User:Falcon Kirtaran

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Flags

WikiStress level: 0.25/3 or 8.33%

This user is interested in the belief that displaying userboxes does not divide the Wikipedia community but rather emphasises its diversity.

SI	This user prefers the metric system of measurement.

pno-1

This user is a novice pianist.

clar-1

This user is a novice clarinetist.

voc-3

This user is an advanced vocalist.

C-3

This user is an advanced C user.

C++

This user can program in C++.

vb	This user is a Visual Basic programmer.

prog-2

This user is an intermediate programmer.

G	This user uses Google as a primary search engine.

This user uses Wikipedia as a primary point of reference.

SHW

This user's internet service provider is Shaw Cable.

BB	This user contributes using a broadband connection.

P2P

This user uses P2P file-sharing services unashamedly.

This user contributes using Mozilla Firefox.

g	This user contributes using Gentoo Linux.

This user contributes with
KDE.

This user contributes using a laptop.

CBC

This user is a CBC Radio fanatic.

This user reads broadsheet newspapers.

SW	This user has a shortwave radio.

This user enjoys classical music.

This user enjoys jazz music.

This user fancies Celtic music.

Mis

This user can hear the people sing.

This user is interested in politics.

This user is interested in religion.

This user enjoys writing.

This user enjoys electronics or is an electronics hobbyist.

Editing Wikipedia is something this user does as a hobby.

This user is interested in chemistry.

This user is farsighted.

Secondhand smoke is one of this user's pet peeves.

This user obsessively drinks lots of Water and can be considered Aquaholic.

This user is male.

This user comes from Canada.

This user's Canada includes Québec.

This user comes from Alberta.

This user comes from Calgary.

This user's time zone is MST.

man-
kind

Regarding gender, this user will use the vernacular, not what is "politically correct".

to / too
/ two

This user thinks that too many people have no idea how to use words that they should have learned in grade two.

which & that

This user knows how to use which and that correctly.

their / there / they’re

This user thinks that there are too many people who don’t know that they’re worse than their own children at spelling!

your/ you’re

This user thinks that if your grammar is incorrect, then you’re in need of help.

“,;:’

This user is a punctuation stickler.

. The

This user puts two spaces after a full stop.

,	This user fixes comma splices. They are annoying.

A, B, and C

This user prefers the serial comma.

its

This user understands the difference between its (of it) and it's (it is).

’s	Thi's user know's that not every word that end's with s need's an apostrophe and will remove misused apostrophe's from Wikipedia with extreme prejudice.

"…"

This user favours typewriter style quotation marks over typographic ones.

CA	This user uses Canadian English spelling.

AIM-Able

This user understands AIM talk perfectly well, but does not use it. Ever. Well, sarcastically sometimes. But that's it. Really. lulz.

This user is a member of the League of Copyeditors.

The intent of this userpage is to introduce myself and provide explanations for and the motives behind my various actions.

[edit] About me

I am 18 years old and a proud Albertan. I have an interest in modern mythology, religion, politics, law, education, music, chemistry, and (nearly foremost) computing. I was an assistant system admin at my school at one point in time, and I am currently the de facto system administrator in my house (which has two linux servers and a number of Windows boxes, linux laptops and a stodgy old WinME that is mysteriously still running). Some friends of mine and I are currently creating a linux distribution. I am also a debater, and went to the ADSA provincials in 2006, competing in the semifinal round, in addition to the IDEA ITOC in that same year and the following one, and the North American Debating Championship in 2006. Additionally, I filled the positions of head editor of the Carroll Voice (now-defunct newspaper of Bishop Carroll High School) and was the president (or director internal) of the Bishop Carroll High School Debate Federation. Also, I was the C instructor in the Bishop Carroll Computer Club.

Currently, I'm the president of the much-embattled University of Lethbridge Speech and Debate Society and a BASc. student at the aforementioned school, studying computer science and kinesiology on the way to law school. I also work as an IMAC technician to keep money flowing into my education habit.

My (legal, believe it or not) given name is Falcon Darkstar, which is not to be confused with the other person who goes by the alias Falcon Darkstar (who cropped up recently and seems to write fan fiction) or falcondarkstar (whose name is on a livejournal I would not personally have ever written or thought). Incidentally, I believe that people should be entitled to a degree of anonymity on the Internet; I simply choose to waive part of it here, think what one will.

[edit] My Editing Pattern

My editing pattern is such that it is sometimes very heavy during the summer months, though it becomes lighter for the remainder of the year due to the burdensome demands of my school workload and various extracurricular activities such as debate and the school paper.

Often, as has been seen in the past, I can reach several hundred edits a day during the peak period, which is obviously rarely sustainable. This is because the vast majority of my edits are syntactical or semantic, or deal with categorization.

[edit] Dragon

Yes, it is a conspiracy. Now leave me alone!

[edit] Adminship

I am not currently requesting adminship. I intend to do so again someday in the distant future when I have more time, if ever I somehow miraculously come into lots of time. Squawk.

[edit] My Contributions

I regularly look through random articles (and crawl wikilinks) to check for stubs, and tag and try to expand those which are, in addition to other various chores. I edit wherever I see fit, regardless of the article content. I also consider it very important to be involved in debates and PoV disputes in a civil manner, and I abhor those who make the debates into uncivil arguments based on their personal bias - that's not what this project is about.

If I see an act of vandalism, I will generally take a look at the editor's summary, registered or no. I do not believe that this is an action against the user in particular, as I do not treat those edits with any prejudice - I'm simply looking for other edits in the same bad faith. I often find them, but I will never simply revert a large portion of someone's work pro argumentum ad hominem.

In light of my seething hate of incorrect punctuation breaking up sentence structure, and for love of a decent semicolon, I am involved in WikiProject Punctuation when I have any time for it. Comma splices and mislaid apostrophes must die (a la "not every word that end's in an S need's an apostrophe, comma splice's are evil" - and look how ungrammatical it looks.

Why? Sources that cannot grasp the simple concepts of the language in which they are written have precious little credibility. Would you trust someone on a topic of any complexity when they made all kinds of blatant errors? Whether the apprehension is true or not, it makes the work appear sloppy and prone to error or omission.

I also make a number of contributions to the various pages on Therianthropy and the like, in addition to the discussions thereof. I'm firmly of the opinion (indeed, the obvious opinion) that documented instances of the discussion thereof are primary sources, and that it is not inappropriate for Wikipedia to make use of them - not as proof of the content therein, but as proof that someone or a number of people have written it. The knowledge contained in Wikipedia need not be constrained to things that are the target of significant academic study; after all, it's not paper. We just have to be careful not to lose credibility by stating facts where none exist.

[edit] What I Am Not

A deletionist. I believe that if a page is a borderline case, it should be voted on, and that stubs and small topics should be included. After all, wikipedia is not limited in space anywhere near as much as a book, even as it is not a repository of useless information.
A troll. Sometimes I look at other edits a person has made if they have done something I strongly disagree with, but only to ensure I have not missed a smelly mess
At all tolerant of POV-driven editing and decision-making, particularly the aggravating sort which come from thoughtless media parroting and the like
A friend of people who petition to delete pages that have already been voted as kept, or constantly revert useful work, or insidiously attempt to discredit pages with unwarranted tags

[edit] Opinions

This is a collection of paragraphs which state and justify opinions I hold.

[edit] Wikipedia Is Not an Indiscriminate Repository of Information

In my viewpoint, the statement that Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate repository of information is a particularly contentious and loosely-defined one. Naturally, it cannot simply include all possible information; if it were to, we might as well type up the telephone book and a table of seismic data, and place both of them in here. However, I am firmly of the opinion that topics should not need to be widely recognised or scholarly to be included. Of course things like vanity pages should be disallowed, but that is because they are an attempt to create credibility rather than provide information. Information on specific modern beliefs, however, clearly does not fall into this category. We should include information such as that because it is valid, not exclude it because it is not necessarily scholarly.

[edit] NPOV should not apply to userspace

Of course, as is evident from my userpage, I am strongly of the opinion that NPOV policy should not be applied to userspace. This is for a great deal of reasons. The first of these relates directly to the justification for NPOV itself: that Wikipedia should not be a repository of biased information. This is significant because Wikipedia is essentially an unbiased work (or collection of works) which is created by intrinsically biased people. Nobody can honestly state that they have absolutely no bias or viewpoint, because we are perspective-oriented beings with unique paradigms. As we can clearly see, then, it is not necessary to pretend to be a community of people without a viewpoint in order to create an unbiased work: there are enough users to balance this out, and we are all called to be mature enough to write in the most unbiased, NPOV form possible. The second reason is related to the point of a userpage - to introduce oneself and what one does. This is a valuable tool, because it allows for much greater understanding within the community (thereby potentially quieting some heated fights) and a greater sense of community among editors. If we did not profile our perspective, Wikipedia would be quite a soulless place indeed. Also, it might allow people to avoid conflicts with those who obviously (from the userpage) have a very different viewpoint, and it can put a person's actions in perspective. As the expression of ideas is in userspace, it does not in and of itself bias article space.

The only justification for not allowing personal expression in userspace, then, is the idea that it might lead to bands of like-minded people using aggressive editing tactics. However, I firmly believe that if that should become a problem, it can be solved in other ways through existing structures (RfC, etc.). To advocate censorship in the interest of preventing immature activity places Wikipedians in general on the same level as kindergarten students - it is insulting to the community, and brings Wikipedia down to the lowest common denominator. Such an action might even be called a cousin to protecting all significant pages, or banning the community at large as though they were vandals.

Censorship of any sort, in my opinion, goes directly against the values which Wikipedia espouses and destroys the community, sense of belonging, and possibility of teamwork. Therefore, such a ban must not be implemented.

[edit] Citation as regards newer phenomena

This essay regards a method of dealing with the reality that there are ample cultural phenomena which are relatively new (circa 1990) and have little academic material published on them, and what precisely Wikipedia ought in my opinion to do about it in order to improve its scope.