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| | :Well, you can find out a '''lot''' of things, talk pages included, in the following links! | | :Well, you can find out a '''lot''' of things, talk pages included, in the following links! |
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| - | ===A Notice=== | + | == Welcome! == |
| - | On October 9, 2005, the Wiki user formerly known as '''notstrongorbad''' became '''AbdiViklas'''. I'd always kind of wished I had that name, since to the un-H*R-initiated it simply sounded like some foreign guy. Also it's better than my previous hurriedly-selected, defined-by-negation username. Though for the record, I'm still neither strong nor (relatively) bad. If you really want to see notstrongorbad's legacy, you can still see my contributions at [[Special:Contributions/notstrongorbad]], right back to Sept. 2004.
| + | Welcome to the '''Homestar Runner Wiki!''' I wanted to extend a personal welcome, since I believe strongly that a [[Wikipedia:Wiki|Wiki]] should be a democratic and non-threatening place where everyone feels like they can contribute. Unfortunately it can be very frustrating at first if you make changes that are ignored or changed back by other users, but if so I encourage you to hang in there; as you get a feel for the way things are done around here you'll feel more at home. That was my experience, anyway! |
| - | :'''Origin of the name''': If you're still wondering, it's a conflation of "Abdi LaRue" from [[some kinda robot]] and "Viklas" from [[little questions]]. The two appeared together in [[pom pom#Easter Eggs|pom pom]]. Abdi, according to [[The Brothers Chaps|TBC]], was one of "10 people who had ever e-mailed them"; in the [[flashback#Commentary Transcript|DVD Commentary to flashback]] they imply that he e-mailed them "a lot."
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| - | ==The Life and Times of AbdiViklas==
| + | If you need any help, feel free to ask anyone on the [[HRWiki:Welcoming committee#Members|welcoming committee]] (like [[User_talk:AbdiViklas|me]]!). You can also post questions on the [[HRWiki talk:FAQ|FAQ talk page]]. |
| - | Pardon me while I figure out what I'm doing. You see, I'm looking at this giant, blank text input field, wondering how exactly a user page should be done and what should go in it. The general trend seems to involve talking about:
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| - | #your relationship to [http://www.homestarrunner.com Homestar], i.e. faves and when you first started watching, | + | |
| - | #your involvement in the wiki, and
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| - | #optionally, yourself in real life.
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| - | Rebel that I am, I intend to proceed in ''reverse'' order!! Take that, James Dean!
| + | Here are some tips to get you started: |
| | + | * If you need general information, editing tips, or answers to frequently asked questions, check out the [[Help:Contents|help]] page. |
| | + | * Before you do any significant editing, be sure to familiarize yourself with our [[HRWiki:Standards|wiki standards]]. |
| | + | * Read up on the rules and guidelines for your [[HRWiki:User page|user page]]. What you're reading right now, by the way, is the "Talk:" page that goes with your user page. It's a good way to communicate directly with specific users. The best way to respond, though, is on the same user page where the conversation was started. E.g. if you have a question, go to my [[User_talk:AbdiViklas|user talk page]] and edit it, then watch my page (via [[Special:Recentchanges|Recent changes]]) for a response. |
| | + | * If you're not sure what you can do to help out, head over to [[HRWiki:The Stick|The Stick]]. |
| | + | * If you're looking for more community interaction, you can also register over at our [http://forum.hrwiki.org forum] and get More Community Interaction Than You Or Your Grandmother Can Handle! |
| | + | * Above all, '''be bold''' and have fun! |
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| - | ==Behind the Handle: An Investigative Documentary==
| + | Feel free to delete this message when you're done reading it. (In general, it's frowned on to delete other people's input on talk pages, but this entry is just here to be helpful. When it's done being helpful, I guarantee you won't hurt my feelings by ditching it!) |
| - | I know the simple data of a person's age and occupation don't define him or her--but they're a convenient place to start. I'm 25, and pretty much everything in my world rotates around the violin.<br>
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| - | I went to the [http://www.rochester.edu/Eastman Eastman School of Music] in Rochester, NY, for four years--which is a bundle of stories, let me tell you. A ca. 800-student school has its own unique trials and joys. I came out with some very close friends, some unfriends who were always a little too close, and a largely unnecessary understanding of hexachordal combinatoriality. I wouldn't trade it for the world.<br>
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| - | After graduating in 2003, I started teaching violin lessons, and built up a studio of 24 students, which actually was pretty good $$ for a single person, and I was absolutely loving it. I realized, though, that while it paid my rent, it wasn't something that some middle-aged dad could support a family on, and anything that ''was'' probably required a master's. Since, aside from the $$, I would be happy teaching private lessons for the rest of my life, the obvious choice was the 12-month music ed degree at [http://www.unc.edu UNC], right next door to me. (I know, a public school teacher is hardly the best solution to financial ambition, but if you tell me, as I have in fact been told, that I can "do better than teach high school," or in any other way imply that teaching is anything less than the most noble and worthwhile calling known to man, I will not be responsible for any fisticuffs or impromptu [http://www.taylormali.com/index.cfm?webid=13 poetry slams] that may occur.) At the moment my time is divided between UNC classes, observing and student teaching in local schools, teaching the 12 private students I've kept, and wasting time here. Sleep has been known to occasionally enter into my plans.<br>
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| - | As a musician, I'm of course passionate about music. My tastes date from different periods of my life; only recently have I entered the quasi-hip, [http://www.pitchforkmedia.com Pitchfork]-informed neoindie aesthetic of the Postal Service and Sufjan Stevens; passions dating from high school include the chamber music of Brahms and Shostakovich and an abiding enthusiasm for [http://www.afrocelts.org/ world music] and [http://www.imota.net/ ethnomusicology]; in college I picked up a perverse liking for the minimalism of [http://www.stevereich.com/ Steve Reich], and for [http://www.barockorchester.de/englisch/e_orchest.htm hardcore Baroque performance practice], "the last avant-garde." But for all that, I'm not above top-40, especially with the windows down.<br>
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| - | While on the topic of interests that verge on obsessions: I am a hard, hard, hardcore fan of the fiction of [http://www.chesterton.org/ G.K. Chesterton]. (My guitar-playing brother and I even named ourselves [http://www.whowasthursday.com Who Was Thursday] after his [http://www.dur.ac.uk/martin.ward/gkc/books/thursday.txt best-known novel].) This has several perks: 1) I get to be wildly enthusastic about something almost unheard of, and give myself a pat on the shoulder for "eclecticism," but 2) I don't have to suffer through something appropriately obscure to do so; it's FUN!! I tried the same trick in high school with William Blake, but couldn't sustain my interest. Chesterton--man, I can't think of a ''thing'' he's written that isn't fun!
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| - | ==Homstar Runner: A History of an Addiction==
| + | Sincerely,<br> |
| - | | + | [[User:AbdiViklas|AbdiViklas]] and [[HRWiki:Welcoming committee#Members|the rest of the welcoming committee]] (18:49, 29 October 2005 (UTC)) |
| - | My first introduction to Homestar was in 2003, when I happened to look over my brother's shoulder as he worked his way up the [[Compy 386]] menu (I believe the exact one that was playing was [[current status]].) Realizing, of course, that this was serious, I intended to do it right, and went straight to [[First Time Here?]], after which I proceeded to start with [[some kinda robot]] and work my way ''straight'' up.
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| - | ==HRWiki: Another History of Another Addiction==
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| - | Finally, the moment of critical mass had arrived: I had seen ''everything'' on the site. Hoping to find something, anything, related, I Googled Homestar and found this wiki. My first response, of course, was, "Those emails had Easter eggs?!!!" which provided several more hours of entertainment.<br>
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| - | Thus began an era of brief but intense involvement in HRWiki. Or more specifically in the forum; while I adored and depended on the professionalism and thoroughness of the Wiki proper, I didn't feel qualified to actually work on it myself. From September 15 to Halloween of 2004, though, I was on the forum pretty much when I wasn't sleeping or playing for a show. When I started looking for a computer during intermission of that show, I knew I needed help. Seriously, what with school pressures, it was time to cut back, and I simply went cold turkey. (This might explain my sig there still having the, at the time, current "Side effects may include wine, women, and song!")<br>
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| - | I still used the Wiki every time a new 'toon came out, but the magic of watching those articles take shape right before one's eyes is too great to witness impassively, and the past few times I've gotten involved myself. I figure if I'm always leaving it to the people who know what they're doing, I'll never be one. Accordingly, I'm busy making well-meaning but frequently embarrassing edits that sometimes actually do a little good. Once I even reverted a troll!<br>
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| - | I don't aspire to become one of the prolific, untiring users who, day by day, make the Wiki the excellent resource and remarkably civil place it is; I really ''oughtn't'' to be spending more than about a day per week here, but I do intend to step up my level of involvement; if I'm going to partake of the benefits of the Wiki, it's my civic duty to contribute to its upkeep as well. I must say I've been encouraged by the responses that met my first efforts: pros like [[User:It's dot com|It's dot com]] and [[User:Some HSR themed username|Some HSR themed username]] gently corrected my blunders, and I was so warmly welcomed by so many users who insisted on a user page that... well, the epic you've just read was written.
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| - | ==The End.==
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This is my talk. You can say random things here!
Feel free to delete this message when you're done reading it. (In general, it's frowned on to delete other people's input on talk pages, but this entry is just here to be helpful. When it's done being helpful, I guarantee you won't hurt my feelings by ditching it!)
