The Wikipedia article about DU is quite out of date, as it doesn’t reflect the advent of DU3. With this post I solicited Duers’ help in updating it, but only one person ventured into Wikipedia editing. Thanks to him or her, and to Fearless for providing the link that supported that addition.

Trying another approach: The one DUer who contributed there also edited the talk page to add a list of “Some topics to consider including”. It’s a good list. Anyone who wants to tackle one of these items can post a short explanation here, and I’ll incorporate it into the Wikipedia article. This is watered-down help in the sense that you don’t need to include the detailed instruction that you might provide in response to a member's request here for help. It’s just a summary for non-DUers who are curious about our little corner of the Internet.

Here’s the list:

Terms of Service / Community Standards
Self-moderation
* The Host (Including Forum v. Group Host differences)
* Jury Duty / The Jury Process
* The MIR Team
Descriptions of the Main Forums / Groups (including the concept of "Safe Haven Groups"
Return of the DUzy
Differences between DU2 and DU3 / The DU2-DU3 Changeover
Updated popularity statistics (for this item and the next you can see the current state of the article here)
General upgrades to current text quality (specifically on the repetitious Controversies section)
Screen Capture of the Main Page for photo

A bit of legalese for copyright purposes: If you post anything in this thread as a proposed contribution to Wikipedia, then, as per Wikipedia policy, you irrevocably agree to release your contribution under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 License License and the GNU Free Documentation License. You agree that a hyperlink or URL is sufficient attribution under the Creative Commons license. What all that means is that I can plug your words into Wikipedia and then other people can copy them elsewhere. I'll credit you by your DU screen name unless you tell me otherwise.

Thanks for any help you can give!

The Wikipedia article about DU is out of date in that it doesn't reflect the transition to DU3. (In fact, it's even out of date as to DU2 -- for example, it still lists the Top Ten Conservative Idiots as a current feature.) It needs the help of a few knowledgeable DUers.

Just so no one is worried about accidentally messing up the article while trying to improve it, I've created a temporary spinoff -- a copy of the article within my Wikipedia user page. People can work on that until there's general satisfaction with it, then our new text will become the article.

You can help by going to the spinoff at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:JamesMLane/Democratic_Underground. You click on "Edit this page" (that link is along the top and along the left and at the bottom because Wikipedia wants to make it easy for people to find it and improve articles). Make your changes, then click "Save page" under the edit window.

Some things to know:

* The talk page for the article (at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:JamesMLane/Democratic_Underground) can be used to raise questions about how to explain something, to discuss differences of opinion, etc. You can join an existing thread or start a new one with the "New section" link on the left. I've started with some comments about how we might organize the material.

* Be bold in editing pages! This is general Wikipedia policy. You don't need to use the talk page for every change. Go ahead and do what you think ought to be done. Someone who disagrees can undo your change and explain why on the talk page; then we'll all work it out.

* Don't worry about formatting. Basic wiki markup is: Two apostrophes before and after text italicizes it, three apostrophes before and after bolds it, two open brackets before and two close brackets after creates a wikilink to another article -- but I'll be checking the page to fix any formatting foulups, so just focus on the content.

* You don't need to make the article perfect; just make it better. Any edit that improves the article is a step forward, even if it leaves in place defects that you don't have the time or knowledge to fix.

* Registration is optional and free. You don't even have to provide an email address, but if you choose to, you won't be spammed. You can read more about registration at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Tutorial/Registration and, if you choose, register at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:UserLogin. An advantage of registration is that the page history shows the chosen screen name of the editor who made each edit. If you don't register, your IP address will be shown.

Collaborative editing is different from the individualism of DU, but I hope some folks will give it a try so that the article about DU isn't so badly out of date.