User:Technopat

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is wonder is pretty is wonder is pretty

Dear fellow Wikipedians, Not much of interest to include here except to say that I think Wikipedia is gr8, and to thank all you folks for being out there and helping to keep it all together. It’s well worth our while, whatever its failings.

I spend roughly half my time on Wikipedia reading up on stuff that interests me and the other half proofreading, editing, fixing redlinks, assuming good faith and/or reverting edits by vandals - following their often haphazard trails takes me to articles which I wouldn't normally touch with a bargepole and/or would never normally think of visiting but which can be interesting nonetheless. And once I'm there to revert vandalism and to tweak and to do whatever needs doing, my fingertips start itching and...

I have been known to slip up in my zeal and even to put my foot in it on occasions. If I have made an edit to your work, please take it in good faith and let me know if you disagree with it. Regards, --Technopat 23:47, 17 February 2007 (UTC)

Update I'd just like to thank all the editors who turned up to oppose deletion of the Darwin-Wallace Medal article. This incidence was literally the last straw in a series of events which, in my opinion, go against the whole spirit of Wikipedia.

I was actually in the middle of writing a note to put here declaring my need to take a break until well after summer, but this last-minute rally has restored my faith in common sense, the ability of people to be forward-thinking and other things which I won't mention 'cos it might get misinterpreted. Cheers Folks! --Technopat (talk) 01:02, 29 September 2008 (UTC)

Update I’d also like to thank all the Wikipedians – past and future – who keep an eye out on this page and my talk page and revert the occasional threatening and/or simple vandal edits. That said, I kinda wish that the article someone dedicated to me recently hadn’t been speedy deleted. To be notable enough for Wikipedia is great for the ego :) --Technopat (talk) 16:22, 13 June 2010 (UTC)

• Urgent update. Not feeling especially politically correct right now and need to get this one off my chest. Re. AfD, I don’t wish to generalise, but there seems to be a certain kind of editor – they know who they are – who spends a lot of time proposing articles for deletion. This, in principle, is all well and good, but it has certain drawbacks. Not only does it waste valuable time other editors and admins can usefully spend in the speedy delete process (preventing potentially unsuitable articles from appearing in the first place) and simple vandalism control, areas which are in much need of extra hands, but it also takes up the even more precious time some of us would like to devote to editing existing articles and even actually writing future ones. I suppose that somewhere or another the matter has already been dealt with by those who deal with such matters down in the boiler room, but if not, I’d like to propose some sort of control over the maximum number of AfDs an editor can do a month, if only to ensure that they also contribute constructively to this project in other tasks. Or something along the lines of the Rollback or Autoreviewer rights categories. And in answer to all those snarky cries of “Inclusionist!”, a quick look through my contributions will show that I do more than my fair share of speedy deletes. Not to mention anti–vandalising. Sigh!--Technopat (talk) 16:24, 14 June 2010 (UTC)

’Nother update re. the above and the spate of AfDs I have come across lately. I have so far participated in several AfDs – every single one of which has resulted in Keep with a minimum of effort. If it hasn’t already been done, maybe someone interested in mindless stats could assess the percentage of delete vs. keep of AfDs and the amount of time&space they occupy. The fact that all the ones I have participated in have been kept, i.e. notable by Wikipedia standards and consensus, leaves me with the nagging doubt as to whether the same is the case for the many others I never even noticed and which may have been deleted... --Technopat (talk) 23:41, 18 June 2010 (UTC)