User:Mostlyharmless
__This user occasionally edits Wikipedia.__
I'm a recent MPhil in Indonesian history from the Australian National University, and current public health student at the University of Auckland.
Featured Pictures
I spend a lot of time over at
A few thoughts on editing
The first rule of Wikipedia is, and should always be "
Wikipedia is now a bureaucracy, with thousands of self-appointed
As a result, I've given up on editing in article space. I've also pretty much given up on creating articles. I know that plenty of others feel the same.
incr This editor is an incrementalist.
Plenty of people think Wikipedia is almost full, that 3 million articles is almost there. Rubbish. In my area of study there are perhaps 100,000 places (applying the same notability standard as is applied to places in the United States and UK) that each deserve an article. That's just geography, in one country. Deletionists will turn Wikipedia into a stagnant pool. This place thrives on the joy of creation, and fails when that is stifled.
"[[Wikipedia is not a random collection of information. It is an encyclopedia. It is a tertiary source. Everything on here ought to link back to secondary sources." - User:Esperant
Reference relentlessly. If something doesn't have references to reliable sources, search for them and add them (before you take it to
Books and peer reviewed journals trump the internet 9 times out of 10. Google Book Search and Google Scholar are absolutely indispensable, but not the end of a search. The internet has great limitations, especially for subjects in languages you don't speak, and things that were notable more than 10 years ago, or things that haven't been digitised.
Wikipedia:Notability says that if something has received coverage "...by sources [that] address the subject directly in detail" "...in reliable sources that are independent of the subject" it stays. As simple as that.
Wikipedia:Verifiability says "In general, the most reliable sources are peer-reviewed journals and books published in university presses; university-level textbooks; magazines, journals, and books published by respected publishing houses; and mainstream newspapers. As a rule of thumb, the greater the degree of scrutiny involved in checking facts, analyzing legal issues, and scrutinizing the evidence and arguments of a particular work, the more reliable it is."
Wikipedia:Reliable sources says "Wikipedia relies heavily upon the established literature created by scientists, scholars and researchers around the world. Items that fit this criterion are usually considered reliable. However, they may be outdated by more recent research, or controversial in the sense that there are alternative scholarly explanations. Wikipedia articles should point to all major scholarly interpretations of a topic.
mi-1 He tapepa rawa te reo Māori o tēnei tangata. | |
---|
fr-1 | Cet utilisateur peut contribuer avec un niveau élémentaire de français. |
- The material has been thoroughly vetted by the scholarly community. This means published in peer-reviewed sources, and reviewed and judged acceptable scholarship by the academic journals.
- Items that are recommended in scholarly bibliographies are preferred.
- Items that are signed are more reliable than unsigned articles because it tells whether an expert wrote it and took responsibility for it"
I'm not down with User:rednamespacelinks. If you have a red user name and do not wish to create a userpage (which is a perfectly reasonable wish), please redirect it to your talk.
I tend to create stubs (see below), and watch them grow, rather than expand existing articles. Kinda like Johnny Appleseed.
My creations
- Biographies and People
- Busineses
- Film and images
- Geography
- Language
- Music
- News
- Organisations
- Publications
- Universities
- Scientific
- To do list
Articles I've saved
I actually think that this section is just as important as the stuff above. These are articles on subjects for which non-trivial coverage in Reliable Sources exists, and which people put effort into creating. This is by no means an exhaustive list, as I've saved many more things over the years. Most things at
- Biographical articles
- Books, music and culture
- Concepts
- Food
- History and politics
Lok Bhalai Party, Siege of Catubig
- Places
- Science and technology
Relevant external link
The Australian National University's Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies