User talk:Maneetmahal

By Lionelt

Welcome to the inaugural issue of The Right Stuff, the newsletter of

The Right Stuff is a newsletter consisting of original reporting. Writers will use a

WikiProject Conservatism has a bright future ahead: this newsletter will allow us tell the story. All that's left to say is: "Let's roll!"

By Lionelt

A new style guide to help standardize editing was rolled out. It focuses on concepts, people and organizations from a conservatism perspective. The guide features detailed article layouts for several types of articles. You can help improve it

I am pleased to report that we have two new members:

By Lionelt

On August 3rd

By Lionelt

The Right Stuff caught up with

Q: Tell us a little about yourself.
A: I'm Dan, a Wikipedian since 2007, from North Carolina. I started out with an interest in history, robotics, style guidelines, and copyediting. These days, I'm the lead coordinator for the Military History Project and a reviewer of Featured Article Candidates. I've been an administrator and maintained WP:Update, a summary of policy changes, since 2008.

Q: What is your experience with WikiProjects?
A: I guess I'm most familiar with

Q: What makes a WikiProject successful?
A: A lot of occasional contributors who think of the project as fun rather than work, a fair number of people willing to write or review articles, a small core of like-minded people who are dedicated to building and maintaining the project, and access to at least a few people who are familiar with reviewing standards and with Wikipedia policies and guidelines.

Q: Do you have any tips for increasing membership?
A: Aim for a consistent, helpful and professional image. Let people know what the project is doing and what they could be doing, but don't push.

If you've got a core group interested in building a wikiproject, it helps if they do more listening than talking at first ... find out what people are trying to do, and offer them help with whatever it is. Some wikiprojects build membership by helping people get articles through the review processes.

By Lionelt

The arbitration request submitted by

By Lionelt

Was your article deleted in spite of your best efforts to save it? You should consider having a copy

WikiProject Conservatism is expanding. We now have a satellite on Commons. Any help in categorizing images or in getting the fledgling project off the ground is appreciated.

We have a few new members who joined the project in September. Please give a hearty welcome to

On October 7, WikiProject Conservatism was nominated for deletion by member Binksternet. He based his rationale on what he described as an undefinable scope, stating that the project is "at its root undesirable". Of the 40 participants in the discussion, some agreed that the scope was problematic; however, they felt it did not justify deletion of the project. A number of participants suggested moving the project to "WikiProject American conservatism". The overwhelming sentiment was expressed by Guerillero who wrote: "A project is a group of people. This particular group does great work in their topic area[,] why prevent them from doing this[?]" In the end there was negligible opposition to the project and the result of the discussion was "Keep". The proceedings of the deletion discussion were picked up by The Signpost, calling the unfolding drama "the first MfD of its kind". The Signpost observed that attempting to delete an active project was unprecedented. The story itself became a source of controversy which played out at the Discuss This Story section, and also at the author's talk page.

Two days after the project was nominated, the

In other news, a new portal focusing on conservatism has been created at WikiSource. Wikisource is an online library of free content publications with 254,051 accessible texts. One highlight of the portal's content is Reflections on the Revolution in France by Edmund Burke.

October saw a 6.4% increase in new members, bringing the total membership to 58. Seven of the eight new members joined after October 12; the deletion discussions may have played a role in the membership spike.

Click here to keep up to date on all the happenings at WikiProject Conservatism.

By Lionelt

Timeline of conservatism, a Top-importance list, was nominated for deletion on October 3. The nominator stated that since conservatism in an "ambiguous concept", the timeline suffers from original research. There were a number of "Delete", as well as "Keep" votes. The closing administrator reasoned that consensus dictated that the list be renamed. The current title is Timeline of modern American conservatism.

By Lionelt

On January 21,

Member

By Lionelt

Another discussion addressing the project scope began in December. Nine alternatives were presented in the contentious, sometimes heated discussion. Support was divided between keeping the exitsing scope, or adopting a scope with more specificity. Some opponents of the specific scope were concerned that it was too limiting and would adversely affect project size. About twenty editors participated in the discussion.

Inclusion of the article Ku Klux Klan (KKK) was debated. Supporters for inclusion cited sources describing the KKK as "conservative." The article was excluded with more than 10 editors participating.

Project membership continues to grow. There are currently 73 members. Member

Click here to keep up to date on all the happenings at WikiProject Conservatism.

By Lionelt

Articles about the GOP presidential candidate and staunch traditional marriage supporter have seen an explosion of discussion. On January 8 an RFC was opened

The Abortion case