1

Recently, I noticed this page: http://www.wikihow.com/wikiHow:UserPageContest I’d like to know if it would be ok with an admin if I rewrote the page and ran it? Every month or so, people who have registered get a message from me asking them if they want to participate again? @Confusionist ? Someone?

2

The contest is dead, as far as I am concerned. It hasn’t been touched since it’s last run in 2011, which no one entered, looking at the page’s history. It could be brought back to life, but it sure is nice to ask an administrator before doing so. By the way, I changed the status of the page to “no current contest”, so one should be able to be opened, depending on the administrators.

3

Sorry guys, but I oppose this. Although people are free to personalize their user pages however they want, wikiHow is not a social networking site and we try to discourage people from spending excessive time decorating user pages and instead to focus on the mission. Contests are also frowned upon because of its tendency to make editors choose quantity over quality; specific to this contest, there also would be a lot of user page edits to patrol unnecessarily.

4

I couldn’t agree more with @Illneedasaviour , these contests are incredible annoying and add absolutely nothing to the mission. It’s just a popularity contest and who can type/edit the fastest and usually the people who enter it are gone within a month if not sooner.

5

Thanks. By the way, comments probably wouldn’t have to be on-site. Comments for the contest could go here on the forums in a forum post.

6

Not a good idea. Wouldn’t spending time making your user page look cool distract from the wikiHow mission? We need to focus on more productive things.

7

This is no place for artistic contests. I added this to the discussion page:

There is no standing policy, of which I’m aware, prohibiting this. However, please understand that every change in user pages, like all pages, requires the contribution of volunteers to copy/edit and patrol all changes. Also, be aware that if you do enter you will be putting your user page, and all its information out to a parade of invaders, any of whom may vandalize your page and steal information, whether they compete or not. The contest is not approved or disapproved by wikiHow, and no action or protection will be taken or offered.

Compete if you like, but just be aware that the first time it starts to get out of hand it may be discontinued, and the page deleted.

Be careful.

Let the chips fall where they may. If it gets deleted, oh well.

8

I’m runniing this, and I’ll send out this warning to everyone who enters @Davjohn and I’ll make sure to tell them to keep the voting messages to a minimum. However, I believe that the user automatically patrols their User Page edits as patrolled though.

9

Davjohn please avoid bumping threads. @Admin please close? Thanks.

10

@Blackcats-Awesome @Davjohn is an admin, and his points are important and should be considered by all who are considering this. 

I will also add that such contests and games do not serve our mission of creating a useful how-to manual, and that I would much rather see people concentrating on improving articles rather than their own user page, which has no bearing on helping anyone do anything.

By the way, tagging @Admin does absolutely nothing. You need to tag a specific person.

11

Could we please NOT do this type of contest?

Rationale:

1 - wikiHow is NOT a social media site.  If you want to exchange your personal contact with another person off site?  Do so in a forum designed for it.

2 - Furthermore, this type of “contest” sets up one user as a judge/jury over other users… whether or not they actually have any experience, expertise or authority to do so is another issue… and here at wikiHow we’re trying to collaborate to write “How to” articles… NOT compete to see whose page looks the coolest.

3 - I’ve been around on the site long enough to see this type of contest crash and burn multiple times in the past.  This type of “contest” rarely, if ever, helps anyone or anything at all.  If anything… it causes more bad feelings and disappointed newbie editors than it’s worth. 

Just my two(or three) cents from my (likely not so very) humble opinion.

Thanks for your consideration.

12

Ps… @Isorhythmic and @loiswade42  @ Elyne, @Illneedasavior and are also admins…

13

If we so desire, I guess the contest should not go on. I will hold it (which means I’ll really just forget about it after awhile) if the admins so desire.

14

There has been a clear consensus of admins in these threads alone that do not wish to have these contests go forward.

Closing thread.