On May 3, 2006, at 1:33 AM, charles matthews wrote:
We're not
hunting down newbies and forcing them to participate in
deletion discussions. Deletion discussions take place within the
Wikipedia community, and like any community we have our jargon.
If someone wants to join that community, they
have to learn the
jargon. Even the most welcoming communities work this way.
No they don't. You're describing rude, myopic communities with
little real
interest in outreach. Not a global voluntary organisation.
Only rude, myopic communities have their own jargon? Are you saying
that (for instance) the hacker community, academics, and
professionals all belong to "rude, myopic communities"? Are you
saying that baseball fans are a "rude, myopic community" because they
use terms unfamiliar to newbies like "strikeout", "walk", and
"infield fly rule"?
The purpose of jargon is to make communication easier within a group.
Everyone here knows what "cruft" is. In AfD contexts, it's extraneous
content not suitable for inclusion in the encyclopedia. We're all
willing to explain that to newbies. And anyone who's offended by the
word "cruft" needs to grow a thicker skin, because once we start
making up euphemisms for it, we'll end up with even more impenetrable
jargon than we have now.
--
Philip L. Welch
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Philwelch