Summary style (was Re: [WikiEN-l] Response to Bryan Derken)

[Bryan Derksen]

At 09:43 AM 6/8/2004 +0000, Abe Sokolov wrote:

>bryan.derksen at shaw.ca wrote:
>"So it's not surprising that I would use a lot of "character flaw"-type 
>language and that my posting wouldn't be particularly constructive as far 
>as the debate over the article itself is concerned, since the subject I 
>was focusing on was (my opinion of) character."
>
>I did not get a good first impression of your editing style based on my 
>experiences in that specific encounter either. You were utterly unengaged 
>with the narrative and the historical aspects of the article. You only 
>seemed concerned about shuffling around text, titles, series boxes, pages, 
>and the like.

Well, yeah, because I hadn't even read the whole thing yet at that point. I 
didn't show up there to change the contents, I don't know much about the 
American Civil War so I doubt I would have anything to add on that 
particular subject. I was there specifically because I was concerned about 
the organization.

>But did you stop to figure other whether you knew what you were doing?

Yes. That was the whole point of what I was doing in Talk in the first 
place; I was trying to figure out the best way to go about changing the 
organization of the article by seeking input from people who knew more 
about the subject it was on than I did. I wanted to develop my ideas in 
public and solicit input on them before I started actually fiddling with 
the article, especially considering the fragility of the way it is 
currently organized.

I _know_ that I don't know much about the American Civil War. I also know 
that, if I'm careful and pay attention to the people who do, I am capable 
of working on the layout of an article about it without doing any great 
harm. I happen to be quite an experienced Wikipedia editor,  I've worked on 
plenty of articles about whose subjects I knew little. I like doing that 
because I learn a lot that way.

>Perhaps I should've spent more time briefing you on all the complications 
>that would arise from your proposals instead of hoping that you'd figure 
>this out on your own after reviewing the talk page discussions and reading 
>the article. Still, do you expect everything to be spoon fed?

See, this is exactly the sort of thing I'm complaining about. You're 
assuming here that you know exactly what is best for the article, and if 
only I'd pay attention to what you're saying I'd obviously agree. Well, no. 
I don't consider it at all unreasonable to disagree with what you think is 
best for that article, and I don't believe you have any special right to 
overrule my opinion on that matter. You have to _convince_ me if you want 
me to agree with you, not try to threaten or belittle me.

>bryan.derksen at shaw.ca wrote:
>"But my main concern is still whether you plan to continue using the 
>threat of edit wars in that discussion. Apologies don't matter much if the 
>basic problem remains unresolved."
>
>I'm not at all sorry about that comment. You're just taking it the wrong 
>way. Right now, I oppose your proposals just as much as you support them; 
>the threat of an edit war is always implicit whenever this is the case 
>between two editors. My only crime there might be speaking an esoteric 
>truth. Anyway, all I meant was be patient (thus, adding a note about why 
>you might want to be patient) and continue negotiating. This doesn't mean 
>that I'm not listening.

I had only _begun_ to develop my proposals yet at that point, and I had no 
intention of touching the article(s) itself until after I'd explored them 
and settled on one that everyone liked. Your crime there, IMO, was assuming 
right from the outset that you were Right and I was Wrong and then 
immediately launching a preemptive attack as if I could be dissuaded in no 
other way. Maybe it's because you've had bad experiences with other 
editors, but what difference does that make in how things look from my 
perspective in this encounter? All I see is someone being irrationally 
aggressive and possessive of an article I wanted to do some work on.

I'm afraid I haven't changed my opinion about you one whit based on these 
postings, if anything it's just cementing it in my mind. You might well be 
a very knowledgeable historian and a great writer of articles, but you're 
not very good at _collaborating._ I think that in the Wikipedia environment 
that's a pretty big handicap.