Template talk:User Cdn Armed Forces

message: Reverted userbox to original wording as it was changed without any prior discussion and certainly no consensus.  Moreover, once the edit was done and was reverted by the original creator with an acceptable reason, it was reverted again to its modified state without discussion.   Unless there is a consensus to change, it should stay as it originally was. 
THe userbox is for people who supports the Canadian Armed Forces, not people who want to make pages on wiki about it.  it totally changed the meaning of the userbox.  (Lostkiwi 01:45, 4 August 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks for your numerous edits to the 'pedia.  They are appreciated.  Regarding the User Cdn Armed Forces template, I'd like to tell you a bit about the history of the User templates.  The first User templates were the so-called Babel boxes, templates that created groups of users who knew various languages, both so they could communicate between themselves, and so others could identify them and contact them about the languages they knew.  This was directly in service to contributing to articles - verifying interwiki links, translating articles, and other tasks like that.  People liked the form of the boxes, and gradually expanded their use, first to musical instruments, then to the vast panoply of boxes we have today.  Over time, the original focus of the boxes on identifying groups of users who had skills and abilities they wanted to use to contribute to the 'pedia was lost, and it came to be believed that the boxes merely expressed personal statements, not necessarily related to the 'pedia at all.  However, the technical ability of the standardized, templatized boxes to identify and group users remained present, and potent.  Unlike direct text, individually written by each user to express whatever personal statements they wish to express, User templates provide an automatic list of their users (via the Whatlinkshere feature).  They have been used to contact only the members of the implied group, both as assumed allies, and as a hit list of intended victims to be harassed.  As long as the boxes remained focused on the 'pedia, this, while sometimes unfortunate, still on the whole benefited the 'pedia, and only opened up the users to risks they intended to run.  But the use of the User templates for purposes unrelated to contributing to the encyclopedia means that the group-forming possibilities of the boxes are and can be used for purposes utterly separate, and even opposed to the goal of contributing to the encyclopedia we are all trying to write here.
That's why I proposed the changed wording that I did; a group of Users who want to work on our coverage of the Canadian Armed Forces is a good and useful thing, and something that the group-forming abilities of User templates can assist with.  A  group of users who merely appreciate the Canadian Armed Forces, but who may or may not make use of that appreciation in connection with the 'pedia is harmed by the group-forming abilities of User templates.
I look forward to your response, either here, on my talk page, or on the talk page of the template itself.  If I do not get a response within a week of posting this message, I will assume you accept the proposed wording change, and I will reapply it.  Feel free to revert it again if I do, but I urge you to respond to this message as well.  Thanks again for your work on the 'pedia! JesseW, the juggling janitor 18:56, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

message: I have changed the text to reflect the official name of the Canadian military.
--Ng.j (talk) 07:43, 22 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Canadian Forces]]