Hi, Tdubell. This is NOT some automated message...it's from a real person. You can talk to me right now. Welcome to Wikipedia! I noticed you've just joined, and wanted to give you a few tips to get you started. If you have any questions, please talk to us. The tips below should help you to get started. Best of luck!  Chzz   ►  21:10, 21 September 2010 (UTC) reply

You don't need to read anything - anybody can edit; just go to an article and edit it. Be Bold, but please don't put silly stuff in - it will be removed very quickly, and will annoy people. Ask for help. Talk to us live, or edit this page, put {{helpme}} and describe what help you need. Someone will reply very quickly - usually within a few minutes. Play in your user area. For example, create User:Tdubell/test. Edit existing articles, before you make your own. Look at some subjects that you know about, and see if you can make them a bit better. For example, Wikipedia:Cleanup#2009. When you're ready, read about Your first article. It should be about something well-known, and it will need references. Good luck with editing; please drop me a line some time on my own talk page. There's lots of information below. Once again, welcome to the fantastic world of Wikipedia! --  Chzz   ►  21:10, 21 September 2010 (UTC) reply Getting started A tutorial • Our five pillars • Getting mentored How to: edit a page • upload and use images Frequently asked questions • Tips Where to ask questions or make comments Request administrator attention Policies and guidelines Neutral point of view • No original research Verifiability • Grade sources • Cite sources What Wikipedia is not • Biographies of living persons External links • Spam • Vandalism Deletion policy • Conflict of interest • Notability The community Signpost • IRC channels • Mailing lists • Best articles Build consensus • Resolve disputes Assume good faith • Civility • Etiquette No personal attacks • No legal threats Writing articles Be bold in editing • Develop an article The perfect article • Manual of style Pages needing attention • Peer review The missing manual

The graph says it all, really; massive increase since we cleared the backlog and introduced a bit better system. As I've said before, it is a 'victim of its own success', I think. Currently, it is pretty backlogged.

Quite a few get missed, as you can see if you flick through the archives - but I don't know what we can do about that, really, other than hope more people give feedback.

The long-term solution would be to keep these editors; so many come to just create one article, and are never heard of again; if just a few of those stayed, and started giving feedback, then we'd have a more workable system.

I suggest discussion in this WT:FEED section. Cheers!

(I've send this message out to a small number of people that I think/hope will be interested; people who have given feedback, etc. if wrong, apologies, let me know.)

 Chzz   ►  00:05, 26 September 2010 (UTC) reply