Archive:Monthly Write-a-Thon

What's a Write-a-Thon?

It's a bunch of people getting together on a wiki at a particular time to do a bunch of writing. It's like an online party! Heck no, it is an online party! It's also an excuse for infrequent wikiers to show up and party hardy; to exchange ideas with people we might not "meet" otherwise.

But hey, why not show up in between the write-ins, too!

When?

Write-a-Thons happen the first Wednesday of every month. The next Write-a-Thon is Wednesday, September 3, 2008. September 3rd starts on September 2nd, 1200 UTC, when it starts being Wednesday in New Zealand, and ends on September 4th, 1200 UTC, when it finishes being Wednesday in Hawaii. Save The Date! Put it on your calendar! Set yourself a reminder!

Any new article you create, and any edit you make to somebody else's Write-a-Thon article during that time period will count, though to be a bona fide partier, you have to write your new articles when it's that day in your part of the world.

Our first Write-a-Thon took place Wednesday, August 1, 2007 and was considered a roaring good time--we had about 30 partiers creating something like 50 articles, and editing lots.

What are the rules?

Rules? This is a party! There are no rules!

Well, OK, maybe there are a couple rules:

• We'll have a Write-a-Thon the first Wednesday of every month.
• To participate, you only have to do two things: (1) start a new article (even just a stub will qualify, if not too short - and please remember to include the subpages template!), and (2) make a substantive edit (not just a copyedit) to somebody else's new article. Then you can list your name here as a partier. Until then, sign in as a porch-sitter, party-crasher, or total party poop.

This month's Party Theme

Wednesday, September 3, 2008

My Favorite Band!

Or your favourite Music Genre...your favourite orchestra...recording artist--their best song (I may shudder, but hey, it's up to you!) If it's musical, and it's your fave, write about it!

(You can also be inspired by some of the future theme suggestions, below. Or propose one yourself--just scroll down. Or write about something that takes your fancy--or the first thing that comes into your head--JUST DO IT!)

The Partiers

• Aleta was late to the party room, and found it empty! Time to go knock, knock, knocking on people's doors! Came back and started with what might well be the world's most famous brother act and another boy band. Hmm...there'll be more... Aleta Curry 21:56, 2 September 2008 (CDT) Aleta returned to the beginning to do some editing to count herself among the bona fide partiers. Today, since it's still Wednesday in the U.S., listening to Marcelo's interesting bossa nova inspired your M.C. to change the red link for the great Ella Fitzgerald. I notice that CZ has started a band, but we've got no choir! Horrors! Aleta Curry 17:57, 3 September 2008 (CDT)

Okie, I've made an edit to another boy band, although not a very major one. When I finish today's input into my new article about the glorious, *glorious*, GLORIOUS Weavers, I'll have become a full-fledged partier. (And right now, to prove it, I am just about to take my last sip of a 5-to-1 Plymouth Gin/Noilly Prat martini -- how nice to know that there is a second, nearly frozen glass of same in the freezer waiting for me to go downstairs and retrieve it -- the Weavers will thank me for the effort!) Hayford Peirce 21:08, 3 September 2008 (CDT)

• David E. Volk edited The Jackson 5 and started The Hudsons. David E. Volk 23:14, 2 September 2008 (CDT)

How embarrassment! I thought you meant The Hudson Brothers till I read your article! Aleta Curry 05:16, 3 September 2008 (CDT)

• Is it a bird, is it a plane? Chris made a start on Capercaillie, but don't grouse when you find out the truth. :) Chris Day 01:01, 3 September 2008 (CDT)
  • No clue what it means or even how to pronounce it, but the name of this band makes me smile.Pat Palmer 16:39, 3 September 2008 (CDT)
    • Kap-er-kay-lee is the correct pronunciation. The band is named after a species of grouse that lives in the Scottish highlands. Chris Day 16:58, 3 September 2008 (CDT)
• Favorite band, hmmm....Citizen's Band, Gastric band...I think I'll go for Genesis (band) -Derek Hodges 04:47, 3 September 2008 (CDT)
  • This reminds me of a great line I heard on television the other day. "What's your wife's favourite flower?" "|Self-raising!" Louise Valmoria 20:53, 3 September 2008 (CDT)
• Daniel started Ari Babakhanov, edited education and added videos to Kawir.

• Anthony.Sebastian started and worked on three articles since the last Write-a-Thon, namely Photosynthesis, Cognitive science and Hormesis. He may ask that they count something in relation to today's activity, though he finds himself reluctant to set such a present and has high hopes of starting something new today (2:16 p.m. here in San Francisco as I key this). --Anthony.Sebastian 16:19, 3 September 2008 (CDT)

Yes, of course that all counts. I suppose we have to write about Tony Bennett or (I Left my Heart in) San Francisco, now. Aleta Curry 17:57, 3 September 2008 (CDT)

Nah, I did get a chance to start a new article. (See farther down for entry on that.) --Anthony.Sebastian 23:27, 3 September 2008 (CDT)

• While being shaken mightily on the rough tracks of Amtrak, User:Pat_Palmer is endeavoring, during her evening commute, to further flesh out abc (music notation). She won't be able to finish it tonight due a meeting but she will be watching the festivities during breaks and will continue tomorrow.Pat Palmer 16:36, 3 September 2008 (CDT)

Aleta is very impressed that Pat can write about music notation. Aleta Curry 17:57, 3 September 2008 (CDT)

Hey, I was using abc notation back in 1996...if you're familiar enough with it, you can "sight-read" music in a whole new sense! --Larry Sanger 21:36, 3 September 2008 (CDT)

• Mal was out chasing cars, missing most of the party. Open your eyes though, and you'll see that Mal started an article on Snow Patrol. Anyway, he has to run as he has to shut his eyes. This is beginning to get to me - we could make this go on forever! --Mal McKee 17:35, 3 September 2008 (CDT)

Hi Mal! Glad to see you, even with your eyes wide shut. Aleta Curry 17:57, 3 September 2008 (CDT)

• The other Anthony wrote about scientific notation, which has nothing to do with bands, but it was something he could do while at work. Anthony Argyriou 19:10, 3 September 2008 (CDT)

• Louise dashed in to kick off an article on Joy Division and will get back to the write-a-thon when she gets home from work--it's a hectic day out here! It's been a hard day's night and I've been working like a dog ... so I'll be back soon. Louise Valmoria 21:21, 2 September 2008 (CDT) Let's waste time chasing cars ... becoming a bona fide partier this month with an edit to Snow Patrol.Louise Valmoria 19:10, 3 September 2008 (CDT) Meanwhile, birds and planes go through the rainbow--it's so divine to get a chance to write about some favourites ... like Sigur Rós, Franz Ferdinand (band), Arctic Monkeys ... and to meet Larry's challenge about bands I should be embarrassed to admit that I liked, let's go for Hanson. I'm not sure yet if reality TV show rejects should count ;)

Wait a second--Larry actually said we should admit to liking bands we're embarrassed to admit to? Aleta Curry 23:21, 3 September 2008 (CDT)

Well, it was a variation suggestion that he made in our reminder email: I have a slight variation on the monthly topic: bands you loved as a youth, but which you are now embarrassed by. And this question happened to lighten up a very tense day at work, as well as prove very revealing: answers range from George Michael, Wham!, Def Leppard, Portishead, Slade, Englebert Humperdinck ... Louise Valmoria 23:33, 3 September 2008 (CDT)

Aha! (a band, for those too old or too young to know, tee hee) Lou's in da house! Aleta Curry 21:45, 2 September 2008 (CDT)

• Tom brought pop music and Stevie Wonder to the party, and danced to heavy metal while tapping away at education. --Tom Morris 19:52, 3 September 2008 (CDT)

• Larry Sanger finally wandered in, listening to Altan, who were playing reels, as usual. And he is about to start making small edits to everybody else's articles. a-ha, I see one; Norwegians!; and here I thought they were Americans; no wonder the weird grammatically awkward "Take On Me"; uh, ;-) . Bopped with The Jackson 5 (I remember a small Michael Jackson dancing on TV...from when I was even smaller) and tackled a little education (life-long, don't you know).

• Hayford, finishing his second martini (see above, Chez Aleta) finished off his initial article about The Weavers, and, having edited Aleta's article about those Irish boyos, achieved Full Partier Status. What a sacrifice! I gave up watching that Eskimo woman give some sort of speech or other. Oh, well, I can read about it in the NYT tomorrow.... Hayford Peirce 21:47, 3 September 2008 (CDT)

• Anthony.Sebastian did get a chance to start a new article, on that ancient Greek surely everyone has heard of, Alcmaeon of Croton. I hope others will help elaborate on the biography of that important person in the history of medicine. --Anthony.Sebastian 23:23, 3 September 2008 (CDT)

Keen-as-mustard and jumped the gun

• Because I'll do anything to avoid actual work (or worse yet, grading papers), I've started my September composition (he he): Abc_(music_notation)Pat Palmer 18:36, 18 August 2008 (CDT)

"Composition" - ha, ha.

Wow! jumping the gun already! Will one of you wizards please archive the August page so we can get September's up if people are going to be so johnny-on-the-spot? Wow!

Aleta Curry 18:40, 19 August 2008 (CDT)

Porch sitters--article creators who didn't edit a new article

• Alex begins his rocking wednesday with Blind Guardian. -- Alexander Wiebel 04:11, 3 September 2008 (CDT)

• Marcelo was distracted composing Bossa nova... "Quiet Nights of Quiet Stars". Marcelo B. Barata Ribeiro 08:16, 3 September 2008 (CDT)

• Howard C. Berkowitz 09:08, 3 September 2008 (CDT) is never quite sure how to respond to the write-a-thon. There are several specific articles in Internet networking and security that I have in progress, may be review for a new contract/job. That creates a whole web of related articles, with at least one colleague/collaborator involved.

In going through military things, I variously stopped and filled in several magenta links, as well as "oh, that reminds me" additional articles. In some cases, I've identified things I can't answer, which may be addressable by a collaborator with the time, may actually be holes in the logic, or may have deliberately obscure and classified answers.

I have several "capstone" article trying to organize a topic but still very experimental, such as "locality of networks"..

Oh, but there's only one way to respond to the Write-a-Thon, Howard: write something!  :) All the above counts! Aleta Curry 16:58, 3 September 2008 (CDT)

• Patrick Brown created Ulaid.

• Marc got his thrash on, creating Metallica. He plans to source/expand/etc. it soon, though he definitely won't mind if someone else gets to it first! --Marc J. Dziezynski 20:18, 3 September 2008 (CDT)

Party crashers--article contributors who didn't create a new article

• It's 4am in the United Kingdom, and instead of being asleep like normal people, Tom Morris has been editing articles on The Jackson 5, Google Chrome and education. Once he has finished abusing his circadian rhythms, he may write some articles. --Tom Morris 22:06, 2 September 2008 (CDT)

The shy ones, absent-minded profs, and other modest creatures

• Sarah Palin isn't a musician, but John gets credit just the same.

Travel(l)ing through North America at the moment and it's wall-to-wall Sarah Palin on CNN, so... John Stephenson 22:05, 3 September 2008 (CDT)

• I was going to write an article but ... Catherine Woodgold 22:13, 3 September 2008 (CDT)

Special Requests

This is the Month of September and our first Workgroup Week on Biology is just round the corner. Please lend a helping hand. Supten Sarbadhikari 20:30, 2 September 2008 (CDT)

Hear hear! --Larry Sanger 21:15, 2 September 2008 (CDT)

Questions

Today (or was it yesterday?) the new browser Google Chrome has been launched. I'm using that for this post. Shouldn't we fill up that page? Supten

For the moment, it's Windows only, leaving me with nothing to comment. Daniel Mietchen 03:26, 3 September 2008 (CDT)

• I want to know if anyone over the age of 30 can think or write about The Jackson Five without singing? Aleta Curry 22:19, 3 September 2008 (CDT)
  • Me, Me, Me! I don't even know who they flippin' are! And I certainly never hoid them, except, I suppose, in my deepest nightmares.... Hayford Peirce 23:09, 3 September 2008 (CDT)
    • Stop lying! That's like crusty octegenarians who claim never to have heard of The Beatles! Aleta Curry 23:15, 3 September 2008 (CDT)
      • Not so! I'm certainly an overbaked baguette of a sexagenarian, and I've *hoid* of the Beetles, and even heard, mebbe, four of their songs, but I ain't never *hoid* of the Jackson 74, or listened to them. Michael Jackson I *have* heard of, but, thank God, never actually, hoid.... (Ludwig von Peirce, who, thank goodness, is now 100% deef) Hayford Peirce 23:21, 3 September 2008 (CDT)
    • [spit-takes her tea] Whad've you been livin' in a cave for the past 30 years?? How could you avoid this with kids? Peirce, you're one helluva funny guy, I'll say that fer ya! Aleta Curry 23:39, 3 September 2008 (CDT)

Just after discussing someone else's mixed Greek/Filipino wedding plans at work ... What cultural traditions have you seen at a wedding that you find particularly interesting? Louise Valmoria 23:47, 3 September 2008 (CDT)

Good one, Louise! Among my favourites are the hoisting of the happy couple up into the air on chairs and dancing about with them at jewish weddings (although a couple of my friends have looked like they were hanging on for dear life!)

Another is the exchange of "a token" at Irish weddings, like a penny--my particular fave was a clever bride who gave a NYC subway token!

I like when people raised in the West but with strong ethnic traditions change into national costume for the reception; I've seen that a few times.

I also like the Orthodox custom of holding crowns over the couple's heads to signify that they're king and queen for a day.

I've quite an international circle--can you tell?

Aleta Curry 00:00, 4 September 2008 (CDT)

Big Collaboration topic

All, we did a credible job with Sports last month. I'd like to try another Big Collaboration--I hope you'll be interested. The topic I've put out there is

Education

We may not all know the theory and history, but we sure know a lot about it in other respects, I think! --Larry Sanger

[singing] We don't need no Education, we don't need no thought control....

Previous shindigs

• August 6, 2008
• July 2, 2008
• June 4, 2008
• May 7, 2008
• April 2, 2008
• March 5, 2008
• February 6, 2008
• January 9,2008
• December 5, 2007
• November 7, 2007
• October 3, 2007
• September 5, 2007
• August 1, 2007

Official libations

2007

• Inaugural - beer!
• September - champagne
• October - we were refurbishing the bar and only had coffee!
• November - made up for last month with more vodka than was good for us and plenty of rum.
• December - eggnog and wine

2008

• January - Whisky and the Cocktail of the Month, a pharisee
• February - schnapps and the Cocktail of the Month, the caipirinha (considered the national drink of Brazil)
• March - port wine (which should probably live at port (wine), no? (Someone put that on their list, please....Oh, *someone* did--thanks, Ro) and the Cocktail of the Month, a Dead Aunt
• April - Akpeteshie hot and fresh from Ghana. And cool shandies and spritzers if that took your fancy. Lotsa staggering around the bar after this party!
• May - Was it champagne? No, we were dry, I think.
• June - Were we abstaining yet again?
• July - Sherry
• August - pineapple juice Well, that's all right, I guess!

Write-a-Thon Theme Suggestions

New Suggestions and Discussion

Go ahead and propose one!

• I had a thought the other day - why don't we have a Subpages day - either separate or as a Write-A-Thon theme? There's tons of them Bibliographies, Related Articles and Definitions that need writing. --Tom Morris 11:48, 4 July 2008 (CDT)

It's a good thought, Tom, and I can see where the subpages need doing. Trouble is, whenever the Write-a-Thon has been too narrowly restricted, particularly when the suggested 'theme' is really a codename for 'work', it doesn't go over well. The WaT's great success is the fun, write-what-you-want atmosphere.

Maybe a separate subpages initiative?

Aleta Curry 18:25, 4 July 2008 (CDT)

Edited to add: Actually, why don't I add this in to October's spring clean? The more options, the more likely people will find something they like doing. Aleta Curry 18:33, 4 July 2008 (CDT)

Yes, I like the general idea too. --Larry Sanger 07:24, 3 September 2008 (CDT)

• Could fall under the category of 'Attractions', and 'National Parks' also covers some of these too. Most countries also have at least one UNESCO Heritage Listed location--could well be worth a shot, as these locations would have a rich history as well as artistic/cultural significance. Louise Valmoria 20:16, 6 August 2008 (CDT)

Future Theme Schedule

• September - My Favorite Band! - Or your favourite Music Genre...your favourite orchestra...recording artist--their best song (I may shudder, but hey, it's up to you!) If it's musical, and it's your fave, write about it!
• October – Spring Cleaning (or “housekeeping”, for those of you for whom it’s not Spring) Let’s mass-attack some of our outstanding chores, particularly “lists”, such as: Common words with multiple uses (in need of disambiguation), e.g. as in CZ:List of words with multiple uses. * Further suggestion: Wanted pages * computer science biographies needed * Redirects * Write a subpage * Check Approved articles for completeness of subpages

(feel free to add in your own pet peeves)

• November - National Parks - most countries have them but Citizendium doesn't...yet.

UK, USA, AU, CA, NZ, FR

May I suggest a separate theme for each workgroup, and a campaign to obtain a commitment from each member of each workgroup to start a new article, however stubby, but thoughtfully and excellently stubby. A rhetorical question. Incidentally, CZ has no article on Rhetoric, a fascinating subject with roots in antiquity and above-ground branches and fruit in the 21st century. --Anthony.Sebastian 19:31, 19 August 2008 (CDT)

See also

• Larry Sanger, Why the Write-a-Thon worked, Citizendium Blog, August 9, 2007
• Weekly Wiki
• Article of the Week
• New Article of the Week

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