Misplaced Pages

Revision as of 00:41, 24 January 2013

Misplaced Pages essays High‑impact

This page is within the scope of WikiProject Misplaced Pages essays, a collaborative effort to organize and monitor the impact of Misplaced Pages essays. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion. For a listing of essays see the essay directory.Misplaced Pages essaysWikipedia:WikiProject Misplaced Pages essaysTemplate:WikiProject Misplaced Pages essaysWikiProject Misplaced Pages essays High This page has been rated as High-impact on the project's impact scale. The above rating was automatically assessed using data on pageviews, watchers, and incoming links.

This page was nominated for deletion on 13 May 2011. The result of the discussion was withdrawn.

Technical expertise

Maybe intelligence and technical expertise should be two different kinds? I see them as mostly separate. Friday (talk) 17:22, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps - if so, explain what subtleties you were talking about. I assumed you meant wikicode and the like. xenocidic (talk) 17:24, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

Fancy formatting isn't something that most people need to understand. We've got people who learn that stuff and use it well, and people who don't worry about it, and it all works out. I meant tricky things like understanding the nature of "rules" on Misplaced Pages. Friday (talk) 17:36, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

k, I misunderstood where you were going with that. feel free to revert - but do suggest fleshing out "subtleties". xenocidic (talk) 18:04, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

Excellent stuff

A very good, coherent, and enjoyable read :) Nice work. Moreschi (talk) (debate) 16:13, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

Agree. /Blaxthos ( t / c ) 12:22, 22 June 2008 (UTC)

I'd buy it for a dollar.--Crossmr (talk) 03:33, 24 October 2009 (UTC)

Not every person belongs at Misplaced Pages, because some people are not sufficiently competent

But don't assume.

WTF, sounds like it came straight out of rand's mouth herself —Preceding unsigned comment added by 208.100.229.144 (talk) 19:00, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

Well how about, Not every person belongs on a tightrope, because some people are not sufficiently competent. I know that I don't have a good enough sense of balance and will therefore never be competent on a tight rope. But even if I wouldn't admit it, it would quickly be obvious to anyone else who was watching by the fact that I kept falling off. Likewise with Misplaced Pages, you just need to check someone's contributions to find out how competent they are and whether they are becoming more or less competent, whatever they personally may think of their own level of expertise. Nothing particularly Randian about it. It's just common sense. -- Derek Ross | Talk 21:34, 26 August 2008 (UTC)

I've heard of Argumentum ad Hitlerum. Is there also a version of that fallacy for Ayn Rand? As with everyone else, both Hitler and Rand were right about some things, and wrong about some other things. What made Hitler dangerous was that he was extremely competent politically, which put him in a position to do some real damage with his incorrect ideas. Incidentally, the essay should mention the Dunning-Kruger effect, which when it applies can make persuasion alone a very weak tool for changing the behavior of incompetent people. --Teratornis (talk) 22:00, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

I don't know how easy it is to recognize the simply hopelessly incompetent. I think other types of editors are more disruptive, especially when they have a seemingly infinite amount of time to fight for anything they desire:

1. FreshStarts, that got banned, and come back with another user name.
   As the essay states, "many of our trolls do their trolling by feigning incompetence." When a tendentious FreshStart, that has lost the confidence of the community, comes back and starts hollering don't bite me I'm new -- while demonstrating they know all about Misplaced Pages -- they cause problems for good editors, and drive some of them away.
2. It states in the essay, when someone "causes major disruption, this is a bad thing that must not be allowed to continue. A bull in a china shop" that has been editing for a long time, and has lots of edits -- and has risen above the need to follow Misplaced Pages policies and guidelines, due to allies -- can be very disruptive, especially when s/he's an administrator. The ones that fight for policy and guideline changes, or resist changes, that might keep them from being disruptive -- gaming the system in the process -- cause people to lose faith in the sustainability of Misplaced Pages.
3. Established editors that rush to accuse opponents of breaking dubious or trifling rules, ad nauseum, half the time in error.
   They go off on a never-ending series of fishing expeditions, to see what sticks, to try to make a record of an adversary's alleged wrongdoing -- to repress, drive off or silence their opponents -- to win disputes over an article. These editors -- who usually have reason to be unafraid that they will get into trouble -- can make less experienced editors afraid to discuss, much less edit.

None of these types care a lick about how disruptive they are to other editors, and they know how to avoid getting into trouble over it.

Left unchecked, they cause editors to lose respect for Misplaced Pages -- and when an encyclopedia loses respect, people cease to see it as one. -- Rico 19:35, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

lol - this is getting a little Animal Farm-ish: we're all equal as editors, except some editors are more equal than others...

while I don't disagree with some of the points of this essay, i does tend to mix a number of unrelated issues, in some odd ways. emotional incompetence, bias and grudges, ESL issues, stupidity and lack of education: it reads like a litany of bad faith assumptions, and the original author probably should have read through wp:BEANS first. No sense encouraging people to give up AGF too quickly. I'm tempted to go through and rewrite it from somewhat more philosophical/psychological perspective. would that be acceptable? --Ludwigs2 06:04, 8 June 2010 (UTC)

I say go for it. -GTBacchus 22:40, 4 October 2010 (UTC)

It's all circular

(in a good sense)...because it is only according to consensus that we can determine who has been unreasonably incompetent, when. Still, a great essay, IMO!--Hodgson-Burnett's Secret Garden (talk) 20:34, 22 December 2010 (UTC)

Anyone who disagrees with the consensus, that the incompetents' opinions are not required for consensus, is unreasonably incompetent. Why else do you think it is so easy to establish a consensus? 173.183.79.81 (talk) 03:48, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

I'm not sure but...

I hate to resort to the slippery slope argument, but I really do imagine that people will one day start using this as a golden excuse to avoiding the assumption of good faith policy. Basically anyone not assuming good faith can simply say they actually are assuming good faith.

A:"Omg you're a total failvalanche get out of this place"

B:"Assume good faith"

A:""

173.183.79.81 (talk) 03:45, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

Indeed, most Misplaced Pages policies can be abused as sticks to beat other Wikipedians with. Personally I've very rarely witnessed Misplaced Pages:Assume good faith invoked by someone whose own faith was blameless. Guidelines are abused by editors who lack moderation and invoke them as ironfast regulations. --Wetman (talk) 05:18, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

Actually, this page is required because of excessive interpretations of the AGF policy. A typical example was an editor who, apparently, was not able to communicate with others except by writing sonnets, of all things.

A: "Please stop communicating in sonnets, except in personal communications with editors who have made it clear that they don't mind. It's almost impossible to understand what you mean to say with them, and the mere attempt wastes valuable time and attention of editors who have better things to do."

B: Responds with a sonnet about unfairly he is being treated and what a strange and unfriendly place Misplaced Pages is.

(Made-up example dialogue from memory.)

It took ages to get this editor banned indefinitely, because there was no reason to suppose we were dealing with a prank, as opposed to a severely disturbed individual. IIRC, in the end he was blocked for the evident lack of competence that very obviously made the necessary collaboration in a project to build an encyclopedia impossible. Hans Adler 06:33, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

I guess Misplaced Pages rules, just as all systems of enforcement will never prevent people from causing damaging. We sometimes have to face it: if people want to do damage, they can, either by direct damage when a rule is missing, or by framing others when the rules are present. Reminds me of when I heard that, man have always dreamed of a way to make others' hate and disobedience futile, but the real solution is to prevent reason for hate and disobedience to emerge in the first place. 173.183.79.81 (talk) 01:46, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

There's a more recent ArbCom example when someone got banned for their "unusual style of communication" among other things: Misplaced Pages:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Senkaku Islands. Have mörser, will travel (talk) 06:04, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

I encountered an editor once who said the following about himself:

1. He was a German living (permanently) in some small Asian country.
2. He had horrible repetitive stress injuries that made typing painful.
3. He believed that English spelling was irrational.
4. As a result, he "needed" to communicate by typing enormous comments that were phonetically spelled and omitted all spaces and nearly all punctuation because his "disability" prevented him from using normal spelling, pushing a space bar, using voice-to-text software (the "disability" here was apparently about his unwillingness to buy it), etc. So "Now is the time for all good men to come to the aid of their country" might be rendered as something like "nawisthetymferolgudmentokumtotheeduvderkontri"—and he generated huge volumes of this.
5. All editors were required by American laws to not only let him do this, but to be kind to him and to defend him against people who complained, and to "translate" his near-nonsense so that others would be less likely to complain.

I don't remember what happened to him: People were rude, so he left? He got blocked? He got bored with his performance art project (one did wonder if he was simply making it all up)? I don't remember. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:01, 13 October 2011 (UTC)

I don't know if your example is just hypothetical, but I found a wikisonnet . Uʔ (talk) 07:49, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

Making this a guideline

Does anybody have thoughts on potentially promoting this to a guideline? It would probably have to be rewritten so that it's not read from a first-person perspective, and cleaned up to be a bit more professional, but overall, it does seem like a good essay to counter overuse of WP:AGF. Inks.LWC (talk) 06:05, 27 July 2011 (UTC)

• No. This is best left as an essay. It is interesting and informative, but it does not guide any decision. It does not help decide who is, or who is not competent, and does not guide decisions as to what to do when encountering incompetence. Not should it. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 06:22, 27 July 2011 (UTC)

That might have been true in 2011 but it's not true anymore. CIR is often used as a reason for administrative action. In this case, for example, an editor of two months was indef blocked on the basis of WP:CIR. If admins are going to do this sort of them then WP:CIR should be promoted to policy status. --Nstrauss (talk) 00:34, 24 January 2013 (UTC)

• Strongly agree. It's nice to assume good faith...but having to constantly clean up after editors who do not understand the concepts that they are editing is a colossal waste of time/energy. --Xerographica (talk) 00:41, 24 January 2013 (UTC)

Lack of competence vs incompetence

One of the difficulties with using this essay is that it is perceived as a personal attack to suggest that any editor is incompetent in any particular area. The word "incompetent" has very strong negative connotations. The problem here is that forms of negation such as "in", "un" or "not" have two meanings: "the opposite" ; or "anything other than" . The confusion is that those who are not (entirely) competent are (completely) incompetent . However, there are degrees of competence. Being able to ride a bicycle is some competence towards riding a moped, motorcycle, or even driving a car. And a lack of competence does not imply uselessness. Even those who cannot drive can recognize bad driving.

In my view this essay might work better if it were more explicit about the distinction between "not competent" and "incompetent", and recognized the shades of gray in between. What matters is that editors should be sufficiently competent to contribute in the way that they contribute to the areas to which they contribute. Being insufficiently competent does not imply incompetence. Geometry guy 23:41, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

There has been no reply here (or edit to the article) in nearly two weeks: I shall bear this in mind when other editors cite this essay in discussion. Geometry guy 23:29, 11 February 2012 (UTC)

• I'll be happy to answer this for you.

  In the essay, there's a bit commenting on the tendency of some to call the essay uncivil. This stems, IMHO, from a persistent fallacy: that "civility" = "being nice/uncritical." This is, of course, not true. Civility simply means acting with courtesy and due respect. It is not, by definition, uncivil to tell someone "Your actions and statements are disruptive, and continuing them puts you at risk of being blocked" when, in fact, they are and they will. Uncivil is "You're a troll, and if you don't take a hike I'm going to block your ass."

  In like fashion, I see no reason for politically correct weasel-wording in discussing competency. If you are incompetent in a particular field, and you insist on editing articles in that field, it is not uncivil to say so, and it neither implies nor infers that because you are incompetent in X field, you're incompetent in every other field as well.

  Is it "nice" or "uncritical" to say so? Probably not, no. But someone clueless enough to not recognize that he knows nothing about an area, impetuous enough to determine he needs to push his POV on the subject nonetheless into the world's largest encyclopedia, thin-skinned enough to resent being called on it, and lacking enough in English language skills to jump to the conclusion that a charge of incompetence in one area must equate to a comprehensive condemnation of him as a human being? That fellow isn't an asset to a collaborative project such as Misplaced Pages. Ravenswing 06:27, 11 March 2012 (UTC)

If people citing this essay normally did so with a coherent explanation of what areas of competence the person being addressed lacked, that would be all well and good. However, most references to this essay boil down to "I don't like the way you edit. You should read WP:COMPETENCE or you will probably get blocked." That's much closer to "a comprehensive condemnation" than a meaningful explanation of a problem in a particular area. --Demiurge1000 (talk) 14:14, 11 March 2012 (UTC)

I am not a fan - and no editor should be - of the syndrome where an essay is cited as the authority for backing up any action, whether it be a deletion, a block, an edit war or opposition to the same. That people misuse or miscite essays, or mistake them for black-letter policies, is not the fault of the essays. Ravenswing 18:14, 11 March 2012 (UTC)

Indeed not. But when objections are raised to the existence of this essay, its defenders (including myself at one time) generally say "that's not actually a problem because the essay is not intended to be cited that way". That defence holds no water if the essay is generally mis-used. --Demiurge1000 (talk) 22:48, 11 March 2012 (UTC)

Someone has claimed that misuse of an essay isn't a problem? Perhaps so, although that's a particularly muddleheaded way of thinking; misuse is always a problem. That it's a problem requiring the elimination of the essay is another thing altogether, and that's absurd. If every essay, guideline and policy on Misplaced Pages that has been misused by idjits were eliminated, for no other reason than that some people just can't be trusted, it'd be a pretty bare field out there.

For my part, I'd much rather respond sensibly to such situations and resort to calling people on any such misuse, rather than just throw up my hands. Ravenswing 01:18, 12 March 2012 (UTC)

We need more Wikipedians like you, then! So far I've not seen anyone else "call people on" such misuse of this essay.

If the essay were properly used more often than it's misused then it wouldn't be such an issue, but right now, it seems to be rather the other way round.

And if we find ourselves trying to eliminate the majority's natural behaviour when such an essay is available to them, because it's not acceptable to eliminate the essay, then we have things rather the wrong way round. It's an essay, it's not holy writ. If there's a way of fixing the essay through ordinary editing, then that should be the first step. If not, AfD beckons. --Demiurge1000 (talk) 02:58, 12 March 2012 (UTC)

I read this thread with interest, but it seems only to address the first two sentences of my initial post. What about the rest? Geometry guy 01:03, 14 March 2012 (UTC)

Personally I think the essay will still be used (or perceived) in an inappropriate manner so long as it has any association with the word "competence". Emphasising the difference that you point out will not solve the problem, because, of the two meanings you discuss, the common English understanding of the word "competence" is that one is either competent or incompetent. (So for example, in a work environment, if I say "this issue was caused by a lack of competence on the part of the engineer", then the assumption is that I am insulting the engineer even though I am using your "lack of" wording rather than the "incompetent" wording. What I might say instead could be something like "a lack of appropriate training for the engineer contributed to this issue occurring" or something about the engineer's expertise being more focused on other areas).

By which I mean, even if I say "I'm sorry, but you're not quite competent enough to copy-edit articles for Featured status yet" or "I'm sorry, you're not quite competent enough to edit Misplaced Pages at the moment", then readers will naturally assume that what I am actually stating is that they are incompetent. It's easy enough to write both the sentences without using the c-word (and I've done so on quite a few occasions), and probably that's what needs to be done for this essay too. --Demiurge1000 (talk) 01:29, 14 March 2012 (UTC)

Until, of course, the new word is proclaimed by a vocal enough minority to be pejorative, and yet a newer word is requested. That being said, GG, the first two sentences of your post were far less muddled, and far more readily addressed, than that which followed. As far as your "shades of gray" go, I disagree; it is entirely subjective, and not particularly useful, to attempt to gauge whether someone is only "partially" competent in a particular field, and if so, to what degree. IMHO, for the purposes of Misplaced Pages, either you are competent in a field or you are not; we don't need half-educated/trained people writing articles on subjects they do not fully undersand. Ravenswing 01:53, 14 March 2012 (UTC)

So you're expecting the euphemism treadmill to be a problem? I don't know but what you are right.

Fundamentally, there's no method that accurately communicates the issue and is totally inoffensive. There never will be. Some people will always be offended by hearing that someone else thinks they aren't perfect. We cannot copyedit our way into a world in which narcissistic injury does not exist. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:09, 16 March 2012 (UTC)

"Euphemism treadmill." Huh; I hadn't heard that turn of phrase before, and shall have to remember it. Quite useful. Ravenswing 22:44, 16 March 2012 (UTC)

Great essay but...

It doesn't talk about how to properly deal with incompetent people. It's hard going through the whole dispute resolution regimen without sounding like a total newbie biter, and clamping down on their edits until they get the hint isn't very nice or effective. _dk (talk) 21:04, 23 April 2012 (UTC)

I haven't looked at this talk page recently, but the (present) last section indicates a problem with competence, although, on whose part, is not at all clear. Any ideas? — Arthur Rubin (talk) 21:42, 6 January 2013 (UTC)

Credentials

I see someone asked for clarification for "It is also not free license to ask for someone's credentials", what's not clear about it? You cannot ask other people's credentials to imply they are not appropriately qualified for the purposes of the article. --88.119.185.29 (talk) 09:38, 21 November 2012 (UTC)

Questions regarding possible inclusion of "Disabling conditions" section, and also about how to specifically deal with individuals with such

First, I think that this essay probably needs some sort of acknowledgment that there are individuals who might be psychologically incompetent to edit. I am thinking here specifically of cases like Attention Deficit Disorder, senility and other age-related mental deterioration, people with memory loss issues, as well as, possibly, people with some form of schizophrenia or other mental impairments which prevents them from seeing reality in a way conducive to editing.

Also, I think that there might be reason to include a specific section regarding how to deal with such cases. I believe that there might be one such editor here right now, who, based on some of their own comments, may well qualify under one or more of the points I raise above. This comment is not however specifically directly about that individual, and on that basis I am not offering any names. Also, honestly, if we haven't yet encountered any instances of previously useful and productive editors who suffer some sort of mental deterioration which proves to be an impediment to their continued functioning here, I think it likely we will in the future. While none of us would want to see that situation arise, I think it would be very useful if we might be able to come up with some specific ideas regarding how to deal with individuals who are experiencing some loss of mental agility, as well as, potentially, people who are experiencing such loss but are not themselves able or willing to acknowledge it or change their on-wiki behavior based on it. John Carter (talk) 19:39, 6 January 2013 (UTC)

I guess people with existing mental health disorders (or specific memory problems, cognitive problems, etc.) simply do not spontaneously feel like "hey, let's be a highly active editor at the very complicated Misplaced Pages, this is where I belong". They might try a few times though. This may change when the interface will be changed for a simpler one (the upcoming visual editor for example) - then we may have to deal with such cases.

I guess the current problem might rather arise with existing good and active editors. Some might be fairly old and may begin to have memory problems, for example. Some might have a accident. It might be hard for them to acknowledge the change, and give up on their hoppy to edit Misplaced Pages - we all know how being addicted feels. ;-) Such cases should be dealt with delicacy. Cheers, Dodoïste (talk) 08:20, 11 January 2013 (UTC)

We have had such problems. I can think of two banned editors offhand whose mental conditions (one psychiatric, the other on the autism spectrum) were a significant factor in the inappropriate behavior that led to their bans. Editors with Asperger's syndrome are not unusual, and some of them find Misplaced Pages both extremely compelling (many tedious tasks with a defined "correct" or "incorrect" outcome) and extremely difficult (social interactions). We need people who are willing to go through thousands of articles to (for example) correct list formatting to comply with WP:ACCESS#Lists, but some of the people who are willing to do this task have trouble handling disputes that inevitably appear if you change thousands of articles (e.g., an ignorant editor reverting their corrections and yelling at them about it. Not everyone handles false accusations gracefully). WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:53, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

Competence vs good faith

Recently I was blocked for a week for referring to two editors and one admin as incompetent. Here's third party evidence of their *insert euphamism here* ... User_talk:Bwilkins#Concentrated_benefits_and_diffuse_costs_2. I also referred to the two editors in question as Value Destroying Editors (VDEs).

When I asked all the editors involved to copy and paste exactly which passage from the personal attacks entry was applicable to my behavior...they were unable to do so. That's because my behavior has focused ENTIRELY on what the editors in question have been doing...and NOT on who the editors are as people.

This entry needs to be improved so that editors know exactly what steps can be taken to deal with editors who consistently edit way outside their areas of expertise. For example, should there be a noticeboard specifically created to deal with incompetence? --Xerographica (talk) 19:53, 6 January 2013 (UTC)

The entry needs to be improved so that editors know exactly what steps can be taken to deal with editors who understand the subject, but do not comprehend, or are incapable of following, Misplaced Pages policies and guidelines. (I don't know whether you were serious, but I am.) — Arthur Rubin (talk) 21:44, 6 January 2013 (UTC)

I have a problem with the "area of expertise" concept as it's being used, since it seems in contradiction to the ban on original research. That is, you should not necessarily have to have expertise in medicine to edit a medical article. There are perhaps types of edits that require knowledge in the subject area, like being able to summarize a highly technical journal article into a new paragraph, or changing the meaning of an existing paragraph based on such new research, but there are many types of edits that don't really require any such specific knowledge (e.g. MOS issues, spelling, grammar, punct, etc.). In other words, it should be more clear that one can be competent for certain types of edits, while not necessarily being competent for others, and it would be better to point out the specific areas of incompetence (as others have said) as well as suggested work for which the editor may be better suited.

That aside, I haven't seen WP:CIR misused in the several months that I've been watching the admin side of things. In fact, it wasn't even mentioned in one case where it was clearly applicable and the user was eventually (and correctly IMO) blocked for some of the reasons cited in the essay, after a significant amount of discussion and attempts to work with them. —— 20:03, 11 January 2013 (UTC)

Competence is not ...

I've modified the bullet item about credentials. (It was tagged for clarification.) The idea of asking or demanding credentials is problematic. After all, how would we really know if the stated credentials on a user or user talk page were genuine? I could set up an account that looks like I'm a MacArthur Scholar, who's written various best sellers, and have appeared in Playboy/girl magazine, etc. But would you really know if this is true? (In fact, it's sorta like Internet dating!) Also, showing credentials in order to make or justify an edit is rather ad hominem. The real issue is whether the particular edit is worthwhile.

Here is an example: someone pretending to be Sue Gardner has made certain edits to an article I've been watching. This ersatz editor (warning -- WP:EGG!) has a total count of 1,669 edits. (I think I'll post a Service award on her talk page.) Is she competent? Is she really Sue Gardner? What does she know about rent seeking? After all, she doesn't tell us anything about her knowledge of tenantism or landlordism. Along comes User:PAR -- who has a higher edit count -- and, thank goodness (?), Sue's edit is reverted. (See: ). The real issue is whether the edit or contribution or reversion or revision helps the article. The skill of the editor in making the edits in accordance with guidelines is important. But posting credentials won't change any editor's skill level or competence, nor change the value of any particular edit.--S. Rich (talk) 05:14, 12 January 2013 (UTC)

Noosphere

What do you think about deleting or rephrasing the sentence "We must always value the project as a whole more than we value the contributions of any individual editor" ? If a contribution is individually valuable, it is necessarily (i.e. by definition) valuable to the whole. Alfy32 (talk) 21:38, 22 January 2013 (UTC)

One possible example for a situation underpinning that sentence would be a hypothetical where one editor may do good work, but their actions cause other editors to depart the project, resulting in a net negative to the project when compared with the removal of editing privileges for that individual editor. VernoWhitney (talk) 22:33, 22 January 2013 (UTC)

Does that indeed happen? Do editors indeed happen to boycott someone despite him doing a good job? Or do you have a better example? Alfy32 (talk) 23:05, 22 January 2013 (UTC)

Competence: continuous and infinite in both directions

I want to add a paragraph as to how "competence" is not defined monolithically. It is mentioned that one must be competent to edit on a given subject, or must altogether know how to write - i.e. as if whether or not to participate in our collective wealth creation process was a mere binary decision.

But apart from actual editing, there are many other ways one can help the community. Undo vandalism, add sources, translate, comment on AfDs, etc. Even when it comes to editing, there are various ways (levels at which) one can contribute. Just like in a real economy, the productive capacity of individuals is heterogeneous and specialized, and distributed along non-discrete scales. In short, Misplaced Pages needs a working class (that is, above the bots).

I think that many good-faith contributors that may be labeled "incompetent" (and thus discouraged) could be redirected towards other (nonetheless helpful) tasks.

If anyone has ideas or sources/references to share on this I would appreciate it.

PS: newbies such as myself also like to work up the competence scale, by assuming more productive tasks as familiarity with rules and traditions increases (and as does the Peter wariness).

Alfy32 (talk) 22:19, 22 January 2013 (UTC)

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