Ashershow1

Congratulations!

Congratulations on your first published article. --Pi zero (talk) 03:35, 9 January 2011 (UTC)

Thanks a lot, I plan to write many more. Ashershow1_talk 06:17, 9 January 2011 (UTC)

Fifteen headless bodies found in Acapulco, Mexico

Hi. Just in case you missed it (it is kind of unobtrusive), after the first fail I added a short post on the collaboration page with links to discussions re what constitutes copyvio/plagiarism. --Pi zero (talk) 13:56, 11 January 2011 (UTC)

Ah yes I see it. I've been thinking a lot about Wikinews and its future as a Wikimedia sister project. It seems that Wikinews is made up of a small handful of contributors who spend a lot of time working on the quality of Wikinews, and no one else contributes very much. The fact that so many important, borderline breaking news stories are not published does not reflect well on the efficiency of the site. I'm considering righting an essay at the watercooler about some of my ideas/suggestions, but I'm somewhat confused at the moment as to what the advantage of reading a Wikinews article is, instead of say, just reading the source the articles provides. Maybe you could enlighten me. Ashershow1_talk 17:54, 11 January 2011 (UTC)

I'm a bit uncomfortable with the word "efficiency" there, because it seems like suggesting our defining purpose is to cover all the most important news stories. That'd be nice, but our defining purpose is to publish newsworthy stories that our contributors want to (and are able to) write.

(BTW, as a comparatively long-term participant here I see the current sluggishness on the project as an historical anomaly, whose primary relevance for the long term is that we're working on designing measures to prevent it from happening again.)

For our synthesis articles — as opposed to original reporting — key merits that come to mind are

• NPOV. This has become a positively quaint notion in parts of the mainstream media these days.
• reliability. One of the several vital reasons we require multiple independent sources: it makes us more resistant to the sorts of erroneous single-source stories that periodically blow through the mainstream media. In the recent Arizona shooting, there's been criticism of Wikipedia because at some point their article said Giffords had died. Our article didn't make that mistake.
• permanent free availability. Articles on the mainstream news sites have a way of disappearing behind paywalls after a while. Ours won't.
• full disclosure. We're very clear about where we got our information from. It's also out in the open when we change our articles. Mainstream news sites often change their articles clandestinely, a practice drive home here when a cited source reads differently during our peer review than during article writing. On Wikinews, substantive changes within 24 hours after publication are in the edit history, and substantive changes after that also involve a {{correction}} notice.

For inspirational thoughts about Wikinews, I recommend Blood Red Sandman's user page. --Pi zero (talk) 20:51, 11 January 2011 (UTC)

When you say this is a "historical anomaly," do you mean Wikinews has not always been short on reviewers? I guess my real question is, who is our prime readership? For example, my article on the Afghani suicide bombing, is still the leading article on the front page of the site. I don't think most readers are coming here to read week-old news. I guess from my perspective as a high school student, and primarily a Wikipedia editor, I see my writing as something that can always be read no matter how old it is. In a thousand years from now, people will still be reading about the inauguration of Barack Obama on Wikipedia. However I can't say I feel the same confidence about Wikinews. Wikipedia has close to no competition, while Wikinews has some pretty heavy-duty competition. Thus, I feel that as a news organization, Wikinews should at least strive--even if it's not our defining principle-- to have the latest news stories as soon as possible.

Please bear in mind that I am very new to Wikinews, so I may be wrong about all of this. I'm interested in your response.

-Ashershow1_talk 21:58, 11 January 2011 (UTC)

A year ago, Wikinews was not short on reviewers. Typical review times were only a few hours, and people got upset if their article hadn't been reviewed in nine or ten hours. Then the atmosphere of the project turned sour for a while, and a number of major Wikinewsies resigned. Slowly, over several months, review times went up and rate of output declined. Meanwhile, new reviewers continue to add to our ranks at a slow but, it seems to me, historically plausible rate — the positive effect of which may be delayed just as the negative effect was. And the year-end holidays are apt to be a slow time anyway. --Pi zero (talk) 06:08, 12 January 2011 (UTC)

Audio Wikinews

Just listened to your first to recordings, congrats on stepping into the waters! -- kamnet (talk) 18:25, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, I don't think most people realize how much work goes into recording Audio Wikinews. I thought it would be easy to just read the article aloud, but I ended up re-recording it about 15 times before I could read it relatively smoothly. Props on all those recordings. --Ashershow1_talk 18:52, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

The more you do it, the easier it gets. One tip that helps me, especially with using Audacity, is that you can break the recordings down into chunks. Read a section, if it's very long then stop and take a rest before picking up on the next, or if you flub a line stop and edit out the sentence it occurs in. Hit the ">>" button to jump the cursor to the end of your track before you start recording again. When you're done you can cut/paste it into one single track and finish your edits. -- kamnet (talk) 17:48, 2 March 2011 (UTC)

Ahem

Since when is French "patent nonsense"? I take offense to that claim. —fetch·comms 04:54, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

It was not the language that made the article patent nonsense (although French is inappropriate on English wn), it was the content of the article which translated into an anti-war rant against the president of France. I would never consider a language patent nonsense. --Ashershow1_talk 05:47, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

Reviewer Promotion

I have promoted you to the Wikinews:Reviewer class, entrusting you with the ability to mark revisions of articles as sighted (review). Please take a moment to read:

• Wikinews:Flagged revisions
• Wikinews:Reviewing articles
• {{Peer review}}
• {{Review}}
• Reviewed article version
• Flagged Revisions extension information, on MediaWiki

You are welcome to use {{User Wikinews reviewer}}.

If you have any questions don't hesitate to ask for help on my talk page, and thank you for contributing to Wikinews!

--Pmlineditor (t · c · l) 10:55, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. --Ashershow1_talk 19:03, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

Congrats on the promotion.

You might find the following link handy; most of it is a checklist for reviewers, that I created both to help keep track of everything and as a guide to where to find stuff (because it's not all in the Style guide, it's actually scattered all over the place).

• WN:Tips on reviewing articles

BTW, a technique I recommend: if nothing else arises, try to find some useful copyedit to make before a passing review. There's usually something, and trying to find something (or even trying and failing to find something) helps keep you on your toes, while the visible evidence of the copyedit will help keep the author on xyr toes. --Pi zero (talk) 00:13, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

Duly noted. Thanks for the link. --Ashershow1_talk 02:20, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

Ex US Secretary of State Warren Christopher dead aged 85

EPR didn't sight this; I did so for you. It's been a while since I've seen this happen, but it's not uncommon. After publishing an article, I always check either the latest page version or the revision history, to make sure the published revision was sighted properly.

There is, by the way, good reason for the dire warnings on WN:Newsroom#In Category:Published without formal review: we once had someone incautiously sight an article that shouldn't have been published, when it occurred in that section.

Now I'll drop a note about the EPR failure at User talk:Bawolff. --Pi zero (talk) 01:49, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

Gene mutation produces autism-like traits in mice

Hi, I fixed the sentence failing the review. Hopefully all else is ok. Thanks! Mattisse (talk) 13:27, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

Hey sorry I couldn't do the second review...I sort of fell asleep right after the first one :) --Ashershow1_talk 17:02, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

Hi Ashershow, thanks for all the reviews you've been doing! A suggestion: in the future, if an article has only one minor problem that prevents publishing, you can simply correct it yourself (rearranging a sentence, formatting, etc.) instead of a fail review. A change like that shouldn't make you too "involved" to review, and has the added benefit of getting the story out sooner. Just a thought, cheers. Tempodivalse [talk] 17:43, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

Agreed. Thanks for the tip. --Ashershow1_talk 18:19, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

Proposal

Hi! I'd appreciate your comments on this thread for reviving the project. I really want to get recent proposals implemented and get Wikinews going on the path to success. The more people help brainstorm and discuss constructively, the better. Tempodivalse [talk] 19:19, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Hey, thanks for your input at the water cooler, I'm glad someone still has some enthusiasm. The discussion is becoming uncomfortably long though, maybe we could restart it in a new sub-thread with a focussed summary of our plans? My original goal was to remove the bureaucratic hurdles faced during peer-review, but other editors took it down the path of NPA/civility. Also, if you could join IRC tonight for the workshop/think tank, that'd be great. I can't make it but I hope we'll see some brainstorming and ideas churned out. Details here. Tempodivalse [talk] 19:23, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

Please give your input, please!

I am attempting a Dispute resolution at Wikinews:Dispute resolution/Brian McNeil and Mattisse and I am soliciting your input as to the problem. I urge you to give feedback. Soliciting input is the next step in the Dispute resolution process. Please do! Regards, Mattisse (talk) 23:54, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

privs

Busy elsewhere? We understand, but this is a notice of privilege expiry!

Note! Your privileges on English Wikinews have been reduced.

Under the Privilege expiry policy (enacted October 13, 2012) the rights held by your user account have been reduced due to inactivity, or lack of privilege use. You can view your user rights log here.

Point 4 of the Privilege expiry policy provides for fast-tracking reacquisition of privileges. We all understand that real-life commitments can severely curtail the level of commitment you can give to Wikinews; the privilege reduction is in no way intended as a reflection on your past work, or to imply you are unwelcome. The aim in curtailing privileges is to address security risks, and concern that a long period of inactivity means you may not be up-to-date with current policy and practices.