User talk:Atilsley

Welcome!

Hello, Atilsley, and welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for your contributions. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are some pages that you might find helpful:

I hope you enjoy editing here and being a Wikipedian! Please sign your name on talk pages using four tildes (~~~~); this will automatically produce your name and the date. If you need help, check out Wikipedia:Questions, ask me on my talk page, or place {{helpme}} on your talk page and ask your question there. Again, welcome! --Fl e x (talk|contribs) 19:51, 2 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Bruce Metzger

Please see User_talk:Flex#Bruce_Metzger for my response to your comments. Cheers! --Fl e x (talk|contribs) 02:22, 3 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I double checked your Westcott quotations and citations and found them both to be incorrect (and incomplete!). I fixed both and added links to the original sources where I found them. Do you have a more specific reference for the third reference (e.g., page number, publisher and date, ISBN, perhaps even a quote)? See also my comments at Talk:Bruce_Metzger#Original_research. --Fl e x (talk|contribs) 15:49, 3 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Colin Tilsley

Hello again! You'll see that I reverted your edit to Colin Tilsley. I did this because it was not written from a neutral point of view (e.g., "Sceptics and atheists might question various aspects of the bible, but no one can counter the powerful testimony and witness of Colin Tilsley.") and was a bit too "peacocky" and "weasely". Also, based on your user name, you will want to take note of the guideline on conflicts of interest ("Material that appears to promote the interests or visibility of an article's author, family members, or associates may place the author in a conflict of interest."), particularly WP:COI#Close_relationships. Let me know if you have any questions about this. --Fl e x (talk|contribs) 17:39, 3 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Hi there! I prepared the original article after looking at the autobiography (my wife and I sell second-hand Christian books), and seeing the wide influence Colin seemed to have had through GLO. Since the information had been published in a book, it was verifiable, and was not "original research" (I wasn't writing it out of my head or from asking people who knew Colin). Also since he had founded organisations that were clearly visible on the internet, I figured mentioning them would help too. Evidently someone thinks I need links from other articles, but without writing articles about the GLO (which again would have to be based on verifiable sources), I think this might be difficult. I do think that it is getting more difficult to produce articles on Wikipedia, because, whilst initially people on Wikipedia were busy writing articles, now there seem to be loads of people patrolling it and even writing new policies. An example is a (disputed) policy on whether a subject is important enough to get on here - something that would never have happened initially - witness the lists of articles from ancient encyclopaedias, a vast number of which are about people no-one has ever heard of in the present day, yet they were listed to have Wikipedia articles added eventually. Frankly I think a lot of people just won't bother writing any more, if there are going to be endless questions asked about every article. On the other hand, the publicity Wikipedia has generated means that they want to make sure people aren't just making stuff up, so I suppose it's fair enough in a way. --PeterR 21:24, 3 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks Peter. Did you have a chance to Meet Colin Tilsley in the UK around 1975-1978? We lived in Bournemouth while Colin started the work of GLO in the UK. The headquarters are now in Motherwell, Scotland. Atilsley 05:06, 4 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

In response to PeterR, all articles should be sourced (see WP:V), but it wasn't your text that I removed. Regarding writing new articles, Jimbo Wales has said that the focus here should be on improving the quality of existing articles rather than increasing quantity by adding new articles (that's not to say that all the notable topics have articles now, but it's much closer than it used to be). Just because most people today have never heard of, say, Heraclitus does not mean that he is not important for the history and development of Western philosophy and civilization. Moreover, just because a small band had an article written about them in a newspaper doesn't mean they deserve their own Wikipedia article. It's a fuzzy line, but there does have to be a line. Anyway, I was more worried about WP:NPOV than WP:OR in this case. --Fl e x (talk|contribs) 14:08, 4 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Atilsley, you wrote on my talk page:

I'd like a little more help with understanding why the new text for Colin Tilsley was removed, please. I've read through numerous policies around POV, and I appreciate that there will be some overlap especially coming from a family member. But being a family member doesn't preclude me from submitting factual commentary surely? If I had a different username would that have made a difference? Wiki would be the worse for it if so.

My family interest aside, C Tilsley was a significant individual in the growth of missionary/evangelical work throughout Europe and Asia, so I wish to add as much content as possible.

BTW, I could not find a specific policy on commenting on family. Atilsley 05:03, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

Let's consolidate discussion of this here. I voiced several concerns above. The first was that your edit did not conform to the neutrality policy. The example sentence I gave is ample proof of that, but another I'd cite is "The work of GLO continues strong today, in part [due] to Colin's great level of trust and faith in God's ability to sustain and grow ministry work." That line is fine when talking to Christians who hold the same beliefs in God's promises as you, but as a statement of objective fact (which is how it is phrased) is not neutral in a secular encyclopedia. This is the most significant problem with your addition. One way to address the problem is to rephrase problem statements into something like "Tilsley believed that...." Also, be sure to avoid "Christianese" -- lingo that is common among and understood by Christians but not the world.

My second, lesser concern was that the tone you wrote in was too peacocky. For instance, "he was a gifted evangelist" should be phrased more like "Martyn Lloyd-Jones called him a 'gifted evangelist' (Some book, pub: date, page)." The sentence, "In his illness, he demonstrated great courage," should be rephrased similarly.

My third, lesser concern is related to the second and was that your edit didn't give specifics for general claims, e.g., "He is regularly and fondly remembered at various conferences throughout the world." It wasn't so much the neutrality of that claim (which is the focus of WP:WEASEL) that I was worried about so much as the vagueness of the claim (compare "Passive voice" under WP:WEASEL#Other_problems).

Finally, I mentioned the guideline on conflicts of interest. Note first that the policy says close relationships may be a COI. The policy is in place particularly for disputed figures such as politicians (you may have heard about some U.S. congressman's staff editing his page to remove or soften critical material). I don't really know anything about Colin Tilsley and doubt that there is much controversy surrounding him, but I wanted to bring that guideline to your attention anyway. It does not prohibit you from contributing to the article at this point, but you'll need to be careful, especially if you edit critical material that someone might add later. (One way to handle such things is to post your edits on the talk page and let the third-parties make the changes for you if they deem them neutral and notable.)

As far as your user name, it doesn't matter, though it did hint that you were related to the Colin. Following the COI guideline is a matter of honor and only becomes a matter of enforcement if problems arise.

Hope that helps. Please respond here if you have any more concerns. (PS, I added a comment to the section on Bruce Metzger above that may have been hidden by this discussion.) --Fl e x (talk|contribs) 14:08, 4 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

All noted with thanks - I'm learning! Atilsley 23:01, 4 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Very welcome. Feel free to ask on my talk page if you have any other questions. (You'll note also that I indented the above posts per WP:TPG.) Cheers! --Fl e x (talk|contribs) 01:20, 5 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Metzger redux

Please see User_talk:Flex#Metzger_redux. --Fl e x (talk|contribs) 13:59, 22 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]