HistorianVictory

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Concerns about your editing

Hello HistorianVictory,

I notice that you are a new editor and that you have edited (or tried to edit) eight articles so far. All of these edits have been to add citations to articles by William Welsh to various articles about battles. None of your edits have improved the prose or encyclopedic content of these articles. This pattern of editing suggests that you are not here to improve the encyclopedia as much as you are here to increase the online visibility of William Welsh's published writing. Please read WP:SPAM which discusses this kind of editing. Please also read WP:COI and if you have any personal connection to Welsh, or are yourself Welsh, declare your conflict of interest openly. This is a project to build and improve an encyclopedia and should not be used to promote anyone's career. Thank you for your careful consideration of my comments. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 17:23, 3 July 2016 (UTC)

Immediate action taken to remove the citations

Hello Cullen328:

Thanks for your advice. I am William Welsh. I am a writer-editor with more than 25 years of experience. I hold a bachelor of arts in history, and also a master of arts in English.

I was not aware that it was inappropriate to post my articles in military and history periodicals as sources to Wikipedia. It was a novice Wikipedia editor's honest mistake, and was most certainly made in "good faith," as such a scenario is described in the rules (read after the citations were made). I am proud of my hard work -- scholarly work -- and I wanted to share the existence of it with the public; specifically, those doing research on the topics about which I have produced content that adds to the body of knowledge on a given topic. I was unaware of that rule. Now I am aware of it. Whether I agree with the rule or not doesn't really matter. It is Wikipedia's rule, and therefore I will follow it.

Upon reading the Wikipedia rules as you suggested, I promptly deleted, I believe most, if not all of the citations. I deleted to these pages:

--Bannockburn (made this on 7-4-16 before I saw your message, at which point I undertook deletion process described) --Mongols in Europe (from 7-3-16) --Battle of Montgisard (from 7-3-16) --Roger of Lauria (from 7-3-16) --Charles of Anjou (from 7-3-16) --Battle of Blenheim (from 7-3-16) --Battle of Sedan (from 7-3-16) --Battle of Bannockburn (from 7-3-16) --Culp's Hill (Battle of Gettysburg)(from 7-3-16) --Battle of Civitate(from 7-3-16)

The "Saladin" page is semi-protected. I had requested one of my magazine articles on Saladin be added to that page. But of course I would withdraw that request at this point. I couldn't easily get back into the place where I made that request.

I believe I deleted all of the citations I made.

Certainly I could, if time permits in my schedule, add to the encyclopedic content for these and similar topics. I've written articles on military campaigns from Ancient Times through World War II. I certainly could in the future improve the encyclopedic content of Wikipedia articles (and cite scholars other than myself).

A number of years back (at some point within the past decade) I had made some editorial changes on Wikipedia pages involving events in the Middle Ages where I found the entries to be grossly inaccurate when held up against the best and most recent research on the topic. I do not recall whether I jumped in and made the edits without signing up as an editor. (I may indeed have done it that way, if that is actually possible.)

Any edits I would do in the future would be on topics where I am passionate enough to want to devote the time. Medieval Warfare is one of my specializations, and an area about which I am very passionate, so that would likely be where I would begin. But I do have a fondness for many warfare topics (i.e., personalities, weapons, soldiers, and battles, campaigns, and wars).

Again, thank you for your patience and advice. I hope you receive my comments and feedback promptly. I am not sure whether you will be flagged on this message.

--HistorianVictory HistorianVictory (talk) 08:03, 4 July 2016 (UTC)

HistorianVictory: thank you for removing the links to your own works.

Editing only articles on which you feel passionate sounds to me like a mistake. If all editors did that, there would be a lot of sound and fury, and little progress. Ideally, editors work on articles where they are familiar with the sources but indifferent to the content. Maproom (talk) 08:33, 4 July 2016 (UTC)

Hello Maproom:

I probably did not make myself quite clear regarding the use of the word passionate in the context of editing articles.

I meant working on topics of which I have an interest. Perhaps that's a better word than passionate.

I did not mean passionate in the context of having an academic argument to make or an axe to grind, so to speak.

Of course, as you mention in your observation, an editor should contribute where he or she is knowledgeable of the sources and can make a contribution to readers' broad, as well as precise understanding of the material. I would expand or clarify based on my knowledge of a subject or topic.

Thanks for bearing with me.

HistorianVictory (talk) 19:30, 4 July 2016 (UTC)