User:Cedders

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I didn't often log in until April 2006, but made several random additions and corrections anonymously from 2004 onwards. I'm most interested in history of ideas, politics, science fiction, and artificial intelligence. --Cedderstalk /Toolbox /Proposals /...

[edit] Mission

Please don't take offence if I mark a page that you have started for deletion or speedy deletion. Instead please see What Wikipedia is not, Wikipedia:List of bad article ideas, and whichever is appropriate of the following guidelines for notability:

I do a bit of new changes/pages patrolling and may start helping with one or more of the following tasks:

My IRC name on freenode.net is 'Ceddrs'.

[edit] Editing philosophy

Wikipedia by definition is not adding to the sum total of human knowledge. The most it can hope to do is present some existing knowledge in a convenient, concise form. However, a major part of that must be summarising paper sources which are not already available through the web - perhaps the best web commentaries and summaries should still be in static pages outside Wikipedia along with original research.

Is Wikipedia reliable? No, I would not rely on it for anything at all important. Of course all editors are hoping it will tend towards accuracy, but because of vandalism and inexperienced editing article will always vary in quality.

I tend towards inclusionism, although would prefer the coverage of Wikipedia to be a bit more even - there is a lot of information about current TV programmes, say, but much less about 20th century writers. Therefore I am also attracted by mergism.

One exception to erring on the side of inclusion is where an article or insertion obviously has a public relations or promotional provenance. Attempts to remove point-of-view are usually only partially successful even if most of the article is deleted. I believe this kind of abuse of Wikipedia should be strongly discouraged by deletion, as in fact usually happens if the new pages patrollers are alert enough. Please see my /Proposals that there could be more structured referral of these editors to other Wikis where NPOV would not be an issue.

[edit] The obligatory userboxes

This user tries to do the right thing. If they make a mistake, please let him or her know.
they This user considers singular they standard English usage.
mankind This user supports the use of gender-neutral language.
A, B, and
A and B		 This user prefers to use the serial comma only when its omission can be confusing.
no ads This user is against commercials in Wikipedia.
en This user is a native speaker of English.
eo-1 Ĉi tiu uzanto povas komuniki per baza nivelo de Esperanto


Durham University coat of arms This user studies or studied at Durham University.
This user provides information using user boxes for statistical reasons.
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INTP This user has an INTP personality
per the Myers-Briggs typing system
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but not narrow.
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= This user supports the Make Trade Fair campaign.
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This user is a pirate. Arrr!
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This user is a
Citizen of the Galaxy‡
and nothing else matters.
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