Difference between revisions of "Conservapedia:Guidelines"

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Conservapedia wants original content on its website. Please do not post articles/essays from other websites to Conservapedia.
 
Conservapedia wants original content on its website. Please do not post articles/essays from other websites to Conservapedia.
  
While exceptions are made for longstanding editors to copy some of their work on other websites to Conservapedia, this is the exception and not the rule.
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While exceptions are made for longstanding editors to copy some of their work on other websites to Conservapedia, this is an exception and not the rule.
  
 
== Member Accounts ==
 
== Member Accounts ==

Revision as of 15:09, November 28, 2017

These guidelines form an adjunct to the Conservapedia Commandments.

Administrators

The Administrators of Conservapedia have the ability to protect/unprotected pages, edit protected pages, move pages, block/unblock users, mediate and resolve disputes.

Duties

  • Unlike Wikipedia, we do not block for ideological reasons. Warnings are appropriate, not for obscenity, vandalism or parody (Which are block-able offenses without warning.), but for silliness and other problems. In rare cases, our approach to repeated ideological conflict is to lock the page, and then allow the Administrator Group to make changes on a manual basis based upon submitted suggestions on the Talk page.
  • Revert wars and trolling a discussion page on points contrary to the Conservapedia philosophy, a pattern of continued use of vulgar or sexually based words, all are cause for blocking a user. Name calling and insults are disruptive to the site and most likely will result in a block as well.
  • Administrators and Bureaucrats can be consulted on questions of policy and procedures. Concerns about the validity of an interpretation should be directed to a senior administrator or bureaucrat, who is directly involved in the creation and application of policy.
  • Editors with blocking rights must be careful in the issuance of a block. A block is to be respected both by the recipient and by others with blocking privileges. When an error occurs, it's best for the blocking editor to undo so as to limit confusion. However, this is not always possible.

Promotion

Conservapedia is a meritocracy. Administrators are selected as needed from the best of the best contributors, there is no popularity contest to determine promotion, and nominations not accepted. By your own work shall you be known.

List of Administrators

Assistants

The block function has been devolved to select users who have shown an ability to be trusted. Many of the current Administrators started as one of these Assistants and this status can be considered a way to evaluate users for promotion. As "emergency Sysops", the authority of these users is limited to warning users of policy violations and blocking for blatant vandalism and harassment requiring an immediate response.

Post original content

Conservapedia wants original content on its website. Please do not post articles/essays from other websites to Conservapedia.

While exceptions are made for longstanding editors to copy some of their work on other websites to Conservapedia, this is an exception and not the rule.

Member Accounts

See also: Conservapedia:User rights

As a sign of good faith and accountability it is recommended that editors select a user name based on a permutation of their real name. Whenever this would cause confusion, a name based upon a hobby or characteristic would also be acceptable. Obscene or offensive usernames will be blocked on sight. In addition to blocking, junk accounts are subject to deletion at any time as a housekeeping measure. Also,

  • Conservapedia does not allow "sockpuppet" accounts or unaccountable anonymous proxy use.
  • Conservapedia is a politically conservative, Christian encyclopedia project. We welcome opposing views, but are not interested in users who come here only to change articles to their ideology, or disrupt by constantly arguing on the article talk pages that we are "wrong". Trolling comments, incivility and personal attacks can be removed from discussion pages.
  • We are not a debate forum, but a project. If you contribute, where you can, by adding substantive content, abiding by our Guidelines, we welcome you. If not, remember it is a big Internet, and you should go where you can support the goals of that project.
  • Pick a secure/good password for your Conservapedia user account. Some suggestions about picking a secure/good password for your Conservapedia account are located HERE.

See "Civility" below.

  • Blocked users who feel their block is contrary to these policies, are encouraged to email the Administrator blocking them, stating their reasons and giving any explanation(s) for their action(s). The blocking Administrator will consider their explanation/request, and respond with due diligence. If your ability to email has been revoked, look at the blocking Administrator's user page for alternate contact information, or simply email webmaster@conservapedia.com asking it be forwarded to the blocking Admin. Make sure you use the subject "Blocked". You should also copy and paste into the email the message and information you see when getting the block message.

Style

Use plain English, preferably American English. Do not surprise the reader with strange or unusual meanings. Do not pull punches or sugar coat things, with a few exceptions.

  • Do not, for example, say "is controversial" when you mean "is criticized" - criticism is one side (negative), while controversy is two contending sides.

Avoid jargon, i.e., words which only experts in a field can understand. So, don't say femur when you can say Thigh bone. When explaining advanced concepts in mathematics or science, begin with an introduction which any high school student can understand. If you can't explain it in simple words to a 10-year-old, you probably don't understand it very well yourself. Articles on complex topics need an introduction which assumes little or no previous knowledge.

Attribution

There's a difference between stating flatly that "the earth is 6,000 years old" and reporting that "Young Earth creationists say that the earth is 6,000 years old." Likewise, there's a difference between saying "All living species of animals evolved from earlier species" and saying "Most atheist biologists believe that all living species of animals evolved from earlier species".

English teachers call that attribution.

Here's another example:

  • It was raining on Tuesday. (unattributed)
  • John said it was raining on Tuesday. (attributed)

Newspaper report on a murder trial:

  • Smith killed Jones.
  • Judge Robinson found Smith guilty of killing Jones.

Simply by attributing a statement to the person who said it, we can turn bias into fact. That is, we convert a statement about something from a biased assertion into an attribution. We don't say "X". We say that "A said X."

Notice that at no point do these statements endorse any of the views. The sample text provided merely states what each view is, without saying whether any of them is correct or incorrect.

Thus, a good article "describes" - it does not "prescribe".

In regards to attribution, always cite and give credit to your sources,[1] even if in the public domain. Conservapedia's Manual of Style assists new wiki users on how to put footnotes in an article.

Civility

See also Conservapedia:Avoid personal remarks
  • You must be civil. No bullying. Incivility and personal attacks should be replaced with the {{personal remark removed}} template. Conservapedia Administrators as well need to interact with others according to the same standards of civility we ask of editors.
  • Your user page/discussion pages, are indeed your castle, from which you can agree, disagree and discuss issues as you will. However you cannot use them to bully, ridicule (make fun of) or attack (denigrate) Conservapedia or other users, and their opinions. Users are free to remove comments from their own user talk pages.
  • There is a difference between intellectual discourse, and attacking someone for what they believe. Wikipedia condones bullying and mob rule, we don’t.
  • Violators of the CP Guidelines will be blocked.

Article level

Articles should be written as much as possible to be understandable at a high school (ages 14 to 18) level, in order to ensure they will be accessible and educational to students. If more complex information is necessary, as in advanced math entries, then it should be explained as simply as possible in the introduction, and a full explanation should follow in the body of the article.

Article length

Please endeavor to make your articles informative. Create articles that provide value to your readers and which will prompt them to refer those articles to others.

Avoid creating articles so short that they could not easily be put in other encyclopedias.

Conservapedia is an encyclopedia. It is not a dictionary.

Reliability

A few suggestions about reliability.

  1. Reliability is the quality that makes people want to rely on you.
  2. It's like trust: you have to earn it.
  3. People test you, and you must pass their test, or they won't trust you or rely on you.
  4. A major difference between Liberalism and Conservatism is how much each group is willing to have its pronouncements checked, its actions reviewed and evaluated
  5. Science is reliable when enough scientists make enough effort to check each other's work.
  6. Bias gets in the way of reliability.
  7. Neutrality may not be an antidote to bias.
  8. Be careful about the credibility of your edits; may be you could incorporate information that enhance the credibility of an article or a page.
  9. Avoid exaggeration, extreme positions or radical points of view.
  10. Be objective.

Teamwork

A few suggestions about teamwork:

  1. Let others boss you around.
    • Yes, take assignments from your fellow editors. If someone asks you for an article on a topic you know about, or are interested enough to bone up on, please do.
    • Conform to formats, styles, and emerging patterns of article organization.
  2. Be nice to the other editors.
    • Sarcasm seems witty when you're typing, but will the reader really get the point you are trying to make?
    • Hurt feelings reduce cooperative spirit and ultimately work against teamwork.
  3. Be helpful.
    • Can you find quotes and facts quickly by googling?
    • Are you good at spellchecking, grammar, copy-editing?
    • Do you know how to design a template or format a table?
  4. Let others know what you are doing, and respond quickly to queries.
    • Use talk pages, especially user talk pages.
    • Allow others to contact you via email or instant messaging
    • For really difficult issues, consider speaking by telephone
  5. If necessary use: Conservapedia:Image upload requests

Templates

  • Templates should only be created with specific sysop approval, and then immediately protected.
  • Conservapedia does not allow templates to be used as signatures, because of the potential they create for wide-scale vandalism, which could even be done by someone other than the person to whom the signature belongs.
  • All templates should be submitted here for approval.

Copying From Other Sources

Copying from other sources is only permitted in specific circumstances, as explained below. Note that this is an expansion of Commandment 1.

Permitted

Copying from other sources can only be done in the following circumstances:

  • You are copying from a public domain source. In this case, put a notice on the page to indicate this. An example notice is {{Copyright Details (US Government)}}. Note that Wikipedia and Wikipedia mirrors are not in the public domain.
  • You are copying something that you wrote, on Wikipedia or elsewhere. In this case, put a {{copied from}} notice on the talk page of the article. Note that it must be all your own work, and not include contributions made by other editors.
  • You are copying something that someone else wrote, with their explicit permission. This must also be noted on the article or talk page, and the original author should also note, for example on his user page on the original site, that he has provided such permission.

Not Permitted

The following is not permitted (unless it fits the criteria above).

  • Copying slabs of text from multiple other sources. Just because you copy from several sources does not make it your own work.
  • Copying from one or more other sources and changing some words. Someone else's work changed around a bit is still copying their work; it does not constitute your own work. If it is still recognisable as another work altered, it constitutes copying.

If You See A Copied Article

If you notice someone copying from another source, please bring it to the attention of an administrator. Either he or you (see below) should put a {{WP no copying}} notice on the user's talk page and delete the article. That notice explains what is allowed and not allowed, and advises that the deleted article can be undeleted if the copy is permitted as explained above. (A non-administrator can post the notice, although if the article name is included, it is worded as though an administrator posted it.)

90/10 Rule

See also Trolling

The 90/10 rule, unique to Conservapedia, authorizes the blocking of accounts that engage in excessive article talk page,[2] bickering, last wordism, and other unproductive activity. Specifically, as has been stated in the Conservapedia:Commandments since soon after the formation of Conservapedia:

"Unproductive activity, such as 90% talk page edits and only 10% quality edits to Conservapedia articles, may result in blocking of the account."
  • The 90/10 Rule applies to people who talk, talk, talk without redeeming value in the way of substantive contributions. Nothing could be simpler. Inordinate amount of talk is a time-waster. Different viewpoints, if logical, are welcome here. Incessant talk, as can be seen on countless other sites, is not. The talkers can rant elsewhere. We're here to learn.
  • Users can talk all they want, as long as they contribute substance at the same time. It's easy to contribute substance. It's the reason we're here. But no project can succeed if the participants do nothing but talk.
  • The 90/10 Rule is remarkably adept at discouraging and eliminating the mobocracy or talk pollution that runs rampant on other sites, such as Wikipedia. Implementation is simple and application is swift.

Essays

Conservapedia has essay space. To create an essay at Conservapedia please put the prefix "Essay:" in the title of the Conservapedia web page. In addition, please use the category tag "Essays" along with any other appropriate category tags.

Essays must be original content and not largely copies of other web pages on the internet. In addition, essays should follow the Conservapedia commandments, Conservapedia's Manual of Style and the aforementioned guidelines.

Topic bans and main page talk bans

If an editor has a problem with the quality edits in a particular area(s), he may incur a topic ban. Please see: Conservapedia:Topic bans.

See also

Notes

  1. Sources should be authoritative works, not merely published opinions by others. No sources advocating or supporting unlawful activity of any kind are allowed.
  2. http://www.conservapedia.com/index.php?title=User_talk%3AAschlafly&action=historysubmit&diff=884284&oldid=884283