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	Thank you Kotra for stepping forward and reading this. When the dust settles on your first adoption it will be Misplaced Pages's gain if you choose to adopt anew. Good luck with that! ] (]) 18:52, 4 January 2009 (UTC)		Thank you Kotra for stepping forward and reading this. When the dust settles on your first adoption it will be Misplaced Pages's gain if you choose to adopt anew. Good luck with that! ] (]) 18:52, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

			:Thanks for the response and the kind words. I think we generally agree, so I'll just briefly go over the couple details we don't agree on, and then propose a change to the wording at ] that reflects our agreement.
			:Your quoting is a bit misleading out of context. I said he could come to me for mediation (not protection), and that I could advocate for him "''if being unfairly accused or harassed''", continuing with "but don't assume I'll always be an ally: if you do something wrong I'll let you know". I think this clearly states I will not be a shield for him, and if he misinterpreted that (which, judging by his , he didn't), that was not my doing. I never intentionally communicated to him that I would be a shield, and if he somehow thought that originally, he soon was disavowed of it once I began complaining about his incivil edits.
			:I could have harped on him every time he did not assume good faith, yes. Instead, there were a couple instances when I did not because either he had already been criticized enough by other editors for it (I don't like to "pile on"), or I simply was not around. I do not afford a lot of time to Misplaced Pages, and there have been points where the adoption has used up nearly all of my allotted Misplaced Pages time (now, for instance).
			:Regardless. I think my adoption may have been closer to a mentorship than adoption is usually intended to be. I found this necessary due to the actions of the adoptee, and I hope that wasn't out of line for me to take it in that direction. But I think we can agree that neither adoption nor mentorship is a shield. I have put my proposal below in a sub-section so other editors will see it more readily. -] (]) 23:38, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

			=== Proposed addition ===
			On ], I propose adding under "Adoption is not:" the following bullet:
			* A shield. Adoptees remain solely responsible for their behavior.

			I think this would help adoptees (and adopters who read the adoptee's area) from getting the wrong idea about the adopt-a-user system. Thoughts? -] (]) 23:38, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

	==Adopter not yet ready?==		==Adopter not yet ready?==

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Inactive adoptees

I'm not sure if this has been discussed before, but I've noticed that my adoptees have become inactive (three last edited in January 2008, and one a year ago). Given the long period of time, I'm assuming that they are not coming back, either because they got bored with Misplaced Pages and decided it wasn't for them, or I'm a bad adopter—I'm hoping not the latter.

I wondered if there are other cases of this or if some standard practice is in place. Frankly, I'm not sure if I should keep the adoptee boxes on my userpage for people I don't think will return to editing, but I worry they may pop back in think I've forgotten about them. Any thoughts? (Guyinblack25 21:38, 20 August 2008 (UTC))

Hi Guyinblack25, i've found that if you dont think your adoptee will come back to the project, they usually won't. It won't be anything you've done that's driven them away, some people just don't find the project is for them. Previously i have had adoptees stop adopting, and i've found that the best way to deal with it is to leave a note on the adoptees talk page, stating that you are ending the adoption, but then say that if they do come back, you will happily pick up were you left off as adopter. Then you can happily remove the boxes. Hope this helps. Reece (Talk) (Contributions) 22:20, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Hi GIB! I actually don't display a userbox for each individual adoptee, I have a table (User talk:Xenocidic/wikiadopt/header) transcluded onto my main adoption page (User talk:Xenocidic/wikiadopt) and when they become inactive, I just "noinclude" them on the table so they don't get transcluded onto the main adoption page and make a note of their last edit date. Feel free to robbe anything you want from my pages. –xeno (talk) 22:24, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the feedback. (Guyinblack25 22:58, 20 August 2008 (UTC))

question

are u allowed to have more than one adopter, --Daisy404 (talk) 20:48, 25 August 2008 (UTC)daisy404--Daisy404 (talk) 20:48, 25 August 2008 (UTC)

Likely: It is up to another adopter if they wish to adopt you aswell. In most cases one Experienced adopter is all you need. If you require another adopter consider asking a active adopter and see what they say. Regards 11:47, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

Referral from context of WP:AN/I?

I don't know whether or not this is urgent? If this is urgent, I am responding with appropriate urgency to a well-intentioned suggestion.

The following comes from Misplaced Pages:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents#User:Tenmei's abusing AfD and personal attacks.

This posting was addressed to Caspian blue:

I think you are overreacting, because the fundamental problem with Tenmei is his inability to make himself understood, not civility issues. It is not my intention to mock you. The other blocks is less indicative than what I assumed when looking at your log, and as such is not really relevant to this discussion. Taemyr (talk) 21:49, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

This posting was addressed to me:

Tenmei, I urge you to seek a Mentor. The fact that most editors find your style of discussion to be difficult to understand, as well as tending to sidetrack the discussion, is going to be a problem for you and editors around you until you substantially improve your prose. Taemyr (talk) 21:55, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

I thought I'd made an on-point contribution to this thread; and Taemyr's response was the following, which suggests that it was not seen as helpful or appropriate in the context.

Something definitely needs to be done about Tenmei's style of discussion if he is to be a constructive participant in this project. I suggested mentorship higher up in this tread. Taemyr (talk) 21:19, 30 August 2008 (UTC)

The following is the text I posted. Taemyr's reaction was not what I would have expected -- not positive or approving, to be sure. --Tenmei (talk) 21:46, 30 August 2008 (UTC)

Extended content
When two men fight over a woman it's the fight they want, not the woman It seems to me that there's a commonly-used American expression which applies here -- an old joke that when two men fight over a woman it's the fight they want, not the woman. I think it's the fight itself which is most important to Caspian blue. At best, maybe it's an adolescent attempt to do what seems to be the right thing ... but somehow the best intentions fall a little short of the mark? I don't think anyone can sort this one out. I know I can't. The more important problem at hand is that there are likely to be other similarly-motivated wiki-editors who make the prospects doubtful for any article which includes both Korean and Japanese themes. The future is especially uncertain for articles like Korean missions to Edo and Joseon Tongsinsa which rely for their ultimate success on a collaborative merging of Korean and Japanese scholarship. These articles seem already to have become another one of those Sterling examples of wiki-failure. As some of us know quite well, there are some Misplaced Pages articles which have devolved into nothing but proxy battlefields in a centuries-old set of disputes between Korea and Japan, between Koreans and Japanese. When I created the rough draft of Korean missions to Edo, I thought there was a chance that this specific subject could become a meaningful example of something else -- an illustration of something which worked out well to the advantage of everyone; but whatever progress I thought had been made was dashed when Caspian blue accused me of personal attacks and Korea-bashing. As everyone knows, this deflects attention away from working towards developing commonly-understood objectives ... and indeed, I had some reason to believe that an AfD discussion was working towards a consensus decision, but that was untimely closed merely because of the unsubstantiated allegations Caspian blue posted here. I tried to find an example of this American saying on the Internet. The following is from a televised discussion about a political compromise in the US Senate in 2005. We don't really need to understand the politics of whatever it is these two men are analyzing -- the objective was simply to find an illustration of an apt phrase used in context. JIM LEHRER: Take us through this, David. These are your folks -- the conservatives. How are the conservatives going to react to this? Is anybody going to have to pay a price, do you believe? DAVID BROOKS: I don't think they'll have to pay a price. The conservative like James Dobson are apoplectic. James Dobson wakes up apoplectic. But, you know, they wanted to fight. I'm reminded of that old joke that when two men fight over a woman it's the fight they want, not the woman. They were geared up for this fight. But I think in a not-too-distant future people are going to see that this is a good win for those conservatives because .... Two wiki-examples of wiki-failures are Liancourt Rocks and Comfort women. I recognize that the real-world disputes about these subjects are both controversial and valid; but the talk pages provide ample evidence that for many contributors, the proxy wiki-fights are more important to the combatants that the article itself. In the example from American television offers another useful mirror in terms of a word I had to look up in the dictionary. Brooks says that "James Dobson wakes up apoplectic," meaning that he wakes up in morning highly excited, ready for a fight about what he believes in. If I've understood wiki-etiquette correctly, Brooks would be reprimanded at WP:AN/I for writing "Dobson wakes up apoplectic," but I think I can safely write that Caspian blue acts as if he were apoplectic before he clicks into a discussion about Joseon tongsinsa or Korean missions to Edo; and what seems like Caspian blue's frustrated anger is only indirectly related to whatever words are to be read on the computer screen. For Caspian blue and other peers with whom there is common cause at articles like Liancourt Rocks and Comfort women, it appears as if it is often very difficult to maintain a distinction between what infuriates them in the real world and what is construed as inflammatory, offensive or personal attacks in the wiki-context. When I nominated Joseon tongsinsa for deletion because it did not comply with WP:V, that was not an anti-Korean gesture. When Caspian blue added an online Korean encyclopedia entry as a reference source for 4 in-line citations in Joseon tongsinsa, I translated the article via Bablefish. That was not an anti-Korean gesture. The machine translation was largely unreadable, of course; but by simply highlighting the Gregorian calendar dates with a bold font, it became possible to show that there was no correlation between the alleged citations and the source. That was not an anti-Korean gesture. I mistook the ensuing silence as an indication that the real work of merging reliably sourced information had at last begun. I was even proud of myself for having stumbled through the onerous task of machine-translated Korean to English which could be read by the other AfD discussion participants. But NO -- that's not what happened. Instead, the modest momentum of constructive engagement was stalled, quashed, blocked. Instead, the consensus reality of wiki-dispute resolution focuses attention elsewhere. I predict this can only happen again and again ad nauseam as it has played out in other articles. The task at hand is difficult enough, but it explicitly becomes a Sisyphean exercise unless something is done differently. In my view, Liancourt Rocks and Comfort women are doomed to failure because each are independently re-inventing the wheel over and over again. Caspian blue has participated in both talk pages -- and I mention this only as a way of demonstrating a knowledge that both articles exist and that both illustrate talk page difficulties. In addition, I know about both these pages, and now anyone who reads these words will know as well -- but where is the wiki-mechanism which allows for a chance that participants at Talk:Korean missions to Edo can profit from the investments of time, energy, and intellectual engagement in difficult discussions on these talk pages? Other than posting here, what can be done to avoid the endless cycle of re-inventing the wheel in Korean missions to Edo and other similarly difficult articles? --Tenmei (talk) 16:45, 29 August 2008 (UTC)

Extended content

When two men fight over a woman it's the fight they want, not the woman

It seems to me that there's a commonly-used American expression which applies here -- an old joke that when two men fight over a woman it's the fight they want, not the woman. I think it's the fight itself which is most important to Caspian blue. At best, maybe it's an adolescent attempt to do what seems to be the right thing ... but somehow the best intentions fall a little short of the mark? I don't think anyone can sort this one out. I know I can't.

The more important problem at hand is that there are likely to be other similarly-motivated wiki-editors who make the prospects doubtful for any article which includes both Korean and Japanese themes. The future is especially uncertain for articles like Korean missions to Edo and Joseon Tongsinsa which rely for their ultimate success on a collaborative merging of Korean and Japanese scholarship.

These articles seem already to have become another one of those Sterling examples of wiki-failure. As some of us know quite well, there are some Misplaced Pages articles which have devolved into nothing but proxy battlefields in a centuries-old set of disputes between Korea and Japan, between Koreans and Japanese.

When I created the rough draft of Korean missions to Edo, I thought there was a chance that this specific subject could become a meaningful example of something else -- an illustration of something which worked out well to the advantage of everyone; but whatever progress I thought had been made was dashed when Caspian blue accused me of personal attacks and Korea-bashing. As everyone knows, this deflects attention away from working towards developing commonly-understood objectives ... and indeed, I had some reason to believe that an AfD discussion was working towards a consensus decision, but that was untimely closed merely because of the unsubstantiated allegations Caspian blue posted here.

I tried to find an example of this American saying on the Internet. The following is from a televised discussion about a political compromise in the US Senate in 2005. We don't really need to understand the politics of whatever it is these two men are analyzing -- the objective was simply to find an illustration of an apt phrase used in context.

JIM LEHRER: Take us through this, David. These are your folks -- the conservatives. How are the conservatives going to react to this? Is anybody going to have to pay a price, do you believe?

DAVID BROOKS: I don't think they'll have to pay a price. The conservative like James Dobson are apoplectic. James Dobson wakes up apoplectic. But, you know, they wanted to fight. I'm reminded of that old joke that when two men fight over a woman it's the fight they want, not the woman. They were geared up for this fight. But I think in a not-too-distant future people are going to see that this is a good win for those conservatives because ....

Two wiki-examples of wiki-failures are Liancourt Rocks and Comfort women. I recognize that the real-world disputes about these subjects are both controversial and valid; but the talk pages provide ample evidence that for many contributors, the proxy wiki-fights are more important to the combatants that the article itself.

In the example from American television offers another useful mirror in terms of a word I had to look up in the dictionary. Brooks says that "James Dobson wakes up apoplectic," meaning that he wakes up in morning highly excited, ready for a fight about what he believes in. If I've understood wiki-etiquette correctly, Brooks would be reprimanded at WP:AN/I for writing "Dobson wakes up apoplectic," but I think I can safely write that Caspian blue acts as if he were apoplectic before he clicks into a discussion about Joseon tongsinsa or Korean missions to Edo; and what seems like Caspian blue's frustrated anger is only indirectly related to whatever words are to be read on the computer screen.

For Caspian blue and other peers with whom there is common cause at articles like Liancourt Rocks and Comfort women, it appears as if it is often very difficult to maintain a distinction between what infuriates them in the real world and what is construed as inflammatory, offensive or personal attacks in the wiki-context.

When I nominated Joseon tongsinsa for deletion because it did not comply with WP:V, that was not an anti-Korean gesture.

When Caspian blue added an online Korean encyclopedia entry as a reference source for 4 in-line citations in Joseon tongsinsa, I translated the article via Bablefish. That was not an anti-Korean gesture.

The machine translation was largely unreadable, of course; but by simply highlighting the Gregorian calendar dates with a bold font, it became possible to show that there was no correlation between the alleged citations and the source. That was not an anti-Korean gesture.

I mistook the ensuing silence as an indication that the real work of merging reliably sourced information had at last begun. I was even proud of myself for having stumbled through the onerous task of machine-translated Korean to English which could be read by the other AfD discussion participants.

But NO -- that's not what happened. Instead, the modest momentum of constructive engagement was stalled, quashed, blocked. Instead, the consensus reality of wiki-dispute resolution focuses attention elsewhere. I predict this can only happen again and again ad nauseam as it has played out in other articles.

The task at hand is difficult enough, but it explicitly becomes a Sisyphean exercise unless something is done differently. In my view, Liancourt Rocks and Comfort women are doomed to failure because each are independently re-inventing the wheel over and over again.

Caspian blue has participated in both talk pages -- and I mention this only as a way of demonstrating a knowledge that both articles exist and that both illustrate talk page difficulties. In addition, I know about both these pages, and now anyone who reads these words will know as well -- but where is the wiki-mechanism which allows for a chance that participants at Talk:Korean missions to Edo can profit from the investments of time, energy, and intellectual engagement in difficult discussions on these talk pages?

Other than posting here, what can be done to avoid the endless cycle of re-inventing the wheel in Korean missions to Edo and other similarly difficult articles? --Tenmei (talk) 16:45, 29 August 2008 (UTC)

Theresa Knott counsels: "You need to keep posts short. No one reads huge long posts. Try limiting yourself to a maximum of 5 sentences (normal length ones) or one short paragraph of 10 likes of text. That way people will actually read what you say." Although I want to post the following on her talk page, it is too long -- hence unhelpful, ineffective, useless.

Extended content
Theresa Knott -- I wonder if you could become a kind of "fulcrum" in ways neither of us can imagine yet? As you know, Guy describes WP:ANI#User:Tenmei's abusing AfD and personal attacks as a "festival of Stupid" and Future Perfect at Sunrise characterizes it as mere "bickering." In that context, you represent a plausible fulcrum from which to leverage an ultimately constructive outcome: Please re-visit just the second clause from a sentence which knowingly mis-states my AfD position: Caspian blue's summary of the complaint at hand: Tenmei ... also claims that the nominated article should be completely deleted even after it is getting cited with a reliable source by me. For the moment, set aside the fact that each of the following explained that the only way to invite assistance from the Article Rescue Squadron was by nominating an otherwise unsourced article for deletion: Talk:Joseon tongsinsa#Merge Talk:Korean missions to Edo#Merge Talk:Joseon tongsinsa#Deletion Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Joseon tongsinsa Misplaced Pages talk:Article Rescue Squadron#Needing diplomacy and finesse Just focusing on that second clause, Caspian blue slyly managed to avoid scrutiny of the Korean language source which was cited. All that was needed was changing the venue from the fully-engaged AfD discussion thread to this one where the issues could be re-framed in more superficial terms. The AfD was summarily closed by Seicer because of Caspian blue's unsupported allegations that the discussion had degenerated into personal abuse. Future Perfect at Sunrise has now merged the articles. In my view, it was only possible to get as far as we had done because there were a sufficient number of others participating in the AfD discussion. It plainly took more time to struggle with figuring out how to engage a process to resolve the WP:V problems with the rescue process than it took to locate and post a single Korean language encyclopedia entry. It took longer to translate the source than Caspian blue has invested in making a substantive contribution to article content. What was this really all about? I don't know, but I do know that this specific on-line text does not support any of the specific sentences for which it was cited. QED: From this experience, Caspian blue will have learned that this is an effective gambit. There's no arguing with its success; and as a special bonus, the exercise furthers an unfathomable anti-Japanese vendetta. This was a victory in a one-sided fight was gained with relatively little effort except for a bit of argumentative prose. The disputing itself has value because of a modest adrenalin-boost fuels a practice-session which improves Caspian blue English fluency. Who can deny that Caspian blue achieved a defined set of goals? I would have wanted to add some part of the above to the thread which is soon to be archived; but I can't see how to explain myself more succinctly than this. Why is this outcome a good one? Perhaps you may become a fulcrum at some point in a future in which Caspian blue's over-reaching comes to your attention in a dispute involving someone else? --Tenmei (talk) 20:23, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

Extended content

Theresa Knott --

I wonder if you could become a kind of "fulcrum" in ways neither of us can imagine yet?

As you know, Guy describes WP:ANI#User:Tenmei's abusing AfD and personal attacks as a "festival of Stupid" and Future Perfect at Sunrise characterizes it as mere "bickering." In that context, you represent a plausible fulcrum from which to leverage an ultimately constructive outcome:

Please re-visit just the second clause from a sentence which knowingly mis-states my AfD position: Caspian blue's summary of the complaint at hand:

Tenmei ... also claims that the nominated article should be completely deleted even after it is getting cited with a reliable source by me.

For the moment, set aside the fact that each of the following explained that the only way to invite assistance from the Article Rescue Squadron was by nominating an otherwise unsourced article for deletion:

Just focusing on that second clause, Caspian blue slyly managed to avoid scrutiny of the Korean language source which was cited. All that was needed was changing the venue from the fully-engaged AfD discussion thread to this one where the issues could be re-framed in more superficial terms. The AfD was summarily closed by Seicer because of Caspian blue's unsupported allegations that the discussion had degenerated into personal abuse. Future Perfect at Sunrise has now merged the articles. In my view, it was only possible to get as far as we had done because there were a sufficient number of others participating in the AfD discussion.

It plainly took more time to struggle with figuring out how to engage a process to resolve the WP:V problems with the rescue process than it took to locate and post a single Korean language encyclopedia entry. It took longer to translate the source than Caspian blue has invested in making a substantive contribution to article content. What was this really all about? I don't know, but I do know that this specific on-line text does not support any of the specific sentences for which it was cited.

QED: From this experience, Caspian blue will have learned that this is an effective gambit. There's no arguing with its success; and as a special bonus, the exercise furthers an unfathomable anti-Japanese vendetta. This was a victory in a one-sided fight was gained with relatively little effort except for a bit of argumentative prose. The disputing itself has value because of a modest adrenalin-boost fuels a practice-session which improves Caspian blue English fluency.

Who can deny that Caspian blue achieved a defined set of goals? I would have wanted to add some part of the above to the thread which is soon to be archived; but I can't see how to explain myself more succinctly than this. Why is this outcome a good one?

Perhaps you may become a fulcrum at some point in a future in which Caspian blue's over-reaching comes to your attention in a dispute involving someone else? --Tenmei (talk) 20:23, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

Inactive waiting-for-adoption?

I was perusing the waiting-for-adoption category.. A large number of the users listed haven't been active on the site in months. Should they be removed? If not, should we establish an activity cutoff point? Prince of Canada 20:06, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

I normally would remove the userbox if they hadnt edited in 60 days and I would leave them a note on their userpage. See Category talk:Wikipedians seeking to be adopted in Adopt-a-user#Spring cleaning for a suggested boilerplate message. –xeno (talk) 20:08, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

Personally, I went through several months ago and offered adoption to everyone who hadn't edited for more than a month or two (several dozen, as I recall). As I expected, none responded. I think this is a little more friendly than just removing the box, and accomplishes the same task. You're at little risk of being overwhelmed by responses, too, so this is the approach I'd recommend. And if anyone responds, bonus points! --Sopoforic (talk) 20:12, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

That's fine as long as you yourself don't plan on becoming inactive in the near or distant future. Make sure to change the boxes to adoptoffer to clear the cat =) –xeno (talk) 20:15, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

I think I prefer xeno's approach; I don't see it as unfriendly, plus Soporific's apprach just moves them from one cat (waiting) to another (offered). Prince of Canada 20:23, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

You could always combine the two, removing the userbox completely, but still offering adoption. –xeno (talk) 20:30, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

Oh, I didn't mean that it was unfriendly--for an inactive user, simply removing the box is fine. I meant, rather, that by offering adoption to the inactive users, you have a chance of coaxing them into editing again; something like 'encouraging' might have been a more appropriate term. Too, I don't really see them sitting in the 'offered' cat as a problem. But, by all means, do what you prefer. Xenocidic's approach is fine, too. --Sopoforic (talk) 01:06, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

Doh, I should have gotten that meaning. My bad. Prince of Canada 01:26, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

New IRC channel

I'm currently working on a new IRC channel, #wikipedia-en-adopt, I'm seeking a bot that can monitor the C:ADOPT and I'm also seeking folk who are familiar with freenode who would be willing to OP this channel, thanks —— RyanLupin • (talk) 21:16, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

Update

I think Misplaced Pages:Adopt-a-User/Adoptee's Area/Adopters needs a serious update. Some users have retired, some which are not listed as admins are now, some users are full for adoptees, and I think the page could overall not help a newbie. I'm proposing a message sent to all listed adoptors, and asking them to update their status. If a user doesn't respond within two weeks, they will be taken off the list, and possible be put in a "Former Adoptors" category, like WP:ADCO.--LAA Fan _review 16:48, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

I agree, the list does need some updating. -- RyRy (talk) 17:18, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

I also agree. I think you could probably ask Xenocidic to use his bot to mass notify everyone on the adoption page (I'm assuming his bot is capable of such a task) ——Possum (talk) 21:13, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

xenobot can certainly do this. does someone want to draft the message to be delivered? –xeno (talk) 12:47, 5 October 2008 (UTC)

Hi there Adopt-a-user!
	We've noticed that some of the great members of Adopt-a-user haven't updated their adoption status in a while. We'd love it if you could drop by and update your info. Thanks!

- Prince of Canada 13:18, 5 October 2008 (UTC)

How about this?

Hi there Adopt-a-user!
	We've noticed that you are in the Adopt-a-User program under Active Adopters. We are currently updating the information for adoptors. If you could, please update your status here. Thanks.

I'll give this to Xeno.--LAA Fan _review 17:55, 5 October 2008 (UTC)

Hold on, perhaps we could discuss first? AaU is a friendly place, I'd prefer that we used somewhat more friendly language in our outgoing messages. Prince of Canada 23:23, 5 October 2008 (UTC)

Yea, there's no rush... alternatively rather than blasting the entire list we could just remove adopters who have not editing in 60 days and leave them a message notifying them of that. I did this a while back and you can see the message I used here: Misplaced Pages talk:Adopt-a-User/Adoptee's Area/Adopters#Spring cleaning... –xeno (talk) 23:50, 5 October 2008 (UTC)

I dunno.. I think I'd prefer to see the whole list blasted, as we probably have some people who are at <60 days but don't want to be involved anymore, so may as well ask them to clean out now. Plus it increases the chance of unaffiliated people seeing a PRETTY BLUE BOX and saying "Hey, what's that about? I want in on that!" Prince of Canada 23:52, 5 October 2008 (UTC)

Fair enough. Something along the lines of... Hey there! This is a friendly reminder to update your status at Misplaced Pages:Adopt-a-User/Adoptee's Area/Adopters in order to provide new users with the most up-to-date information on available adopters. Also please note that we will be removing adopters who have not edited in 60 days. If you become active again (and we hope you do!) please feel free to re-add yourself. Something like that? –xeno (talk) 23:56, 5 October 2008 (UTC)

Yes, exactly. Warm and fuzzy! Prince of Canada 00:08, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

I like that version, too. BTW, shall I go and spring clean the user who haven't edited in 60 days?--LAA Fan _review 01:17, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

Blast is done. –xeno (talk) 14:42, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

Haha my watchlist is full of the same edit summary! XD ——Possum (talk) 14:45, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

Major reaction! --Hirohisat 00:16, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

While there was some minor confusion over the phrasing (some thought that we were referring to them specifically as "60 days inactive"), overall this has been a successful initiative with many people tweaking their status. Kudos to everyone involved. –xeno (talk) 12:51, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

Looking to becoming an adopter

Hi. I'm interested in becoming an adopter, but I wasn't sure if the 500 edits limit is for mainspace edits or total edits. Would I qualify? I haven't been blocked/warned during my stay on WP. For your convenience, a link to my edit count: . — Twinzor - Do I suck or rock? 16:13, 14 October 2008 (UTC)

Yes, go for it! We can always use more active adopters. –xeno (talk) 03:12, 15 October 2008 (UTC)

Housekeeping

I've just been doing a bit of housekeeping in the Adoptees category. I've removed a few people who haven't been active in at least a month, and changed the status of a couple. 19:28, 20 October 2008 (UTC)

Help

I needed help, so I got myself into an adoption. But that person told me that he would not be too active on the website, and suggested that I get myself a "co-adopter." And that is what I did. But that person doesn't seem to answer my inquiries. What should I do? I still need help. ] ] ] (talk) 00:43, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

Inappropriate adoption

We have policy against giving health related advice. That must include not giving well-meaning but unqualified psychotherapy. The sole purpose of WP:ADOPT is to help inexperienced users towards constructive contribution for the good of the encyclopedia. The following case shows these policies can fail.

A user has presented himself as darn proud to be heterosexual, seeks to edit Male rape, subscribes to a newsletter about male-male contact sport, claims to have experienced being raped by homosexuals, edits repeatedly article(s) about sexually motivated crime and claims to have been to hell. This person's contribution history is replete with instances of personal attacks, typically in the form of accusing other editors of stalking him or pursuing a certain sexual or political agenda and mixed with frequent apologies that do not always seem to reflect improved behaviour. I think it not useful here to provide diffs that would identify this user. There has been a WQA and WP/ANI focussed on him and much turbulance in his interaction with other users who will certainly recognise of whom I speak.

The above described user was adopted. As well as mentoring, the adopter is seen to act as an advocate for the adoptee. That has included deflecting questions posed to the person, telling the person to whom he need not AGF, discussing with other user(s) when and what they should ask the person, and offering to handle any problems arising between him and other editors. Adoption is equated here with extraordinary tolerance. The adopter who can no doubt point to some improvement lately in the adoptee's behaviour will recognise what I have noted. Again I don't need to identify the person here.

My purpose in this post is to point out (with the benefit of hindsight) what has gone wrong in this adoption case. A person showing unstable and obsessive behaviour should not be adopted because adoption is not a free pass for unacceptable behaviour. Nor is it intended to provide psychotherapy to a person displaying symptoms of PTSD . I don't think an adopter should adopt the role of a lawyer in whatever wikidrama the adoptee gets into.

Neither of the people I have mentioned need step forward unless they want to (and neither is likely to thank me for this). However a case like this shows that the bar should be set higher for adoptions. Ways to do that should be discussed. Cuddlyable3 (talk) 16:33, 8 December 2008 (UTC)

I'm sorry that I didn't see this until now. I don't recall being told this was here until it was linked to in the current AN/I report, but I apologize if a reply from me was hoped for.

As the editor's adopter, in general I agree with you. Adoption has clearly not been sufficient in this case. However, I think it has been beneficial for one major reason: as adopter, I served as a sort of "neutral intermediary", someone the editor could trust more than those editors who were obviously (though sometimes legitimately) against him. I consider myself somewhat of a friend to my adoptee, and sometimes people will only listen to the advice of their friends. So, I have tried to support him when I can, and censure him when I feel the need to. However, I feel a good adopter shouldn't be too harsh on their adoptee, even if the adoptee is way out of line. An adopter should be understanding and patient: the onus is on other editors to be harsh. I believe this because if you feel that everyone is against you, you are defenseless when you happen to be in the right, and you have no motivation to improve.

Regardless of this, I don't think I have been as lenient on my adoptee as you describe. I strongly agree, and did from the start, that an adopter should not be a shield. There is a difference between an occasional advocate and a shield. A shield protects an adoptee from all criticism, legitimate and not. An occasional advocate, which I have tried to be, protects an adoptee from unfair criticism, or otherwise assists the adoptee when they don't understand where others are violating the rules. This means that neither the adoptee or those that have a problem with the adoptee will ever be completely satisfied with the adopter. I think your view of this particular adoption may be that of a party who falls on the latter side, and it is understandable that you would feel I wikilawyered for him on some occasion when you felt he was in the wrong. However, if my assumption is correct, then I was not so much wikilawyering as expressing my actual views, views which had not previously been expressed. I may be jumping to conclusions here, though.

Regardless, I think this is supposed to be one of the functions of an adopter: an overall neutral helper. However, this is my first and still my only adoption, so I may be mistaken.

In any case, I do think adoption was insufficient in this case. The adoptee improved in some areas, but in one particular area, continued to fail to assume good faith with other editors, even despite several warnings from me and others. I don't, however, think adoption was a bad idea, or a net loss. It has helped (as most recently attested to by another editor), and I don't see how my presence has given the adoptee a "free pass" for troublesome behavior. The last AN/I on the adoptee ended with little result because no uninvolved editors would express an opinion on sanctions. I refused to mete out sanctions myself because of my involved status as the subject's adopter (which I considered a conflict of interest). As a result, I had no practical effect on the conclusion of that AN/I, and so was neither shield nor discipliner. And more recently my presence has in fact served as the opposite of a shield: in the current AN/I, I have myself endorsed a topic ban, the harsher of the two restrictions proposed. I did this because I have more fully understood that adoption has not been enough.

I suppose the main thing we agree on would be that it should be made perfectly clear that adoption cannot be used as a shield for inappropriate behavior, and the adoptee, in the end, is solely responsible for their edits. -kotra (talk) 05:14, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

When a member of our family is sick we can hate the sickness while loving them no less. I am thinking here of the sort of strains that arise when there is mental sickness, such as dementia in an aged parent. I saw the civility problem that arose despite your good efforts to guide your adoptee in terms of mental symptoms. I shan't say much here about your specific adoption and adoptee because that is occupying several fora already. The subject here should be how your experience should mould the future direction of WP:ADOPT.

The goals presently stated at WP:ADOPT look similar to a Help Desk. (That was also mentioned in the Archive 4.) The main difference from that service is that the adopter agrees to help the adoptee with their FUTURE UNSPECIFIED needs. Since CadenS will probably see this because of the same link that brought it to your attention Kotra, I acknowledge that he dislikes use of them/their as singular pronouns, but they have entered usage as a way of keeping neutral about gender without constructing "him/her his/hers". We live in sensitive times, right? :-)

Patience and leniency are human virtues that redeem in the way Shakespeare expressed better than I am able, see picture. You have them in abundance Kotra and please don't let recent rocky experience change that! However they are not panaceas. The value of experience is to teach better ways of doing things next time around.

I suggest in hindsight that it is better NOT to welcome an adoptee with such words as "come to me anytime you have...a dispute with another user that could use mediation" or "I can also be an advocate for you.." I hope not to lose our mutual respect by further suggesting that your eagerness to be involved with an adoptee (himself already in some confrontation) did give him an EXPECTATION of some kind of shield from the Misplaced Pages milieu. Is it possible that CadenS responded more to that expectation than to the seriousness of the advice you gave?

If I ever adopt a newbie as you bravely tried, I believe I should "go the extra mile" in giving help, while actually being STRICTER than most in not tolerating ANY level of incivility. See . Adoption must remain a privilege that is conditional. (Joke: I could always send my obdurate cases to you!)

Thank you Kotra for stepping forward and reading this. When the dust settles on your first adoption it will be Misplaced Pages's gain if you choose to adopt anew. Good luck with that! Cuddlyable3 (talk) 18:52, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the response and the kind words. I think we generally agree, so I'll just briefly go over the couple details we don't agree on, and then propose a change to the wording at WP:ADOPT that reflects our agreement.

Your quoting is a bit misleading out of context. I said he could come to me for mediation (not protection), and that I could advocate for him "if being unfairly accused or harassed", continuing with "but don't assume I'll always be an ally: if you do something wrong I'll let you know". I think this clearly states I will not be a shield for him, and if he misinterpreted that (which, judging by his agreement, he didn't), that was not my doing. I never intentionally communicated to him that I would be a shield, and if he somehow thought that originally, he soon was disavowed of it once I began complaining about his incivil edits.

I could have harped on him every time he did not assume good faith, yes. Instead, there were a couple instances when I did not because either he had already been criticized enough by other editors for it (I don't like to "pile on"), or I simply was not around. I do not afford a lot of time to Misplaced Pages, and there have been points where the adoption has used up nearly all of my allotted Misplaced Pages time (now, for instance).

Regardless. I think my adoption may have been closer to a mentorship than adoption is usually intended to be. I found this necessary due to the actions of the adoptee, and I hope that wasn't out of line for me to take it in that direction. But I think we can agree that neither adoption nor mentorship is a shield. I have put my proposal below in a sub-section so other editors will see it more readily. -kotra (talk) 23:38, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

Proposed addition

On Misplaced Pages:Adopt-a-User/Adoptee's Area, I propose adding under "Adoption is not:" the following bullet:

A shield. Adoptees remain solely responsible for their behavior.

I think this would help adoptees (and adopters who read the adoptee's area) from getting the wrong idea about the adopt-a-user system. Thoughts? -kotra (talk) 23:38, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

Adopter not yet ready?

Steelerfan-94 (talk · contribs) is the current adopter of Kalajan (talk · contribs). I'm very worried about Steelerfan's adoption procedure. He has made many errors and I don't believe he is ready to begin adoption. I went to him, but my attempt at reasoning with him have been removed, as well as an e-mail reply ignored (he sent me an e-mail asking about his procedure, I gave him tips, he didn't want to follow them). Many things I've seen during the adoption are also very troubling. Here, he is teaching his adoptee that it is fine to remove comments from other users talk pages. Here and Here, he is encouraging getting a nice userpage and signature already, instead of advising him to edit articles. I asked Steelerfan via e-mail to take care of this and let him know that Kalajan is spending to much time obsessing over userpages and signatures (WP:MYSPACE). Since that thread, Kalajan has made too many edits to his userpage. I basically don't believe Steelerfan was ready to adopt, and I think the adoption of Kalajan should be taken over by another user. Thoughts? aye matthew ✡ 21:44, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

iMatthew, please stop watching Steelerfan-94's edits, the past week or so, I've noticed you constantly looking at his edits. Please stop, as he probably thinks it's bordering WP:STALK. Let Steelerfan-94 get on with it, and give him breathing space - everywhere he goes, he has you following him. You've stated here that you won't stop watching his edits. Please, stop. D.M.N. (talk) 21:52, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

I've been concerned about his edits while he is adopting this new user. Editing poorly and teaching users the wrong thing isn't good, and I've been trying to get Steelerfan back on track. His adoptee watching every move he makes, and is supposed to learn from him. aye matthew ✡ 21:55, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

I do not advocate userspace edits like he's done. I've talked to him about it via Email and he's gonna work on it. I could paste copy's of it. I looked at your adoption page, and I'm going to work on it. How am I "encouraging" him to have a nice userpage and signature? I said no to the userpage, and I created him a signature not knowing he would know how to edit it and do so often. I'm ready to adopt, I don't want you hovering over me though, This is a new experience for me and Kalajan, It wouldn't be right to just have someone else do it once we've already started working together. Again, I have talked to him about it I just don't do it in public so everybody doesn't have to see it, or comment on it. And Matt, please don't take out your personal feelings about me, on kalajan and all the other user's who have to see this. SteelersFan-9 4 21:59, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

My personal feelings towards you are that you are a good editor, but like everyone on Misplaced Pages, have flaws -- which may prevent you from handling the adoption correctly. I guess we'll just have to see how the rest of it plays out. aye matthew ✡ 22:18, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

Thanks Matt, I don't want to get into it but I'm going through a family sickness and death, that may really be whats making me a little.....IDK please over look it as it's only temporary. Just like when I tried to retire a couple months ago. SteelersFan-9 4 22:24, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

Alright, sorry to hear about it. aye matthew ✡ 22:28, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

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