Mitaphane (/'mitəˌfen/) is the screenname for the wikipedian Shawn Conn. When he's not writing about himself in the 3rd person or adding hyperlinks to many things, he's usually writing, working, reading, playing video games, or following his next big interest in life. He mostly writes wikipedia articles (with some work on Wikiquote) about video games or computers due to his background in Computer Science and video games, but occasionally has other interests he contributes to.

I am generally against the use of labels when it comes to people and their beliefs. Not only does it frequently create misconceptions about others, it is also divisive. That is not to say labels are pointless; often it is important for groups of people to be "on the same page" so that a group can act in unison for the good of a particular purpose or cause. Case in point, a wikipedian should be a person committed to the causes of the Wikipedia. However, at all times, a person should never surrender their rational thought for the sake of inclusion within a group; it is important to stay vigilant against the blindness of dogmatism. For that reason, there aren't many beliefs I ascribe myself to. Although, there are some beliefs that describe me better than others.

• Politically: Pragmatic Libertarian
  Personally, I don't believe any political theory holds up to any stress test. There are too many different types of abilities, personalities, and creeds of people with countless many more scenarios in which people find themselves in to be described by some sort of elegant political theory. Any theory is bound to be short-sighted in that sense and any problems it solves are likely to cause some other problem (for better or worse depending on your perspective). My philosophy has a core belief that a individual should be free to do anything he wishes so far in that he doesn't violate others' ability to do the same. That said, I also recognize people, as social creatures, benefit much more working as a group rather than as individuals and that sometimes forcing people to follow some rules (with a preference for soft power over hard power when possible) benefits everyone, including the individual even if he swears otherwise. In an ideal world, I'd imagine a place in which people could opt in/out of laws where they could solely face the consequences of their choices. Unfortunately, such a place will never exist; the actions of one person doesn't just effect himself.
• Theologically: Strong Agnostic
  (Me < Universe < Beyond)
  There is absolutely no way me can fit into beyond. The human mind, or even all of humanity, with all its capacity and accomplishments, does not have the capacity to contain everything in the universe, and it certainly doesn't not have the capacity beyond that, or in other words God (who would have to stand outside the mechanics of the universe) if it exists. Saying that a person or humanity can understand something beyond the universe is naive. Religion says more about the thoughts, feelings, and beliefs of people than it does about the truth of the universe or what lies beyond. I know my limitations. Humanity should understand it's. Thinking critically, the absolute best thing I can say what I know about the universe or whatever else lies beyond that is this- nobody fucking knows.
• Wikipedia: There is much discussion about what the Wikipedia is and what is not. To me, Wikipedia is a perpetual body of work that sums up humanity's knowledge. While Wikipedia's body of knowledge is vast, it can by no means contain every thought or piece of information ever known. Articles are meant to give the reader general relevant information about the topic, a detailed synopsis. Unfortunately, to due to systemic bias, Wikipedia gets a little heavy on ludicrous popular culture information but that's a demographic problem, not a problem inherit to the concept of Wikipedia.
  
  With general guidelines, policies, practices, and enough dedicated people, an ordered process of creating very informative articles can take place.
  
  I think of it much like a massive journalistic research project. An encyclopedia, being a tertiary source, summarizes all the secondary sources it has. Without any sources, an article can only credibly, at best, give a definitions of a topic, which even that maybe called into question. This can tend to frustrate some editors who write stuff they know to be true. The problem is knowing something to be true doesn't prove to anyone it's true. The human mind doesn't have perfect recall. In absence of all the details about a topic, the mind will start filling in details with imagined, guessed, or fuzzy information. This is no fault of the author, is just a general limitation of the human mind.
  
  Combined with good policy, the mass torrent of information coming from many wikipedia can be culled down, verified, and provide a great amount of information from ! to 🀫

This user is a participant in WikiProject Video games.

This user is a member of the Video Games Reference library Project.

This user is a supporter of the Wikipedia Neutrality Project.

This user has a page on MediaWiki.

This user has a page on Wikibooks.

This user has a page at Wikiquote

This user has a page on Wiktionary.

• CVG Magazine project

		The Random Acts of Kindness Barnstar
		For the great job that you do at the help desk! -- Lost(talk) 03:14, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

This user is a Go player.

This user prefers Belgian beer.

This user enjoys computer and video game music outside gaming.

• Beer
• Critical Thinking
• Economics
• Video Game Music
• Writing

• Who is the Man With the Name that Rhymes?