User talk:Peter Bell

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[edit] March 2008

Hi, the recent edit you made to History of Australia has been reverted, as it appears to be unconstructive. Use the sandbox for testing; if you believe the edit was constructive, ensure that you provide an informative edit summary. You may also wish to read the introduction to editing. Thanks. Steve Crossin (talk) 08:28, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Thuringowa history

Hi thanks for this info, i will look into it and add/update the areas that need it, the only book i have about Thuringowa's history is one by Diane vance, called Thuringowa past and present, but it's last update was 1997 so again i thank you for your info and will go and get them ASAP. Thanks heaps Thuringowacityrep (talk) 10:24, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Great Barrier Reef history

Dear Sir, thank you very much for letting me know about the existence of your book - I am very much interested in pursuing the topic, but unfortunately I don't readily have access to a copy of your book. As a stop-gap, I'd like to put its' title in the "Further reading" section of the main Great Barrier Reef article. Hopefully I will have the chance to pursue finding a copy of your book at some future date (probably not before mid-June). If this is unacceptably slow for you, theoretically, you could paraphrase from your own book to improve the article, but some people might get a bit iffy about that, thinking that you're trying to use Wikipedia to promote your own views or some other such rubbish. Your book should count as a reliable source regardless of who eventually uses it as a source in the article, as it is published by AIMS, and, of course, you are a highly professional person.

I see that you have been doing some extensive re-writes of Australian history articles - it would be very much helpful if you could cite some sources, as it helps other people to be able to find out more. Please let me know if my stop-gap idea is acceptable to you, or if you would like any assistance with citing on Wikipedia. -Malkinann (talk) 04:21, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

I've plugged it into the Further reading section, does it look right? I've also written (myself?) a note on Talk:Great Barrier Reef to remind me that those sources you've pointed me at are relevant to that part. I'm ever-so-slightly morbidly curious as to how you think the two articles stack up (the main one and Environmental threats to the Great Barrier Reef), as broad, high-school level aimed overviews, but that way madness lies. Having an article critiqued by an academic who has professionally written on the topic would be the Holy Grail of trying to gain featured article status (the best articles on Wikipedia). Part of the reason I'm concerned you're not citing your cleanups and fact-changing is that sometimes, if it's controversial or little-known, people will just remove the (completely true) work, without bothering to check it out. With a citation next to it, or a reference list, then they should know to go 'hey, this seems wrong and dumb, but they reckon it comes from this source'. Depending on how enthusiastic the person is, they will either read the book or be trust that if there's a source, it must be true. The small works you've been performing on Wikipedia are valuable - I don't want to see them deleted just because someone didn't trust them. -Malkinann (talk) 13:16, 19 May 2008 (UTC)