Tabularasasm

Questions about reverts to social identity entry

Hello! I was wondering if you could provide more information on the past two reverts done to the SI updates. Jfwang and I have been modifying the article as part of a course project aimed at improving Wikipedia entries related to organization communication. Our professor requested that we remove the entry for Historical background of social identity theory, as it seems to put too much detail into the entry. Is there any way we can get the change to stick without the automatic reverts? I'm not sure if the bot automatically changes it back or if you just get ping-ed whenever possible vandalism occurs. If it's something that you think should definitely be there, we'll update our instructor. Wikipedia's a community effort :-) Tabularasasm (talk) 13:25, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

The reverts are mine, not a bot's -- but they were reverts because you're removing a lot of well-sourced, well written content, without providing a reason for its removal in the edit summary. And I'm not entirely sure what "puts too much detail into the entry" means. The section seems to be to be a valid, informative section, and I don't really think it should be removed, but I don't actually know much about the subject, and could be wrong.

In any case -- you should probably read up a bit on wikipedia policy with regards to what content is notable and not -- see WP:N -- and what wikipedia's policy is with regards to reverts, see WP:BRD specifically for this case. To be more specific -- after your change has been reverted, you should discuss on the article talk until consensus is reached, and then change the article to match consensus.

I'm always a little wary of improving wikipedia as a school project... we are of course glad of new, constructive editors, but sometimes the often the students in the class have no idea how to write for the encyclopedia and source things properly and whatnot, and end up doing more harm than good. And we would much rather turn the well-meaning, harmful users into well-meaning, constructive users. I would suggest to your professor that for the first week or two of whatever this class is, that he go over the pertinent wikipedia policies with the students -- take a look at the five pillars -- WP:5P -- and the appropriate subarticles for what's most important.

If you need any more help, WP:HELP is a great place to look -- and there are links there to noticeboards where you can ask questions. Or of course, you can always ask me, but the folks there tend to be more noticeable than I am. In any case, thanks for the effort, please keep at it -- I do very much hope this project continues in a constructive manner -- every little edit helps, and a horde of them helps even more. Gscshoyru (talk) 14:06, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

Wait a second... you go to Carnegie Mellon? That's my alma mater... which professor is doing this? Which department? Gscshoyru (talk) 14:08, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

Yep, CMU. Dr. Kraut (HCI) is doing it for his Organization Communication course, so instead of writing a term paper that only he reads, we can help get some articles up to (hopefully) GA status. And, we had the basics of Wikipedia and such in the class prior to modifying anything. I just messaged you since I wasn't sure what was going on with GLOO being listed. Plus, it seems like no one pays attention to the discussion page for the article; we posted information earlier in the course for comments and received none. Just seemed like it'd be more time efficient to contact you directly.  :-) I'll add a section to the discussion page regarding it, though, and see if anyone else monitoring it has feelings either way.

As for the edits, that particular section is definitely well written/cited, I agree. Our prof suggested removing it since the material itself doesn't deal with SI; it just gives a lot of information about the state of social psychology prior to its development. It was suggested to simply sum up the content in one line and prepend to the start of the next section concerned with development. That way, the background is more similar to what would be listed in an actual encyclopedia entry on the topic. Tabularasasm (talk) 14:37, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

Did some digging by looking through your contribs. Looks like this is actually well thought through and well done, unlike previous wikipedia class projects I've seen, so no problems there.

No one does seem to pay attention to talk pages to most articles, no. I've noticed that too. Only the ones for contentious articles, sadly. People do, however, pay attention to edit summaries -- see WP:ES, please. Your edits are much less likely to be assumed as vandalism by people like me if you give an edit summary that explains your reason why you're doing what you're doing.

igloo -- see WP:GLOO -- is a vandalism-fighting tool, used by users. It's mostly automated, but no actions occur without the user initiating them. There was a link in the edit summary, right? Right?

I really have no idea about what to do with the section. If you think it doesn't really belong there, put a note in the talk, as you said, and wait a bit -- then delete it and see what happens. Or, rather than deleting it you can try branching it off into a new article, and put a "for more information see ___" template at the top of said section on the current article. See WP:SPLIT for the relevant policies and instructions, I think. I have no idea how that will go over, though -- the section on it's own may not be notable enough for its own article. Maybe you could branch it off and fix it up for extra credit? But I'm usually loath to have well-written and sourced content removed from the encyclopedia altogether.

In any case, I wish you good luck with all this, and your grade ;) And I hope you all stay on as contributors after this assignment -- we'd love to have you. Gscshoyru (talk) 15:02, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

Thank you :-) I'll pass your comments along to my partner regarding edit summaries and regarding the section itself to our professor. As someone that's unfamiliar with the topic, if you like the section, it might be best to leave it in. And I agree. Not a fan of placing it in a new article. The information has been specifically tailored to inform people of how Tajfel and Turner's introduction of SI clashed with prior theories. Thanks again! Tabularasasm (talk) 15:13, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

Oh, so what you're saying is that it's a non-neutral point of view in some way? See WP:NPOV for the neutral point of view policy -- one of the most important ones on wikipedia. If this is in violation of that policy (read the policy page first to be sure, please), then by all means, fix it up so that it becomes NPOV, or remove it if necessary. And don't forget to explain that in the edit summary. Gscshoyru (talk) 15:21, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

Nope, it's definitely neutral. Basically, it's like having a section in an article discussing the US talk about the formation of it. It would mention England and clashes with colonists, but it wouldn't have to hit everything in history. For instance, it probably wouldn't have need to bring up British poets or something. The info is presented to get across to readers that social psychology at the time focused on identity as formed by the individual and his/her traits, which contrasts with Tajfel's theory in that he was returning to collectivism and this idea that who we know and associate with shapes who we are. Tabularasasm (talk) 15:52, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

Oh, I misunderstood you earlier then. I do understand your analogy, though. So it's back to my original suggestion. Talk page, wait, then change it if no one comments (and probably, no one will). Gscshoyru (talk) 16:03, 15 April 2011 (UTC)