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"Stick with me and you'll be farting through silk."
-- Actor Robert Mitchum after he proposed to his future wife, Dorothy Spence, in the late 1930s. Mitchum remained married to Dorothy until his death in 1997.
"Never mind the 60 feet, let's talk about the 6 inches."
The Wikipedia Project is a remarkable endeavour, offering a sensible and comprehensive set of policies and user-friendly software programs. I hope to contribute to it in a positive way on a semi-regular basis.
Here's my edit count on WP according to Essjay's Tool Here's a list of my contributions: [1]
3,000th edit: Monday, September 18, 2006.
Pages that I've started or contributed significantly to
From November of 1996 to November of 2004, I worked as the senior editor/ news editor of SCENE magazine, a locally owned bi-weekly publication covering news, arts and entertainment. I was also a regular columnist at SCENE, writing a lively opinion column under the banner of "RamFed&Loaded." Today, I am a freelance writer and researcher/ author.
ArtSCAPE, a monthly arts publication (www.artscapemagazine.ca) in London was launched on January 25, 2006, features my column on city hall and the arts and often a second column on arts-related subjects. (Effective October of 2006, I am no longer writing for ArtSCAPE).
Taking the "evil-doers" to court is always fun. First you smoke 'em out with the filing documents, then you get 'em running with evidence and cross-examination and then the presiding Judge brings down The Million-Pound Sh-t Hammer -- in your favour, of course!
858532 Ontario Limited o/a Checker Limousine v. Jim Eiler, Director of Employment Standards, Ontario and Dana Randall (Court File #544/95).
Stuart Campbell v. Ministry of National Revenue and Jack Anderson (Court File #97-739-UI).
Another public interest case that I was involved in and won involves our municipal freedom of information and protection of privacy legislation. After being denied access to the identity of the holders of two City of London taxi-plates (#320 and #323) by the City Clerk on August 12, 2003, I filed a formal appeal to the Information and Privacy Commission (IPC) office in Toronto on October 6, 2003 (MFIPPA Request #2003-28), pursuant to the Municipal Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act.
DECISION: Finally, after 13 months, the IPC reversed its earlier decisions/ position on similar cab industry information requests/ appeals and ruled in my favour on October 28, 2004, ordering the City of London to release the information to me (IPC's seven-page decision and Order #MO-1862, dated Oct. 28, 2004). This decision has a province-wide impact involving similar requests for municipally held information about those holding taxi-cab owner licences -- relevant to those who undertake to track the ownership of lucrative cab plates in an often controversial industry.
Hey cab driver ... once more 'round the block! And don't take me the long way!
I am currently completing a 135-page, fully footnoted paper entitled, A Colourful History of London, Ontario's Acrimonious Vehicle-for-Hire Industry, 1855-2006, as part of London, Ontario's 150th anniversary as an incorporated city (more than 10,000 residents).
Also in the works is another book, tentatively titled, Juice Monkeys: The Incredible Cock-Up at London Hydro, 1996-1997. This electrifying civic nightmare has more twists and turns than the road map of the U.S. State of Georgia.
EDITING WARS: You doity rat! You edited my article and I'm a gonna get you good, see! Blah de blah de blah blah blah ... wake me up when the war's over!
Being an administrator on Wikipedia has no interest for me. While there's obviously an extremely valuable role for administrators, bureaucrats, stewards and arbitrators to play, it seems that the deeper one gets involved with the project, the greater the expectations and ultimately, the heartaches. Kind of like life itself.
No wonder so many Wikipedians wind up taking "wiki-holidays" or "wiki-breaks."
The often-petty in-fighting that I've come across amongst various contributors over this or that information/ edit/ block is unfortunate. But, given a project of this size, its complexity, the number of active users and human nature itself, I suppose that it's surprising there's not more nastiness, trolling and vandalism.
An article that you have been involved in editing, Sean Twist, has been listed for deletion. If you are interested in the deletion discussion, please participate by adding your comments at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Sean Twist. Thank you.Please contact me if you're unsure why you received this message. -- PhantomSteve/talk|contribs\ 12:56, 10 May 2010 (UTC)
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