User:DreamGuy

About DreamGuy

I registered about a year ago but have been making changes to selected articles for well over two years. My fear was that registering would mean I'd spend a lot more time than I want working on all sorts of articles... and it has, oops, but I got sick of seeing IP numbers up there when I made changes.

Mythology and Jack the Ripper were the two main articles and topic areas I originally came here to update, as a lot of posters got their information from extremely bad sources. Unfortunately both fields are full of books by people with little to no actual knowledge on the topics and just regurgitating things they read in earlier poor references, so a lot of people read these things and end up knowing less than they did before they started. And even more people read works of fiction and assume they are true, which of course is not good when it comes to adding information to an encyclopedia.

There are also a lot of other articles I'll look at here and there as they come up.

Usually what I end up doing is undoing really bad edits by other people: spam, hoaxes, trying to put their own opinion into an article as if anyone else cares, and so forth.

About me? Eclectic scholar, published author, and all around nice and sexy guy, but I won't list details as Wiki guidelines discourage self-promotion.

The good thing about Wikipedia is anyone who spots something wrong can change it. The bad thing about Wikipedia is all the people who want things to be wrong (either from bias or cluelessness) outnumber the rest, and the worst editors (lack of real world credentials, strongest bias, dedicated spammers) devote the most time to it.

Useful templates

Two I made:

• fictionlist - for nonfiction articles overrun by lists of fiction/music/popular culture making reference to the topic
• fictioncruft - for fiction articles that just has way too many nonnotable examples listed

Tagging articles/sections:

• advert - article reading like ad
• plot - plot summary overly long
• cleanup-laundry - overly long lists
• examplefarm - listcruft
• external links - for just too many
• cleanup-spam - for the hardcore bad links
• trivia - for section named trivia
• unencyclopedic - whole section/article needs to go away
• disputed & disputed-section - factual problems
• POV & POV-section - for the pushers
• totally-disputed & totally-disputed-section - disputed + POV
• importance - article not encyclopedic
• importance-s - section

Tagging specific lines:

• fact - cite source here, please
• who - who says this?
• POV-statement - this part here is biased
• or - somebody is just pontificating here on their own, aren't they?

Links

• WP:NOT#TRIVIA - extremely handy, probably moreso than just WP:TRIVIA since there's less room for deluding oneself about what is and is NOT allowed

Awards

There were a few from a while back I didn't preserve, but here are the recent ones moved over from the talk page:

I award DreamGuy the Editor's Barnstar for his merciless efforts to keep spam, vandalism, subtrivial fictional references, fantasies presented as facts, unsourced non-sense and Encyclopedia Mythica crap out of Wikipedia. It's a messy job but someone's got to do it. Thank you. - Haukur Þorgeirsson 11:26, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

I, Kerowyn, award this The RickK Anti-Vandalism Barnstar award this barnstar for tireless efforts in reverting vandalism, squelching sockpuppets and generally making Pseudoscience and Mythology marginally more sane places to be.

The Barnstar of Diligence may be awarded in recognition of a combination of extraordinary scrutiny, precision and community service, you deserve this for your massive and tireless work towards NPOV. ~~ N (t/c) 22:53, 8 November 2005 (UTC)

I give this NPOV award to User:DreamGuy for his tireless, fearless work for the neutrality and his insistence on the necessity of scholarly references. --BorgQueen 23:11, 8 November 2005 (UTC)

Not a Barnstar: If I didn't think barnstars were so insipidly stupid, I'd award you one for dealing with User:Evmore and the situations created by the same. I don't have the patience for that. -- Krash 06:00, 30 December 2005 (UTC)