User:WormTT/Adopt/Turbo566

Turbo566 (talk · contribs)[edit]

Hi Turbo566, and welcome to your adoption center. I've substituted across a lesson for you and I thought you'd like to know that you do now have your own official page. As you can see from User:Worm That Turned/Adopt, I've created an adoption HQ, where you can read ahead in the lessons. I haven't finished them all as yet - the red linked ones are likely to change, but feel free to read ahead - it might help. The tests might include a couple of extra unique questions if I see an area that you might need a little extra development - don't take it as a negative, it should help. Also we now have a talk area for us to use, away from the more public areas - if you would like to use it - it's at User Talk:Worm That Turned/Adopt/Turbo566. Let me know if there's anything else you'd like to see Worm^TT · (talk) 13:00, 5 March 2012 (UTC)

The Worm That Turned Adoption Course Barnstar

How do you fancy some barnstars for your work so far? Only 2 at the moment, there's a lot more to come. Worm^TT · (talk) 12:32, 30 March 2012 (UTC)]]

Wiki Markup

How to Edit[edit]

So by now you know how to edit pages, one of the most important features of Wikipedia. The interesting bit, however, is getting things to look, well, interesting. There are a number of different bits of code that you can use in your editing to create different effects when the page is saved - they can be as simple as bold text or italics, but different bits of code can be combined to make a very appealing layout.

I should warn you that in most cases, special formatting is frowned upon in articles. It should only be used in certain situations, and when it is necessary to illustrate a particular point. Aside from those cases, text in articles should be just as you see it in this sentence - plain black, with only the occasional wikilink to spice things up.

The old editing toolbar - a few less buttons!

Here, I'm going to show you what each of the buttons on your editing toolbar does and how to use the particular bit of code it produces. There are rather a lot of them, so what I'm going to do first is show you where you can go to test all this out while you're reading. There are two places: you can go to the main sandbox that everyone uses at Wikipedia:Sandbox. This is a special page that is cleaned out every hour automatically, that gives editors a place to play with new code and vandals a place to vandalize other than our articles. The only problem with the sandbox is this: Whatever you save there isn't likely to stay for long, and there is a high chance of you getting hit with a few edit conflicts. So, to avoid that, you can create your own sandbox! On Wikipedia, you are able to tack "subpages" onto your main user page to use for testing things out, writing new articles, or other projects like what we're doing here. This page (User:Worm That Turned/Adopt) is a subpage of User:Worm That Turned, and the source of this lesson (User:Worm That Turned/Adopt/How to Edit) is a subpage of that subpage. You can create user subpages by searching for the page you want to create in the search box. It won't find it, of course, however a red link will appear at the top of the page. Click on that, and edit away! For example, try searching for User:Worm That Turned/Example and creating it.

To make your sandboxes, we're going to skip a few steps. This is a handy little box that we can use to start making a new page. It will bring you to your own personal sandbox, which you can start using right away.

Now that you have somewhere to test all this code out in, let's start showing you what all it does. Here we go!

Toolbar Button	What it does	The code it makes	Short description	What it looks like	Notes
	Bold text	'''Bold text'''	Three apostrophes (') on either side of the bold text	Bold text	The title of an article is always in bold the first time you see it.
	Italic text	''Italic text''	Two apostrophes (') on either side of the italic text	Italic text
	Internal, or "Wiki" link	[[Link Title]]	Two square brackets on either side of the link	Link Title OR Wikipedia OR User:WormTT/Adopt/Turbo566	Pages that do not exist appear in red (Hence the name "red link"), blue if they do exist, and in bold if they link to the page they are on.
	Internal link, but this time with a twist	[[Link Title\|displayed text]]	An internal link, with a pipe (usually found under the backspace) separating the title and the text to be displayed	The free encyclopedia	By inserting a pipe, you can make different text appear. Clicking on the link to the left will bring you to Wikipedia.
	External link	[http://www.example.org link title]	A single square bracket on either side of the URL and title. The URL and link title are separated by a space.	link title	The arrow you see indicates an external link. Other symbols represent other types of pages: A lock for an https:// or "secure" site, an Adobe PDF logo for .pdf extensions, a smiley-face speech bubble for irc:// channels, among others.
	Level 2 section heading	== Headline text ==	Two equals signs on either side of the headline.	To avoid breaking the Table of Contents, I will not demonstrate this here. The heading with your username is a level 2 header, and the heading above this table (How To Edit) is a level 3 (=== level 3 ===)	Lower-level headers can be created with more equals signs. Only one equals sign on either side makes a level 1, usually only found in the title of the page. Level 2 headers are most common, and levels 3 and lower allow more specific divisions.
	Insert image	[[File:Bad Title Example.png]]	Exactly the same as an internal link, however the pipe works differently. The Image: prefix and .jpg (or whatever) extension MUST be present.		The image size, framing, location, and captioning can all be controlled using the pipe character mentioned before. The most common application is [[File:Bad Title Example.png\|thumb\|caption here]], which produces a captioned thumbnail as you see in the picture of the toolbar above. Further settings are described in Wikipedia:Extended image syntax.
	Insert media	[[Media:Example.ogg]] OR [[File:Example.ogg]]	Exactly the same as an internal link, however pipes should not be used. The "Media:" OR "Image:" prefix and ".ogg" extension MUST be present.	Media:Example.ogg OR	Sound files are always in .ogg format, for reasons we'll get to later on. Don't worry if you've never heard of it before, the MediaWiki software features a built-in player, which you can get to appear by using the "Image:" prefix instead of "Media:". It doesn't make any sense to me, but that's how it works.
	Mathematical formula	<math>Insert formula here</math>	Two math "tags", a technical term (not really) for two angle brackets surrounding the word "math". A closing tag is indicated with a slash.	$Insertformulahere$ $a^{2}+b^{2}=c^{2}$	This gets super-complicated and math formulas are only used on a limited number of articles anyway, so I won't go into too much detail. If you really want to play with it, there's an index of character codes at Help:Math. If these formulas do not display properly, please let me know. Oh, and yes, I know it's American :(
	Ignore wiki formatting	<nowiki>[[Insert]] '''non-formatted''' ''text'' here</nowiki>	Two "nowiki" tags.	[[Insert]] '''non-formatted''' ''text'' here	This code I've been using throughout the table to show you the code. Any wikimarkup inside a nowiki tag is ignored and displayed as written.
	Signature with time stamp	--~~~~	The operative bit of the code is four tildes (that squiggly bit next to the 1 key). The two dashes don't do anything.	--Worm^TT 22:09, 24 February 2011 (UTC)	Three tildes (top) only display your signature. Four tildes (middle) show your signature with a timestamp, and are most commonly used. Five tildes (bottom) give only the timestamp.
	Horizontal line	----	Four dashes.		Please use sparingly.
Buttons shown below this line are only used on Wikipedia. While the code will do the same thing on other wikis, you may not see a button for it on your toolbar.
	Create a redirect	#REDIRECT [[Insert title]]	The phrase "#REDIRECT" followed by a wikilink to the target page.	Preview "Acidic", a redirect page	Redirects are intended to correct spelling and capitalization mistakes in searches (since the search sucks) and reduce confusion over related terms. Any link to a redirect page will send you instead to the target - for example, click on Acidic and see where it takes you. WARNINGS: The code must be on the first line of a page to operate. Also, NEVER redirect to a redirect. This creates a "double redirect", which can screw up the server, your browser, and your brain, if you're the one trying to search for something.
	Strike-through text	<s>Strike-through text</s>	This is one of the few active HTML tags. It's two "s" tags around the text.	~~Strike-through text~~	This is usually used when someone is retracting a comment they made in a discussion or talk page, but wishes to leave the comment visible as a matter of record. Note that even if something is removed on Wikipedia, you can still find it in the history.
	Line break	Before<br />After	Again, an HTML tag. A single tag with two variations: <br> or <br />. I haven't been able to find any difference between the two.	Before After	Useful on Wikipedia because simply hitting "Enter" doesn't work. You have to hit enter twice to make a new paragraph, or use this to knock it down a line.
	Superscript	x<sup>3</sup>	HTML "sup" tags	x³	Not much to say here. This is NOT what you use to make footnotes, though. That button comes later. This also doesn't work in math formulas, so don't try it.
	Subscript	H<sub>2</sub>O	HTML "sub" tags	H₂O	See above.
	Smaller text	<small>Small Text</small> Big text	HTML "small" tags	Small Text Big text	Nothing to say here either.
	Comment	<!-- Comment -->	Same as the HTML code for comments. Angle bracket, exclamation point, two dashes, your comment, two dashes, closing angle bracket.		Note how nothing appeared in that box. There is something there, it just didn't print. These are usually used to leave unobtrusive messages to editors about articles. For a funny example of a comment in action, go to Madness and click the edit button.
	Picture gallery	<gallery> Image:Example.png\|Caption1 Image:Example.png\|Caption2 </gallery>	Two "gallery" tags, which enclose a list of images to be included in the gallery. Captions can be added by inserting a pipe after the image name, followed by the caption.	Demonstration not possible here. Click the link to the left to see an example.	Galleries are a way to show several pictures in an article without cluttering them up, but they have been criticized for being "tacky," and really should be used sparingly.
	Quoted text (appears indented)	other text<blockquote> abc </blockquote>other text	Two "blockquote" tags around the quote	other text abc other text	Should be used for extended quotes. If you use this, make sure to provide a source for the quote, and to use direct quotes as little as possible to avoid copyright infringement.
	Insert table	{\| class="wikitable" \|- abc \|}	Table syntax is complicated, and we'll cover that later on.	This is a table.	Like I said, we can cover this in a separate lesson if you want. It's not something I'm going to require.
	Add a reference (footnote)	blah blah<ref>Reference</ref>	Two "ref" tags around the reference text.	blah blah^[1]	References are displayed using the code <references />. There's a fancy bit of coding you can do to make the same reference appear multiple times, demonstrated in the second line. By adding a `name="blah"` parameter to the first instance of a reference, you can make the same reference appear more than once. I have these footnotes displayed below the table so you can see how they appear.
	Add a duplicate reference	blah blah<ref name="copy">Duplicate</ref> blah blah<ref name="copy"/>	The duplicate reference has a slash at the end of the tag.	blah blah^[2] blah blah^[2]

The references[edit]

(That was a level 4 header, with four equals signs)

^ Reference
^ ^a ^b Duplicate

Other stuff[edit]

You can make lists and indents by adding characters to the beginning of a paragraph, like so:

A space before your paragraph will make the paragraph display in a box with machine font, and will cause it to run off the page if it is long enough.

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum.

A colon (:) will cause a block indent, with all lines starting away from the edge of the page.

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum.

An asterisk (*) will make a bullet.

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum.

A pound or number sign (#) makes a numbered list.

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum.
Curabitur pretium tincidunt lacus. Nulla gravida orci a odio. Nullam varius, turpis et commodo pharetra, est eros bibendum elit, nec luctus magna felis sollicitudin mauris. Integer in mauris eu nibh euismod gravida. Duis ac tellus et risus vulputate vehicula. Donec lobortis risus a elit. Etiam tempor. Ut ullamcorper, ligula eu tempor congue, eros est euismod turpis, id tincidunt sapien risus a quam. Maecenas fermentum consequat mi. Donec fermentum. Pellentesque malesuada nulla a mi. Duis sapien sem, aliquet nec, commodo eget, consequat quis, neque. Aliquam faucibus, elit ut dictum aliquet, felis nisl adipiscing sapien, sed malesuada diam lacus eget erat. Cras mollis scelerisque nunc. Nullam arcu. Aliquam consequat. Curabitur augue lorem, dapibus quis, laoreet et, pretium ac, nisi. Aenean magna nisl, mollis quis, molestie eu, feugiat in, orci. In hac habitasse platea dictumst.

You can mix and match the last three characters to get several different effects. The only caveat, though, is that you must have a continual line of #'s in order to maintain the numbering. This does not mean, however, that the numbered list has to be displayed at all times. See below for an example:

This code	Produces this
`:Lorem :Ipsum :#Dolor :#Sit :#Amet :#Consectetur Adipisicing :::Edit`	Lorem Ipsum Dolor Sit Amet Consectetur Adipisicing Edit

Note that you don't have to hit enter twice when starting a new line from one of these types of paragraphs. However, when you don't use them, you do. Those last two sentences are on a different line from this one in the editing box, but there is no line break when they are displayed.

Have fun!

Lesson 1 - Five Pillars - Complete

Imagine a world in which every single person on the planet is given free access to the sum of all human knowledge. That's what we're doing.

User:Jimbo Wales

The Five Pillars[edit]

One of the most important essays in Wikipedia is WP:FIVEPILLARS which is designed to eloquently sum up what we're here for.

Pillar one defines Wikipedia as an encyclopedia. It suggests some things that we are not. Thoughts about what we are not are covered in the deletion lesson.
Pillar two talks about neutrality, a concept that this lesson will be concentrating on.
Pillar three talks about free content. The Copyright lesson will go into this in more detail.
Pillar four talks about civility. Wikipedia is a collaborative working environment and nothing would ever get done if it wasn't. I'll go into civility more during the dispute resolution module.
Pillar five explains that Wikipedia does not have firm rules. This is a difficult concept and will be covered in the Policy and consensus lesson.

Once you get your head around these five pillars, you will be a Wikipedian and a good one at that. All 5 are covered in my adoption school, though at different lengths. Be aware that I don't know everything and I would doubt anyone who said they did.

How articles should be written[edit]

The articles in Wikipedia are designed to represent the sum of human knowledge. Each article should be written from a neutral point of view – personal opinions such as right and wrong should never appear, nor should an editors experience. Neutrality also means giving due weight to the different points of view. If the broad scientific community has one set of opinions – then the minority opinion should not be shown. An example is in medicine – if there was an article on say treatment of a broken leg, a neutral article would not include anything on homeopathy.

To ensure that the information in an article is correct, Wikipedia has adopted a policy of verifiability. Anything written in Wikipedia should be available to confirm by looking at the associated reliable source. Wikipedia should not include anything not verifiable by seeing it is published elsewhere; in other words, it should not contain anything original.

Reliable sources[edit]

So what is a source? Wikipedia uses the word source for three interchangeable ideas – a piece of work, the work's creator or the work's publisher. In general, you would expect a reliable source to be published materials with a reliable publication process, authors who are regarded as authoritative in relation to the subject, or both. This doesn't mean that a source that is reliable on one topic is reliable on every topic, it must be regarded as authoritative in that topic – so whilst "Airfix monthly" may be a good source on the first model aeroplane, I would not expect it to be authoritative on their full size equivalent.

A source that is self-published is in general considered unreliable, unless it is published by a recognized expert in the field. This is a very rare exception – so self publishing is generally considered a no-no. This means that anything in a forum or a blog and even most websites are considered unreliable by default. One interesting sidepoint is on self-published sources talking about themselves. Obviously, a source talking about itself is going to be authoritative, but be careful that the source is not too self-serving – the article really should not be totally based on a direct source like that.

Mainstream news sources are generally considered reliable... but any single article should be assessed on a case by case basis. Some news organizations have been known to check their information on Wikipedia – so be careful not to get into a cyclic sourcing issue!

There's a lot more about what makes a source reliable here.

Questions?[edit]

Any questions or would you like to try the test?

No i think i get it all.

Five Pillars Test[edit]

Five Pillars This test is going to be based on questions. One word "Yes" or "No" answers are unacceptable. I want to see some evidence of a thought process. There's no time limit - answer in your own words and we'll talk about your answers.

1) Q - You have just discovered from a friend that the new Ford Escort is only going to be available in blue. Can you add this to the Ford Escort article and why?

A - I think if you researched it more and found a source that backed up your friends claim then you could, but only in the specific section that dealt with that make of ford escort and not something silly like "All ford escorts are unavailable in any colour but blue" you should also point out that this does not prevent the owners from having them resprayed themselves and that it is only the dealer that is offering therm in only blue, actually thinking about it more i don't think you should mention it more than "This model of ford escort was produced as blue only from the factory" as colour is an easy thing to change on a car.

Very good, the important factor is that you need to source information to something reliable, and your friend isn't reliable. I'm not sure if it would be worth going on about people being able to change the colour in this hypothetical example, but quantifying that it means "from the factory" seemed reasonable. Great answer.

2) Q - A mainstream newspaper has published a cartoon which you see is clearly racist as part of an article. Can you include this as an example of racism on the newspaper's article? What about on the racism article?

A - i think uploading this could be seen in breach of copyright , and newspapers hire the cartoonists to create humour among articles and as such the cartoon only represents the cartoonists opinion twisted to be humerous and not the opinion of the newspaper. also, racism is subjective and while it may seem offensive to you, other people would view it as acceptable so i don't think that you could, no.

That's definitely true, if you were to upload the cartoon. I meant referring to it, if not actually showing it. However, you've hit the nail on the head in that "racism is subjective". If there is public outcry about the cartoon, maybe, but as it stands - nope.

3) Q - You find an article that shows that people in the state of Ohio eat more butternut squashes than anywhere in the world and ranks each of the United States by squashes per head. Interestingly you find another article that ranks baldness in the United States and they are almost identical! Can you include this information anywhere on Wikipedia? Perhaps the baldness article or the butternut squash article?

A- I don't think that you could mention this as it is likely only a coincidental correllation and would have to be researched more to find a scientific paper that is peer-reviewed and repeatable ect. ect. before this information could be put on wikipedia and even then, i don't think you would put it on the baldness or butternut squash article exempt (actually rethinking that you could put "this fruit causes baldness in some cases" or "evidence has shown that baldness can be caused by butternut squash") and only the article on Ohio but a source that backs it up is the most important factor here.

Again, exactly right. It might make an interesting journal article, but unless that's already done, you can't include it on wikipedia.

4) Q - Would you consider BBC news a reliable source on The Troubles? Would you consider BBC news to be a reliable source on its rival, ITV?

A - I don't think it could be taken as a totally reliable source on either of these as they are heavily involved in both (I did The Troubles as a case study in my GCSE'S). The BBC despite putting themselves out as a neutral organization are run by the British goverment who tried to whitewash the most shocking event (Bloody sunday) with the widgery report and so would probably have tried to gag the media as well, however the british government did then produce a inquiry under Tony blair that was much more impartial so i think in the past the BBC couldn't be trusted on The Troubles but now the British Government freely admits fault and i think enough time has passed to view a lot of the information in an impartial way, I think in this case the BBC should be used as a source with caution on part of the editor. And on the subject of ITV i don't think you could use the BBC at all as they are actively trying to beat ITV (Despite being the ones that allowed them to get a foothold in the first place) and would instead probably use the British Television regulatory board Ofcom or some other impartial organisation that examines the channels.

That's a very good answer - and I'm glad you've put so much thought into it. You're almost exactly right, but the other factor I'd bring in here is "editorial judgement". I wouldn't veto BBC on either topic, but I may look for more sources on both. Either way, I'd probably read the source in question and make a decision based upon that.

5) Q - Would you consider Ben and Jerry's official Facebook page a reliable source?

A- I would not as Ben and Jerry's own page is going to be heavily biased towards themselves and the fact that Facebook is a Social network means any information posted on their is very flexible and is not regulated for truth so Facebook and other social networks are bad sources in general.

Very much so. There are rare instances when we can use facebook (generally as an official site when subject doesn't have another one), but they are few and far between for exactly the reasons you state.

6) Q - A "forum official" from the Daily Telegraph community forums comments on Daily Telegraph's stance on world hunger. Would this be a reliable source?

A- I don't believe that it would as this is the view of one out of many forum officials and is not the overall opinion of the entire newspaper

Perfect.

7) Q - Would you have any problem with beerbarrels2u.co.uk being used in a beer related article?

A - Yes, as using them could be seen as advertising for the company which is not allowed on Wikipedia

It does depend on the information and whether it is available elsewhere. In general, bang on.

8) Q - Would you have any issue with using the About Us page on Xerox as a source for the history section of the Xerox article.

A - Yes, as an About us is self-published by Xerox which is generally not allowed and will be heavily biased towards themselves and will likely not be an accurate account of their history.

On the other hand, for purely factual information which may not have another source (the date they made their first printer), it's not unreasonable to use. In general, avoid, but there are no absolutes.

9) Q - Everybody knows that the sky is blue right? An editor doesn't agree - he says it is bronze, do you need a source?

A - I would not think that a source was neccessary as nearly everyone (Excluding special cases such as the blind) can see that the sky was indeed blue and the science supports this with wavelenghts of light .ect i think i would conduct a conversation with the editor to establish why he has this opinion and whether he can prove that the sky is indeed bronze.

Really? I'm looking out the window right now and the sky is grey. Oh, and there was a lovely sunset last night where it was red. Then black a few hours later. Perhaps it's not always blue! You've got the right attitude though with discussing it with the editor - consensus is key on Wikipedia!

I hadn't even thought of that! i shouldn't of overlooked something as obvious, perhaps this should be clarified by " during the daytime " and identify different colours the sky could be under different circumstances. A very good point. Actually, i think that perhaps you could allow the person to say "The sky is Bronze" as long as they clarified the circumstances in which this is true and if the conditions are acceptable then just leave it be e.g. "The sky is bronze when a traffic accident caused large amounts of bronze gauze to cover my field of view" (for want of a better example)

That's one of my favourite things about wikipedia, it does get you to think about things in a new way. There's actually two competing essays on the subject WP:You don't need to cite that the sky is blue and WP:You do need to cite that the sky is blue Worm^TT · (talk) 16:12, 7 March 2012 (UTC)

Results[edit]

Can I first say thank you so much for actually taking the time to give such in depth answers. The point of these questions is to get you thinking and it's clear that you have been. I've added some comments to each question - if you want to discuss further, just go ahead and do so, otherwise, let me know here when you're ready to move on. Worm^TT · (talk) 13:09, 7 March 2012 (UTC)

Your comments have helped me see it from a different angle, something that just shows how important it is to colaberate with other editors i suppose, but i am ready to move on (Preferably with the Wikimarkup lesson that i have had a quick look at as i am interested, and i would like to think good, at coding)

I'll drop the wiki-markup lesson in for you to read, but I don't have a test for it. Feel free to ask any questions regarding it on the talk page. Otherwise, on we go :) Worm^TT · (talk) 16:13, 7 March 2012 (UTC)

Lesson 2 - Wikiquette - Complete

Wikiquette[edit]

WP:Wikiquette - or the etiquette of Wikipedia is something that you may already be familiar with, depending how much reading around the different wikipedia pages you've made.

I'm just going to highlight some of the important Wikiquette items that you should try and remember. It may help you out.

Assume good faith - This is fundamental and I'll be going over it again in dispute resolution. Editors here are trying to improve the encyclopedia. Every single member of the community. EVERY ONE. If you read a comment or look at an edit and it seems wrong in some way, don't just jump straight in. Try and see it from the other editors point of view, remembering that they are trying to improve the encyclopedia.
Sign your talk posts with four tildes ~~~~. The software will stick your signature and timestamp in, allowing the correct attribution to your comment. I have a script that reminds you to do this if you think you'll forget.
Try and keep to threading, replying to comments by adding an additional indentation, represented by a colon, :. I cover more about this in my basics of markup language lesson - let me know if you'd like to take it. Talk pages should something like this - Have a read of WP:THREAD to see how this works.

How's the soup? --[[User:John]]
:It's great!! --[[User:Jane]]
::I made it myself! --[[User:John]]
Let's move the discussion to [[Talk:Soup]]. --[[User:Jane]]
:I tend to disagree. --[[User:George]]

How's the soup? --John

It's great!! --Jane

I made it myself! --John

Let's move the discussion to Talk:Soup. --Jane

I tend to disagree. --George

Don't forget to assume good faith
There are a lot of policies and guidelines, which Wikipedians helpfully point you to with wikilinks. Their comments may seem brusque at first, but the linked document will explain their point much better than they may be able to.
Be polite, and treat others as you would want to be treated. For example, if someone nominated one of the articles you created for deletion, I'm sure you'd want to know about it, so if you are doing the nominating make sure you leave the article creator a notification.
Watch out for common mistakes.
Did I mention that you should assume good faith?
Comment on the edits. Not the editor. I'll cover this more in dispute resolution.

Questions[edit]

Any questions?

I think that Wikiquette is one of the most important lessons for a user to learn. Perhaps they should be introduced to a proper article on the subject when they first join? well that is not for me to decide but i think i am competent in this and will try the test.

Test[edit]

Have a look at the conversation below:

What's the best car in the world? -- Rod

Probably something German or Japanese. -- Freddie

Like what -- Rod's Mate

I dunno, something like Volkswagon? -- Freddie

Volkswagon Passat --Passat Lover <-Postion:A

What do you want it for? -- Jane

Volkswagon Passat --Passat Lover <-Position:B

Well, the Passat lover clearly loves his Passat, but who is he replying to? In

1) Position A?

A- As he is at one indent further than rod's mate's question then he is answering rod's mate

2) Position B?

A- He is at one more indent that Rod's question and so, although is answer is the same as the previous one, he is now answering Rod.

3) An editor who has a low edit count seems awfully competent with templates. Should he be reported as a possible WP:SOCK?

A- As this situation could apply to myself (not helped by when Gilderien started my userpage mistakenly (yes he told me, i found it amusing)) i would (and hope others would) act in Good faith as you reiterated and perhaps ask an admin to investigate further or ask them outright on their talk page as i do not have the authority to make such a decision myself without proper evidence.

Results[edit]

Very Good! Well done. You're right, good faith is key here. I actually grumbled at Gilderien myself over that matter! Worm^TT · (talk) 13:36, 12 March 2012 (UTC)

Copyright[edit]

Welcome to the lesson discussing Copyright. It's one of the most important lessons I teach, because not adhering to it can lead to a ban from Wikipedia. I'm hoping to take you back to basics and will be focusing on images. However, a lot of the same concepts apply to other media files and even text too! I'll mention a bit more about that at the end of the lesson.

Glossary[edit]

There are a lot of terms associated with copyright. If you are having trouble with any, here's a quick reference.

Term	Explaination
Attribution	The identification of work by an author
Copyright symbol	© - used to show work is under copyright
Creative Commons	Creative Commons is an organisation that provides licensing information aimed at achieving a mutual sharing and flexible approach to copyright.
Compilation	A new work created as a combination of other works, which may be derivative works.
Derivative work	A work which is derived from another work. (Eg a photograph of a painting)
Disclaimer	A statement which limits rights or obligations
FACT	Federation Against Copyright Theft
Fair use	Circumstances where copyright can be waived. These are strict and specific to the country.
Copyright infringement	Use of work under copyright without permission
Intellectual property	Creations of the mind, under which you do have rights.
License	The terms under which the copyright owner allows his/her work to be used.
Non-commercial	Copying for personal use - not for the purpose of buying or selling.
Public domain	Works that either cannot be copyrighted or the copyright has expired

Image Copyright on Wikipedia[edit]

Ok, now if I use a term that's not in the glossary and I don't explain, feel free to slap me. Are you ready for this? Ok. Take a deep breath. You can do it.

Copyright is a serious problem on a free encyclopedia. To remain free, any work that is submitted must be released under the WP:CC-BY-SA License and the WP:GFDL. You can read the actual text under those links, but the gist is that you agree that everything you write on the encyclopedia can be shared, adapted or even sold and all you get in return is attribution.

So, there are basically two types of images on wikipedia.

Free images
Non-free images

Free images are those which can be freely used anywhere on Wikipedia. A free image may be either public domain, or released under a free license, such as CC-BY-SA. Free images can be used in any article where their presence would add value. As long as there is a consensus among the editors working on an article that the image is appropriate for the article, it's safe to say that it can remain in an article. Free images can even be modified and used elsewhere.

Non-free images, however, are subject to restrictions. Album covers and TV screenshots are two types of images that are typically non-free. They may belong to a person or organization who has not agreed to release them freely to the public, and there may be restrictions on how they are used. You have to meet ALL of Wikipedia's strict conditions in order to use them. (Non free content criteria)

In practise, if it comes out of your head - is entirely your own work, you have the right to make that release. If you got it from somewhere else, you don't. That doesn't mean it can't be used though. You can in these situations

If the work has already been released under a compatible or less restrictive license.
If the work is in the "public domain" - Very old items, 150 years is a good benchmark
If the work is not free in certain circumstances (Non free content criteria summary below, but actually a lot more detailed)

There must be no free equivalent
We must ensure that the owner will not lose out by us using the work
Use as little as possible (the smallest number of uses and the smallest part possible used)
Must have been published elsewhere first
Meets our general standards for content
Meets our specific standards for that area
Must be used. (we can't upload something under fair use and not use it)
Must be useful in context. This is a sticking point, if it's not actually adding to the article, it shouldn't be used.
Can only be used in article space
The image page must attribute the source, explain the fair use for each article it is used and display the correct tag

It's a lot, isn't it! Well, let's have a look at the non free stuff. I'm going to suggest two different images. One, a tabloid picture of celebrity actress Nicole Kidman, and the other, the cover of the album Jollification by the Lightning Seeds. The tabloid picture of Nicole Kidman will instantly fail #1, because there can be a free equivalent - anyone can take a picture of Nicole. The album cover on the other hand is unique - there's no free equivalent. It's discussed in the article too, so showing it will be useful in context (#8). The copy we show should be shrunk, so that it can't be used to create pirate copies (#2). I couldn't put it on my userpage though (or even here) (#9)

Get it? Well here are a few more examples.

I could upload a publicity picture of Eddie Izzard. Now, the photographer holds the copyright to that particular picture of the hilarious man. I can claim fair use, but the claim would be invalid because you could just as easily go to a performance Izzard is giving and take a picture of him yourself. (That's what happened here) The publicity picture is considered replaceable fair use and so would be deleted.
Person X could upload a picture of the Empire State Building from a marketing kit they distributed. This image would likely be copyrighted, and so they claim fair use. But I happen to have been to New York and have a picture of the ESB. I upload that instead and release it into the public domain. The first, copyrighted picture, is also replaceable.
For the article on the Monterey Bay Aquarium, I want to upload an image of their logo (visible in no great detail here). I go to their website and upload their version. This fair use is allowable, because no matter where or how they display their logo, it'll be under the same copyright. Since the simple art of scanning or taking a picture of a piece of work is not enough to justify my ownership of the rights to the image, there is no way to obtain a free version of the logo.

Commons[edit]

When people refer to Commons on wikipedia, they're generally referring to Wikimedia Commons, a repository of free material. Images on Commons can be linked directly to wikipedia, like that picture just to the right and above. Now, since commons is a free repository, fair use is not permitted. It makes sense to upload free images to commons, so that they can be used by all language encyclopedias.

Copyright and text[edit]

So you think you've got your head around copyright and how it applies to images? Well done. Let's see how it applies to text. All the principles are the same - you can only include text which has been released under CC-BY-SA. In fact, if you notice, every time you click edit, it says right there

Content that violates any copyrights will be deleted. Encyclopedic content must be verifiable.

By clicking the "Save Page" button, you agree to the Terms of Use, and you irrevocably agree to release your contribution under the CC-BY-SA 3.0 License and the GFDL. You agree that a hyperlink or URL is sufficient attribution under the Creative Commons license.

So you are in effect contributing every time you edit. Now, let's think about that non-free content criteria - "No free equivalent" means that you will never be able to license text under it (except for quoting) - as you can re-write it in your own words to create an equivalent. You always, always, always have to write things in your own words or make it VERY clear that you are not. Got it? Good.

Questions[edit]

So Overall, If you cannot obtain the image yourself then use the least damaging/infringing image? This seems almost like WP:IAR where if it is not possible to not break the rules then you should.

Hmmm, I suppose you could look at it that way. It's not quite "if you can't get it yourself", because if anyone could get a free image of something, then that image should be used. A non-free image of Angel of the North for example would be deleted, but a non free image of Nazis invading Paris, would be acceptable. (That one was actually free, but you know what I mean). There are some that would argue that fair use images actually harm the "free" in a "free encyclopedia". There's a lot of rules around Fair Use, but it's a great feature we have. Worm^TT · (talk) 15:43, 12 March 2012 (UTC)

Test[edit]

Q1) Do you think Wikipedia *is* free?

A-

Q2) When can you upload a picture to Commons?

A-

Q3) You find music displaying this licence [1] (non-commercial). Wikimedia is non-commerical, can we upload it to Commons?

A-

Q4) A user uploads a poster which is a composite of all the Beatles album covers. Can he do this? It is his own unique composition.

A-

Q5) Can you upload a press image of the Pope?

A-

Q6) Can you upload a press image of a prisoner on death row?

A-

Q7) You find an article that matches a company website About Us page exactly. What do you do? You check the talk page, and there's no evidence that the text has been released under WP:CC-BY-SA

A-

Q8) Can you see any issues with doing a cut-and-paste move?

A-

Q9) A final practical test... Go. Have a snoop around some wikipedia articles, see if you can find an image which is currently being used under "fair use". Come back and link to it (using [[:File:IMAGENAME]]. You must get the : before the File name, as we cannot display the image here!)

A-

[1] Reference

[copy-2] Duplicate

[1]

[2]