Welcome to Wikipedia Remember the five pillars of Wikipedia Wikipedia is an encyclopedia incorporating elements of general and specialized encyclopedias almanacs and gazetteers All articles must strive for verifiable accuracy unreferenced material may be removed so please provide references Wikipedia is not the place to insert personal opinions experiences or arguments Original ideas interpretations or research can not be verified and are thus inappropriate Wikipedia is not a soapbox an advertising platform a vanity press an experiment in anarchy or democracy an indiscriminate collection of information or a web directory It is not a newspaper or a collection of source documents these kinds of content should be contributed to the Wikimedia sister projects Wikipedia has a neutral point of view which means we strive for articles that advocate no single point of view Sometimes this requires representing multiple points of view presenting each point of view accurately providing context for any given point of view and presenting no one point of view as the truth or the best view It means citing verifiable authoritative sources whenever possible especially on controversial topics When a conflict arises regarding neutrality declare a cool down period and tag the article as disputed hammer out details on the talk page and follow dispute resolution Wikipedia is free content that anyone may edit All of Wikipedia s text is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution Sharealike 3 0 Unported License CC BY SA much of it is also licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License GFDL It may be distributed or linked accordingly Recognize that articles can be changed by anyone and no individual exclusively controls any specific article therefore any writing you contribute can be mercilessly edited and redistributed at will by the community Do not infringe on copyright or submit work licensed in a way incompatible with Wikipedia s licensing Wikipedia has a code of conduct Respect your fellow Wikipedians even when you may not agree with them Be civil Avoid conflicts of interest personal attacks and sweeping generalizations Find consensus avoid edit wars follow the three revert rule and remember that there are articles on the English Wikipedia to work on and discuss Act in good faith never disrupt Wikipedia to illustrate a point and assume good faith on the part of others Be open and welcoming Wikipedia does not have firm rules besides the five general principles presented here Be bold in editing moving and modifying articles Although it should be the aim perfection is not required Do not worry about making mistakes In most cases all prior versions of articles are kept so there is no way that you can accidentally damage Wikipedia or irretrievably destroy content Sincerely