User:Asilvering/Getting into it

preamble

Common misconceptions

• the reasons you have put off joining and why they are stupid

First steps

1. Make an account. Do this right now. Stop hesitating. There are things on Wikipedia that run on timers - some technical, some social - and you should start running those timers ASAP. Some people are here to wreck the place. In various ways, this helps signal that you are not one of them.
   1. Don't pick a stupid name. Your username is how people will refer to you. If it is long, people will shorten it. Make sure your name has at least one of these options open that you do not hate: an acronym of the first letters of each word in the name; the name in its entirety; the first syllable of the name; the first word of the name.
   2. If you find a name you love, which was taken by someone years and years ago who made no or virtually no edits, you may later be able to "usurp" their name, but don't count on it. You can change your name later if you need to, but it's an annoying process, and other people will always be able to figure out what your name was before.
   3. For the love of God, do not use your government name.
2. Figure out what kind of newbie you are. Wikipedia is huge and it's hard to figure out what to do at the beginning. It is useless to ask the people who have been here for a long time for help on this, since we all have a to-do list the length of our arm and can no longer remember the feeling of having nothing to do. Are you the kind of person who needs to go read all the manuals? Are you the kind of person who wants to read a lot of backroom conversations to learn The Culture? Are you the kind of person who immediately wants to Write Something? Are you the kind of person who wants a grunt job to do? etc. Probably, you don't know yet. Wander around the site clicking buttons you haven't clicked before and seeing where you get and if anything catches your interest.
   1. If you just created an account because I told you to do that ASAP, and you don't actually want to start doing the Wikipedia thing right now, this is actually ideal. You have lots of time to idly work your way up to whatever you ultimately decide to start doing. The next time you're bored on the internet, just start wandering around the backrooms on Wikipedia.
   2. If you wander into a part of the backrooms that starts making you feel pessimistic or jaded, leave!! I promise you that, whatever you found, it is not a normal part of the editing experience. Don't let disputes you weren't even part of steal your motivation.
   3. Exception to the above: if what you spotted was an admin acting badly in, say, the past two weeks or so, please tell me (privately). We can't fix this unless we know it's happening.