So the Havalais article as posted started off like this:
"Some have suggested that the very common practice of beginning a communication theory class with an attempt to define communication and theory is a flawed pedagogy. Nonetheless, it is difficult to begin a study of the theories of communication without first having some grasp, however temporary and tenuous, of what sorts of phenomena "count" as communication, and what kinds of ideas about those phenomena constitute "theory" or, more specifically, good theory."
(From http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Theories_of_communication&oldid=5…)
As I rather suspected, far from encyclopedic style. In fact the epitome of pompous academic wind-up (as in 'listen to 15 minutes of this and then I might tell you something').
Charles
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"Gregory Maxwell" wrote
> It's sometimes hard to convince someone that we're not trying to be
> mean when we tell them they must cite sources because when the look
> around Wikipedia they find homogeneous swaths of it uncited or poorly
> cited.
>
> We have parallel problems with copyright violations and other areas
> where the active community has thoroughly agreed that Wikipedia should
> do X while most of Wikipedia still does Y.
Not a great comparison. Copyvio strikes at the legal viability of the whole project. Referencing - well, read Kenneth Clark's book on Gothic Architecture where he talks about writing as if the Ph.D. examiners were looking over his shoulder. We are not good in getting this in proportion.
Charles
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At 06:17 PM 10/28/2006, Sam Korn wrote:
>1. We are getting more rigid about demanding sources/citations for new
>material. This is necessary. I expect most academics who contribute,
>being used to being judged by their qualifications/reputation, will
>not cite and reference their work in the way Wikipedia demands.
Giving references is the one thing about writing an encyclopedia
article that academics are used to.
Chris
What's the best procedure to follow when encountering an article like
[[Bugaboo Spire]]? It doesn't seem to be copied copyrighted material,
but more likely original research, and at the very least a how-to
guide[1] for climbing certain mountains. Simply chopping the material
in question out seems a little brutal.
[1] cf. [[WP:NOT]]
--
Earle Martin
http://downlode.org/http://purl.org/net/earlemartin/
G'day* folks,
SDA India reports
Microsoft, Yahoo!, Google, and eBay took the top positions, however relative
newcomers Wikipedia and YouTube are making a rapid climb up the World Wide
Web (WWW), as per the monthly Internet snapshot, released by Comscore.
Wikipedia had 154 million visitors in September, while YouTube came in
number 14 with 81 million visitors.
http://www.sda-india.com/sda_india/psecom,id,102,site_layout,sdaindia,news,…
More in story.
(Hmmm. If Youtube was worth 1.6 billion, and we have nearly twice as many
visitors how much would we be worth but I digress)
Amazon had 133 million while Fox Interactive Media (presumably mostly
Myspace) had 118 and Ask 112 million.
Regards to all.
Keith Old
* Shamelessly stolen from Mark Gallagher. I hope it wasn't copyrighted
Phil Sandifer wrote
> Unfortunately, the Chronicle article goes on to state that the
> Halavais added, as an anon, an article on communication theory within
> his area of expertise, and it was swiftly gutted.
>
> Sadly, that article isn't mentioned, making it harder to identify
> what went wrong there. But we ought take caution, once again, about
> [[WP:BITE]] - the anecdote of "I corrected this information but it
> got changed back to wrong" or "I contributed an article on topic X
> that I'm a clear expert on but it got gutted" is getting too common.
Quoting the piece:
'Shortly after Mr. Halavais's career as a troll ended, the professor this time posting anonymously contributed another article to Wikipedia, a piece on theories of communication, his area of expertise.
"It got shut down pretty quick, and I think there's just a small piece of it left online," he says. "Some other professors I talked to said the same thing happened to them: They were experts in their fields, they wrote something well in their area of expertise, and it got cut up." '
Let's bear in mind that the piece has no clear idea of the difference between a troll and a vandal. The original prank edits were made all of two years ago (2004). This may relate also to 2004, therefore. We can't trust the article to know the difference between anonymous and pseudonymous edits. Under current conditions an anon cannot start such an article.
We also cannot trust the article to know the difference between a serious copy edit and the removal of trustworthy stuff. There may have been existing coverage: many new articles end up redirected or merged. We cannot know whether it was written in encyclopedic style, or was a personal essay/lecture notes style of submission.
In short, besides this being anecdotal and time-expired data, the source seems iffy and the report scanty.
Charles
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Forwarding to list on request of Fred Bauder.
Hi Fred,
Thanks for the response.
I would be grateful if you could please clarify the last two sentences
since I am not sure if I am reading them right.
Are you saying that Wikipedia is poorly equipped to deal with a hate
group against a small cult without "unequivocal reliable sources"? What
is impossible with a major world religion? That Wikipedia is impossibly
poorly equipped to deal with a hate group or any hate group would find
it impossible to abuse Wikipedia?
What would qualify as "unequivocal reliable sources"?
Thanks & regards,
bksimonb
-------- Original Message --------
Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Libel of organisations or just individuals
Date: Sat, 28 Oct 2006 07:32:01 -0600
From: Fred Bauder <fredbaud(a)ctelco.net>
To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l(a)Wikipedia.org>
CC: Fred Bauder <fredbaud(a)ctelco.net>, Simon Blandford <simon(a)bkinfo.net>
References: <45434B0E.9060709(a)bkinfo.net>
On Oct 28, 2006, at 6:20 AM, Simon Blandford wrote:
> I'm a little unclear on this from reading Wikipedia's policy on libel.
>
> It seems concerned only with libel of individuals. What is the policy
> with regards to organisations? In the UK the libel laws cover
> organisations as well as individuals.
>
> For example, what happens if an article is being used as a front for a
> religious hate group? Would whether the "religion" was mainstream or
> quite small make any difference?
>
> Thanks,
> bksimonb
A policy is being developed at Wikipedia:Articles about ongoing
enterprises
We are against libel regardless of who it is directed at. As to
religious hate groups, I would say we are poorly equipped to say that
is the case without unequivocal reliable sources even in the case of
a small weak cult. With respect to a major world religion, it is
impossible.
Please forward this to the list wikien-l(a)Wikipedia.org as otherwise
they will not receive it.
Fred
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G'day folks,
Government Computing News reports on a story of how an assistant professor
posted incorrect information on Wikipedia to see how long it would take to
get picked up. It is reported in The Chronicle of Higher Education. All the
fabrications were picked up within three hours.
http://www.gcn.com/blogs/tech/42433.html
This week, *The Chronicle of Higher Education* reported on how an assistant
professor<http://chronicle.com/temp/reprint.php?%20id=z6xht2rj60kqmsl8tlq5ltqcshc5y93y>deliberately
posted a number of errors in Wikipedia in order to see how long
it would take for them to be noticed.
<snip>
"The fibs that professor Alexander Halavais slipped in were deviously
subtle: that abolitionist Frederick Douglass, lived in Syracuse, N.Y. for
four years, and that the Disney film *The Rescuers Down Under* won an Oscar
for film editing. Both are false, but would you have doubted these
"factoids"?
Halavais hypothesized that the obscure errors would "languish online for
some time," the *Chronicle* reported. Instead the Wikipedia volunteers
eliminated all the fabrications within three hours of being posted. And the
volunteer checkers even admonished Halavais for making stuff up. We've
written about both the potential
power<http://www.gcn.com/print/25_25/41673-1.html?topic=technology_products%20wik…>of
and the uncertainties
surrounding <http://www.gcn.com/blogs/temin/41869.html> group-led network
projects before, but this Halavais' little experiment certainly does bode
well for the form."
Well done to those involved in correcting this misinformation.
Regards to all.
Keith Old
So our "living persons" banner contains the following text:
"This article is about or directly concerns one or more living people
and therefore must adhere to the biographies of living persons policy.
Specifically, unsourced or poorly sourced negative material about
living persons should not be posted to this article *or its talk
page(s)*. Such material must be removed without hesitation. "
(emphasis in original)
I'm particularly concerned about the "or its talk page" bit. Is
someone just confused, or should we actually *not* move material from
the talk page like this:
I have removed the following text because it sounds defamatory and
probably isn't true: "John B Smith was busted twice for frequenting
prostitutes in the 1970s". Anyone have a source?
How can we realistically work with potentially defamatory statements -
eg, requesting sources for them - if we can't even repeat them on talk
pages?
Steve