User talk:Eschaton1985

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JoJo Anthrax (talk) 13:58, 27 February 2024 (UTC)

Welcome!

Hi Eschaton1985, welcome to Wikipedia! I want to applaud your editing technique; Editing Wikipedia is very difficult, editing wikipedia on UFOs is very very very difficult. The best "editing" is actually done on a talk page, and your suggestions were very welcome improvements.

So, I guess I'm the project's go-to guy for finding Reliable Sources on old UFO sightings, now??? I didn't know that until you showed up, but I'm happy to wear the hat. Defending the project from spam, medical misinformation, vandalism etc is a completely different skillset than writing an article -- I can write articles, but I could never do what others do where they monitor all incoming edits, forever. I'm amazed at the editors and admins e who can do that and not burn out, I feel like I get the "fun part".

But the flip side of that is that we DO need an influx of people who have a lot of domain expertise to help us see ways to improve the articles, as you did. I know a LOT about UFOs, but I'm just one person, and I didn't know there was video tape of Hudson Valley UFO.

An ideal Wikipedia would document every "culturally significant" UFO report, just as we document every "culturally significant" Marian apparition. In my free time for the past few years, I've tried to help make that goal a reality... After five years, I've made it from June of 1947 to December of 1951... At that rate, I would have got to Hudson Valley sometime around 2061? So we definitely welcome you here and are glad to have you, we need all the eyeballs we can get. Feoffer (talk) 01:56, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Hi Feoffer, thanks for the kind words. I unfortunately don't have the time to really devote to wikipedia like some do who share the "fringe belief" that being a wikipedia editor is a worthwhile use of their free time (if it was the consensus view we'd be having a very different conversation, now wouldn't we? haha). I plan to pop in here and there where I know the most, or where I see things being done that just don't seem right.

I truly admire what you did for the article we worked together on, so really I think I view myself, in my limited ability to contribute, as more of a second set of eyes to your own when able.

And, as I'll probably be saying to a lot of people here for a long time to come, thanks for all the tips and the help. Maneuvering this bureaucracy, however necessary, is bewildering! Eschaton1985 (talk) 02:32, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Maneuvering this bureaucracy, however necessary, is bewildering! Well ya know what we say about Wikipedia -- it's a good thing it works in practice cause it certainly doesn't work in theory!

IF you have ties to the Ufology community -- can you please help us find out where Luis Elizondo was born? One journalist said Miami, but we're told it was actually someplace in Texas, but we don't know where. Right now we just list United States. It's small thing, but we're being told that the subject of the article takes personal offense to the error (which admittedly does sound exactly like a born Texan, doesn't it?).

Obviously, it would have to come from an authoritative or reliable source, not a message board comment. Mr. Elizondo could list his birthplace on his official site, on social media accounts linked from his official site, or through literally any media source of his choosing (e.g. George Knapp). Feoffer (talk) 04:41, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

I assume he's not allowed to correct it himself? Anyway, despite my interest, I don't have those kinds of ties. Eschaton1985 (talk) 07:01, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

I assume he's not allowed to correct it himself? I mean, technically, as a general rule, it's bad form for people to edit articles about themselves. But the bigger issue with a user showing up claiming to be the subject of an article is verifying that they really are who they claim to be. If Lue wanted to handle this all on his own, probably the easiest way would be to email the project from an account that's verifiably his. Feoffer (talk) 08:08, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Just an update. Someone got the Herald-Tribune to issue a correction, so we now correctly report his birthplace as Texas. Feoffer (talk) 10:14, 7 March 2024 (UTC)