AnonMoos 18:28, 16 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

So, to summarise your position: One tiny hint of contrition, followed by a yet more information on how badly the changes were executed. In short: 'get thee gone, newbie - you are a stain upon my Wikipedia landscape'. Yes, it's a semi-major project, as it's aiming to cover not just the first book, but all 26 books - in short, reading every book and filling out details on the characters, lands, creatures, etc that are found. Congratulations!! You have killed off some valuable Wikipedia contributions! I wonder how many times you've done that already, and will continue to do it as you 'own' Wikipedia content. I also have a feeling that the subject area is controversial due to the attitudes of an 'editor' of this content who - instead of guiding and following Wikipedia best practice with respect to article editing - is instead presiding over his fiefdom. Enjoy. 'Welcome to Wikipedia' - HAH! Have you contributed to the Gorean works, or are you simply 'presiding'? Tiberiusgrant