Wikipedia:Levels of competence

This is an essay.

It contains the advice or opinions of one or more Wikipedia contributors. This page is not an encyclopedia article or a Wikipedia policy, as it has not been reviewed by the community.

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This page in a nutshell: All editors go through a series of levels in their understanding of Wikipedia.

In martial arts, there is a concept along the road to mastery called shu ha ri that could be explained as:

One who is a beginner plays within the boundaries.
One who is proficient explores the boundaries.
One who is an expert creates the boundaries—or ignores them altogether.

While editing Wikipedia:

Beginners don't know (or are only starting to learn) the rules.
Intermediate users learn the rules.
Advanced users learn the spirit of the rules.
Finally, once users understand the spirit of the rules and principles, they can sometimes ignore them.

Challenges

Beginner

tip: Don't be afraid, just be BOLD! There's no way you can damage the wiki that can't be corrected in under a minute that doesn't get you in the stocks.

Edit Wikipedia, just make a change, go ahead! If you make a mistake, someone will correct you. If someone more experienced than you corrects you and points you at policy, assume good faith and learn what they are asking you to learn. Refusing to learn may result in the community deciding you cannot learn.

Intermediate

tip: you can pick up a lot of ideas about how consensus was previously formed by reading policy, guideline, and essay pages

Can you name the five pillars of Wikipedia, and apply them?
What are some issues with the five pillars as chosen? Would you choose other pillars? Why?

Advanced

tip: Try to get people to react to you in ways that just happen to lie along the lines of policy. When in a discussion, instead of pointing to the policy itself, try to integrate your understanding of the policy in your own words, and try to convince people that way. You'll probably learn a lot from how they reply!

Do you understand WP:IAR?
If you are an admin, can you enforce policy without use of your admin tools?
Can you get people to follow policy, without making a single link to a policy page yourself?
Can you convince people to follow the principles behind the policy, simply by setting a good example?

Notes

↑ shu-ha-ri can be loosely translated as Learning, Applying, and Transcending

Wikipedia essays (?)

Building, editing, and deletion

Philosophy	Articles are more important than policy Articles must be written All Five Pillars are equally important Avoid vague introductions Civil POV pushing Cohesion Competence is required Concede lost arguments Content philosophies Dissent is not disloyalty Don't lie Don't search for objections Duty to comply Editing Wikipedia is like visiting a foreign country Editors will sometimes be wrong Eight simple rules for editing our encyclopedia Explanationism External criticism of Wikipedia Foreign-language Wikipedias are not precedent Galileo complex Here to build an encyclopedia Leave it to the experienced Let it cool before proposing a rule Levels of competence Levels of consensus Most ideas are bad Need Not broken is ugly Not editing because of Wikipedia restriction Not every article can be a Featured Article The one question Oversimplification Paradoxes Pave the path Paraphrasing Parallelism POV and OR from editors, sources, and fields Process is important Product, process, policy Purpose Reasonability rule Systemic bias There is no seniority Ten Simple Rules for Editing Wikipedia Tendentious editing The role of policies in collaborative anarchy The rules are principles Trifecta We are absolutely here to right great wrongs Wikipedia in brief Wikipedia is an encyclopedia Wikipedia is a community Wikipedia is not RationalWiki Wikipedia is written by humans, for humans Yes, Wikipedia is indeed a bureaucracy
Article construction	100K featured articles Abandoned stubs Acronym overkill Adding images improves the encyclopedia Advanced text formatting Akin's Laws of Article Writing Alternatives to the "Expand" template Amnesia test A navbox on every page An unfinished house is a real problem Archive your sources Article revisions Articles have a half-life Autosizing images Avoid mission statements Be neutral in form Beef up that first revision Blind men and an elephant BOLD, revert, discuss cycle Build content to endure Cargoculting Cherrypicking Chesterton's fence Children's lit, adult new readers, & large-print books Citation overkill Citation underkill Common-style fallacy Concept cloud Creating controversial content Criticisms of society may be consistent with NPOV and reliability Dictionaries as sources Don't cite Wikipedia on Wikipedia Don't demolish the house while it's still being built Don't get hung up on minor details Don't hope the house will build itself Don't panic Don't "teach the controversy" Editing on mobile devices Editors are not mindreaders Encourage the newcomers Endorsements (commercial) Featured articles may have problems Formatting bilateral relations articles Formatting bilateral relations templates Fruit of the poisonous tree Give an article a chance Gotfryd custom How to write a featured article Identifying and using independent sources History sources Law sources Primary sources Science sources Style guides Tertiary sources Ignore STRONGNAT for date formats Into the Woulds Introduction to structurism Link rot Mine a source Merge Test Minors and persons judged incompetent "Murder of" articles Not every story/event/disaster needs a biography Not everything needs a navbox Not everything needs a template Nothing is in stone Obtain peer review comments Organizing disambiguation pages by subject area Permastub Potential, not just current state Presentism Principle of Some Astonishment The problem with elegant variation Pro and con lists Printability Publicists Put a little effort into it Restoring part of a reverted edit Robotic editing Sham consensus Source your plot summaries Specialized-style fallacy Spoons versus forks Stublet Stub Makers Run an edit-a-thon Temporary versions of articles Tertiary-source fallacy There are no shortcuts to neutrality There is no deadline There is a deadline The deadline is now Topics to avoid Try not to leave it a stub What is a reliable source Understanding Wikipedia's content standards Walled garden What an article should not include Wikipedia is a work in progress Wikipedia is not being written in an organized fashion The world will not end tomorrow Write the article first Writing better articles
Content additions	Avoid thread mode Copyediting reception sections Coup Don't throw more litter onto the pile Gender-neutral language Metacoverage Myth vs fiction No trojan horses Proseline Reading in a flow state Turning biology research into a Wikipedia article Use our own words We shouldn't be able to figure out your opinions Write the article first Writing about radiation Writing about women Writing better articles
Deletion	Adjectives in your recommendations AfD is not a war zone Arguments to avoid in deletion discussions Arguments to avoid in deletion reviews Arguments to avoid in image deletion discussions Arguments to make in deletion discussions Avoid repeated arguments Before commenting in a deletion discussion But there must be sources! Confusing arguments mean nothing Content removal Counting and sorting are not original research Delete or merge Delete the junk Deletion is not cleanup Does deletion help? Does merging help? Don't attack the nominator Don't confuse stub status with non-notability Don't overuse shortcuts to policy and guidelines to win your argument Emptying categories out of process Follow the leader How the presumption of notability works How to save an article nominated for deletion I just don't like it Identifying blatant advertising Identifying test edits Immunity Keep it concise Liar liar pants on fire No Encyclopedic Use Notability is not everything Nothing Nothing is clear Overzealous deletion Relisting can be abusive Relist bias The Heymann Standard Unopposed AFD discussion Wikipedia is not Whack-A-Mole Why was the page I created deleted? What to do if your article gets tagged for speedy deletion When in doubt, hide it in the woodwork Zombie page

Civility

The basics	Accepting other users Apology Autistic editors Being right isn't enough Contributing to complicated discussions Divisiveness Don't retaliate Editors' pronouns Edit at your own pace Encouraging the newcomers Enjoy yourself Expect no thanks How to be civil Maintaining a friendly space Negotiation Obsessive–compulsive disorder editors Please say please Relationships with academic editors Thank you Too long; didn't read Truce Unblock perspectives We are all Wikipedians here You have a right to remain silent
Philosophy	A thank you never hurts A weak personal attack is still wrong Advice for hotheads An uncivil environment is a poor environment Be the glue Beware of the tigers! Civility warnings Deletion as revenge DGG's Two-Comment Rule Duty to comply Failure Forgive and forget It's not the end of the world Nobody cares Most people who disagree with you on content are not vandals On Wikipedia no one knows you're a dog Old-fashioned Wikipedian values Profanity, civility, and discussions Revert notification opt-out Shadowless Fists of Death! Staying cool when the editing gets hot The grey zone The last word There is no Divine Right of Editors Most ideas are bad Nothing is clear Reader The rules of polite discourse There is no common sense Two wrongs don't make a right Wikipedia clichés Wikipedia is not about winning Wikipedia should not be a monopoly Writing for the opponent
Dos	Assume good faith Assume the assumption of good faith Assume no clue Avoid personal remarks Avoid the word "vandal" Be a humble article creator Be excellent to one another Be pragmatic Beyond civility Call a spade a spade Candor Deny recognition Desist Discussing cruft Drop the stick and back slowly away from the horse carcass Encourage full discussions Get over it How to lose Imagine others complexly Just drop it Keep it concise Keep it down to earth Mind your own business Say "MOBY" Mutual withdrawal Read before commenting Read the room Settle the process first Wikipedia:Stop it You can search, too
Don'ts	Because I can Civil POV pushing Cyberbullying Don't accuse someone of a personal attack for accusing of a personal attack Don't be a fanatic Don't be a jerk Don't be an ostrich Don't be ashamed Don't be a WikiBigot Don't be high-maintenance Don't be inconsiderate Don't be obnoxious Don't be prejudiced Don't be rude Don't be the Fun Police Don't bludgeon the process Don't call a spade a spade Don't call people by their real name Don't call the kettle black Don't call things cruft Don't come down like a ton of bricks Don't cry COI Don't demand that editors solve the problems they identify Don't eat the troll's food Don't expect others to remember your pinging rules Don't fight fire with fire Don't give a fuck Don't help too much Don't ignore community consensus Don't knit beside the guillotine Don't make a smarmy valediction part of your signature Don't remind others of past misdeeds Don't resubmit a draft in the same state it was last declined in Don't shout Don't spite your face Don't take the bait Don't teach your grandmother to suck eggs Don't template the regulars Don't throw your toys out of the pram Don't tilt at windmills Do not insult the vandals Griefing Hate is disruptive Jew-tagging Nationalist editing No angry mastodons just madmen No ableism No Confederates No Nazis No queerphobia No racists No trojan horses No, you can't have a pony Passive aggression POV railroad Sealawyering Superhatting There are no oracles There's no need to guess someone's preferred pronouns You can't squeeze blood from a turnip UPPERCASE
WikiRelations	WikiBullying WikiCrime WikiHarassment WikiHate WikiLawyering WikiLove WikiPeace

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Wikipedia:Levels of competence

Challenges

See also

Notes