User talk:Trevdna

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Feel free to talk to me. However, please be forwarned:

I will post in every conversation where the last post occurred.

Thanks, and happy posting! -Trevdna

Contents 1 Welcome 2 Early life of Joseph Smith, Jr. -- featured status vote 3 Attaboy 4 Help desk question 5 George Washington Farewell Address... 6 FairTax 7 LDS projects 8 Wikipedia:Latter Day Saint Collaboration of the fortnight 9 Staying current on WP:LDS 10 Joseph Smith, Jr. 11 Checking Up

[edit] Welcome

Hi Trevdna, and welcome to Wikipedia! Thanks for joining the coolest online encyclopedia I know of. I hope you stick around. You'll probably find it easiest to start with a tutorial of how the wikipedia works, and you can test stuff for yourself in the sandbox. Check out the simplified ruleset. When you're contributing, you'll probably find the manual of style to be helpful, and you'll also want to remember a couple important guidelines.

1. Write from a neutral point of view
2. Be bold in editing pages
3. Use wikiquette.

Those are probably the most important ones, and you can take a look at some others at the policies and guidelines page. You might also be interested in how to write a great article and possibly adding some images to your articles.

Be sure to get involved in the community – you can contact me on my talk page if you have any questions, and you can check out the village pump, where lots of wikipedians hang out and discuss things. If you're looking for something to do, check out the community portal. And whenever you ask a question or post something on a talk page, be sure to sign your name by typing 4 tildes like ~~~~. Always sign the talk page, never the articles.

Again, welcome! It's great to have you. Happy editing!--May the Force be with you! Shreshth91($ |-| r 3 $ |-| t |-|) 12:08, 27 November 2005 (UTC)

Thanks man, I appreciate it! Nevermind the fact that I've learned almost all that in the nearly two months I've been here; it's really great to know that someone is looking out for me here! However, the simplified ruleset is something I hadn't come across. Thanks again! Trevdna 15:16, 28 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Early life of Joseph Smith, Jr. -- featured status vote

Thanks for your suggestions on the peer review page. The article is now up for featured article status. Please vote here, if you can. COGDEN 22:35, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

Early life Joseph Smith will be featured on the Main Page on the front page on the 23rd. Vandalism will probably be frequent that day. Could you help in monitoring the page? The 23rd starts at 7 pm ET on Dec 22nd, since wikipedia goes by UTC. Thx in advance. Trödel•talk 22:40, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

Sure - I would be glad to help, but I'm not sure how much time I'll have that day - my parents will probably want me to help with last-minute Christmas preparations and such. --Trevdna 17:58, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

Thanks, I know it will be a busy day, so it will be a great group effort. I did have the day off but now I have Mon off instead so I have a lot less time than I planned. Trödel•talk 19:41, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

I wasn't able to get to the computer, and it slipped my mind anyway - sorry I couldn't help at all. --Trevdna 02:54, 24 December 2005 (UTC)

NP - Hope you were able to get lots of fun Christmas stuff done - Have a good day. Trödel•talk 03:04, 24 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Attaboy

You are a trooper. Keep with us on the WP:LDS articles. Good will come of it. Tom Haws 00:04, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

Of course I mean the above. I am personally delighted to have your personal attention to the LDS Church article. And I am sure the article will be the better for it, and other articles as well if you aren't already worn out. I have been at Wikipedia for two years. That is long enough to learn to see and appreciate sincere comments and offers to assist. Tom Haws 03:46, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Help desk question

Regarding your question on the help desk - you might want to read wikipedia:Copyright FAQ Raul654 20:03, 24 December 2005 (UTC)

Thank you - this is very helpful. --Trevdna 20:08, 24 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] George Washington Farewell Address...

I actually wrote the whole address and added it but people started removing exerts which go over in detail the important parts of the address. Quotes are different from exerts. It really goes over his advice to the nation on how people should act towards religion, foreign policy, morality, and political parties etc. It describes the address which quotes would not. This was the body of the address which answers many important questions that people have. Many people do not grasp why Washington felt that political parties are subversive and I feel that it's imperative to explain why Washington felt that way in more detail to answer peoples questions. You also wont find these exerts and detailed info in any other place and schools certainly wont say anything about the address except briefly saying that he advised the country to stay out of foreign entanglements.

-Eric

That section of the article is on the Farewell Address and the ideas it was trying to espouse. We summarize it, and offer links (inline citations) to the full text for anyone who wants to know. But just quoting the whole thing in the middle of a Wikipedia article doesn't get across the message you were trying to. Summarizing it in greater depth in the (sub)section (Geroge Washington stated the he felt *** about *** and he detailed his resaoning in the address, located here) is an option, but quoting it in the middle of the article as block text (with little explanation or context) isn't helpful.

Even as it is, with the link to the text, it feels unnessicary to quote it - what purpose does it serve? --Trevdna 05:02, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] FairTax

Sorry it took me so long to get to this but you caught me in the middle of a vacation and I’ve been slow getting back into my wikihabits. Anyways, regarding the FairTax article I now offer these comments:

• As I stated before, always be considering and re-considering the structure. An example of a possible improvements could include creating simpler headings (like “The FairTax tax rate and tax base” → “Taxation rate” or “Effective household tax burden” → “Tax burden”). Also, the sections “Predicted benefits”, “Effects on…” and “Other indirect effects” all seem to have the same general theme. These could be re-organized to “Economic effects” using the more realistic (genuinely academic) studies and “Predicted benefits and costs” with more value-judgement-based (advocacy or one-sided) studies.
• It still needs some images with colour to help the reader get through that ten pages of text on the impacts of taxation policy. Simple pie or bar charts would help the “tax burden comparison” and other parts involving calculations or comparisons.
• The article needs to be more balanced in terms of pro vs. con (positive vs. negative impacts). I realize that there are many more “pro” sources and studies but the editors must use their judgements in what is important and relevant (strong arguments), what is inconsequential and what is just fear-mongering/promising-the-world.
• I’m sure in your research on this subject you found many claims as open to inpretation and the pro/con sides to ‘careful’ with their statements. As this could be a controversial political topic, the editors need to have a comprehensive view of the arguments in order to present them clearly. Two misleading statements that stuck out for me are:
  • ”… making the overall policy effectively progressive in nature.” in the opening paragraph...it is my understanding that national sales taxes are actually regressive…to everybody living above the poverty line.
  • ” Supporters estimate that the economy will be 10 to 14 percent larger within 10 years…” opposed to the last ten years? Don’t all stable economies grow between 10-20% every 10 years?
• The “Pending task list” looks fine. In addition to it, more history on the topic (prior to 2003) and what the sticking points are (why it hasn’t been passed yet) might be interesting (but perhaps not necessary) in the “Leg. overview” section. Also, the new referencing system m:Cite/Cite.php might help keep track of the references. --maclean25 20:17, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] LDS projects

In response to your general notice: I am active in LDS articles -- although they are not my exclusive interest. You will find my ID on several recent postings including the LDS project page and the fortnight/quarterly/whatever project (that is a frustrating area). So, in general, count me in.

However, I take a little exception to your general opinion that things have slacked off. You may not be aware of how much work was done by a number of LDS project members on the successful effort to have the Early life of Joseph Smith, Jr. named as a featured article in December. In a real sense, that was our group project for about 6 weeks. COGDEN took a strong lead, but many LDS project members acted as copy editors and researchers. I suspect that any Wiki participation lag since Joseph's birthday has been due to the fact that our members have had to compensate, in their real lives, for the time they devoted to the featured article. Plus the holidays, of course. So -------- give them a few weeks and I expect to see their names again.

If I can be self-critical, however, I think that our LDS project here has an underlying problem or two. Wiki is by nature a libertarian style project -- with each person acting independently and boldly. Wiki tries to compensate for this inate lack of organization by seeking a form of concensus, electing administrators and organizing projects around common interests. However, LDS culture is highly structured in a heirarchy. I suspect the LDS membership here feels like a fish on a bicycle when it comes to doing things without any such structure. So, we leave little notes for one another and hope someone leads out. The group might be better off electing a leader or organizing a couple of committees or something. But, several people have tried to organize things more tightly, and then seemed to become discouraged. In addition, I think our real lives intrude when we try and place a time frame on a project (i.e. the fortnight/monthly/quarterly idea), as many of us are tightly scheduled with work, family and church responsibilties. I often feel I am stealing time from those things to work on Wiki -- even though it is great recreation for me.

So, after ranting about it, I commend you for your effort in trying to draw our attention to the state of the project. As we have a number of relatively new members, it would be wonderful to start a new dialog about how the project should run. I look forward to contributing as I can. Best wishes. WBardwin 01:48, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

I concur. No one's really been working on the things in the Project Box, but I think most of us keep the project pages on our watchlist and check them out when they're updated, and participate in discussion. We all work on and police articles about Mormonism frequently. We've just not been paying much attention to the Expand, To Do, Cleanup, etc. sections of the project box.

I don't know if it's so much that we lack organization as it is that we all have other things to do and tend to only work on what is deemed particularly important. I mean we could improve surely but I don't think there's any major flaws in our project besides business or indifference.

However, I have noticed that there are a few people in Category:LDS Wikipedians that I've not seen on any LDS articles. Maybe you should try soliciting them. And hey man those who are in LDS and in the project but not in this category should fix that. cookiecaper (talk / contribs) 02:43, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

Got your note as well. I appreciate the initiative. I'm actually already at work on the Jeff Lindsay article, albeit very slowly. Will keep an eye on the project page when possible; I mix this in as a distraction from graduate studies and tend to do things rather sporadically. Deadsalmon 19:09, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

OK, I did not try to imply that anyone was lazy, or even that any one in particular was inactive. However, the activity levels on the LDS articles overall is severly lacking. Thank you for your comments.

Also, I just realized something. To prevent stuff like this from happening anymore, if someone is working on an open task, it would be a great idea to sign their name beneath the article with a little comment that it was being worked on actively. That way, we may be able to get an idea for what is happening, and what still needs to be done.--Trevdna 15:21, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Wikipedia:Latter Day Saint Collaboration of the fortnight

Point of annoyance -- I'm not a programmer and I hate templates! Why do we need a template to nominate a new article? It's not as if a rigid format is necessary to understand a nomination. I think the Mormon Battalion article would be a good candidate (see talk page) - and will nominate it once I have an hour to figure out the stupid template. There -- griping done, feel a little better. Sorry to take it out on you. Well, Mormon Pioneer would be a good project and still has my vote, and I've recently done some work on Isaac Morley. Hope to see this collaboration move forward a little. Best......... WBardwin 23:30, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

Umm... did you try the whole "Wikipedia:Latter Day Saint Collaboration of the fortnight#To nominate an article, please click on "edit" on the right section? It's rather straightforward from there... Also, why are you griping to me??? --Trevdna 15:10, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

No offense -- you had just adjusted that section last. When I wanted to nominate, I found the silly template again, and you seem interested in the collaboration process. Best ....... WBardwin 01:12, 14 January 2006 (UTC)

Trevdna, Welcome aboard the WP:LDS. Glad to have some new blood on board. Excellent work. Also, please make sure to add Mormonism-related articles to List of articles about Mormonism. -Visorstuff 20:58, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Staying current on WP:LDS

Trevdna, welcome to WP:LDS. My best way for seeing all the activity on the project is to keep WP:LDS on my watchlist. And in return, when there is significant activity at any particular article, I bring it up at the project page or talk page. It seems to work pretty well for me. Anyway, we have made tremendous strides since I first showed up in 2003. I just wish the other languages like Spanish could get off the ground. Tom Haws 18:55, 25 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Joseph Smith, Jr.

A request for mediation has been filed with the Mediation Committee that lists you as a party. The Mediation Committee requires that all parties listed in a mediation must be notified of the mediation. Please review the request at Wikipedia:Requests for mediation/Joseph Smith, Jr., and indicate whether you agree or refuse to mediate. If you are unfamiliar with mediation, please refer to Wikipedia:Mediation. There are only seven days for everyone to agree, so please check as soon as possible.

[edit] Checking Up

Haven't seen you in a while and thought I'd check on you. I see you've decieded to take a break. The FairTax article has been getting better and better and I'm continuing efforts to make it a Featured Article. I hope to see you back writing again soon! Morphh 20:35, 15 June 2006 (UTC)