Thundersnow

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It is approximately 11:40 in Connecticut.

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WLM-US 2013

Will you be joining in with us again? It would definitely be a great help.

Sincerely,

Smallbones_(smalltalk) 20:56, 20 August 2013 (UTC)

Thank you for the thought, Smallbones. Short version: No.

Long version: Hell no

I had been feeling the urge to edit WP again. My birthday is mid-August, and I looked in on WLM-US as a present to myself. Not much there so I looked on the NRHP project page, as it is a backbone for WML-US to build on. There were pointy edits and deletions, F-bombs and em-F-asis words, SHOUTing, rampant I-didn't-hear-that, back-biting talkpage edits, battle-worded edit summaries, all over WP by NRHP project members. I see the same accusations flying, the same actions being taken or avoided, the same mess by the same editors that there was back in November. The one thing I expect to see in relation to that "all-that" has not happened: no one has even tried to discuss any problems. No one has discussed the contentious edits/editors in a (neutrally-worded!) section of the project. No editor has said, "I do not understand why you made this edit. Will you please explain your reasoning to me?" on another editor's talk page. No editor has been told that there is a consensus and they should come talk about it. No one has posted to an uninvolved admin, or even AN, saying, "We cannot handle this without help. Help!" Someone on the project said, "This is why we can't have nice things" and proceeded to blame one editor. I blame them all. Every editor who has taken part in the dust-up has essentially shot themselves in their collective feet, as any dispute resolution process starts with showing where discussion about the problem has taken place. They have nothing to show for resolution, and plenty to show how they made it worse. I note that "all-that" is taking place only a couple of weeks before WLM starts up, and WLM has barely been mentioned on the NRHP project. WLM-US appears to be rather short of their goals for things to be done before 01 September (in fact, they appear short of goals, period). There will be chaos attendant to WLM playing catch-up right before start-up. WLM-US cannot escape the National Register, it is too large of a draw for photographers; therefore, WLM-US cannot escape the NRHP project, with all its chaos. I remember how I felt last winter, and I refuse to put myself anywhere near that state again, which means avoiding the NRHP project completely, which means avoiding WLM-US. Canada, though... I treated the border as a skipping rope in WLM '12. Perhaps this year I will just jump the border completely. Probably not.

Peace and long life. Thundersnow (talk) 16:36, 23 August 2013 (UTC)

I'm very sorry you feel that way, but I understand where much of it comes from.

I've thought many times about what's the best thing to say to you, but the best I can come up with is "Thanks."

A year ago, I thought you were some kind of miracle from God sent to save me from the impossible workload that I had got myself into. I must have thought that anything I could say would only make things with you worse (they couldn't have been better from my point of view), so I'm sure I said the minimum. A new "sorry" and "thanks" are due here.

The way this site runs is obviously crazy on its face, and I have no idea why people think that they can do what they do here so commonly. Do be aware that nobody escapes this, not even Jimbo Wales. I also have to say I have no idea why this works out so well in the end (for the encyclopedia at least). You have to understand that I think of encyclopedias in terms of the 1958 World Book that I grew up with.

I don't remember much about the quarrel with Doncram, except that I thought that on *some* issues you hadn't thought everything through, and, as is quite common, Doncram hadn't considered the effect of his words on other people. I guess you have to have thick skin to operate around here. I did feel that, whatever my thoughts on the issues, I should have stood up for you simply because of loyalty and my debt of gratitude, but I just took the easy way out and let other people handle what I thought was a complicated issue. Sorry.

I'd guess you know that I am not organizing WLM-US this year. I had an issue or two of my own that are not worth going into here - but felt that there was no need for me to beat my head against the wall, trying to convince people to do what I thought they should do. You can't make people do what you want them to do around here, you have to convince them, and I obviously wasn't a good enough convincer. Still it's that time of year and I'm like an old firehorse out to pasture, just waiting for the bell to ring!

Please do come back, whenever you feel like you'll enjoy it.

All the best,

Smallbones

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