Wikipedia:Editor review/Chaosdruid
Chaosdruid (talk · contribs · count) I have been around for a while now and would like to know where my skills are lacking and can be improved as well as how my current skills may be put to better use. Chaosdruid (talk) 00:16, 10 November 2010 (UTC)
Questions
- What are your primary contributions to Wikipedia? Are there any about which you are particularly pleased? Why?
- I would say that my main contributions are in editing and housekeping. My usual contributions are to improving articles as well as creating a few new ones; probably 60% of my time is spent here. I also have been house-keeping to a lesser extent, mainly in keeping an eye on the projects I am involved with as well as doing Wiki-housekeeping with ARS, GOCE tasks and trying to bring the robotics project up-to-date as well as the odd hour spent every week on recent changes watch or checking random pages for copyediting/ref improvement and more recently for copyvio and trying to reduce the backlog of over long articles from 2006 on; probably 20% of my time is spent here. The rest of my time has been mostly spent on learning policy and trying to understand how each project that I have joined has different needs and wants and how to achieve those by not getting stuck into one way of thinking. I have also tried to expand my skills by using AWB for pages under the robotics project scope as well as keeping the stats and project guides maintained on the portal. I have been really pleased with the amount of work I was able to put into all areas but especially with getting the hang of AWB and the amount I have learned about Wiki policy & procedure and actually being able to put it into practice has given me a much higher level of confidence over the last 9 months. I am also happy about the way I have managed to handle those awkward situations that arise when new users are turned from bad habits by showing them the right way to do things as well as collaborations with a few editors that have resulted in much better articles and understanding of procedures.
- Have you been in editing disputes 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? If you have never been in an editing dispute, explain how you would respond to one.
- Yes, I think every editor at some point will end up in a dispute, no matter how small or large. Whether or not they choose to follow through, how they approach it is the main factor in how that dispute will develop - It is the nature of editing that there will always be opinions that differ on even the most seeminlgy mundane of topics or even punctuation. I first tackled disputes in Cyprus articles where the debates get very heated very quickly and have always found it best to state that I am a neutral editor and to try and find common ground for all involved as I see that as the best way forwards. I see my role as to ensure MOS, policy and guidelines are followed and to point out to others that the point is the article, truth and fact. I have more recently been involved with a dispute where my neutrality was challenged in a rather big way and even after the warring editors had taken it as far as a couple of ANIs and an RfC I managed to keep a balanced approach and as the editor in question was at the resignation stage and exploding every hour or so I had still managed to keep a civil dialogue running with him as well as helping them with their work in other areas. I think that is the key, neutrality and focus on the article and its content. I would hope that there would never be a case that I could not keep my cool. Walking away from a dispute for a while or a day often leads to the editor seeing how silly their comments were and in 90% of the cases the matter is resolved within a day or two with focus returning to collaboration and improvement of the articles.
Reviews
I have come across you at the Guild of Copy Editors, and from what I can tell, you are definitely an experienced editor. Your content work is impressive, and you demonstrate knowledge of policy fairly well in your day-to-day editing activity. There are no problems with your civility that I can see. Something that I would recommend to you and any other user is vandal fighting. It teaches you about several policies (the vandalism policy and the blocking policy to name a couple), and it can also be a good way to relieve stress (as long as you don't leave bitey or incivil comments on a vandal's talk page). That's about it for my review. Happy editing! The UtahraptorTalk/Contribs 03:11, 12 November 2010 (UTC)